Midwife : Liza Page 14

  Liza slurped absently at a pot of milk whilst she mumbled. The milk slopped down her whiskery chin onto her gown but she did not notice. “What to do, what to do?” She had tried several times to remove the curse but had failed. The last several nights nightmares disturbed her sleep; Nicholas thrusting his face into hers, shouting, accusing her of killing him. Now the villagers were talking about it, blaming her, she was sure.

  Liza realised she had no appetite for the cheese, and gave it to Bonney instead.

  Two women approached Widows’ cot later that same day; the afternoon after the Michaelmas feast. Isabella thought all would be quiet around the village today as most of the inhabitants attended the fair in Reedwich. Even so, the women had dressed plainly, and concealed their faces. They took the back paths through the forest to the cot; Isabella did not want anyone to see them going to Liza.

  The door to Widows’ Cot was bolted shut and at first Isabella thought Liza must be out. But then she heard a low growl from within followed by a short bark of welcome as Bonney recognised the scent of his former mistress. Liza unbolted the door and an enthusiastic Bonney ran out to greet them, followed slowly by the old midwife. By the saints, she's looking a lot older since I last saw her, Isabella thought, more shrunken; careworn. Nicholas has probably been at her again, she guessed, trying to get her out of her cot. The man's a fool after the way she cursed him, should have learned his lesson.

  “Your Ladyship, Mistress, come in, come in, forgive me, I cannot offer you - ” Liza shuffled back into the gloom and threw open the window shutter to admit more light and air, but it did not make much difference; the room remained dark and smoky. There were only two stools; one for Liza and one for whomever consulted her. “If you please, my Lady – Mistress – take these seats if you please - ”

  As they sat, a weak shaft of light fell upon Rosalind. “Mistress! Your face! Whatever has befallen you?” Liza pointed Rosalind’s face more into the light as she examined the bruises, noting the outline of finger marks and mumbling to herself. “Never fear, old Liza has unguents to help. Dear me, dear me -”

  “Never mind that, Liza,” Isabella commanded. "Stop, 'tis of no account." Liza let go of Rosalind's face and turned obediently towards Isabella. "Now, Liza, give me your solemn oath you will never, ever, divulge by any means we have visited you today, and why we have come to visit you in such secrecy."

  Her curiosity piqued, Liza nodded quickly. Although, she thought, I think I guess what this is all about. Ladies like them don’t come visiting old Liza for a bruise or two. That love potion, she remembered. The physick must've worked only too well.

  She hobbled over to her clothes trunk and sat gingerly on the lid. This was likely to take some time, she muttered to herself, may as well rest my old bones. Bonney padded over to lie at her feet.

  “Lady, old Liza would not be here today if she gabbed secrets.” She leaned back on her arms as she regarded the women before her. “Seems to me you’re in a bit of trouble. Yes? But ’tis the way of the world, Lady, way of the world, young people must sow their oats!” She glanced pointedly towards Rosalind’s belly, hidden under a cloak and cackled. “And sometimes the oats take root!”

  Lady Isabella regarded her coldly. “Well, maybe.” Liza saw her hesitate before continuing. “You are correct, Liza, Rosalind is with child and the child must be got rid of. That is why we are here. Of course, as soon as the child is gone, you will be rewarded well.”

  Liza’s blue eyes sharpened. “Aye, my Lady, but it's a difficult task you're asking. Difficult and mighty dangerous. For all involved."

  “Be sure of this Liza, if you refuse - well, Lord Roger and I might be forced to reconsider where and how you are housed. Master de le Haye will pay a good rent for this site.”

  Liza considered for a few seconds, only a slight trembling of her jaw betraying her consternation, and then spoke to Rosalind. “How far gone are you, child?”

  “Near to five months.”

  “Has the babe quickened within you?”

  “Yesterday. The movement inside me made me faint.”

  “Aye, you’re about five months, sounds right. So, you will birth this babe

  in February?”

  Lady Isabella interjected. “She will not birth this baby at all, Liza. You

  will prepare something to cast out the child.”

