We walked for a while in silence until I felt the tension in her ease as her pace slowed. "So you like the guards more as you get to know them better," I teased. "Any one in particular?"
"Don't, Josie. I'm not in the mood."
I stayed silent for the remainder of the walk.
We were woken by shouts and someone banging on the door. "Josie! Josie, help!" It must be either Delle's husband or the husband of my other patient. Hailia, please don't let it be too bad.
By the time I reached the door, Meg's father had already answered it. The man standing there clutching his arm and coughing was not a family member of any of my patients, but I knew him well.
"Wallace, come in, come in," Mr. Diver said. "What's wrong? Is that smoke I smell?"
I smelled it too. Then I saw the glow above the rooftops. "Merdu," I said. "Fire!"
"The Row," Wallace gasped out between his coughs. "It's burning."
"All of it?" Meg asked.
Wallace nodded gravely. "Me and some who live near it tried to help, but it was too hot. And the smoke…"
"Lyle!" Mr. Diver shouted as he ran back inside. "Lyle, get up! Get dressed!"
Outside, several other men up and down the street were dashing out of their homes, pulling on coats and gloves, blankets or pails slung over their shoulders. If The Row were on fire, they'd need more than that.
And then I saw the stream of people making their way to the Ashmoles' house across the way. Women and children, mostly, and a few men barely able to stand. They coughed and spluttered, and cradled injured arms. They cried, some even wailing as they hurried forward, carrying a limp loved one. The air was clogged with smoke and the sounds of pain, misery, and utter desperation.
There were so many, and all heading in the same direction. To my old house.
"Josie, can you look at my arm?" Wallace asked.
"She can't help you," Meg said. "You know she can't. I'm sorry to turn you away, but you have to go to Doctor Ashmole."
"He already has too many patients," Wallace rasped.
"I know but—"
"Please, Josie. No one will notice if I come in. Patch me up so I can go back and help fight the fire. If it spreads, all of Mull will be in danger."
The figure of Mistress Ashmole appeared in the doorway opposite, candlestick in hand. She let in the first person in the queue and refused entry to the next in line. The woman cradling a baby slumped against the wall as a coughing fit overtook her.
Mistress Ashmole glanced toward us and lifted her candle higher.
Meg bundled Wallace outside and he trudged away, coughing, and joined the queue outside the Ashmoles' house. One of the patients in the middle of the queue, a man clutching the side of his face, stepped out of line and approached her.
"Wait your turn!" Mistress Ashmole snapped. She disappeared inside and slammed the door shut. I heard the bolt slide across.
"Why won't she assess them and prioritize the order according to the severity of their injuries?" Meg asked.
"She doesn't know how," her mother said. "She's overwhelmed."
I headed back to my room and quickly dressed.
"No, Josie," Meg said, blocking the doorway. "You're not going over there. Doctor Ashmole will just have to see them one at a time. Perhaps he will look at the queue and pick out who to see first."
He might, but it wouldn't matter. He was only one man, one doctor. Even if I did help prioritize the patients for him, he could only work so quickly. Most of the injuries would be burns and there was little to do except slather on the sap from the pomfrey tree. But Mistress Ashmole wouldn't have enough of it, and the patients would be coming all night.
"There is something we can do," I told them. "Doctor Ashmole will need more sap and bandages. Much more."
Meg's eyes lit up. "We'll ask the other women in the street to help us collect as much as we can carry." She snatched up her cloak and flung it around her shoulders, not bothering to put on a gown over her shift first. "We'll take it to Mistress Ashmole."
Mistress Diver met my gaze. "And bring some back here?"
I nodded.
"Mother!" Meg cried. "You can't ask Josie to do that."
"It's my choice," I told her. "I won't stand by when I can do something."
"It's too dangerous. It won't be a fine this time. You'll be imprisoned. Or worse."
"Bring the patients in the back way through the courtyard," I said. "We'll swear them to secrecy."
Meg made a scoffing sound.
Her mother picked up Meg's boots and handed them to her. "They'll agree if it's going to save them and their loved ones."
I hoped I could save some of them. Burns were difficult to treat, and breathing in smoke could be just as deadly, if not more so. Some people would die from their injuries. I prayed it wouldn’t be many.
Chapter 4
I prepared the kitchen as best as I could while Meg and her mother gathered pomfrey sap in the forest. I tore linen into strips, cringing as I did so. It wasn't my linen. But Mistress Diver would have done it if she were there, and I knew she would have it no other way.
Torren Bramm, a fisherman, came to the front door, coughing so hard that he could hardly speak. His eyes watered and both of his hands were wrapped in cloths.
"You can't come in," I told him. "Not this way. Go around the back. Don't let the Ashmoles see you."
He nodded, understanding my meaning, and left, his body bent as another cough wracked him. Torren was a good man, and I knew his daughters well. He wouldn't cause trouble for me.
I realized as I returned to the kitchen that only the men would come to me for help. Few people from inside The Row knew I had medical knowledge, so they would not come. Long-time locals from outside The Row who tried to put out the fire would be men. It was they who would approach me when they saw the long queue of injured at Doctor Ashmole's house.
Before I reached the kitchen, someone else banged on the front door. It was another man I knew, a good friend of my father's. I told him the same thing I'd told Torren Bramm. As he walked off, I glanced again at the fiery glow in the night sky. It had grown. The stars and moon had disappeared behind clouds of smoke. Mull was being smothered from above and burned from within. I'd seen fires before, although not on this scale. I knew how fast they could spread. If it wasn't put out soon, it would reach my street.
I glanced westward, in the direction of the palace. Could they smell the smoke from there?
I was about to close the door when I spotted a shadowy figure moving in the window opposite. Mistress Ashmole, perhaps, keeping an eye on me, or on the long queue that was growing restless as they waited to be seen by her husband.
Torren was waiting for me in the kitchen when I reached it. I helped him to drink a tankard of water then set a large pot to boil on the stove, adding a pinch of amani spice I found in Mistress Diver's larder. The steam would help clear his airways. Then I unwrapped the bandages around his hands. They were blackened and swollen, the skin blistering.
"There's nothing to do except wait for the pomfrey sap," I said. "Until then, try to relax and steady your breathing.