After I finished consulting with Mr. Pitt, I next met with those three physicians to whom the entire realm had entrusted His Majesty’s care. Mr. Pitt had previously mentioned Sir Lucas Pepys, a man of forty-six, short, lean, with craggy jowls and thin wire rim glasses. He had recently been named Treasurer of the Royal College of Physicians earlier in the year and I was impressed with his modest and approachable affect even if he was a trifle eccentric. I often wondered if his studies of the mind and its delinquencies were motivated out of his own afflictions.

Richard Warren, the Prince of Wales’ personal physician who had been assigned to the treatment of His Majesty, was quite a different creature. Tall and smug, he was always impeccably attired, eager to flaunt the great wealth he had acquired over of fifty-seven years. It would only be on precious rare occasions I would ever see the smirk that appeared permanently affixed on his face disappear.

The final of the three was, of course, Sir George Baker, His Majesty’s personal physician and one of the most esteemed figures in the Royal College of Physicians, serving as its president at that time. He was the eldest of the three and even that made him four years my junior. Age and his comfortable life in the Royal Court had fattened him considerably. His sight was poor by that point in his life and he relied on especially thick glasses that regularly fell down his nose as gravity tried to claim its prize.

Doctor Warren was the first to greet me in that strange empty red room in Winsdor Castle.

“Doctor Willis, I see that you arrived safely,” he announced mirthlessly through his smirk. “Would you be terribly offended if I had previously referred to you as the Mad Doctor from Lincolnshire?”

I did not humour the man on his insult and turned my attention to Sir Lucas, who emerged from behind Warren’s broad frame.

“I have heard so much of your work, Doctor Willis!” he chirped excitedly. “I’ve spent a lifetime dedicated to curing those afflicted by those same maladies. Noble and hard work, yes. I haven’t seen your name in many submissions to the journals, though. Why is that?”

I bowed politely to Sir Lucas.

“I have found myself far too burdened with practice to engage in much scholarship. My notes are copious, however, and I would be pleased to share them with such esteemed company,” I said.

Warren’s smirk grew and he turned his head toward Sir Lucas.

“It would be difficult for Doctor Willis to be published as he is not a member of the Royal College of Physicians,” he said, condescension overwhelming in his every word.

Sir Lucas recoiled as though he had been shocked by a lightning bolt.

“Not… Not a member?!” he gasped, but then composed himself. “Most irregular, yes. But we are desperate. All ordinary forms of medical treatment have failed to produce any progress.”

“We don’t all agree on that point, Sir Lucas,” Warren dissented.

At that moment, Sir George Baker entered. I recall that Sir George laboured under an illness that day and sneezed repeatedly.

“Ah, you must be Doctor Willis,” he said in a nasally voice. He then ignored me and turned toward the other two doctors. “I just attended to His Majesty and I regret to say that the pulse has risen to one-hundred and ten!”

I was shocked, but Warren shook his head.

“The pulse will vary without signifying. We have seen that before,” Warren scoffed.

“I beg your pardon, Doctor Warren, but that isn’t true!” Baker shot back. “The pulse is a most excellent measure of one’s health! A high resting pulse like this indicates His Majesty’s humours are out of alignment. Quite too sanguine, which explains some of the agitation. I have ordered another round of blistering.”

“As I recommended this morning,” Warren pompously added, visibly irritating Sir George.

Sir Lucas, however, shook his head.

“We have been attempting these same remedies since October, yes? The King is no better and, if anything, seems to be getting worse,” Pepys insisted. “The Prime Minister’s suggestion made sense to me as an avenue we should explore.”

“Superstitious nonsense,” Warren spat with a malicious laugh. “He’s a politician, not a doctor.”

“As president of the Royal College of Physicians, there are certain odd matters that come to my attention from time to time. Queer things. I have never seen them myself, but—”

“Sir George, then how do you know that they have happened, in fact?” Warren interjected.

Baker glanced at Pepys and then at me.

“Because I trust these men, Doctor Warren!”

I coughed politely to draw attention from the three. It had become quite clear to me that they were not doing anything productive.

“I am aware of the Prime Minister’s suspicions and I appreciate his experience,” I said calmly. “Proper medicine, however, involves eliminating the most likely causes and then going to the least likely. Eliminating possibilities leaves us with the ultimate reality. Sir George, might I ask some simple questions first?”

Sir George nodded while Warren sighed.

“Does His Majesty have any infections at the moment?” I asked.

“None,” Sir George replied immediately.

“Has His Majesty’s diet changed radically?”

“No. His Majesty eats less with his agitation, but it is a consistent and hearty diet.”

“Are there physical manifestations? Queer stools, discharges, and the like?”

“His water is blue,” Sir George said with a grimace. “Other than that, no.”

“Blue?”

“Yes, inky and blue or violet depending on the light.”

“Worth noting,” I commented aloud. “Stools?”

At that moment, Sir Lucas inserted himself with great excitement.

“Exquisite, fetid, stinking stools!” he exclaimed. “Volume, shape, and so on are very healthy. I have kept a thorough accounting of them, yes. You might want to examine them?”

I should note that I had never found the presence of healthy stools to preclude the possibility of illness. It is certainly true that extraordinarily unhealthy stools, those thin, misshapen, bloody, or otherwise irregular can signal a great disturbance in a man’s overall health, but as to the state of one’s mind? That is far less clear.

“I may give that log a cursory examination,” I said politely, attempting to avoid offending Sir Lucas. “Any signs of growths?”

“None. We lanced two boils that seemed to be bothering His Majesty,” Sir George commented, making a gesture of poking through a boil with a needle.

“Have you attempted restraints and behavioural modifications?” I inquired at last, knowing this would be a point of contention.

“This is His Majesty!” Sir George barked in outrage. “You cannot treat the King of England like some Lincolnshire lunatic.”

“Disgraceful,” Warren added.

Sir Lucas did not appear to take nearly the same level of offense.

“Unconventional corrections might be, well, useful?” Sir Lucas tried to offer to the others. “It would help to rule some things out, yes?”

“Quite right, Sir Lucas,” I immediately added. “Those undergoing distresses of the mind often forget how to behave. Bad habits. Broken routines. A loss of familiarity with accepted norms. Lapses in protocol. These are worrying things for a monarch.”

Sir George and the other two doctors exchanged nervous expressions. Sir George’s countenance grew pale.

“His Majesty should be coming through this room shortly on his usual walks,” Sir George said nervously. “Perhaps you can make an assessment?”

“That I shall.”