  Liza wanted time to think this through. “Come back tomorrow,” she

  said. “I can do nothing today, the herbs I need are not to hand at the moment.”

  “Liza, you must give her medicine now. We will not wait. We cannot wait.”

  “Lady, I cannot ….”

  “You will be well rewarded,” Isabella repeated. “All this - ” she indicated the room, “will be changed if you wish - I will give you a new cot, right here in the forest if you want, with two rooms and a hearth, a good roof, a comfortable bed, a separate shed to brew your herbs, new clothes, a pig - anything you want, even a chimney! But you must rid my daughter of her burden. Here and now.”

  The old woman slid awkwardly off the clothes chest, her heart racing with excitement, but unsure of what to do. She shuffled over to the window opening and breathed in the fresh forest air. The offer of a new cot had taken her aback and she wanted to consider it, savour it in peace, to imagine herself warm and dry, with comfort and plenty the rest of her life. She could not refuse such an offer.

  Normally, she would never agree to abort a pregnancy so far advanced. It was one thing to bring on the courses of a woman who was a few weeks late, quite another to cast out a baby who had already quickened. Bringing about a miscarriage at this stage was difficult and dangerous - the girl could bleed, or die of any of the foul humours likely to invade her body. She knew the medicines that would help rid Rosalind of the child, but there was much to go wrong, and then she would need to go exploring. The mouth of the womb would have to be stretched; that in itself was hazardous; the womb may rise up into the chest and cause suffocation, or black bile might flood out and overwhelm the other humours. Or the womb’s mouth might never close again. Foul humours could then get in and spread, or remain in the womb making the matrix so slippery that future babies would be cast out.

  A hundred things could go wrong, and the blame would be laid on her. Goodness knew what would happen then, she could be imprisoned, even hanged - she had risked the surgery on Margaret Attehill's baby to save a life; what her Ladyship asked now would end one life and put at risk another. But it must be worth taking the risk, for a new cottage.

  Then she thought of Nicholas, and how because of her, he was withering away, and her heart sank. Soon he would die unless the curse stopped. She should never have cursed him, she said to herself for the thousandth time. Liza brings life, not death. And the baby has quickened, its soul has entered by now, the child lives. Liza brings life, not death. This, against the promise of a new cot with a chimney, more than enough space to make and store her medicines, all she could ever want. But it was the thought before last that decided her.

  Liza turned slowly to Isabella, cringing at the anger she expected. “I can't help you. Please, Lady, don't ask this of old Liza. Please,” she said, wringing her hands together. “I beg of you, your Ladyship - life is precious - you should believe this, who've lost so many babes - besides, ‘tis dangerous - remember how you bled at your miscarriage and old Liza came to you with her physick and skill, and ….” her voice trailed away as she noticed Isabella had stopped listening.

  For a few moments Isabella sat, her eyes blank, gazing into the smouldering fire. Suddenly she rose from her stool and started to pace up and down the tiny room, avoiding the clutter of cooking pots on the floor, obviously thinking hard.

  “Of course! Of course, the answer is plain!” She stopped pacing and stood to face Liza. “When you said life is precious and I should know - all the babies I lost - all made sense - if only we can manage the deceit,” she turned to include Rosalind. “I shall take the child as my own - t'will be as tho
ugh I gave birth, and no-one need discover, ever. And if the baby lives, and is a boy, Lord Roger will have his heir.”

  “But how ...” her daughter started.

  “With cunning and planning! Liza, if you will attend us when the time comes, and the secret is kept, and the child is a healthy boy, then your new cot will be built and, within reason, you can have whatever else is in my power to give you.”

  “Gladly, my Lady,” Liza said, stunned by the speed of events. Hastily, she gathered her wits. “But if it's not a boy, my lady – if it's a maid - or a stillborn?”

  “Oh, well, then we shall see, but you will be well rewarded, even so. Now, we must go. I've a lot of planning to do if this is to be brought off. I'll send word when I need you, but in the meantime, not a whisper to anyone, if the secret leaks out there will be nothing for you, nothing. Do you understand?” Liza nodded, too overcome to say more.

