Bartholomew knew little about the days he was ill.
Occasionally he was conscious enough to hear low voices, and he heard the College bell ringing for meals and for church services. The swellings on his neck, groin, and under his arms gave him intense pain, and he was usually aware of little else.
After five days, he saw a candle flickering on the shelf under the window. He watched it for a while, wondering why the shutters were closed and a candle burning when he could see daylight seeping under the door. As he tried to turn his head, a searing pain in his neck brought everything back to him. He remembered walking back from the plague pit and finding the obnoxious student sleeping on his bed, and recalled meeting Philippa in the shack in the convent grounds.
'Philippa!' he said, his voice no more than a whisper.
'She is well, but worried about you, as is your sister.'
The student had appeared, and was leaning over him, dark rings under his eyes, and his hair even more rumpled than Bartholomew remembered.
'What are you doing here?' Bartholomew croaked.
'Tsk, man! The lad has been looking after you day and night! Show a little gratitude.'
Bartholomew gave a weak grin. 'Cynric! Thank God! I thought you might be gone.' He reached for Cynric's hand to assure himself his imagination was not playing tricks.
Cynric, touched, became brusque. 'Lie still, or those incisions will start bleeding again.'
'What incisions? Did Gregory Colet come?'
'Master Colet has given up on the world, and spends his days on his knees with the monks. It is young Samuel who has been looking after you.'
Bartholomew looked appalled, and winced as he tried to move his arms to check where the swellings on his neck would have been. "I feel as though I have been savaged by a dog,' he groaned. 'What has he done to me?'
'He cut the swellings open to drain them. Just as you have been doing to others, Master Physician. Now you know how it feels,' said Cynric, ruefully rubbing his own lacerated neck.
Bartholomew looked at the student. 'Who are you?' he asked, wondering why a fit and healthy young man would opt to care for a plague victim he did not know.
'Samuel Gray,' said the student, promptly.
'Yes, from Bene't Hostel. But that is not what I meant. What do you want from me?'
Gray looked at the floor. "I followed you to Trumpington, and then back in the snow. When you returned from seeing the miller's boy, I came here while you went off to see to Cynric. I was waiting for you, but you were such a long time, I fell asleep.' He looked up and met Bartholomew's eyes. "I was Master Roper's student, and he is dead, so I would like to study under you.'
His speech over, he tried to look nonchalant, as if Bartholomew's response was not that important to him anyway, but in the silence that followed, his face grew anxious and he watched Bartholomew intently.
"I see.' Bartholomew was suddenly very tired, and could not stop his eyes from closing. Then he was shaken awake again. 'Will you have me?' the student asked insistently.
Bartholomew struggled to free himself from Gray's grip, but was as weak as a kitten. 'Why me? What have I done to deserve this?' he said, his voice heavy with sleepiness.
Gray looked at him narrowly, trying to assess whether there was a hidden insult in the question. 'There are not many of you left,' he said rudely.
Bartholomew heard Cynric laughing. He could feel himself drifting into a deep and restful slumber. Gray's voice brought him awake again.
'Will you have me? I have a good degree, you can ask Hugh Stapleton. Oh…' his voice trailed off.
Stapleton was dead. 'Master Abigny!' he exclaimed jubilantly. 'You can ask him, he knows me!' He gave Bartholomew another gentle shake.
Bartholomew reached up and grabbed a handful of Gray's tunic, pulling him down towards the bed. 'You will never be a good physician unless you can learn when to let your patients rest,' he whispered, 'and you will never be a good student unless you learn not to manhandle your master.'
Releasing Gray's clothing, he closed his eyes and was instantly asleep. Gray looked at Cynric. 'Was that a yes or a no?' he asked.
Cynric, still smiling, shrugged and left the room, closing the door softly behind him. Gray stood looking down at Bartholomew for several minutes before tidying the bedclothes and blowing out the candle. He lay down on the pallet bed Cynric had given him and stared into the darkness. He knew that Bartholomew would live now, so long as he rested and regained his strength.
Bartholomew coughed in his sleep, and Gray raised himself on one elbow to peer over at him. He believed he had taken no risk in tending Bartholomew, for he was one of the plague's first victims in Cambridge and had survived. He did not think he would catch the disease a second time, and had been making a good deal of money by offering to tend plague victims in the houses of rich merchants. But that was nothing compared to what he may have earned by nursing Bartholomew. He had heard about Bartholomew's methods and ideas, and had longed to study with him when he was an undergraduate, but the physician already had as many students as he could manage.
Gray knew exactly what he wanted from life. He intended to become an excellent physician and have a large number of very wealthy patients. Perhaps he might even become the private physician of some nobleman.
Regardless, he intended to find himself a position that would bring him wealth and enough free time to be able to enjoy it. He knew Bartholomew worked among the poor, but to Gray that meant he would gain far more experience of diseases than from a physician who tended the rich. He would be happy to work among the poor during his medical training, but then he would be off to make his fortune in York or Bristol, or perhaps even London.
Gray smiled to himself and lay back down, his arms behind his head. He and Cynric had been caring for Bartholomew continuously for five days and nights, and several times had thought their labours were in vain.
Brother Michael had actually given Bartholomew last rites before the fever suddenly broke.
Once Bartholomew had slept almost twenty-four hours without waking, his recovery was rapid. He was out of his bed and taking his first unsteady steps around the College yard within a day, and felt ready to begin his work again within three days. Michael, Cynric, and Gray urged him to rest more, but Bartholomew insisted that tossing restlessly on his bed was more tiring than working. Bartholomew decided that all plague victims in the College should be in one room so that they could have constant attention.
He set about converting the commoners' dormitory into a hospital ward, relocating the few surviving commoners elsewhere. Brother Michael's Benedictine room-mates willingly offered their services, and Bartholomew hoped that this arrangement might reduce the risks to others.
As soon as he could, Bartholomew went to see Gregory Colet. As he walked through the wet streets to Rudde's Hostel, he was shocked at the piles of rubbish and dead animals that littered them. There were three bodies, crudely wrapped in filthy rags, at the doors of St Michael's Church that Bartholomew judged to have been there for several days. Around them, several rats lay dead and dying, some half-buried in mud and refuse.
Brother Michael walked beside him, his cowl pulled over his head in an attempt to mask the stench.
'What has happened here, Michael?' said Bartholomew in disbelief. He watched a ragged band of children playing on a huge pile of kitchen waste outside Garret Hostel, occasionally stopping to eat some morsel that they considered edible. On the opposite side of the street, two large pigs rooted happily among a similar pile of rubbish. He shook his head in despair at the filth and disorder.
Michael shrugged. 'There is no one left to do anything. Now that Colet has given up, you and Robin of Grantchester are the only medics here. All the others are dead or gone.'