The Dressmaker of Draper's Lane

by Liz Trenow

  Her eyes turned, wide with fear. ‘Save me, Charlotte. I think I’m dying.’

  ‘You are not going to die, Anna. This baby will be born soon, and you are in good hands.’ The clearest memory leapt into my head: the low, reassuring voice of the nun as she helped me to deliver Peter. ‘Breathe slowly and deeply, if you can. Listen to me, follow what I do: in . . . out . . . in . . . out. That’s it, keep going like that.’

  When the spasm passed I took a cup from the bedside table and offered her a sip of water before the next arrived. Then I took up a clean towel, dipped it into the ewer and wiped the sweat from her forehead.

  ‘Just get this baby out. Get it out,’ she hollered, dissolving into pitiful sobs. ‘I don’t want to die.’

  Between each pain I tried to comfort her, telling her that she was doing well, that the baby would soon be born, that she would be right as rain. But as time went by and the midwife’s face became increasingly anxious, I began to doubt my words. Anna’s cries became weaker, she closed her eyes and her face seemed to blanch yet whiter, as though all the blood in her skin had simply leaked away.

  I was beginning to fear the worst when her poor battered body seemed to contort again, and the midwife peered between her legs, shouting. ‘I can see the head. Push now, missus. Push as hard as you can. It’s nearly here now.’

  Anna revived slightly, trying to summon the strength for this last onslaught, before giving up. ‘I can’t,’ she groaned. ‘I can’t do it.’ She closed her eyes again and seemed to drift from consciousness.

  ‘For heaven’s sake, isn’t there anything you can do to save her?’ I shouted. ‘She’s slipping away.’

  My plea seemed to galvanise the midwife into action. She ripped away the bedclothes and, placing her palms at the top of Anna’s stomach, began to press downwards with such force that her muscles bulged. Then she moved her hands to either side of the bump, massaging the muscles beneath.

  ‘Come,’ she ordered. ‘Do this for me.’ She placed my hands into position, covering them with her own to demonstrate the pressure required; so fierce that I feared the baby beneath must be squeezed half to death. She returned to the end of the bed and to my horror seemed to thrust her hand right inside my poor friend’s body. All the while, she urged me to push now, push again, harder.

  ‘Let the child die if you must, please God,’ I prayed silently, sweating from the effort of following her instructions. ‘But please, in your greatest mercy, spare the life of my friend.’

  I seemed to lose all track of time, but the next thing I knew was the midwife’s voice. ‘There we go,’ she said, holding up a scrap of blue and bloodied flesh, like a tiny skinned rabbit.

  ‘It’s a girl.’

  She ran her fingers inside the tiny mouth and then proceeded to whack it firmly on the back, several times. The scrap jerked, limp and lifeless. She laid it down and, placing her mouth over the little face, blew into it with her own breath. I gaped, astonished, as with each puff the tiny ribs rose and fell beneath the almost translucent skin. After a few breaths, the skin began to take on a pinker tinge. She stood back and waited for what seemed like an eternity.

  And then, such joy! The child coughed and gave a tiny mew, like a newborn kitten.

  ‘Good girl.’ Swiftly and expertly swaddling it in a towel, she handed it to me. ‘Here, hold her while I try to stop this bleeding.’

  It seemed barely credible that such a tiny creature could sustain life. But she continued to mew, so for the moment she was alive. ‘Wake up, Anna, please,’ I said. ‘Wake up! Open your eyes and see. You have a beautiful baby daughter.’

  There was no response. I felt for a pulse at her neck and could feel it beating, but only faintly. Desperate now, I splashed water onto her face, gently slapping her cheeks. Her eyelids fluttered, just once, but after that she seemed to drift into a deeper sleep. Now I really feared for the worst.

  The midwife lifted what looked like a great lump of liver, wrapping it into a towel and placing it aside. ‘Now we should be able to stem that bleeding,’ she said. ‘But best get the husband to call their pastor, just in case.’

  Henri came running as I called for him. ‘You have a beautiful baby girl,’ I said, showing him the tiny bundle.

