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relatives of the dead often bribe the searchers, elderly women hired by the parish to record the cause of death, to overlook any sign of venereal disease upon the late beloved. In this way, the Bills of Mortality—published each week by the parish-clerks of London, and given in a monthly report to His Majesty the King—have included, along with the usual number of deaths from Fever and Consumption, fatalities of a strange and mysterious nature, such as Timpany, Rising of the Lights, and Vapors in the Head.
    Her father’s mentor, Dr. Thomas Sydenham, was one of the first physicians to make clear the distinctions between the two diseases. Charles Briscoe built upon Dr. Sydenham’s illuminating observations of the disease process and, like him, often set aside humoral theory in favor of his empirical findings. Both men believed that illness was caused not by an imbalance of humors but by an outside agent working on the body. The patient’s imbalance was simply another symptom of disease. This departure from traditional Galenic theory was controversial, but it had some impressive results. In the course of his years with the permissive English court, both in France and in England, Dr. Briscoe developed, by popular demand as it were, a special serum and a method of treatment for the clap that enjoyed a reputation for being as sure as it was secret. And Hannah is the only one who knows it.
    If she wasn’t so overcome by the manner in which Arlington chose to make off with her, she might have realized sooner why she was suddenly so necessary to him, why he chose her instead of one of the courtdoctors. Arlington knew, or at least suspected, what afflicted Louise before he abducted Hannah.
    When she enters the sitting room and informs him and Madame Severin of her diagnosis, he does not look surprised.
    “It is not the pox, then?” Madame Severin asks.
    “No, but there is still cause for concern,” Hannah replies. “She has an extreme exacerbation of the clap such as I have rarely seen. If she survives, she may no longer be able to conceive.”
    “ If she survives?” Madame Severin turns reproachfully on Arlington, speaking angrily in French. “You told me that she had a secret cure, that it was infallible.”
    “Madame Severin, you should be aware that Mrs. Devlin is fluent in the French tongue.” The minister’s voice is steady, though Hannah notes a strain of irritation underneath: he does not brook being spoken to in such a way. “Her mother is French and her father raised his family in France during the king’s exile, as any good Royalist, such as her father once was, would have done. I beg you to be more discreet.”
    Hannah senses Madame Severin’s cold fury at Arlington’s reprimand, but the mistress of the bedchamber is too experienced a courtier to show her displeasure. And what does the minister mean by that dig at her father: a good Royalist as he once was? She knows that her father became disillusioned with the king after the Restoration, but so did many others. What happened between him and Arlington?
    “Do you have knowledge of your father’s secret cure or not?” the minister inquires, keeping to the point. He is, as he said, a busy man.
    “I do, although I am hesitant to call it a cure. I don’t believe that he ever ministered to a woman as seriously ill as Mademoiselle de Keroualle, so I cannot guarantee its efficacy in all cases. I can only assure you that I will do my best to help her.”
    “Your best had better be perfect,” Arlington warns. “Excepting the king, Mademoiselle de Keroualle has no better friends than Madame Severin and I, and we intend that she shall receive the finest care, for her own sake as well as the king’s.”
    And for your own sake as well, Hannah adds silently.
    “Obviously,” Arlington continues, “we cannot conceal that themademoiselle is ill, but we require discretion concerning the nature of her illness. We will put it about that she has a contagious ague