The lady stepped back, eyes wide. 'No!' she exclaimed, still clutching her arm. 'No. There's nothing wrong with it. It's fine.'
The Doctor pulled the man's night dress back down and drew the covers over him. 'Well, there's nothing I can do for him. Best let him sleep.'
'Sleep?' the lady wailed. 'All day, like an animal?'
'I'm sorry,' the Doctor said. 'I should have said best let him remain unconscious.'
'Is there nothing you can do for him?'
'Not really,' the Doctor said. 'The illness is so advanced that he is hardly even feeling the pain now. It's unlikely he'll come round again. I can write you a prescription for something to give him if he does, but I imagine his brother has already dealt with that.'
The lady nodded. She was staring at the great form that was her husband, one fist at her mouth, her teeth biting on her knuckle. 'He's going to die!'
'Almost certainly. I'm sorry.'
The lady shook her head. Eventually she tore her gaze away from the bed. 'Should I have called you earlier? If I had, would that-?’
'it would have made no difference,' the Doctor told her. 'There is nothing any doctor could have done for him. Some diseases are not treatable.' She looked down — with a cold expression, it seemed to me — at the body lying panting on the great bed. 'Happily some are also not transmissible.' She looked up at the lady. 'You need have no fear on that point.' She glanced round at the servants as she said this.
'How much do I owe you?' the wife asked.
'Whatever you think fit,' the Doctor said. 'I have been able to do nothing. Perhaps you feel I deserve nothing.'
'No. No, not at all. Please.' The lady went to a bureau near the bed and took out a small plain purse. She handed it to the Doctor.
'You really should have that arm seen to,' the Doctor said softly, while studying the other woman's face, and her mouth, most closely. 'It might mean-'
'No,' the lady said quickly, looking away and then walking off to the nearest of the tall windows. 'I am perfectly well, Doctor. Perfectly. Thank you for coming. Good day.'
We sat in the hired chair on the way back, wobbling and weaving through the crowds of Land Street, heading for the Palace. I was folding away my spiced kerchief. The Doctor smiled sadly. She had been in a thoughtful, even morose mood all the way back (we had left the same way we had arrived, via the private dock). 'Still worried about ill humours, Oelph?'
'It is how I was raised, mistress, and it seems like a sensible precaution.'
She sighed heavily and looked out at the people. 'Ill humours,' she said, and seemed to be talking more to herself than to me.
'Those ill humours you talked about from insects, mistress…' I began, recalling something that my master had communicated to me.
'Hmm?-'
'Can they be extracted from the insects and used? I mean, might some assassin, say, be able to have made a concentrate of such insects and administer the potion to a victim?' I tried to look innocent.
The Doctor had a look about her I thought I recognised. Usually it meant that she was about to launch into some extremely long and involved explanation concerning how some aspect of medicine worked, and how all the assumptions that I might have held about the subject were completely wrong. On this occasion, though, she seemed to fall back from the brink of such a lecture, and looked away and just said, 'No.'
There was silence between us for a while. During that time I listened to the braided canes of the chair as they creaked and cracked around us.
'What was wrong with the lady Tunch's arm, mistress?' I asked eventually.
The Doctor sighed. 'It had been broken, I think, and then set badly,' she said.
'But any saw-smith can set a bone, mistress!'
'It was probably a radial fracture. Those are always more difficult.' She looked out at the milling people all walking, bargaining, arguing and yelling on the street. 'But yes, a rich man's wife… especially one with a doctor in the family…' She looked round slowly at me. 'You would think such a person would receive the best of attention, wouldn't you? Instead of, it would seem, none.'
'But…' I began, then started to understand. 'Ah.'
'Ah, indeed,' the Doctor said.
We both watched the people for a while, as our quartet of hired men carried the chair through them, uphill towards the Palace. The Doctor sighed after a while and said, 'Her jaw had been broken not long ago, too. It hadn't been treated, either.' Then she took the purse mistress Tunch had given her out of her coat and said something that wasn't really like her at all. 'Look, here's a drinking house. Let's go for a drink.' She looked at me closely. 'Do you drink, Oelph?'
'I don't, that is, I'm not really, well, I have but not-'
She held a hand up out of the side of the chair. One of the rear men shouted to those in front and we drew to an orderly halt right outside the door of the inn.
'Come on,' she said, slapping me on the knee, 'I'll teach you.'
6. THE BODYGUARD
The concubine lady Perrund, attended at a discreet distance by a eunuch of the harem guard, took her daily constitutional as usual a little after breakfast. Her route that day took her to one of the higher towers on the east wing where she knew she could gain access to the roof. It was a fine, clear day and the view could be particularly fine, looking out over the palace grounds to the spires and domes of the city of Crough, the plains beyond, and the hills in the deep distance.
'Why, DeWar!'
The chief bodyguard DeWar sat in a large, sheet-covered chair that was one of twenty or so pieces of furniture which had been stored in the tower room. His eyes were closed, his chin was resting on his chest. His head jerked up, he looked around and blinked. The concubine Perrund sat in a seat beside him, her red gown bright against the dark blue of the sheet. The white-clad eunuch guard stood by the door.
DeWar cleared his throat. 'Ah, Perrund,' he said. He drew himself up in the chair and straightened his black tunic. 'How are you?'
'Pleased to see you, DeWar, though surprised,' she told him, smiling. 'You looked as though you were slumbering. I thought of all people the Protector's chief bodyguard would be the least likely to need sleep during the day.'
DeWar glanced round at the eunuch guard. 'The Protector has given me the Xamis-morning off,' he said. 'There's a formal breakfast for the Xinkspar delegation. There are guards everywhere. He thinks I am surplus.'
'You think otherwise.'
'He is surrounded by men with weapons. Just because they're our guards doesn't mean there isn't a threat. Naturally I think I ought to be there but he will not be told.' DeWar rubbed his eyes.
'So you became unconscious out of pique?'
'Did I look asleep?' DeWar asked innocently. 'I was only thinking.'
'And very fast a-thought you looked. What did you conclude?'
'That I must not answer so many questions.'
'A fine decision. People do pry so.'
'And you?'
'Oh, I rarely think. There are so many people who think — or think they think — better than L It would be presumptuous.'
'I meant what brings you here? Is this your morning walk?'
