Return to Summerhouse (The Summerhouse 2)

“He’s the best the eighteenth century has,” Amy said calmly. “Faith, I know what it is to have culture shock. I’ve been here for over a year and some of the things that go on still stun me, but you have to remember that you and I and Zoë have the benefit of a couple hundred years of learning. Not that we’re better than they are. I like their fresh food and handmade items.”

She quit talking and pulled Faith closer to her. “Tell me what you saw.”

“I don’t know what’s wrong with him, whether he has cancer or TB or maybe just a food allergy, but I know that no matter what his illness is, no human being should be treated like that.” She took a deep breath, then let it out slowly. “The entire backside of him is covered in bedsores, and he has bug bites all over him.”

“Bedbugs and fleas,” Amy said, taking her arm down from around Faith. “I know them well. When I got here I made them burn all the feathers in the mattresses and wash all the linens in lye soap. I made them take scrub brushes and scour the bedrooms. The bugs and fleas are still a problem but much less of one now.”

“You didn’t touch his room,” Faith said and there was accusation in her voice.

Amy didn’t take offense. “No. I was told by Tristan and Beth that their uncle was under the care of the doctor and I wasn’t to do anything to him or his room. All I do is prepare his food.”

“Do you know what she feeds him?”

“What we eat,” Amy said. “I oversee the trays she takes to him. He gets the best that my kitchen makes.”

“Then she eats it herself,” Faith snapped. “William is given only milk, and a bowl of bread mixed with milk. Sometimes he gets beef broth.”

“But I have made special, soft things for him,” Amy said. “Dr. Gallagher told me that William’s teeth are bad and that I should give him only soft food. I have personally mashed peas and made him soups with every vegetable ground up.”

“He doesn’t get the food,” Faith said. She put her hands over her face. “Amy, he is a skeleton. I don’t know how he’s alive. He’s malnourished, and I’m not sure, but I think he’s losing his teeth due to scurvy.”

“Scurvy!” Amy said in disbelief. It was a disease caused by the lack of vitamin C.

They were silent for a moment, then Amy said, “What do you need to take care of him properly? Other than to get rid of that woman, that is?”

Faith took a breath. “He must be removed from that room. If there were a way to do it, I’d say burn the place down. It’s riddled with fleas and bedbugs.”

“Trust me on this, but lye soap is as harsh as a fire. My kingdom for rubber gloves!”

“I need to take him someplace where there is sunlight and warmth. He’s a modest man and I don’t think he’ll want people to see him as he is, but he needs to get outside.”

“I’ll have no trouble getting you anything you want. Tristan loves his uncle very much. The stories he tells about how his uncle used to ride with him and go fishing! I think he was more of a father to Tristan than his own father was.”

“Yet Tristan leaves the man in the hands of a quack like that doctor.”

“I’m glad that in our modern world we no longer trust doctors so completely that we allow bad things to happen to our loved ones.”

“Point taken,” Faith said. “Sorry.”

“I feel this is my fault,” Amy said. “If I’d—”

“What?” Faith said. “Taken on more responsibility than a morose, brooding earl and his neglected sister? Not to mention this whole estate. When would you have had time to take care of an ailing man?”

“True,” Amy said, “but I should have done something.”

Faith looked at her. “If this so-called doctor has been with the family for a long time, then I guess he’s the one who delivered Tristan’s wife of her first child.”

“Yes,” Amy said, blinking. “He did.”

“And she died,” Faith said, her jaw clenched. “And no doubt she died of childbirth fever, which is caused by filthy hands and going from one delivery to the next without so much as washing.”

Amy put her hand to her mouth. “Tristan told me that he thought his wife died because the doctor came so late. He’d been in the village delivering some woman of twins.”

“Did they live?”

“No,” Amy said, looking at Faith. “All three of them died, plus Tristan’s wife and child. He calls it the Night of Death.”

“More likely it was a night when the doctor didn’t wash his hands before delivering the babies. Why should he when birthing is such a messy, dirty job anyway? Why bother washing your hands when you’re just going to get them dirty again?”