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countless bleedings and purges, the man had rallied, then failed again as the consumptive disease ran its bloody course.
    The wizened man knocked at the door, then made pleasant conversation as White ’s lovely daughter led him back into the bedchamber where the frail scholar reclined upon tattered pillows. The stench of death lay heavy in the room. White’s bony hand waved the daughter away, and when he spoke, the apothecary had to lean close to hear.
    “I want a mixture to make me sleep,” White said, phlegm rumbling in his lungs and throat. “A deep sleep, mind you, with no waking for at least five hours. Something that can be stirred into a drink, and swallowed easily.”
    The apothecary nodded. “Is the pain so great?”
    White made a brave attempt at a smile. “ ‘Tis immense,” he said, his eyes shining like dark globes in the narrow sockets of a skeleton. “Pray deliver it tomorrow, and place it into my own hand, not my daughter’s.”
    “It will be done, Master White,” the apothecary answered, struggling to hold his breath so he would not inhale the thickened odors of the room. He bowed, then hurried out of the house.
     
     
    “Supper is ready, Papa,” Jocelyn called, carrying a bowl of pottage into the bedchamber. She lay the bowl on the bed while she arranged her father’s pillows so he could sit upright, then she held the spoon and fed him the watered-down pottage. She tried to smile and keep her voice light as she chatted about the day’s events in their part of the city, but after a dozen spoonfuls her father’s frail hand pushed the spoon away.
    “ ‘Tis enough, Jocelyn, I am not hungry,” he said. The sight of his weary smile through cracked and bleeding lips brought tears to her eyes.
    “Would you like me to read to you?” she said, turning away. “Something from Aristophanes? Sophocles? Marcus Aurelius?”
    “No Greeks or Romans today.” His head fell upon the pillow. “But if you could find something in the Scriptures . . .”
    His eyes closed, and Jocelyn fumbled for the leather-bound Bible by his bed. The “Bishops ’ Bible,” as ‘twas called, was a beloved translation of the Scriptures authorized for the Church of England. Jocelyn let the book fall open to a well-worn page and began reading:
     
    And you, who were dead in trespasses and sins; wherein in time past ye walked according to the curse of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience . . . But God who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead in sins has quickened us together with Christ, for by grace ye are saved . . .
     
    “By grace,” her father murmured on his pillow, the words barely distinguishable. “Only by grace, Jocelyn. ‘Tis what Martin Luther fought for.”
    “I know, Papa.” She paused to see if he would say anything else, but he lay still. She kept reading. “And has raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenlies in Christ Jesus: that in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace in kindness toward us through Christ Jesus.”
    She paused as an image came to her mind: her father, sitting in a heavenly golden chair among white-robed saints who lingered in a sea of misty clouds and could see down to earth. In the days to come he would watch her to see how she lived, what she did, where she would go . . .
    “Grace,” her father murmured again from his pillow. “Unmerited favor. God knows I do not deserve the goodness he has bestowed upon me.”
    She sobbed, and his eyes flew open at the sound.
    “Weep not,” he said, struggling to catch his breath.
    “I’m sorry, Papa, I can’t help it.”
    Robert White reached across the pages of the Bible in her lap and held her hand. “Don ’t worry, girl. I’m in no pain.”
    “Yes, you are, and you don ’t deserve to suffer like this, Papa! If I could take the pain for you, I would, I