  ‘A girl? She’s alive?’ He peered into the miniature face, no bigger than a puckered crab apple, and tears began to course down his cheeks. ‘But Anna . . .?’

  ‘She has lost a lot of blood. The midwife says we should call the pastor.’

  ‘The pastor? Bon dieu.’ The expression of utter anguish in Henri’s eyes will stay with me forever. He handed the baby back and kneeled by the bed, taking the limp body of his wife in his arms, placing his head on her chest. ‘Don’t leave me, Anna, I love you so much. And I shall not be able to go on without you,’ he keened, looking around with desperate eyes. ‘For God’s sake, don’t let her die.’

  The midwife was busying herself pulling away the bloodied sheets, piling them into a corner. ‘She’s stopped bleeding,’ she said. ‘That’s a good sign.’

  ‘And she is still breathing. We must pray for the best,’ I said, kneeling beside him. ‘Here, take your daughter, hold her close. The cries might help to bring her round.’

  ‘Open your eyes, Anna my darling, look at what we have.’ Henri held the little bundle close to his wife’s cheek so that she might hear its tiny whimpers. ‘Wake up and say hello to our beautiful daughter.’

  He pulled aside the fabric to more clearly reveal the baby’s angry red face. Her mewing was growing louder by the moment. This child was determined to live.

  ‘The baby must be fed, Henri. I’ll send for a wet nurse, shall I?’

  He nodded, gratefully. ‘And can you ask for the pastor so she can be christened? I want to call her Anna.’

  23

  Drugget: a coarse woollen fabric, felted or woven, self-coloured or printed on one side, sometimes corded but usually plain.

  Henri, Mariette, Clothilde and I took turns to hold vigil at Anna’s bedside twenty-four hours a day. Afternoon blurred into night, and dawn arrived once more. Cook worked tirelessly to ply us with food, exhorting us to ‘keep up your own strength to help the missus’. But none of us could summon much appetite.

  She brought nutritious broths that we attempted to drip into Anna’s mouth with little success. She remained motionless, her face pale as a corpse, the breath barely fluttering in her chest. But her heart was still beating.

  Despite her tiny frame, and against all our expectations, the baby continued to live. She was too weak to suck, so the wet nurse dribbled milk into her mouth until, after two anxious days, the little mite began to move her jaws and pucker her lips. At last she was persuaded to suckle; just a few seconds at first, but for longer each time as she grew in strength. We encouraged the nurse to feed the baby in Anna’s chamber so that she might hear her daughter’s mewling, or somehow sense her presence.

  On the third day Anna’s condition worsened, her poor abused body alternately racked with the shakes and then becoming hot and restless. The doctor shook his head. ‘Childbed fever,’ he muttered. ‘Often fatal, I am afraid. But we will do our best.’ He returned to administer various foul-smelling potions into her mouth and her nether parts, and cupped the skin of her belly to make it blister. Before he left, he recommended cooling her fevers with wet flannels and opening the windows during daytime, allowing sunshine and fresh air into the room.

  When Clothilde questioned this advice he said, ‘In the old past we used to keep fever patients in darkness and prevent vapours from entering the room. But there is new thinking these days, and I now tend to the view that fresh air is good for them, so long as they are well wrapped and do not become chilled.’

  News of Anna’s perilous condition spread throughout the community, and Monsieur Lavalle was kept busy downstairs as a procession of friends and family, fellow master weavers, journeymen, members of the French church and even grand mercers with their elegant wives arrived on the doorstep at Wood
Street to pay their respects.

  Anna’s aunt Sarah came, along with her daughter, neither of whom I had seen for several years. Lizzie is a lively soul and a great devotee of the latest fashions; she greeted me with genuine pleasure, but Sarah appeared uncomfortable. She has never really approved of Anna’s marriage to a Frenchman and now seemed unconvinced that he could provide her niece with the best care.

  ‘You have engaged a proper physician, I hope?’ she said, more than once. ‘We have a very good man, Lord Harley. You must have heard of him? He was Lord Mayor a couple of years ago. We cannot do with second best; Anna is so precious to us. His leeching has saved the life of many a fever patient. Let us pay for him to come to you.’

