An Unholy Alliance by Susanna Gregory

Author:Susanna Gregory
Language: eng
Format: epub

She rubbed a dirty hand over her face and tears began to roll. He saw a half-empty bottle on a table in the middle of the room, and poured some of its contents into a drinking vessel that had not been washed for days. He handed it to her and then made her sit on one of the stools. He sat opposite, and patted her hand comfortingly, feeling ineffectual.

Eventually she looked up at him, her eyes swollen and red. 'I am sorry,' she sniffed.

'What is wrong?' Bartholomew said helplessly. 'Please tell me. I may be able to help.'

She shook her head. 'You are a kind man, Doctor,' she said, 'but there is nothing you can do to help me.

I am doomed.'

Bartholomew was nonplussed. 'Doomed? But why?'

Sybilla sniffed loudly and scrubbed her nose across her arm. "I saw him,' she said, her eyes full of terror, and began to cry again. Bartholomew waited until the new wave of sobbing had subsided, and made her drink more of the cheap wine from the clay goblet.

'Tell me what happened,' he said. 'And then we will decide what to do.'

She looked at him, her eyes burning with a sudden hope in her white face. Just then, the door swung open and a woman entered. Bartholomew rose politely to his feet. She stopped dead as she saw him, and looked from him to Sybilla, her face breaking into a wide smile.

'Oh, Sybilla!' she said. 'I am glad you have decided to go back to work. I told you it would do you good. You look better already. I will leave you in peace.'

She turned to leave. Bartholomew was half embarrassed and half amused at her assumption.

'You misunderstand, Mistress,' he said. 'I am only a physician.'

The woman beamed at Sybilla. 'Better than that stonemason you had! You are doing well.'

Sybilla rose unsteadily and grasped the woman's arm.

'He is not a customer,' she said.

The other's attitude changed. 'Well, what do you want then?' she demanded of Bartholomew. 'Can you not see she is unwell?'

'Yes, I can,' said Bartholomew. 'That is why I am trying to help.'

'Help?' asked the woman suspiciously. 'How do you think you can help?'

'I cannot know that,' said Bartholomew, his patience fraying slightly, 'until I know what ails her. She was about to tell me when you came in.'

'Have you told him?' she asked Sybilla. Sybilla shook her head. 'Then do not. How do you know this is not him, or someone sent by him to find out what you know?'

Sybilla shrank back against the wall, and more tears began to roll down her face.

'If I were "him",' said Bartholomew testily, 'you have just told me that Sybilla knows something, and you have put her life in danger.'

The woman looked at him aghast. 'God's blood,' she swore in horror. She turned her gaze on Sybilla. 'What have I done?' She pulled herself together suddenly, seized a rusty knife from the table, and brandished it at Bartholomew. 'Who are you, and what do you want from us?' she demanded, steel in her voice.

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