CHAPTER FIVE

The child would live. At least for now. The fate of his newly post-partum wife was not so certain, but in his experience, the doctor knew that she stood a chance if the bleeding could be controlled.

In tending to his wife's hemorrhage, Dr. Willoughby immediately demanded that Tess and Cassie chew copious amounts of tobacco leaves, spitting the soggy cuds out into a bowl, while the bulk of the noxious stuff simmered in a cauldron over the room's fire. Mixing the tobacco with fresh cotton, he packed the bundle into his wife's birth canal, and added more steeped tobacco juice and leaves as they cooled, to the vaginal poultice.

"Broken tobacco slows the bleed and the cotton clots any blood that does escape," he explained. Both girls felt nauseous and in an effort to ward off the impending headache that would surely follow their own absorption of the tobacco juices, they sipped a warm cup of tea laced with laudanum. Light headed then, and full of silliness, they took to their beds early, each giggling at the other's brown stained teeth and lips.

"We look like the old corner Crone!" Cassie exclaimed, smirking at her reflection in a silver-backed looking glass. Tess smiled too, although the mention of the old woman gave her the shivers.

The corner Crone was a beggar woman renowned for her eerily accurate prophesies and gift of second sight. It was said that she had not been burned as a witch because her advice was frequently but confidentially sought by high ranking city officials and men of power. Dr. Willoughby, however, had only open contempt for the woman and her herbal potions.

"Have you actually seen her, Cassie?" Tess asked.

"Oh yes, I was on an errand and had to go almost down to the waterfront, when I turned a corner and there she was, all dressed in a shabby brown robe, her hood all up and around her head and face," Cassie recalled and pulled her nightshirt up over her head, clasping it under her chin, to simulate just such a hood. "Her hand was all gnarled and fingers all curled, but there was a ring on one of her fingers. It caught my eye because it sparkled as though it had some gems or the like in it catching the sun."

Cassie's eyes widened as she recalled the details, then her eyebrows knitted together in a frown. "Come to think of it, that ring actually didn't sparkle so much as it glowed, just like the glow of a fire's ember, only it was as pure a blue as I've ever seen. I remember wondering how a beggar would come to have such a thing, let alone keep it from being stolen off her ...."

"Did she say anything?" Tess pressed.

"No. Mind, I'd not gotten close to her, but I knew when I saw her, who she was."

"Let's seek her out one day. Soon."

Cassie turned to look at Tess in amazement. "Are you mad? Why would you want to?"

"I don't know. I just want to. Maybe she'll tell our fortunes. Wouldn't that be exciting?" Tess flopped back onto her soft mattress.

"Tess, your father would whip you if he ever found out you went to her, let alone to that part of town. It wouldn't be good for his reputation as a doctor and respectable citizen to have his daughter consorting with the like."

"Well then," Tess retorted with a conspiratorial smile, "he mustn't ever know."

A faint high pitched squeal that ricocheted off the walls and echoed down the hallway abruptly interrupted their conversation.

"Charles the Third bellows, Madam, and I must go" Cassie groaned and gave a tired smile.

Tess held up a hand towards Cassie. "You go to bed." The squeal was more insistent. Tess rolled her eyes and sighed. "I'll tend to the little monster."

"No, it's my duty," Cassie responded and wrapped herself in her dressing gown.

"This one time, I'll go," Tess countered, "he's my brother, after all–" As soon as her words were out, a flicker of hurt flared in Cassie's eyes.

"No. I'll go," Cassie affirmed, the smile fading from her face, and she hastily left the bedroom, padding noiselessly down to the nursery.

Cassie was Tess's unofficial adopted sister. Cassie was also one of the family's servants. She was neither full kin nor indentured servant. She had been received as a young child, in partial payment for medical services that Tess's father had provided to a nobleman's family during an outbreak of fever.

 The deadly fever and sickness had spread like wild fire through the man's house servant and serf populations, decimating both, including Cassie's parents, before ripping through the nobleman's own family. Cassie, spared but orphaned by the plague of disease, had been brought into the household by Dr. Willoughby himself. Not a supporter of slaves in his own household, the doctor nevertheless felt pity for the youngster and all other possible destinations for her seemed filled with only certain hardships.

Accurate birth records on servants and slaves were seldom kept, but by an estimation of his own making, based on the number and size of the child's teeth, Cassie had been perhaps only two years older than his six year old daughter, Tess. Dr. Willoughby had accepted his patient's desperate payment scheme, knowing that the man's fortune, like so many of the fever's victims, had nearly disappeared in less than a fortnight.

Now, at nearly eighteen, Cassie had grown into an attractive young woman. Her hair curled, rather than kinked, in loose waves reaching past her shoulders and nearly to her waist, onto golden brown skin.

Like a man's morning coffee with a dollop of sweet cream stirred in, was how Tess's mother had once described the color. Cassie's teeth, no longer gapping with the smile of a shy eight year old, were straight and white.  This in itself made her stand out from most people, as darkly stained or missing teeth were the norm by adulthood. Elizabeth Willoughby, however, would not abide poor oral care within her household, demanding that everyone, servants included, polish their teeth and gums with a spit-rag before retiring each evening.

