Doomsday Book (Oxford Time Travel, #1) - Connie Willis Page 0,83

thinking about what Lady Imeyne said. “The wound to her head has fevered her lungs,” she said. I don’t think anyone here realizes I’m ill. They let the little girls in the sickroom all the time, and none of them seem the least afraid, except the steward’s wife, and as soon as Lady Imeyne told her I had “fevered lungs,” she came up to the bed without any hesitation.

But she was obviously worried about the possibility of my illness’s being contagious, and when I asked Rosemund why she hadn’t gone with her mother to see the cottar, she said, as if it were self-evident, “She forbade me to go. The cottar is ill.”

I don’t think they know I have a disease. I didn’t have any obvious marker symptoms, like pox or a rash, and I think they put my fever and delirium down to my injuries. Wounds often became infected, and there were frequent cases of blood poisoning. There would be no reason to keep the little girls away from an injured person.

And none of them have caught it. It’s been five days, and if it is a virus, the incubation period should only be twelve to forty-eight hours. Dr. Ahrens told me the most contagious period is before there are any symptoms, so maybe I wasn’t contagious by the time the little girls started coming in. Or maybe this is something they’ve all had already, and they’re immune. The steward’s wife asked if I had had the Florentine? Flahntin? fever, and Mr. Gilchrist’s convinced there was an influenza epidemic in 1320. Maybe that’s what I caught.

It’s afternoon. Rosemund is sitting in the window seat, sewing a piece of linen with dark red wool, and Blackie’s asleep beside me. I’ve been thinking about how you were right, Mr. Dunworthy. I wasn’t prepared at all, and everything’s completely different from the way I thought it would be. But you were wrong about it’s not being like a fairy tale.

Everywhere I look I see things from fairy tales: Agnes’s red cape and hood, and the rat’s cage, and bowls of porridge, and the village’s huts of straw and sticks that a wolf could blow down without half trying.

The bell tower looks like the one Rapunzel was imprisoned in, and Rosemund, bending over her embroidery, with her dark hair and white cap and red cheeks, looks for all the world like Snow White.

(Break)

I think my fever is back up. I can smell smoke in the room. Lady Imeyne is praying, kneeling beside the bed with her Book of Hours. Rosemund told me they have sent for the steward’s wife again. Lady Imeyne despises her. I must be truly ill for Imeyne to have sent for her. I wonder if they will send for the priest. If they do, I must ask him if he knows where Gawyn found me. It’s so hot in here. This part is not like a fairy tale at all. They only send for the priest when someone is dying, but Probability says there was a 72 percent chance of dying of pneumonia in the 1300s. I hope he comes soon, to tell me where the drop is and hold my hand.

13

Two more cases, both students, came in while Mary was interrogating Colin on how he had got through the perimeter.

“It was easy” Colin had said indignantly. “They’re trying to keep people from getting out, not getting in,” and had been about to give the particulars when the registrar came in.

Mary had made Dunworthy accompany her to the Casualties Ward to see if he could identify them. “And you stay here,” she had told Colin. “You’ve caused quite enough trouble for one night.”

Dunworthy didn’t recognize either of the new cases, but it didn’t matter. They were conscious and lucid and were already giving the house officer the names of all their contacts when he and Mary got there. He took a good look at each of them and shook his head. “They might have been part of that crowd on the High Street, I can’t tell,” he said.

“It’s all right,” she said. “You can go home if you like.”

“I thought I’d wait and have my blood test,” he said.

“Oh, but that isn’t till—” she said, looking at her digital. “Good Lord, it’s past six.”

“I’ll just go up and check on Badri,” he said, “and then I’ll be in the waiting room.”

Badri was asleep, the nurse said. “I wouldn’t wake him.”

“No, of course not,” Dunworthy said and went back down