  Henri, ignoring her patronising tone, was admirably firm. ‘Thank you for your kind offer, Mrs Sadler. But Anna is receiving excellent care from a highly qualified French surgeon with all the latest treatments at his disposal. He has our absolute confidence.’ Shortly afterwards she hurried Lizzie away.

  Overhearing Henri’s conversations with business colleagues was bittersweet. I had never before fully appreciated the respect held in the industry for my friend’s talents. After practising for just a few years, her artistry is already much sought after. ‘She would be a great loss,’ one told him. ‘I declare your wife’s designs have been responsible for introducing the principles of painting to the loom. And she has surely helped to establish our excellent reputation for English silks around the world.’ I repeated the compliment word for word into Anna’s ear, hoping that, should she be able to hear me, such appreciation might hearten her and give her strength to fight for life.

  Every ounce of my energy was spent either at the bedside or otherwise supporting Henri in any way possible. Each day I would dash back to the shop for at least a few hours to make sure that Mrs T. was coping, lending my hand to any especially urgent tasks if needed. Everything else went on hold. After seven days, as Anna remained in a sort of half-life, her heart beating and chest rising and falling but otherwise lost to the world, a letter came from Suffolk.

  ‘Listen to this wonderful news,’ I whispered to her. ‘Your father has rallied. He is sitting up in bed, taking food and talking of getting up and going for a short walk tomorrow. And he has been asking about you. He wants to see you, little Jean and the baby too, as soon as you can gather your strength. So you have got to get better for him. Give me a smile, just to show you have heard me, Anna, please. Please?’

  Even this brought no response.

  Her fever worsened, but by some means of inner strength, we knew not how, she clung to life.

  It was early morning on the first day of June as I set out for Wood Street, and the sun was already burning in the bluest of heavens. Summer had truly arrived. But none of this could lighten the deep, impenetrable darkness in my heart. Life without my best friend was unimaginable. Yet somehow I needed to find the strength to face it.

  I had called on God countless times over the past few weeks but even though I support the morality of Christ’s teachings, I cannot bring myself to become a regular churchgoer. The sight of so many hypocrites in one place – puffed-up society worthies parading their virtue, when you know full well that their daily lives are full of sin and deception – tends me to queasiness.

  Although I loved to sing in the Hospital chapel as a child, the smell of musty prayer books brings back too many memories: of hours on my knees enduring the pain of unforgiving stone while praying to some unseen god for forgiveness from sins I had never been aware of committing.

  Sundays at the Manor were no day of rest. We maids would be up at the crack of dawn, lighting the fires that would heat hot stones ready to be lugged in wheelbarrows to the church to warm the cosy box pews where family members would sit in comfort while we shivered on rough benches at the back of the church, frozen half to death in the draught from the doorway.

  In church at least I was free from Tobias, but he would always sneak a quick wink at me, or even whisper as he passed, ‘I’ll be seeing you later, pretty miss.’ After the service we would be treated to the sight of him conversing with the vicar, beaming with righteousness even though to my eyes he was the incarnation of the devil.

  At Westford Abbots the Sabbath inevitably entails sitting with my sister and Peter in our allotted pew right below the pulpit, trying to prop open my eyes as Ambrose drones on with one of his interminable sermons. He’s been known to preach for an hour or even more if the spirit takes him. Sometimes he becomes, as he puts it, ‘alight with God’s flame’, turning fierce eyes upon the congregation and declaiming in a loud and portentous voice about the perils of sin.

  There is a certain entertainment to be had in watching the pulpit rock as he flails his arms, setting the spiders trembling in their cobwebs. It is all I can do to suppress the giggles as his face reddens, the blue veins protrude like snakes about his neck and his eyes roll up in their sockets as he hollers entreaties to God for mercy on us weak and evil humankind.

  Even long after the service is ended he remains on fire, engaging parishioners in animated conversations at the church door as they attempt to inch away to the warm homes and dinners awaiting them. His mood will continue throughout Sunday lunch at the vicarage. If anyone else tries to introduce another topic he will simply talk over them. We sit in silence listening to a reprise of today’s hellfire sermon right there at the table, our plates scraped clean while his remains barely touched.

