Chapter Twenty-Three
It was too dark to continue so she went to get some food. Ann was in a worse mood than usual. As Linnet had expected, Lady Margaret had particular needs.
‘Cook her own food she could, if she needs it done special,’ Ann hissed as she basted a chicken.
Isabelle was back in her corner, slumped over. Linnet went to look at her. The child was breathing very shallowly now and cold to the touch. She shook her but she didn’t rouse at all.
‘Isabelle!’ she shouted at her, trying to wake her but there was no change. She’d been so full of life trying to save the duck just a few hours earlier. This couldn’t be right.
Ann looked over, disturbed by Linnet’s noise, and looked alarmed.
‘That’s not right – did you get the monks to give her the dose?’
‘Yes, they made it up for her earlier – Luke did.’ Linnet was lifting up the little girl who was dangling, heavy and inert in her arms. She needed to get her help.
Running out into the courtyard, she saw the Prior who looked at her with concern.
‘What’s the matter with the child?’
‘She was sick, Father. Brother Luke gave her something but now I can’t rouse her and I’m—’
He reached over roughly and took the child from her as lightly as a bundle of cloth and was running to the Infirmary.
Pol arrived, swooping down and chattering and cawing loudly but the Prior batted him away and kept running.
Linnet followed him as he shouted for Godfreyd who appeared minutes later.
‘What did you give the girl? What ails her now?’
Godfreyd bent over her – the Prior had laid her on a bed – and listened to her breathing, then shouted for Luke. Linnet thought the girl’s breaths were coming further and further apart, and more and more shallowly.
‘Don’t wait for Luke,’ she pleaded, ‘she’s stopping breathing, I’m sure of it.’
Godfreyd shot her a quick look, hard to read, and then reached into his bottles for something and forced a spoon of liquid into the girl’s mouth. They all watched her and Linnet jumped when Isabelle sat half up, retching and spitting and vomiting a thin, pale liquid.
Godfreyd took a careful step back but made soothing noises, one eye on the Prior who was tenderly wiping Isabelle’s mouth and eyes as she came to.
Luke had arrived by now, looking bewildered and afraid.
‘What did you give her?’ the Prior demanded.
‘The… the dose Brother Godfreyd told me to make up, from his leech book,’ Luke stammered – pointing across to the book on the table.
Godfreyd opened it to the page and looked carefully at the receipt. ‘And you made it up as it was stated here?’
‘Yes, I promise I did, I didn’t mean the bairn any harm.’ He looked terrified.
Godfreyd looked closer at the page, then smiled, and turned to the Prior. ‘I see what has happened, Father, the receipt calls for one spoon of poppy elixir, but here – see?’
He pointed to a word and the Prior’s already troubled face darkened further. ‘There are marks for four spoons, aren’t there, Godfreyd? Was this an error on your part?’
Godfreyd looked up and straight at Linnet. ‘No, this was scribed for me. This scribe here. She must have made the error. Almost enough to kill the poor bairn.’
The Prior swung round to Linnet, fury evident in his low, controlled voice as he said, ‘Carelessness, Linnet? A slip that nearly cost Isabelle here her life? I thought you were a good scribe.’
She tried to get a look at the page but Godfreyd had shut the book already. She didn’t think she’d make that kind of error, but what if she had? What if she had injured Isabelle – or worse, what if the child had died?
She couldn’t find words to speak as the Prior continued to glare at her. The silence was broken by coughing. Isabelle looked confused and only half awake still. There was a timid knock on the door and Ann was there.
‘May I take the bairn, Prior? She needs a clear up and a look after, don’t she?’
The Prior handed her over carefully, wiping the last of the spittle from the child’s mouth carefully with a corner of his habit, his concern for her overcoming his usual fastidiousness, then held Ann’s shoulder before the woman could turn away.
‘Mind she gets good food and drink now – and keep her near the fire – until she’s quite well.’
Ann nodded. Linnet could see she was shaken by the events of the evening too.
The Prior swung round to Linnet and said, almost in passing as he left the room, ‘A bad scribe is no scribe I want in my Priory. You can finish the paintings but that will be all.’
Luke left straight after him, not looking at Linnet who was still standing there, aghast at what had happened.
Godfreyd gave her an amused smile, and it dawned on her what had happened.
It wasn’t her who had made the error, he’d deliberately changed the receipt.
She made a lunge for the leech book and managed to get it open on the page before he tore it back from her.
Not before she saw that the number had been changed, written over in a different ink.
‘But, you could have killed the child?’
He shrugged. ‘She’s not my concern. I had a remedy to hand in any case, I thought you’d probably notice her fading. But bringing the Prior in too, that saved me time.’
Linnet felt as if the breath had been knocked out of her.
The Prior had no trust in her now and she would have to leave when the illustrations were done.
She could show him it was in Godfreyd’s hand but he probably wouldn’t see the differences she could see.
Worse, if he told others that her scribing was careless, she would struggle to get more work in holy houses. What was she going to do?
‘I’ll tell the Prior.’
‘And why, tell me, would he listen to you?’
She went back to her room. Shaken and trying to think what to do next.
She looked through her things again. Her coins were safe, she’d hidden them under some dirty linen.
Men wouldn’t go looking under a woman’s rags, she’d learnt that early on.
Tom’s box was also still there. Whoever had gone looking for the book hadn’t troubled with what looked like a few stones and a tatty bit of rope.
But the little bag of paper scraps had been emptied all over the floor.
She cursed and gathered them up. She thought they were all there but it was like some wild game – she’d got the book back but now half the scraps were gone. If someone had been looking through them, they’d not seen the significance. She’d only just seen it herself so that was understandable.
Tomorrow, as soon as Luke was out of the room, she’d try and see if she could match up the scraps and the book edges. If she had to leave soon, she would try and solve this puzzle first. She owed it to Tom.