  Isabella lay sleepless in bed, trying to think of all the complications possible in her plan. No-one must ever find out, she thought. Whatever happens - whether the child is healthy or stillborn, male or female, no-one apart from Liza - and Sarah, yes, I’ll definitely need Sarah - must ever know. Especially Geoffrey Cottreaux. He’ll not tolerate being cuckolded. If he ever finds out, he’ll end the betrothal for certain. I couldn’t endure the humiliation. The de Godwynne name would never recover. But what about my lord husband? Should I tell him my plan? Would he care what I’ve done as long as he gets an heir?

  How to convince everyone the child is mine? That I have borne the child from my own body? It must be a boy. A healthy boy. If it is a boy my life can begin again. There’ll be everything to live for. My duty to my lord will be fulfilled. And all will see it. A slap in the face for his bitch mistress at court, thinks she’s so special just because she's given him a couple of bastard sons. Once more, I’ll be the centre of his world, his adored wife, the mother of his lawful son.

  And Rosalind? How will I hide her? She must be hid here, in the keep, so I can pass her child off as mine when she births it. But suppose she dies? I can hide a living woman, but not a dead body. If she dies before giving birth I’ll say she insisted on hiding there, the shame loomed too great of birthing a bastard child - and my own pregnancy miscarried by the shock of her death – but if she dies giving birth or just after – what will I do then? There’s nothing much I can do if that happens, just hope it doesn’t, pray that Liza’s skill will bring her through. That the risk I’ll have to take. There’s everything to win, but everything to lose.

  Isabella schemed all night, and dawn stole near before she fell into a deep sleep.

  Chapter 14

  Giuseppe Vizzinci sat in a small lecture room in Padua. The University teemed with students, professors, servants, all in their distinctive gowns. Most of the students studied law. The faculty of Arts and Medicine was small and contained less than one tenth of the students of the University, but nevertheless the medical school was the largest of its kind in Italy, famous throughout Europe for the quality of its teaching.

  He enjoyed his freedom from the constraints of the Infirmary and the Monastery, the constant praying, chanting, and fasting. He missed having his own patients to attend, but here, even though he still wore the robes of a monk, he was free to come and go as he wished, and a choice of brothels stood within easy reach of his lodgings. Soon, he would get around to acquiring a mistress, he thought, something - some woman - who would give him more satisfaction and pleasure than a whore. Something sweet smelling, young and attractive, for his use alone. Perhaps like Rosalind.

  Occasionally, Guiseppe thought about her, thankful he had been able to leave Hollingham, and indeed England. Now he studied medicine, what he had always wanted; all in all, events had turned out very well. He thought it might be interesting to return to Hollingham one day and find out what, if anything, had happened with Rosalind and her so-called pregnancy. Maybe one day, after he gained his doctorate.

  Professor d’Abano, swarthy and dressed in a red and blue gown, sat in his chair and lectured from a tome resting on a low wooden lectern. The ancient book described the effects of the planets on each part of the body. “Blood is made of meat perfectly concocted, in quality hot and moist, governed by Jupiter. It is by a third concoction transmuted into flesh, the superfluity of it into seed, and its receptacle is the veins, by which it is dispersed through the body.”

  Guiseppe wanted to remember everything, every word, and impress the professor, renowned throughout Europe as a physician and astrologer. Guiseppe still wore the dark gowns of a cleric. All the university students had clerical status and it had not mattered after all whether or not Brother Anton reverted to Guiseppe Vizzinci, but he had decided that in Guiseppe lay more freedom. He had no intention of continuing as a cleric when he graduated, but that would be a long time in the future.

  Six years would pass before he attained his Bachelors degree, and at least ten before the degree he coveted; doctor of medicine. During that time Guiseppe would study grammar, rhetoric, philosophy, logic and natural sciences as well as medicine, surgery and astrology. It all fascinated him.

