Dragonfly in Amber

"Is that a dog?" I had asked one of the orderlies in amazement, when I first beheld Bouton, passing through the Hôpital at the heels of his mistress.

He paused in his floor-sweeping to look after the curly, plumed tail, disappearing into the next ward.

"Well," he said doubtfully, "Mother Hildegarde says he's a dog. I wouldn't like to be the one to say he isn't."

As I became more friendly with the nuns, orderlies, and visiting physicians of the Hôpital, I heard various other opinions of Bouton, ranging from the tolerant to the superstitious. No one knew quite where Mother Hildegarde had got him, nor why. He had been a member of the Hôpital staff for several years, with a rank—in Mother Hildegarde's opinion, which was the only one that counted—well above that of the nursing sisters, and equal to that of most of the visiting physicians and apothecaries.

Some of the latter regarded him with suspicious aversion, others with jocular affability. One chirurgeon referred to him routinely—out of Mother's hearing—as "that revolting rat," another as "the smelly rabbit," and one small, tubby truss-maker greeted him quite openly as "Monsieur le Dishcloth." The nuns considered him something between a mascot and a totem, while the junior priest from the cathedral next door, who had been bitten in the leg when he came to administer the sacraments to the patients, confided to me his own opinion that Bouton was one of the lesser demons, disguised as a dog for his own fell purposes.

In spite of the unflattering tone of the priest's remarks, I thought that he had perhaps come the closest to the truth. For after several weeks of observing the pair, I had come to the conclusion that Bouton was in fact Mother Hildegarde's familiar.

She spoke to him often, not in the tone one generally uses for dogs, but as one discussing important matters with an equal. As she paused beside this bed or that, often Bouton would spring onto the mattress, nuzzling and sniffing at the startled patient. He would sit down, often on the patient's legs, bark once, and glance up inquiringly at Mother, wagging his silky plumed tail as though asking her opinion of his diagnosis—which she always gave.

Though I was rather curious about this behavior, I had had no opportunity of closely observing the odd pair at work until one dark, rainy morning in March. I was standing by the bed of a middle-aged carter, making casual conversation with him while I tried to figure out what in bloody hell was wrong with the man.

It was a case that had come in the week before. He had had his lower leg caught in the wheel of a cart when he carelessly dismounted before the vehicle had stopped moving. It was a compound fracture, but a fairly uncomplicated one. I had reset the bone, and the wound seemed to be healing nicely. The tissue was a healthy pink, with good granulation, no bad smell, no telltale red streaks, no extreme tenderness, nothing at all to explain why the man still smoldered with fever and produced the dark, odorous urine of a lingering infection.

"Bonjour, Madame." The deep, rich voice spoke above me, and I glanced up at the towering form of Mother Hildegarde. There was a whish past my elbow, and Bouton landed on the mattress with a thump that made the patient groan slightly.

"What do you think?" said Mother Hildegarde. I wasn't at all sure whether she was addressing me or Bouton, but took the benefit of the doubt and explained my observations.

"So, there must be a secondary source of infection," I concluded, "but I can't find it. I'm wondering now whether perhaps he has an internal infection that's not related to the leg wound. A mild appendicitis, or a bladder infection, perhaps, though I don't find any abdominal tenderness, either."

Mother Hildegarde nodded. "A possibility, certainly. Bouton!" The dog cocked his head toward his mistress, who jerked an oblong chin in the direction of the patient. "A la bouche, Bouton," she ordered. With a mincing step, the dog pushed the round black nose that presumably gave him his name into the carter's face. The man's eyes, heavy-lidded with fever, sprang open at this intrusion, but a glance at the imposing presence of Mother Hildegarde stopped whatever complaint he might have been forming.

"Open your mouth," Mother Hildegarde instructed, and such was her force of character that he did so, even though his lips twitched at the nearness of Bouton's. Dog-kissing plainly wasn't on his agenda of desirable activities.

"No," said Mother Hildegarde thoughtfully, watching Bouton. "That isn't it. Have a look elsewhere, Bouton, but carefully. The man has a broken leg, remember."

