Chapter 5
July heat in New Orleans was not a mere state of the weather; it was heavy and inescapable, a thick, damp shroud that smelled of river sediment and silt, rotting vegetation, and the desperate, acrid smoke of sulfur fires.
By August, the smoke had become the city's primary atmosphere.
The municipal authorities, in a fit of scientific inspiration that Thomas Ashford found particularly galling, had ordered the firing of cannons at Sunset to clear the miasma.
The boom of the guns shook the glass in its frames and did nothing for the air, which remained as stagnant and lethal as a swamp.
Through this haze, Thomas walked, his black medical bag a constant anchor.
He moved with a precision that served as his only defense against the growing chaos.
In Paris, he had learned that disease had a rhythm, a grim architecture that could be mapped with observation and clean water.
In New Orleans, medicine was more often a matter of superstition and bloodletting.
At Rue Royale, he turned, his boots treading softly on the banquette.
He was a free man of colour, a status that in this city was a narrow ledge between the heights of the planter class and the abyss of the enslaved.
To tread this narrow path required a constant, quiet vigilance.
He was a physician to the wealthy when they were desperate enough to forget his lineage, and a savior to the poor who had no other choice.
Today, however, he was a man trying to outrun the "Bronze John. "
Yellow fever did not discriminate, though the city's geography did.
The wealthy fled to the pine woods of the north, leaving their townhouses to the care of servants and the unlucky.
Those who remained were greeted by the sight of the black hearse, the "corbillard," which rattled over the cobblestones with a frequency that silenced even the most boisterous tavern.
A modest building in the Faubourg Marigny, once a chandler's shop, served as the clinic he had established. It was now scrubbed with vinegar until the scent of cedar and acid was all that remained. Inside, the working unit he had neither expected nor planned for was already engaged.
Cécile was at the long table, her hands busy with the preparation of lemon water and willow-bark tea. She looked up, her expression a mix of exhaustion and resolve. Beside her, to Thomas's private and recurring surprise, was Miss Elizabeth Bennet.
Success in the clinic required a remarkably resistant constitution, which the Englishwoman possessed in abundance.
While other ladies of her acquaintance were currently swooning in the cooler air of the plantations, Miss Elizabeth had remained in the city to assist her father's botanical interests.
When the fever broke, she had simply appeared at the clinic, her sleeves rolled to the elbows, asking where the linens were kept.
"The patient in the corner has woken," Cécile said. "He asks for water, but his eyes are already turned."
With a nod, Thomas settled the professional composure over his features. "Hydrate him if you can. Do not let the barber near him with a lancet. If I see another man bled into his grave today, I shall lose my temper."
"Mr. Darcy has gone to the merchant's house on Rue Chartres," Miss Elizabeth said, her voice steady despite the moans from the back room. "He said the man died in the night and there is no one to clear the site before the scavengers arrive."
Thomas looked at her. Mr. Darcy was another anomaly.
The British trade envoy, a man who had been carved from a particularly cold block of English stone, had volunteered his services with a grim, dutiful persistence.
He did not speak much, but he possessed a physical stamina that was invaluable.
He lifted what others could not and went where others feared to tread.
"He shouldn't go alone," Thomas said. "The districts near the levee are becoming unruly. The guard is spread thin."
"He is rarely truly alone," Miss Elizabeth replied, a subtle sharpness in her tone. "I believe he finds the solitude of a dead man's house quite agreeable. It requires no social performance."
Observation of the exchange suggested she had her own theories on the gentleman, but Thomas did not pursue it. He had patients to see.
Afternoon brought a blur of yellowed skin and the terrible, dark vomit that signaled the end.
Thomas moved from cot to cot, applying cool compresses and recording observations in his ledger.
He sought the reason why the creoles survived more often than the newcomers.
He suspected it was a matter of prior exposure, a theory that the local medical society dismissed as French nonsense.
By five o'clock, the heat had reached its zenith. Miss Elizabeth approached him, carrying a stack of soiled linens.
