Sicktember #26
Prompt #26: Tickle in the Throat
Character(s): Jonathan Lindsay (remember him?)
Title: Suffering in Silence
Summary: Perhaps Jonathan Lindsay should not have gone into Parliament with a brewing cold; in any case, he is here now, and he will not interrupt the proceedings by coughing.
Notes: If any of you were a fly on the wall back in the day, you may recognize the lines of Parliamentary speech that I stole directly from Edmund Burke’s 1774 speech On American Taxation to the House of Commons. Considering this takes place 20 years before and in the House of Lords, you may be like why, but just remember this is, at the end of the day, a snz fic and I stole the least interesting and most generic bits.
On a good day, listening to the petty gripes and cosseted rhetoric of his fellow Lords at Parliament gave Jonathan Lindsay a headache, but on a day such as this one when his head was already pounding without such assistance–well, he was beginning to entertain a private fantasy of bashing his temples in with the speaker’s gavel. Sarah had recognized his headache the moment he blinked at her in the morning sunlight (and really, when had they started deciphering each other’s pain based on some sort of invisible semaphore?) and advised him not to go, for he would soon be falling ill. Jonathan agreed with her on the outcome but not the time frame, arguing that he had at least another day of a throbbing head before the rest of his symptoms followed, and so he could last a day in Parliament.
But now, he was beginning to wonder whether his wife did not possess some powers of divination. Jonathan’s throat was beginning to tickle, but it absolutely would not do to cough. He resolved to do his best to ignore it, but the speech currently being given to the Lords by Baron Lord George Southcote was not providing the type of riveting distraction needed to make such a thing possible.
“It is so said in the paper in my hand.” Southcote held up the paper for emphasis, and Jonathan felt his headache grow. “A paper which I constantly carry about; which I have often used, and shall often use again…”
Perhaps a small clearing of the throat would rid him of the sensation.
“Though I find myself mistaken…”
If anything, the endeavor to clear his throat only increased Jonathan’s urgent need to cough, and so he changed course. Perhaps if he exhaled forcefully, his body would be fooled into thinking he had coughed, and would be satisfied and allow him to be rid of this torment.
“…he will still permit me to use the privilege of an old friendship; he will permit me to apply myself to the House under the sanction of his authority…”
Jonathan tried a half-cough, a breathy, airy little thing, which somehow made his throat itch all the more.
“...and, on the various grounds he has measured out, to submit to you the poor opinions which I have formed upon a matter of importance….”
If the man continued on in this manner, Jonathan truly did not know if he could survive the session. He had not even glimpsed the barest glint of an argument beginning to form on Southcote’s lips, and already there were tears pricking at Jonathan’s eyes from the effort of trying to restrain his coughs. Still, he focused on controlling them with all the discipline of the harshest aesthetic.
“...enough to demand the fullest consideration I could bestow upon it.”
Since attempting to suppress his coughs by sheer force of will was clearly not working, Jonathan tried to meet the next paroxysm with a well-timed swallow. Unfortunately, this led to a veritable burning in his throat, as well as a split-second eruption, before Jonathan could clamp his mouth shut and reign in the sound once more.
The interruption turned a few heads, but did not capture the attention of Lord Southcote, who droned on as unflappably as ever. “He has stated to the House two grounds of deliberation…”
As Southcote continued on, oblivious to Jonathan’s private misery, Jonathan found himself increasingly willingly to trade not-insignificant fineries for a throat so robust as his. For here Jonathan was, throat dry as a tobacco leaf and struggling to keep quiet after scarcely having said a word all day, meanwhile Southcote could prattle for hours about nothing at all with a voice smooth as silk and strong as iron.
“But before I go into that large consideration, because I would omit nothing that can give the House satisfaction…”
With no end to either of his present miseries in sight, Jonathan resolved to grant himself a real, albeit controlled cough in the hopes that it would satisfy the infernal urge once and for all. The instant he did so, however, he realized it for the folly it was. Once the cough burst forth from his lungs it was louder and wetter than he had intended, and it took far longer to get under control than he had anticipated.
To finish it out, and insult him further, it culminated in a sneeze, which he pinched between his fingers. “Heh’PSHH!”
Brilliant, he thought, feeling suddenly exhausted and swelteringly hot beneath his collar. Now he would have to find a way to ward those off as well.
Jonathan was working out a way to swallow around his prickly throat without coughing yet again, when he felt something bump against his thigh. “You sound like you desperately need this,” Lord William Petre said lowly, his handkerchief extended across Jonathan’s lap.
It was only when Jonathan took the proffered cloth that he realized why William had offered it the way he had; stowed within its folds was a small flask, embossed with gold and ivory. Jonathan bit back his smile and took care to keep the flask covered, raising the handkerchief to his face as if to tend to his nose and carefully drinking from the hidden flask. Warm liquid trickled down his throat and offered him the first relief he had felt all day.
“Thank you,” he murmured once he had finished.
“If I have to listen to you and Southcote like this for another hour, I am in serious danger of stringing myself up by my hair ribbons and ending my misery.”
Jonathan almost scoffed before he thought better of it. “Your misery!”
William’s mouth was open to reply, when the speaker’s gavel shook the room like a minor earthquake. “Does the Baronet Petre have an objection to Lord Southcote?”
“None at all, sir,” William said mildly, with a courteous inclination of the head. Once Southcote had begun to speak again, he leaned closer to Jonathan and whispered, “That would require there being a point in the first place for me to object to.”
Jonathan stifled a laugh, and the action was his undoing. In its place sprang forth a violent fit of coughs he was absolutely powerless to suppress; he could merely clutch William’s handkerchief to his mouth like a talisman and wait for the spasms to pass. He was dimly aware that Southcote had stopped speaking again, but far more pressing at the moment was the need to gulp in air at any available moment. Once the fit was finally beginning to settle, and he could draw in breath with shaky gasps, he felt his breath hitch, and he tiredly resigned himself to the inevitable. At least the handkerchief was already in place.
“HETCHOO! Hihh’TCHHH! Ihhh’TCHHH!”
The speaker regarded him with a disinterested mien. “Perhaps Lord Viscount Lindsay is too ill for the day’s proceedings?”
“I think I am indeed, sirs,” he said, sounding, if possible, as though his voice had been raked along hot coals. “If you will excuse me.”
“Lucky bastard,” William said as Jonathan slipped the flask back into his lap before standing to take his leave. “Maybe I should start coughing. How quickly can you catch a cold?”
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