Excerpt from MY STORY: THE GREAT PLAGUE
by Pamela Oldfield
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July 9th
I stared at myself in the mirror this morning and saw a frightened stranger. Aunt Nell lay in the next room.
I had washed her face and hands but dared go no further for fear of doing her some harm. Already there is a cruel swelling in her neck — the beginning of a bubo which will cause her much pain. I tell myself she will survive and cling to this thought. Just before three I heard the door being unlocked and hurried down the stairs full of hope. A frightful apparition waited at the foot of the stairs. I screamed with shock but as soon as it spoke I knew it was the doctor.
“My newly issued protective garment,” he told me in muffled tones. “Hot and cumbersome but ’twill keep out the contagion.”
It was the strangest apparel I have ever seen in my life. A long loose garment covered him entirely with the exception of his head. It was made all of soft thin leather and I saw at once that with the July heat he would roast within it. The headpiece was a leather helmet with a beaklike nose and eyepieces of thin horn that he could see through. I pitied him with all my heart. Who would wish to be a doctor when plague strikes the city?
I led him upstairs into my aunt’s chamber.
“I fear she is delirious this morning,” I told him. “She doesn’t know me.”
“ ’Tis a common symptom,” he told me. “If she recovers it will pass.”
He was tender with Aunt Nell as he examined her. I caught another glimpse of the bubo, which was a small purple swelling, then stepped back a pace. Aunt Nell’s confusion was obvious yet the doctor’s strange garment aroused no comment.
“You are home early tonight,” she murmured, thinking the voice was Papa’s. “Supper will be ready shortly.”
The doctor shook his head in answer to my unspoken question.
“We can do little for her,” he told me. “The sickness must run its course. If the bubo breaks open she has a chance. It will release the poison.”
If it does not, then she will surely die.
And so will I, I thought but kept that to myself. Tonight I have tried to make a pact with God.
“Dear God in Heaven, if you will preserve us all, including Poppet, I promise I will never say an unkind word again. Nor will I be hasty or lazy. Please God, hear my prayer . . . I will pray twice a day and be charitable towards the poor — as soon as I have married well. I will try harder with my pastry and practise my singing. I will spend more time with Maggie at her writing lessons and I will crochet a hundred collars.”
But doubtless God is being overwhelmed with such entreaties. Will he even hear mine among the clamour? Has he heard Maggie’s prayers for her mother, I wonder?
Papa called by to say that Master and Mistress Waybold have gone to her sister’s house in Chatham and that he is staying in the house they have left empty. His presence, they trust, will deter robbers who grow ever more daring as the plague increases. They prey on the sick and steal from abandoned houses.
July 10th
The doctor says Aunt Nell is no better and no worse. He tells me that the King’s Court has moved upriver to Hampton Court. The Parliament will next assemble in Oxford in October.
“So we are abandoned to our fate,” I said with some bitterness.
“Not so,” he replied. “We have our own Lord Mayor and Aldermen. We shall be well served.”
I hope he is right. I am so tired but am managing better than I expected. When I need food I lower a basket on a rope from the upper window. There is money in it and I tell the watchman what we need. He sets off, still clutching his jug, and brings back the goods when he can find them. (I notice he always steals a few coins for his trouble but the poor wretch has to live.) Then I draw the basket up again. I have almost forgotten how life was before this disaster overtook us.
I am keeping busy. I have lit a fire in Aunt Nell’s chamber and each day steep rosemary leaves in vinegar. Then I toss the liquid on to the hot coals which send out much vapour to fumigate the air she breathes. The window is then opened and the stale contagious air is driven out.
Today I washed Aunt Nell tho’ it turned my stomach to do so. She was never robust but now she is almost wasted away and her arms and legs no more than sticks. I forced myself to lay the soapy face cloth upon her body. I tried to avert my eyes for it seemed an impertinence to see her without her clothes but at last I overcame my unease. The swelling grows daily in size and is coming to a head. ’Tis full of loathsome matter but this will be discharged when it breaks. If it does. Her skin is hot to the touch with fever, her lips chapped and split.
Poor dear Aunt Nell. The terrible pain makes her scream in agony and has affected her mind. She often calls me “Mother.” Perhaps she thinks she is a child again. Once today she gave a little smile. I wanted tell her that I loved her but the words would not come. Have I ever told her?
From My Story: The Great Plague. Copyright © by Pamela Oldfield.
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