Roses and Flames

Chapter 31

Doctor Hastings. Whoever it was did not think that the incessant knocking on his door would be enough. A ray of light from the whole struck Patrick, rousing him half way from his sleep, and the sound of his name did the rest. But he could not seem to bring himself to wakefulness completely. For a moment, he was back aboard the ship and it was some keeping boy for him. Only an emergency brought visit at this hour.

“Ehh?”

Not a cabin boy this time. Tom the footman, who looked just as uncomfortable about waking him as he had in delivering Ambrose’s letter, but this time he stood his ground without shifting and almost quivered with the need to act quickly.

“Ambrosia?” Patrick was fully awake now. A day had passed, there had been no response to his offers in the carriage. But if she had decided to accept him, the hour did not matter.

“No, Sir. It is the Duke. He wishes to see you immediately.”

“Tell him to go to the devil. Perhaps that you could not read the hands of the clock.” But the last thing Patrick needed, at this hour, was another strange conversation with his new brother. Whatever it is, it can wait until morning.

“That would not be wise, Mr Hastings. Doctor Hastings,” Tom corrected. “He said it was a professional matter and of some importance. He called me into his room, but would not allow me to enter. He said I must wake but you and that I must bring you immediately.” As much as he might wish to, there was no way to avoid the call, if it was truly a medical matter. He was bound by oath to give help to this man.

“If this is but a bit of sleeplessness caused by overindulgence, I cannot be happy about it.” But what right did you have to take it out on a scared rabbit of a foot man? Tom had even less choice when he faced with such summons. “He seemed most distressed,” Tom said weakly. “Please Sir.”

“Give me a moment, then, to gather my bag and pull on some clothes. And leave the candle.”

“Yes, doctor.” The footman put his candle-stand on the table and closed the door again. Patrick put on breaches and drag the coat over his night shirt and pulled on some boots. If it truly was an emergency he could not read time for more. Then he blew out the light and fumble his way out to the hole and the waiting servant.

Tom let him down do the street and the Thorne carriage, helping to a seat.

“Is the Duke visiting, then?”

“Yes, Sir. He came to dinner, but could not finish it. He did not feel well enough to return him. We put him in the blue room.” Tom closed the door and hopped on the back as the driver set off at a smart pace for Ambrosia’s home. When they arrived, Patrick was taken to the back entrance and through the kitchen, so that is arrival would disturb as little of the household as possible. Once on the servant steps, he needed no guidance to find the guest suit. Things had not changed here since he was a boy.

He rapped once, quietly on the door of the Duke’s room and waited, listening. “Enter,” the voice that answered rasped, but whether it was from illness or an effort to keep quiet, Patrick was not so sure. He pushed to the unlocked door, holding his candle above his head to cast light on the patient. The Duke was sitting on the edge of his bed, his legs dangling and head hung as though it was almost an great effort to hold it on his shoulders.

“I’m sorry to wake you. Or something is very wrong with me,” he croaked.

The symptoms developing were so obvious that Patrick would guess the disease without stepping into the room. If the diagnosis he suspected was accurate then the situation was likely to guess get worse even before it got better.

“You were right to call me and not to alarm the house. May I have your permission to examine you your grace?”

 The Duke gave a shallow laugh. “At your service, doctor.”

 Patrick later the other candles in the room and stored the fire, for the Duke shivered, even though the room was warm. Then he said the candle he had brought in the holder on the bedside table and lead a Duke across the Duke’s forehead. Feverish. And how long they had this been coming? He had been in high color almost two days ago, after the ball. Had his hand being warm that day, when it had touched him? Probably not, for Patrick had noticed nothing at their dinner previous evening.

He pulled the little tube from his back and explained, “this is a recent invention. It will used to listen to your heart and lungs.”

“Dead handy thing,” the Duke said, showing weak interest. “It is good to know that you are an innovator.” Patrick pulled the deuce nightshirt aside and listened. His heart seemed rather fast however the lungs were not congested. The temple was probably due to nerves. But the swellings at the jawline by plainly beginning. The Dukes normally handsome face look like a squirrel in full with notepad cheeks. Patrick ran a practiced hand over the Duke glance and felt him flinch.

“Tender?” He asked. “From here, towards the ears?”

