His intense thirst persisted, but though she gave him one glass of water after another the thirst was not allayed and he soon threw it up. Again and again he vomited, retching with a violence it seemed would tear out his bowels; each time it left him pouring sweat, exhausted and all but unconscious. Amber, who ran to hold the pan and to support him, watched him with horror and pity, and a growing rage.
He’s going to die! she thought, holding the pan beneath his chin, pushing herself against his back to help him sit upright. He’s going to die, I know he is! Oh! this filthy rotten plague!
He dropped down once more, flat on his back, and suddenly she flung herself across him, her fingers clutching at his arms—the muscles, though useless now, still looked hard and powerful beneath the brown skin. She began to cry, holding onto him defiantly and with all her strength, as though determined she would not give him up to Death. She murmured his name, mingled with curses and endearments, and her sobs grew wilder and more frantic until she was almost hysterical.
She was jerked out of her orgy of self-pity, back to reality by Bruce, whose fingers took hold of her hair and pulled her head slowly upward. She looked at him, her face smeared with tears, her eyes oddly slanted as his grip on her hair dragged at her scalp. Sick with shame and remorse she stared at him, wondering desperately what she had been saying—and if he had heard her.
“Amber—”
His tongue had swollen now until it almost filled his mouth, and it was covered with a thick white fur, though the edges were red and shiny. His eyes were dull, but he looked at her with recognition for the first time in many hours, scowling with the agonized effort to seize hold of his thoughts and express them.
“Amber—Why—why—aren’t you—gone—”
She looked at him warily, like a trapped animal. “I am, Bruce. I am going. I’m just going now.” Her fingers, spread out on the quilt before her, moved backward a little, but she could not stir.
He let go of her hair, gave another deep sigh, and his head rolled over sideways. “God go with you. Go on—while—” The words slurred off and he was almost quiet again, though still softly mumbling.
Slowly and carefully she moved away from him, genuinely afraid, for she had heard many awful tales of plague-victims gone mad. She was sweating with relief when at last she stood on her feet again and out of his reach. But the tears were gone and she realized that if she was to be of any use to him she must hold herself in control, do what she could to make him comfortable and pray that God would not let him die.
With quick resolution she went to work again.
She bathed his face and arms and combed his hair—he had not been wearing a periwig when she had met him at the wharf—smoothed the bed and laid another cold compress on his forehead. His lips were parched and beginning to split from the fever, and she covered them with pomade. She brought fresh towels from the nursery, and gathered all the soiled articles into a great bag, though of course no laundress would take it if it became known that there was plague in the house. And all the while she kept one eye on him, tried to understand him when he muttered something and to anticipate what he wanted so that he would not have to make the effort of reaching or moving himself.
About six the streets began to take on life. Across the way an apprentice let down the shutters of a small haberdashery shop, a coach rattled by, and she heard the familiar cry: “Milk-maid below!”
Amber threw open the window. “Wait there! I want some!” She glanced at Bruce and then ran out, scooping a few coins from the dressing-table as she went past, rushed into the kitchen for a pail and down the stairs. “I want a gallon, please.”
The girl, pink-cheeked and healthy, was one of those who came in every day from Finsbury or Clerkenwell. She grinned at Amber and slid the yoke off her shoulders to pour the fresh warm milk. “Going to be another mighty hot day, I doubt not,” she said conversationally.
Amber was listening for some sound from Bruce—she had left the window open just a crack—and she answered with an absent-minded nod. At that moment a deep boom filled the air. It was the passing-bell and it tolled three times—somewhere in the parish a man lay dying, and those who heard it were to pray for his soul. Amber and the milk-maid exchanged quick apprehensive glances, then both of them closed their eyes and murmured a prayer.
“Three pence, mam,” said the girl, and Amber saw her eyes going over her black gown with a sharp glint of suspicion.
She gave her the three pennies, picked up the heavy pail and started to go back into the house. At the door she turned. “Will you be here tomorrow?”
