the bowels, he may take neither food nor water; and that his pulse is fluttering and weak. Indeed, he may have passed from this life while we stand thus, in talking.”
I looked my indecision at Martha, then impulsively seized Mr. Hill by the arm.
“For God's sake, let us be silent,” I said, “and reserve our breath for walking. Miss Lloyd must carry the young Seagraves back to the Dolphin, but I shall accompany you to Wool House. I cannot stay away.”
ETIENNE LA FORGE WAS NOT DEAD; BUT HE LAY IN AN attitude so narrowly approximating it, that I all but despaired of his life. The sharp brown eyes were completely closed, the jaw clenched in pain. He was drenched in sweat despite the room's raw atmosphere, so that his body was racked with chills. His ebony walking-stick lay by his side on the pallet, as though in the last extremity of existence, he would guard this one relic of home. He muttered fragments of French—phrases I could not always catch, or comprehend once I heard them. At times he seemed to be wandering in childhood; at others, he broke into bawdy song, and must be restrained or he should have attempted to dance. But for the most part he seemed torn with anguish, and struggled upright to cry aloud the name of Genevieve. His Beloved, perhaps? Left behind in the Haute Savoie—or in early death?
“Just so it has been,” Mr. Hill muttered, “since eight o'clock last evening. I do not know how much more the human frame may stand.”
Chessyre is dead. I shall not long—
I pressed LaForge's shoulders gently back onto his pallet and bathed his brow. I held a basin while Mr. Hill bled him. Where I knelt on the stone floor, the cold crept through my dress, deadening all feeling in my joints.
“He should not be lying in these dreadful conditions,” I burst out. “None of them should. It is shocking that we tf eat men this way—as though they were slaves, or less than human. He should be moved to a proper bed, near a proper fire.”
Mr. Hill did not meet my eyes. “Naturally. But his condition has declined so greatly, Miss Austen, that I do not think it possible to move him now.”
“This is nothing like the usual course of gaol-fever?”
The surgeon shook his head. “Did I know nothing of the case before this, I should pronounce him poisoned. He suffers, I should say, from an acute gastric complaint quite unlike the troubles of a few days previous. His sickness is lodged in the bowels. It is that which causes him agony.”
I felt my frame stiffen, the breath caught in my chest. “I once witnessed a death from poisoning. It was terrible to behold. Could something noxious have been introduced to his food?”
“But that is absurd! Why should anyone wish to harm a French prisoner? None but ourselves is familiar with even a particle of his history!”
“Monsieur LaForge was in despair yesterday at the suspension of Captain Seagrave's trial,” I told the surgeon urgently. “When he learned the news of Lieutenant Chessyre's murder, he declared that his life was forfeit for having related what he saw aboard the Manon. He is the sole witness to an attempted plot. Do not you comprehend the matter?”
“But who—”
“Whoever killed Chessyre! Have you received a gift of food for the prisoners?”
Mr. Hill hesitated. “Your eggs, of course,” he said slowly, “and a quantity of meat pasties from Mrs. Braggen's kitchen. They were sent in my absence yesterday. But surely Mrs. Braggen—”
“I should never accuse the lady or her household of ill intent. But if the food appeared in your absence— anything might have been done to it.”
“Then why did not every prisoner who partook of the food fall dreadfully ill?”
“Because the poison was meant for only one man,” I persisted.
Mr. Hill shook his head. “My dear Miss Austen, I fear mat your imagination is run away with you. You have been overwrought. All this talk of murder—it may give rise to the most dreadful fancies—”
“There has not merely been talk! Two men are dead. One was killed at sea, another not a mile from this door. It is you, Mr. Hill, who persist in fancy. You must treat LaForge as though he were indeed a case of poison. It can cost you nothing, and may save his life.”
The surgeon studied me shrewdly, then felt LaForge's brow with his palm. “Fever, a fluttering pulse, and a disruption of stomach and bowels.