“Yes.” The response could not disguise the pain. “How about your belly?” Patrick gave some few quick pokes and prods in the area by the pancreas and saw that the Duke flinched again. The infection was taking to his organs? This was not good. Not good at all. He raised the hem of the night shirt and looked lower.

“Pain in the testes?”

“Some,” the duke spoke and Patrick did not know how to explain this, so that the man was not overly alarmed for. Patrick gave his most sage and calming nod. The Duke looked at him as many patients did, as though hoping they would be told that it was nothing, and he should stop being a ninny and go back to bed for you know what it is? And so did he, most likely. He may only wish for a different answer.

“A contagious inflammation of glands, normally found in children. More serious in adults, however. Particularly in men.” But the Duke was likely to know that, soon enough.

“Fatal?” The Duke asked, after slight hesitation.

“Hardly,” Patrick said with what he hoped was a reassuring smile. “Uncomfortable, of course. We must keep you isolated, both for your own sake and to keep you from transmitting the disease to others who stop I cannot.”

“The Parliament…” the Duke made to rise from the bed. Patrick put a firm hand on the middle of his chest and pushed him back. “It will be beyond you for some weeks.”

“Ambrosia…” The duke said as though remembering he must also be concerned for her. She would never have been second in her mind, had that you truly loved her.

“She had already had this disease. In childhood, when it was less severe. Patrick would remember it distinctly, for he had been sick at the same time. Since she is immune, she will be able to visit you, if you wish it. But others had best keep their distance.”

“I notice you’re not afraid for your health.”

“A physician is hardly useful common fears the disease he treats.” Patrick said. “And I have a particularly strong constitution.”

“You must get it from your mother then,” the Duke said, with another groan. “Our father was taken with all manners of illnesses. And now, look at me.”

“One disease is hardly a sign of the bad constitution,” Patrick reminded him, “and this is a common one. I’m surprised you have not had it before.”

“You would know better than I,” the Duke said. “All I was sure about that is that I needed a doctor.” He looked hopefully at Patrick. “I know you have refused my offers a place in my household. But you to be willing to treat now?”

“Of course,” Patrick said, surprised that even the question would arise. “You are in need of me.”

“So it is a position I offered that you disliked and not me specifically,” the Duke said, that his eyes narrowing in his face. “I had begun to suspect it otherwise.”

“My feelings and the reasons behind them nodded off important importance at the moment,” Patrick said briskly, fumbling in his bag to be sure that he was well stocked in the necessary medications. “Do not trouble yourself about them. To me, you are no different than any other patient.” He removed the tincture of opium and belladonna and then set them on the table. “Right now, we must work to get you well and prevent the spread to disease to others in the household. Might you have any idea where you acquired the malady? How long have you been feeling poorly?”

“Several days, at least,” the Duke muttered. “And I did visit the sick ward in the foundling hospital where I am patron. Some of the children there were ill.”

 Patrick all but snorted in disgust. If he had been called out of bed to treat any other do, he would have found that the man had lain with a poxy w***e, or was troubled by gout. At the scene had got mumps from caring for orphaned children. It seemed that Patrick would have no scrap of moral superiority even in the privacy of his own mind. He took care not to be sarcastic when he answered.

“That is the likely source will stop I can use the day to get the duration of the contagion. With luck, most of this household has already suffered through this. But to be safe, we will empty this floor and keep the visits from the servants to the bare minimum.”

The Duke judged his own cheek, feeling the lumps on either side. “I would just as soon as the out of sight, so as not to cause any alarm.”

 Patrick searched the swollen face for any sign of vanity, then concluded that the truth was no different from the words. The man did not want to cause first or bother infecting others or frightening the males please drive humble as well as charitable. The deal was definitely infinitely tedious in his word.

“Think of it as less as an absence of order and more as a quarantine,” Patrick said firmly, reaching for the glass at bedside and measuring drops of medicine from the two bottles into water. “When Lord Thorne awakes I shall have him informed the rest of the house. And I will give you an opiate to help you sleep. I am sorry to say that the discomfort is likely to increase before it abates. But the belladonna should help with that. Meals for the next few days will be soft and rather bland.”

 The Duke sighed. “The way I feel, I do not think I will care to eat them, so it will suit me well.”

 He took the cup and drained it in one gulp and settled back into the pillow. “Send my apologies to Ambrosia and to Lord Thorne for the inconvenience.”

As if Thorne would care, as long as the Duke was alive.