As though he had in fact understood every word, the dog began to sniff curiously at the patient, nosing into his armpits, putting stubby feet on his chest in order to investigate, nudging gently along the crease of the groin. When it came to the injured leg, he stepped carefully over the limb before putting his nose to the surface of the bandages round it.

He returned to the groin area—well, what else, I thought impatiently, he's a dog, after all—nudged at the top of the thigh, then sat down and barked once, wagging triumphantly.

"There it is," said Mother Hildegarde, pointing to a small brown scab just below the inguinal crease.

"But that's almost healed," I protested. "It isn't infected."

"No?" The tall nun placed a hand on the man's thigh and pressed hard. Her muscular fingers dented the pale, clammy flesh, and the carter screamed like a banshee.

"Ah," she said in satisfaction, observing the deep prints left by her touch. "A pocket of putrefaction."

It was; the scab had loosened at one edge, and a thick ooze of yellow pus showed under it. A little probing, with Mother Hildegarde holding the man by leg and shoulder, revealed the problem. A long sliver of wood, flying free of the splintered cartwheel, had driven upward, deep into the thigh. Disregarded because of the apparently insignificant entrance wound, it had gone unnoticed by the patient himself, to whom the whole leg was one giant pain. While the tiny entrance wound had healed cleanly, the deeper wound had festered and formed a pocket of pus around the intrusion, buried in the muscle tissue where no surface symptoms were visible—to human senses, at least.

A little scalpel work to enlarge the entrance wound, a quick grip with a pair of long-nosed forceps, a smooth, forceful pull—and I held up a three-inch sliver of wood, coated with blood and slime.

"Not bad, Bouton," I said, with a nod of acknowledgment. A long pink tongue lolled happily, and the black nostrils sniffed in my direction.

"Yes, she's a good one," said Mother Hildegarde, and this time there was no doubt which of us she was speaking to, Bouton being male. Bouton leaned forward and sniffed politely at my hand, then licked my knuckles once in reciprocal acknowledgment of a fellow professional. I repressed the urge to wipe my hand on my gown.

"Amazing," I said, meaning it.

"Yes," said Mother Hildegarde, casually, but with an unmistakable note of pride. "He's very good at locating tumors beneath the skin, as well. And while I cannot always tell what he finds in the odors of breath and urine, he has a certain tone of bark that indicates unmistakably the presence of a derangement of the stomach."

Under the circumstances, I saw no reason to doubt it. I bowed to Bouton, and picked up a vial of powdered St.-John's-wort to dress the infection.

"Pleased to have your assistance, Bouton. You can work with me anytime."

"Very sensible of you," said Mother Hildegarde, with a flash of strong teeth. "Many of the physicians and chirurgiens who work here are less inclined to take advantage of his skills."

"Er, well.…" I didn't want to disparage anyone's reputation, but my glance across the hall at Monsieur Voleru must have been transparent.

Mother Hildegarde laughed. "Well, we take what God sends us, though occasionally I wonder whether He sends them to us only in order to keep them out of greater trouble elsewhere. Still, the bulk of our physicians are better than nothing—even if only marginally so. You"—and the teeth flashed once more, reminding me of a genial draft horse—"are a great deal better than nothing, Madame."

"Thanks."

"I have wondered, though," Mother Hildegarde went on, watching as I applied the medicated dressing, "why you see only the patients with wounds and broken bones? You avoid those with spots and coughs and fevers, yet it is more common for les maîtresses to deal with such things. I don't think I have ever seen a female chirurgien before." Les maîtresses were the unlicensed healers, mostly from the provinces, who dealt in herbals, poultices, and charms. Les maîtresses sage-femme were the midwives, the top of the heap so far as popular healers were concerned. Many were accorded more respect than the licensed practitioners, and were much preferred by the lower-class patients, as they were likely to be both more capable and much less expensive.

I wasn't surprised that she had observed my proclivities; I had gathered long since that very little about her Hôpital escaped Mother Hildegarde's notice.

"It isn't lack of interest," I assured her. "It's only that I'm with child, so I can't expose myself to anything contagious, for the child's sake. Broken bones aren't catching."

"Sometimes I wonder," said Mother Hildegarde, with a glance at an incoming stretcher. "We're having a plague of them this week. No, don't go." She motioned me back. "Sister Cecile will see to it. She'll call you if there's need."

