Doctor Who_ Byzantium! - Keith Topping [61]
he said, remembering that he had witnessed King Lear's debut performance, fifteen hundred years in the future.
Richard Burbage was a good actor, the Doctor reflected, but rubbish at portraying old men crushed by the delicious uncertainties of life. 'Oh, but I am tired, my friend,' the Doctor said, wistfully, looking into the half-distance at the lights of the town. 'And horrified at the thought of spending the rest of my days stuck in your Byzantium.'
James seemed unsure of how to reply. 'There are worse places to be, surely?'
Ì' m struggling to think of one just at this particular moment.'
‘I am sorry that your carriage has disappeared,' James continued, sensing the cause of the Doctor's misery.
'Perhaps it will turn up.’
`Perhaps,' the Doctor noted. `Though I doubt it'
`You must have faith,' said James. Then he saw the thoroughly grumpy expression on the Doctor's face and decided to change the subject. 'Hebron is worse,' he said.
The Doctor stood up and followed James back into the cave, to a quiet corner where Hebron lay propped up on one elbow, his face twisted in pain. Seeing the Doctor approach, Hebron instantly switched on a beaming smile and lay back.
'You have come at last, my friend,' he said.
The old Christian was clearly ill, the Doctor had seen that in Hebron’s pale face, the sagging skin that was evidence of a dramatic weight loss and those sudden moments when he could no longer hide the excruciating pain that he was suffering. The Doctor seldom befriended anyone, but in Hebron, with his fascinating tales of his travels, the Doctor had sensed a kindred spirit. Someone to whom the cause of adventure was not lost or hidden, but which had been embraced.
The Doctor knelt beside Hebron and gave him a clay pot to drink from. It was painful to watch as the old man coughed and struggled to swallow the water in his throat.
‘Do you know what ails him thus?’ asked Judith, resting a hand on Hebron’s fevered brow. Her palm came away slick and wet and she gave the Doctor and James a grave look.
‘I have some very unpleasant suspicions,’ the Doctor noted.
Hebron’s eye opened and he seemed suddenly alert again. ‘Then you will share your knowledge with me, perhaps?’ he asked.
The Doctor shook his head. ‘I am only guessing.’
‘Then make it a good guess, my friend. Hebron replied.
Placing his hand on Hebron’s chest and using his fingers and the heel of his wrist as two pressure points, the Doctor rocked his hand back and forth around Hebron’s breastbone.
‘The pain,’ he asked. ‘When you swallow, particularly. Is it here and here?’ He indicated two small lumps on Hebron’s chest.
‘Yes,’ choked Hebron as the pressure of the Doctor threatened to squeeze the life out of him. The Doctor removed his hand just before James had the chance to grab his arm and remove it for him.
‘Do you know what it is?’ asked James
The Doctor nodded, sadly. ‘A blockage in the oesophagus, the part of the alimentary canal between the pharynx and the stomach. It could be something very basic like a hernia or a stricture of some kind, but...’ He paused and looked at Hebron with a sadness in his eyes. ‘I’m sorry, but I believe it to be a cancerous growth.’
‘Can it be cured?’ asked Judith.
`No,' said Hebron before the Doctor could speak. 'Not even the Lord himself can choke the thirst of a cancer.'
'I am very sorry,' the Doctor repeated. 'I wish there was something I could do apart from giving you a diagnosis.’
'You have given me the greatest gift of all,' Hebron said brightly, the pain lessening from his face. 'The knowledge of the future.'
The Doctor had never felt so helpless, in more ways than one. `Your fortitude in the face of such news is commendable,' he managed to say, standing, and wiping the dust from his toga. 'You are a good and brave man, Hebron.'
'And you, my friend, are a braver and better one,' Hebron noted as he closed his eyes and fell into a light sleep.
`Let him rest now,' the Doctor said as Hebron's final words played around in his mind.