"I am going to the Rue Chartres," she said. "Cécile says the merchant's house must be cleared of all organic matter if we are to prevent the spread. Darcy has been there for hours."
"Take the carriage," Thomas advised. "And carry the vinegar-soaked cloth."
Watching her go, he admired her lack of hesitation. There was a peculiar harmony between her and Darcy, a tension that fueled their industry. They worked like two parts of a machine that had never been properly oiled but functioned through sheer force of will.
At the merchant's house, Elizabeth found the door ajar. The air inside was heavy with the scent of dust and the faint, sweet rot of a life recently extinguished. Mr. Darcy was in the study. She paused in the doorway, her footsteps cushioned by the thick rugs.
The gentleman did not hear her. He was at the heavy mahogany desk, but he was not clearing it.
He was reading. His posture had the focused stillness of a man extracting intelligence, not inventorying a dead merchant's effects.
He held a sheet of correspondence at an angle to the light, studying the signatures and dates with the same tactical attention she had seen him give to his river charts.
After a long moment, he set the page down and began sorting the papers into two piles—one for the executors, and one that he slipped, with practiced ease, into the inner pocket of his waistcoat.
He was not interested in the silver inkstand or the gold watch on the blotter. He was interested in the information. It was precisely the behaviour of a Crown envoy who understood that a dead merchant's correspondence might contain shipping routes, contacts, or debts that could be leveraged.
Only then did he begin the task he had purportedly come for. He started piling the remaining ledgers into a crate for the executors.
Stepping back, Elizabeth then walked forward again, making sure her heels clicked sharply on the floorboards.
"Mr. Darcy," she said, her voice bright and entirely devoid of accusation.
His composure returned with a speed that was itself a kind of confession.
"Miss Bennet. This is no place for you. The air is foul."
"Foul air is the common lot of New Orleans this month," she replied, stepping into the room. "Have you made progress? My father is anxious that the merchant's botanical records be preserved. He had some rare specimens from the interior."
Darcy gestured to the crates. "I have secured all the papers that seemed of value. The rest should be burned, according to the doctor's orders."
"Indeed. You have been most thorough. I see you have even checked the personal correspondence."
"Next of kin must be identified," Darcy said.
His voice was level, but Elizabeth saw the slight tension in his posture. He was waiting to see if she would question him. She merely smiled and picked up a stack of invoices.
"Of course. How fortunate the Crown sent such a diligent man to oversee our trade. One would almost think you were trained for such... detailed observation."
"A merchant must know his partners," Darcy said.
"And a gentleman must know his duty," she countered.
Silent labor followed, though it was far from empty.
Elizabeth filed the image of him at the desk into the mental ledger she had been keeping since his arrival.
He was something other than what he claimed.
The knowledge settled in her with less shock than she might have expected.
In a city where everyone was reinventing themselves, a man who lied about his purpose was simply part of the local color.
What interested her was why he felt the need to hide it from her.
Returning to the clinic as the sun dropped behind the levee, they found the shadows casting long, bruised streaks across the Marigny.
Thomas was waiting for them, but he was not at his desk. He was sitting on a wooden bench in the small courtyard, his head in his hands. The black bag lay overturned at his feet.
Cécile stood by the door, her face ghost-pale in the twilight. She signaled for Darcy and Elizabeth to stay back.
"Three in one hour," Thomas whispered, his voice a ragged thread. "The boy from the bakery, Madame LeClerc, and then Jean-Pierre."
Jean-Pierre had been a friend, a fellow musician who had played the cello at the soirées where Thomas was allowed only as a guest.
"The science does not matter," Thomas said, his shoulders shaking with a suppressed, violent grief. "I give them water, I keep them clean, and they die anyway. It is as if I am trying to hold back the Mississippi with a spoon."
His face, when he finally looked up, was a shock. The quiet, Parisian-educated physician was gone, replaced by a man who had been hollowed out by the sheer volume of the dead. He had fought with every tool he possessed—logic, hygiene, observation—and the fever had laughed at him.
"I am a fraud," he said. "I am no better than the men firing the cannons."