The nun's small gray eyes regarded me with curiosity, mingled with appraisal.

"So, you are not only a milady, you are with child, but your husband does not object to your coming here? He must be a most unusual man."

"Well, he's Scottish," I said, by way of explanation, not wishing to go into the subject of my husband's objections.

"Oh, Scottish." Mother Hildegarde nodded understandingly. "Just so."

The bed trembled against my thigh as Bouton leaped off and trotted toward the door.

"He smells a stranger," Mother Hildegarde remarked. "Bouton assists the doorkeeper as well as the physicians—with no more gratitude for his efforts, I fear."

The sounds of peremptory barks and a high voice raised in terror came through the double doors of the entryway.

"Oh, it's Father Balmain again! Curse the man, can't he learn to stand still and let Bouton smell him?" Mother Hildegarde turned in haste to the succor of her companion, turning back at the last moment to smile engagingly at me. "Perhaps I will send him to assist you with your tasks, Madame, while I soothe Father Balmain. While no doubt a most holy man, he lacks true appreciation for the work of an artist."

She strode toward the doors with her long, unhurried stride, and with a last word for the carter, I turned to Sister Cecile and the latest stretcher case.

Jamie was lying on the carpet in the sitting room when I came back to the house, with a small boy sitting cross-legged on the floor beside him. Jamie was holding a bilboquet in one hand, and had the other poised over one eye.

"Of course I can," he was saying. "Anyday and twice on Sundays. Watch."

Placing the hand over his eye, he fixed the other piercingly on the bilboquet and gave the ivory cup a toss. The tethered ball leaped from its socket into an arc, and dropped as though guided by radar, landing back in its cup with a snug little plop.

"See?" he said, removing the hand from his eye. He sat up and handed the cup to the boy. "Here, you try it." He grinned at me, and slid a hand under the hem of my skirt, clasping my green silk ankle in greeting.

"Having fun?" I inquired.

"Not yet," he replied, giving the ankle a squeeze. "I was waiting for you, Sassenach." The long, warm fingers curled around my ankle slid higher, playfully stroking the curve of my calf, as a pair of limpid blue eyes gazed up at me, all innocence. His face had a streak of dried mud down one side, and there were dirty blotches on his shirt and kilt.

"Is that so?" I said, trying to pull my leg free of his grasp inconspicuously. "I should have thought your little playmate would have been all the company you needed."

The boy, understanding none of the English in which these exchanges were conducted, ignored them, intent on trying to work the bilboquet with one eye closed. The first two attempts having failed, he opened the second eye and glared at the toy, as though daring it not to work. The second eye closed again, but not all the way; a small slit remained, gleaming alertly below the thick fringe of dark lashes.

Jamie clicked his tongue disapprovingly, and the eye hastily snapped tight shut.

"Nah, then, Fergus, we'll have nay cheatin', if ye please," he said. "Fair's fair." The boy obviously caught the meaning, if not the words; he grinned sheepishly, displaying a pair of large, white, gleamingly perfect front teeth, square as a squirrel's.

Jamie's hand exerted an invisible pull, obliging me to move closer to him to avoid being toppled off my moroccan heels.

"Ah," he said. "Well, Fergus here is a man of many talents, and a boon companion for the idle hours when a man's wife has deserted him and left him to seek his own pursuits amidst the wickedness of the city"—the long fingers curled delicately into the hollow behind my knee, tickling suggestively—"but he isna qualified as a partner for the pastime I had in mind."

"Fergus?" I said, eyeing the boy, and trying to ignore the goings-on below. The lad was possibly nine or ten, but small for his age, and fine-boned as a ferret. Clad in clean, worn clothes several sizes too big for him, he was also as French as they come, with the pale, sallow skin and big, dark eyes of a Parisian street child.

"Well, his name is really Claudel, but we decided that didna sound verra manly, so he's to be called Fergus instead. A suitable warrior's name, that." Catching the sound of his name—or names—the boy glanced up and grinned shyly at me.

"This is Madame," Jamie explained to the boy, gesturing to me with his free hand. "You may call her milady. I dinna think he could manage ‘Broch Tuarach,' " he added to me, "or even Fraser, for that matter."