  On these occasions I keep my eyes to my lap, hardly daring to look up for fear of incurring the worst of my brother-in-law’s wrath.

  So although churchgoing holds no attraction for me, on this clear June day the great white spire of Christ Church towered above me, glowing in the sunshine like a beacon, and something drew my feet towards the wide stone steps that lead up to its porch.

  It was here, Anna had once told me, that she’d had her first full conversation with Henri, having spied him descending the organ stairs. She’d taken him for the organist but he’d explained that he was just helping out at this church – not his own – heaving the bellows for the great organ. It was on that day, she said, that she fell in love with his teasing grin and grew certain, somewhere deep in her heart, that he would become important in her life.

  I stood at the top of the steps, in the shadow of one of the great columns supporting the porch, so wide that two people could not clasp hands around them, and surveyed the scene before me: the heart of Spitalfields. Ahead were the arches of the market, already lively even at this early hour with traders setting up their stalls. To my left was the churchyard, almost filled with graves even though the church has been built but thirty years. Beyond the low workshops of White Row and Rose Lane lay the green of the tenterground, where silk finishers stretch out the woven cloth, still damp after fulling, hooking it onto frames so that it will dry out flat and square.

  All around were streets of tall houses with weavers’ lofts built into roof spaces, with wide windows set to catch every glimmer of daylight. From my raised vantage point on the church porch I was almost on a level with those rooftops and could hear the clack-clack of shuttles from the open casements as journeymen settled down to their looms.

  Just down to my right along Wood Street lay my friend in her chamber, clinging to life by a thread. The thought compelled me forwards. Although the church door was closed and the round iron handle heavy as a sack of stones, something gave me the strength to lift and turn it. When I leaned on it, the door gave way with a long groan.

  I had forgotten how enormous the interior of the church is, larger by far than it appears from the outside. That morning it was luminous, almost dazzling, as the sunshine poured in through the east windows. Soaring columns stretched dizzyingly upwards, supporting rows of barrel vaults on either side, and the detail of the ornate ceiling, picked out in gold, glistened in the light reflected from the white walls. This sight alone is so awe-inspiring that it can make you believe that you are in the presence of something or someone greater than y
ourself. And perhaps, just perhaps, you are. Certainly, on that day, I felt it.

  Despite the racket in the busy streets outside, when I closed the church door behind me all was complete silence, as though I had fallen suddenly deaf. When I cleared my throat, the sound seemed to echo around the vast space. I walked forward, sat down in the back row of the pews and slipped onto my knees.

  Dear Lord, I do not usually ask much of you, but please, please, bring Anna back to us, to her family, Theodore, Jane, Henri and the two babies. She is like a second sister to me, and I do not know how we will go on living if she leaves us.

  My eyes lifted to the altar, but the statue of Christ on the cross reminded me too much of Anna’s ravaged body not more than a few hundred yards away. I closed them again. It may have been a few minutes or more, but the next thing I knew was a hand on my shoulder and a man’s voice, deep and gentle. ‘Would you like me to pray with you, madam?’ I looked up to see a priest, old, white-bearded and bald-headed. Folding his black skirt around his knees, he slid into the pew beside me. ‘I sense you are in fear of losing someone.’

  How did he know? Had I spoken out loud? Or did his faith give him mind-reading powers? It was unnerving. I sat back onto the pew and reached into my pocket for a handkerchief to dry the tears. ‘I thank you for your concern, sir. But I must be on my way now.’

  He was unfazed. ‘Then I will pray on your behalf, if you will permit me. What is their name?’

  ‘Anna,’ I said. ‘And her daughter, also Anna.’

  It had been arranged that I would take over the bed watch from Clothilde that morning, but just as I entered the house we heard her calling: ‘Viens vite. She is awake.’

  Everyone rushed to the bedside: Henri, Mariette, Monsieur Lavalle and even cook. The apprentices were turned away, for there was no room in the chamber once we had all crowded in. Sure enough, Anna’s eyes were open, dark pools in the sockets sunk deep in her skeletal face. I thought of the old priest in the church, whispering to his God. Was this his doing?