Page 5 of The Secret Diary of Anne de Bourgh

I nodded and let him lead me to the sitting-room, though I kept hold of his hand until I was seated. Richard drew another chair to my side and sat holding my hand. He asked Charlotte for a tray of tea.

“Please don’t leave me.” Even though I trusted Richard, the thought of a doctor was terrifying. I could hardly make my voice come out, but Richard heard me. He squeezed my hand gently in his.

“I shall stay,” he said. “I promised that Thornely would not touch you, and I mean to keep that promise.”

Sanderson came in then, followed by a young man in army uniform. I looked past him for the doctor, but Sanderson closed the door behind them and Richard spoke.

“Anne, this is Captain Doctor Christopher Spears. Captain Spears, my cousin Miss Anne de Bourgh.”

The young officer bowed. He could not be much older than five and twenty, and I had expected someone more like Dr Thornely.

“A pleasure to make your acquaintance, Miss de Bourgh,” he said in cultured tones.

Richard would perhaps have drawn him aside for private speech, but I held Richard’s hand too tightly to let him move away. He glanced sideways at me and then said, “Doctor, it is my belief that the local doctor my aunt has engaged for my cousin’s care has seriously mis-diagnosed her and that his treatments have been making her ill.”

“Indeed?” Dr Spears looked from Richard to me, to our clasped hands, and then to my surprise, he addressed me directly. “Will you tell me of your treatment regimen, Miss de Bourgh?”

“I do not know if it is a regimen as such.” It took me a moment to make my voice come out above a whisper, but he had asked me rather than speaking over me. “Every Monday I am bled, and then Dr Thornely gives Mrs Jenkinson a list of the tonics he wishes me to take for the week.”

“Every Monday for how long?” Dr Spears furrowed his brow, and Richard turned my hand over and held up my wrist as mute testimony. “Mary Mother of God!”

I could not help a slight smile as Dr Spears echoed Richard’s oath of yesterday. At once the doctor was bending over my arm. “The other, too?”

He was obviously outraged, and so I held up my other arm for his inspection. The cut made last Monday was still a scab near my elbow, and he touched it with cool, gentle fingers. “This is the work of years!”

“Every week since she was ten years old,” Richard said, and I tightened my grip on the arm of the chair. His anger was for Thornely, but I still shrank from it.

The doctor paused, seemingly to collect himself, and then he asked, “And how old are you now, Miss de Bourgh?”

“Twenty,” I said, and Dr Spears closed his eyes and shook his head.

“Dear Lord. Colonel, you did not know of this?”

“No, and I am furious with myself that I never questioned further. My aunt has always portrayed my cousin as a sickly girl, damaged by the scarlatina that took her father, and indeed often when I have visited Anne has been too ill to see me.”

“I’m not surprised.” Dr Spears touched my face gently, inspecting my eyes. “I need to pull on your eyelid slightly, Miss de Bourgh...”

“It’s all right,” I said, and he pulled my lower eyelid down.

“Seriously anaemic, but that’s no surprise. How much blood does your doctor let, Miss de Bourgh?”

“It depends,” I said. “Sometimes no more than a cupful. But last week, because I refused to let him bleed me when I had influenza, he took more than three cups.”

“Bleed you when you had influenza? He could have killed you!” Spears shook his head, horrified, taking my hand in his again and looking carefully at the scars. “It is a miracle that you are still alive, and that you have not taken infection from all these cuts.”

“But I have, several times,” I said.

Charlotte arrived back then with a tray of tea and biscuits, and when we had all had a cup of tea Dr Spears asked if he might examine me more thoroughly with Charlotte present.

“Don’t leave me.” The panic returned and I clutched at Richard’s hand. “Please!”

“Miss de Bourgh has a quite understandable fear of doctors,” Richard said to Spears, who nodded understandingly. “My cousin Darcy is expected shortly with his doctor, and his wife. Perhaps in Mrs Darcy’s presence the two of you doctors might examine Miss de Bourgh together?”

“Whatever is needed to make the lady comfortable,” Spears said at once, “the last thing Miss de Bourgh needs is cause for any further distress, but she does need a complete examination.”

The Darcy carriage arrived while we were finishing tea, and Charlotte went to replenish the tray while Sanderson escorted the visitors to Richard’s rooms. Darcy came in first, with Elizabeth on his arm. She wore yellow silk and looked at me before she looked at anyone else. A second doctor followed them.

“What is this all about, cousin?” Darcy said irritably. And then his eyes fell on me, and he made me a slight bow. “Cousin Anne.”