" ‘Milady' will be fine," I said, smiling. I wriggled my leg harder, trying to shake off the leechlike grip. "Er, why, if I may ask?"

"Why what? Oh, why Fergus, ye mean?"

"That's what I mean, all right." I wasn't sure just how far his arm would reach, but the hand was creeping slowly up the back of my thigh. "Jamie, take your hand away this minute!"

The fingers darted to one side, and deftly pulled loose the ribbon garter that held up my stocking. The stocking slithered down my leg to puddle round my ankle.

"You beast!" I kicked at him, but he dodged aside, laughing.

"Oh, beast, is it? What kind?"

"A cur!" I snapped, trying to bend over to pull up my stocking without falling off my heels. The child Fergus, after a brief, incurious glance at us, had resumed his trials with the bilboquet.

"As for the lad," he continued blithely, "Fergus is now in my employ."

"To do what?" I asked. "We already have a boy who cleans the knives and boots, and a stable-lad."

Jamie nodded. "Aye, that's true. We havena got a pickpocket, though. Or rather, we hadn't; we have, now."

I drew in my breath and blew it out again slowly.

"I see. I suppose it would be dense of me to ask exactly why we need to add a pickpocket to the household?"

"To steal letters, Sassenach," Jamie said calmly.

"Oh," I said, light beginning to dawn.

"I canna get anything sensible out of His Highness; when he's with me, he wilna do anything but moan about Louise de La Tour, or grind his teeth and curse because they've been quarreling again. In either case, all he wants to do is to get drunk as quickly as possible. Mar is losing all patience with him, for he's haughty and sullen by turns. And I canna get anything out of Sheridan."

The Earl of Mar was the most respected of the exiled Scottish Jacobites in Paris. A man whose long and illustrious prime was only now beginning to edge into elderliness, he had been the primary supporter of King James at the abortive Rising in 1715, and had followed his king into exile after the defeat at Sheriffsmuir. I had met the Earl and liked him; an elderly, courtly man with a personality as straight as his backbone. He was now doing his best—with little reward, it seemed—for his lord's son. I had met Thomas Sheridan, too; the Prince's tutor—an elderly man who handled His Highness's correspondence, translating impatience and illiteracy into courtly French and English.

I sat down and pulled my stocking back up. Fergus, apparently hardened to the sight of female limbs, ignored me altogether, concentrating grimly on the bilboquet.

"Letters, Sassenach," he said. "I need the letters. Letters from Rome, sealed with the Stuart crest. Letters from France, letters from England, letters from Spain. We can get them either from the Prince's house—Fergus can go with me, as a page—or possibly from the papal messenger who brings them; that would be a bit better, as we'd have the information in advance."

"So, we've made the bargain," Jamie said, nodding at his new servant. "Fergus will do his best to get what I need, and I will provide him with clothes and lodging and thirty écus a year. If he's caught while doing my service, I'll do my best to buy him off. If it canna be done, and he loses a hand or an ear, then I maintain him for the rest of his life, as he wilna be able to pursue his profession. And if he's hanged, then I guarantee to have Masses said for his soul for the space of a year. I think that's fair, no?"

I felt a cold hand pass down my spine.

"Jesus Christ, Jamie" was all I could find to say.

He shook his head, and reached out a hand for the bilboquet. "Not our Lord, Sassenach. Pray to St. Dismas. The patron saint of thieves and traitors."

Jamie reached over and took the bilboquet from the boy. He flicked his wrist sharply and the ivory ball rose in a perfect parabola, to descend into its cup with an inevitable plop.

"I see," I said. I eyed the new employee with interest as he took the toy Jamie offered him and started in on it once more, dark eyes gleaming with concentration. "Where did you get him?" I asked curiously.

"I found him in a brothel."

"Oh, of course," I said. "To be sure." I eyed the dirt and smears on his clothes. "Which you were visiting for some really excellent reason, I expect?"

"Oh, aye," he said. He sat back, arms wrapped about his knees, grinning as he watched me make repairs to my garter. "I thought you'd prefer me to be found in such an establishment, to the alternative of bein' found in a dark alleyway, wi' my head bashed in."