  He would have liked to open the bodies of executed criminals to see exactly how men functioned inside, but human dissection remained forbidden by the church. It was a sin punishable not only by death, but by the soul’s eternal relegation to purgatory. He read that, hundreds of years ago, the physician Galen had discovered everything about the workings of men's bodies by dissecting pigs and apes, whose insides were almost identical to humans. Still, he thought, it would have been interesting to find out in more detail how the flow of humours was regulated in men's bodies.

  Professor d’Abano glanced up from the book and then continued, reassured his students listened intently to his words. As well they might, he thought, they - or their parents - are paying enough for the age old wisdom he propounded.

  “Flegm is made of meat not perfectly digested; it fortifies the virtue expulsive, makes the body slippery, fit for ejection -” his voice droned on throughout the warm early October afternoon.

  As Guiseppe listened intently to his professor, hundreds of miles away Isabella and Sarah discussed how Rosalind’s new gowns should be sewn, so they would hide the growing pregnancy for another two months. Until just before Advent, Isabella thought, that should be enough. As soon as the dresses were finished, she and Sarah would adapt two suits of the de Godwynne livery, exchanging the red unicorn on a background of white for the Cottreaux six silver lions on blue. They need not take long to embroider the coats; the emblems were unlikely to have to stand up to close scrutiny.

  “Next, I’ll sew myself a pouch I can tie round my waist and stuff with linen or suchlike, a bit more can go in every week.” Isabella smiled across at Sarah and Rosalind and then laughed. “We have a lot of sewing to do. You know, I’m quite enjoying this!”

  Rosalind merely grunted in a most unladylike way.

  Sarah was enjoying planning for the new baby. At last she would be a nurse again and not a Jill of all trades, traipsing here, there and everywhere, continually at both Lady Isabella’s and Mistress Rosalind’s beck and call. She grew too old for all the running about. If this child lived, and the scheme worked, she would be secure for the rest of her life. And even if the baby died, with all Sarah now knew, Lady Isabella would never dare dismiss her, even if she did find out she had allowed Rosalind to roam unaccompanied in the forest.

  Rosalind just wished Anton would hurry and rescue her from all this madness.

  The next day was cool and damp. Lady Isabella’s rheumatism caused her some difficulty in mounting her grey gelding but she needed go to Reedwich. She had important business there and the sooner she dealt with it, the better. Thomas accompanied her on the two mile ride, east along the muddy lane leading from the manor house, past the Belling's smallholding and then south along the London road, alongside strip-cultivated fields smelling of pig manure, past the Infirmary, past woodland, and into Reedwich.

  “Wait here
, don’t stray!” she ordered as Thomas tethered the horses outside the Godwynne Arms Inn. Her command surprised him; normally he would accompany her Ladyship on her rare errands but this was obviously a mission she would prefer to accom-plish alone. All to the good, he thought, he would wait inside the Godwynne Arms with a mug of ale, warm near the fire.

  Wrapping her cloak about her, Isabella walked as purposefully as her rheumatism would allow along a narrow lane, and then right into a small courtyard. Outside one of the buildings, under a rickety shelter, a young man dressed in a black robe sat at a table, pens, ink and parchment at hand, waiting for custom. He was Matthew Pointer, a scribe. Isabella, like most noble women, could not read or write very well; she could painstakingly write her name, but little more. She sat on a stool opposite Matthew.

  “Good morning, Goodwife,” Obviously, Matthew had not recognised her but greeted her courteously, “What may I scribe for you today?”

  “Write this exactly as I say,” she said. “This is to go to Adam and Peter Brewer, of the manor of Stoveham in Suffolk.” She paused whilst the scribe wrote, and then continued slowly, stopping frequently to check Matthew had understood. “You are com-manded to attend Lady Isabella de Godwynne at the manor house in Hollingham on the morning of the second day of Advent this year, no later. You may lodge at Inns on your way but not near Hollingham. You will wear the livery sent with this and speak to no-one but the Lady Isabella when you arrive. You must tell no-one of the livery, nor where you are going or what you are doing. This is most important. If all this is executed in every detail, you will be well rewarded.”