Although Cassie had grown up officially as her house servant, most times Tess considered Cassie to be a sister, a replacement for the blood sibling she'd never had. As children, the girls had been inseparable. Tess herself was blossoming into womanhood, and she and Cassie were often compared, her creamy complexion and own head full of thick, soft, copper colored ringlets to Cassie's darker palette.

"You two are like the sunrise, all gold and red, and the sunset, all soft shadows and tawny dark," Mrs. Hanley, the family's corpulent cook, had declared. "One's always sure to be followin' the other, too," she noted, nodding with a smile of satisfaction on her face, pleased with her philosophical observation. Mrs. Hanley often made such pronouncements about the goings-on around her, although Tess was quite certain that the jolly woman had never had real education of any kind, and was, in fact, like most of the household help, perfectly illiterate, not being able to read a single printed word.

She was, however, a treasure house of folk wisdom and often shared bits and pieces with the girls, of the folklore and mystic chronicles that were firmly entrenched in her beliefs. Many blustery winter nights had been spent with the three of them cuddled in front of the roaring kitchen fireplace, sipping on hot broths brewed from the various vegetations that the girls had helped to collect during the growing season.

"Ya' know," Mrs. Hanley had once said, her voice low enough that her words would not have carried beyond the closed doors of the kitchen, "there's a reason us three gets on so well." She had nodded her head, her plump cheeks and second chin shaking ever so slightly, as her eyes had sparkled with the excitement of sharing her secrets with the girls.

"Three's a strong number, ya' know," she had confided, looking at each girl, ensuring that she had their rapt attention. Looking back and forth from one to the other, she had leaned alternately toward each of them and continued in a quiet voice, "It's a thing of nature, three is. Three's the number that's important in the Church, fer them what studies and teaches there, but fer us all, three's the number of parts to a family. Mother, father and child. And three's involved in lot of things–sun, moon and stars, fer instance, land and water and air. And the Irish have their three leafed shamrock fer luck ... but the Irish luck and magic, well ... that's another story altogether." She'd shaken her head and given them a wink, and then rushed on. "Three makes a triangle, all sides and points," she'd whispered conspiratorially, "and everyone knows that 'third time's the charm'." She'd beamed at them and gathered them in her arms. "However, mostly three's fer things what wants to be together, like us!" she'd exclaimed happily.

 Tess and Cassie had also spent many daytime hours in the warmth of Mrs. Hanley's kitchen, sipping hot tea and eating her freshly baked biscuits while seated at a table where Tess had painstakingly taught Cassie her letters and numbers. Most times, Mrs. Hanley observed the lessons none too tactfully, peering blatantly over the girls' shoulders.

"That's right," she would advise in an authoritative voice from behind, in apparent sagely assessment of Cassie's written words, "but be a bit cleaner with yer penmanship, won'cha now." And glancing sideways at each other, the girls would bite their cheeks to keep from laughing out loud at such a formal judgment of their work.

It was expected that Cassie would stay with the family until marriage or a further employment offer arose to change her destiny. Hers was an odd arrangement. The Willoughby's had raised her alongside their own daughter, as one of their own, although like their house servants, she had been given daily tasks to do. For such tasks, she had begun to receive small payments for herself on the occasion of her approximated sixteenth birthday. Nevertheless, no one ever discussed her leaving.

She had been dressed and schooled in the social graces as Tess had been, and Dr. Willoughby's approval was expected to be sought out by any prospective young men wishing to spend time in his adopted daughter's presence. Not that there were many. The socialites of upper class London may have secretly found the young woman to be attractive and intelligent, but her mixed parentage was still a negative factor in most of their eyes. Cassie did not care. Her life had been blessed with this family–people who treated her with respect and, yes, even loved her. She had no wish for change.

With them, she had learned all of life's basic skills. Her assistance in the kitchen with Mrs. Hanley had taught her how to cook, to start or bank a hearth fire, and to keep a living space clean and tight enough to discourage rodents, insects, and disease. The errands that she ran for Mrs. Willoughby introduced her to the finer things in life–soft linens and laces, teas, sweets–and gave her respected contact with the merchants involved in their procurement.

Dr. Willoughby's errands were more likely to be of an urgent nature–delivering letters and messages to colleagues and patients, picking up an assortment of medical supplies–he seemed to forever be running short of herbal mixtures, suturing supplies, surgical tools, and bandaging materials–and it was one of Cassie's duties to keep the shelves in the surgical room at the Willoughby's residence fully stocked. In between market visits there was the expected daily cleaning routine for her to perform as well as a thorough mopping up in between patients as required.

This last task was her least favorite, as Cassie did not have the stomach to sop up the jellied blood and small puddles of putrification and bits of flesh and bone that were invariably present after a surgery She admired Tess's fortitude and her ability to help her physician father when he required an extra pair of hands. The amputations and the birthing were the worst, she had decided, although the amputations were over quickly, while the birthings were hours, sometimes days of agony.

Cassie had also decided that she never wanted to put herself through that agony. Her lack of suitors was a blessing to her. Coupling with a man would only bring pain and a life of looking after yet one more person.

No, Cassie assured herself, I have no wish for change in my life. I have enough.