Crow Boy Read Free Page A

imagine what that must have smelled like.’
    â€˜Why don’t you tell everyone, Manky?’ hissed Gillies. More sniggers.
    â€˜In 1753, The Royal Exchange decided to take down the top three floors of Mary King’s Close and use the lower ones as foundations for the new City Chambers. So all this was hidden from the public view, locked away until the year 2003, when it was decided to reopen the Close as a tourist attraction. Now, we’re going to walk down the hill and look at some of the homes of people who lived here in the 1600’s.’
    She turned and led them on down the slope.
    â€˜Some tourist attraction,’ Tom heard Gillies mutter. ‘Place looks like it needs a good clean.’
    â€˜Yeah, it stinks down here,’ agreed one of his cronies. ‘Dead borin ’. ’
    But Tom didn’t agree. He thought the Close was really atmospheric. In this strange, shadowy world beneath the city, it was all too easy to imagine what it must have been like to live in those times. He pictured the narrow streets filled with the bustle of human life – carts and carriages rattling over the cobbles, salesmen and women shouting out their wares as they wandered through the crowd, ragged children chasing after the carriages to beg for coins.
    Now Agnes paused in front of an open doorway and a serious look came to her face. ‘We’re about to enter the house of one of the Close’s residents, John Craig,’ she said. ‘It’s the year 1645, and the bubonic plague has come to the city. When we go into the room, be careful you don’t bump in to anybody.’
    She led the way in and the group followed. When it came to Tom’s turn, he saw that the room was in almost total darkness, save for the light of a lantern beside a roughly made wooden bed. There was a child lying in the bed, his face and bare chest unnaturally pale – and kneeling beside him was a strange and nightmarish figure, similar to the keyring that Tom had looked at earlier. Instead of a hat, he wore a tightly fitting leather helmet, but the face was the same, a great curved beak like a bird of prey and what looked like huge round eyes. It took a few moments to register that the figures were nothing more than waxworks, but it was still an unsettling image.
    There was an uncomfortable silence before Jenny said, ‘Who’s the Crow Man?’
    Everybody laughed at this, but Agnes took it all in her stride.
    â€˜I’ve heard him called some interesting names,’ she said, ‘but that one’s a first for me.’ She moved closer to the figure. ‘This sinister-looking gentleman is Doctor George Rae, Edinburgh’s most famous plague doctor, and he’s here to treat young Thomas Craig who has contracted bubonic plague, as you can see by the telltale buboes on his body.’ She indicated a bright red swelling under the child’s left armpit. ‘Dr Rae is Edinburgh’s second plague doctor. The first, Dr John Paulitious, died in 1645, after just a short time in the job.’
    â€˜What did he die of?’ asked one boy and his friend gave him a scornful look.
    â€˜Work it out,’ he said.
    Agnes nodded. ‘Absolutely,’ she said. ‘Plague doctoring was a very dangerous profession, but quite lucrative. To take Doctor Paulitious’s place, Doctor Rae was promised the incredible salary of one hundred and ten pounds a month. His employers were happy to offer him that because they didn’t think he’d live to collect the money, but they were wrong. In the end he had to virtually sue the Town Council for his back pay.’
    â€˜But why’s he all done up like a big bird?’ asked another girl.
    Agnes smiled. ‘Back in the seventeenth century, people believed that the plague was spread by something called ‘miasma’ – infected air. The mask that the doctor wore had a beak that was literally stuffed with herbs and