“I am sorry, Mademoiselle Sylvia. I thought you understood. You and I can never be together in that way.”
I nod to him. “Some part of me probably did know.” Then I look down sadly at my stomach. My child will never have a happy family, at least not with Alejandro and I. “What do we do now?”
He thinks about this for a couple of minutes. Finally he says, “My nephew encountered a similar situation.”
“Must run in the family then.”
He ignores this, continuing, “He took the mother of his child to a secluded location and she gave birth to the child. When it was healthy enough, he returned and brought the child to his wife, claiming he had adopted it.”
“What happened to the mother?”
“She was well cared for.”
“You mean he bribed her.”
“If that’s how you choose to look at it. He could have easily left them both on their own to live in poverty, as outcasts, or to die.” He tries to take my arm, but I shake it away. “You can stay with my cousin at the vineyard. You can give birth there. Once the child’s old enough, I’ll take it home to Agnes. I’ll say that I’ve adopted it.”
“What about me? What am I supposed to do?”
“You can still see the child, but as her aunt.”
“You mean I can never tell my own daughter that I’m her mother?”
“Yes. Otherwise we will all be undone. Not just you and I, but Agnes as well.”
I stare down at my stomach again, putting my hand on where my daughter grows inside of me. Alejandro’s scenario makes sense from a practical point of view. Everyone wins: our child gets a good home, there’s no scandal to destroy his reputation, Aggie never has to find out, and I can still see my daughter. Except that I can never tell her that I’m her mother. I imagine her as a little girl, staring at me with a stranger’s eyes when I come to visit for the holidays and the two of us exchanging awkward, stilted pleasantries like strangers. I see her as a young woman about to give birth to her own child and taking Aggie’s hand while I have to wait outside while my own grandchild is born.
“No,” I whisper.
“Sylvia—”
I shake my head. “I’m not going to do it.”
“But you must. Or else—”
“I won’t ruin your precious reputation either.” I stand up and then glare at him as intently as I can, although the effect is ruined by the tears in my eyes. “You are never going to see our child or me ever again.”
“Sylvia, wait!” he calls after me, but I’m already running down the steps. I’m not all that fast in this condition, but I’m fast enough to get beneath the seats, where he can’t see me. That’s as far as I need to go.
I vanish myself back to the apartment in Cairo, startling Jaida, who’s dusting the bedroom. She barely suppresses a scream. “Madam Joubert! I did not hear you come in.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.” I lie down on the bed, feeling the urge to sleep for a long time, to never wake up again. If Hisae saw my eyes now, she would probably be willing to oblige me.
“It’s just you and me now,” I whisper to my child.
Chapter 31
I bring Jaida and her family to Paris with me. It’s a tough adjustment for them since they can’t speak French, but at this point Jaida is about the closest to a friend I have who isn’t in the coven. I make sure to compensate her handsomely and to bring in a tutor for her and her children so they can learn the language.
The closer it gets to the blessed event, the more I have to rely on Jaida. By then I’ve taken her around the city enough that she knows where to buy food, clothes, and other essentials. Besides not speaking the language, she finds it difficult to go shopping in a city that doesn’t believe in haggling like back in Cairo. “Don’t worry about it,” I tell her. “I have plenty of money.”
With two weeks to go, I retire to my bed and don’t get up again for the rest of my pregnancy. Jaida becomes my nurse, feeding and bathing me and taking care of my waste. This probably isn’t what she signed up for, but she doesn’t complain. I’m probably the closest she has to a friend in this city as well.
It’s stupid to give birth in Paris, the city I fled from just fifteen years earlier. Alejandro and Aggie are just a couple hundred miles away. I know that they sometimes come into the city so Aggie can examine the latest in fabrics and patterns. When the children aren’t away at boarding school they bring them along too, taking them to the Louvre and parks so they children can be cultured—so they won’t end up like their wild Aunt Sylvia.
It’s when I go to the park that I know what I have to do. Watching happy families like Aggie’s, I know that my daughter and I will never be like that. We’ll be on our own, just the two of us. I could probably tell her that her father died in an accident like Mama told my sisters and I when we were growing up.
That’s not what I want for her. I want her to have a mother and father who love her. I want her to have sisters and brothers to play with. I want her to have a complete family, so she can be happy. I can provide her with a house, toys, and even a horse if she wants one, but I can never provide her a real family—or a real mother. Remembering what Hisae said, I know that I wouldn’t be a real mother to my daughter. I’d just be playacting. She deserves better.
When I tell Jaida what I intend to do, she is shocked enough to voice her disagreement for the first time. “Why would you do such a thing to your child, Madam Joubert?”
“Because I can’t give her a real family,” I explain.
“It’s not the number of parents who matter. It’s how much you love the child.” Jaida of course believes this since she raises her children alone. But she didn’t have a choice, not like I do. I can make sure my daughter has a real family.
“She deserves better than my love. She deserves a real mother like Agnes.”
Jaida still isn’t convinced, but in the end it’s not her decision. It’s my child and therefore my decision to make about her future. Alejandro should be part of this, but he already told me what he wanted to do. I’d rather my daughter grow up with strangers than to have to watch someone else raise her.
Since the coven already knows about the baby, I send word to Sabrina to deliver my child as she did Agnes’s boys. She takes up residence in my apartment two weeks before I’m due, just in case I go into labor early. Jaida watches Sabrina suspiciously, as if the older woman is an intruder, a con artist waiting for an opportunity to make off with my silver and money.
“Are you sure you don’t want Agnes here?” Sabrina asks me not long after she arrives.
“No. I don’t want her to know about it.”
“Why not? She’s your sister.”
“It’s complicated.”
“You mean because the baby’s father is her husband?” Sabrina snickers at this. “I’ve seen much worse in my time.”
It still disturbs me when Sabrina talks like this, as I can remember her when she was a baby. Now she’s going to be delivering my baby. Maybe it’s not smart to ask a woman who once tried to kill me to help with this, but from what I’ve seen, Sabrina remembers nothing of her old life. In her mind she’s always been Sabrina, a witch who specializes in being a midwife and bending dreams.
I’m dreaming when it happens. In my dreams I’m standing on a beach, watching a girl swim. She’s not more than ten years old and I know she’s my daughter; she looks like me with the same red hair and green eyes, only her skin has a bit of Alejandro’s Mediterranean tone. My daughter splashes happily in the water while I watch her and sigh with joy. This joy is short-lived when I see a wave coming up. The wave is taller than the highest building in Paris, like a mountain of water heading for us. My daughter is oblivious to this, continuing to frolic in the water. I scream for her and then dive into the water, trying to swim out to her to grab her before the wave drowns us both. But I know I’m too late; the wave is coming down—
I wake up with my sheets stained as if I’ve wet the bed and a
sharp pain in my midsection. Before I can scream for help, Sabrina is already running into the room, Jaida just a few steps behind. I try to sit up, but Sabrina pushes me back down. “Lie still,” she says. “It’s time. Your water’s broke.” She puts a wooden spoon in my mouth for me to bite down on.
I thought I had a good idea what to expect from having watched Aggie give birth to Luc. It’s much worse when I’m the one feeling the pain. The contractions start far apart, at more than an hour apart. Just when I’m relaxed, the pain will come again, my scream muffled by the wooden spoon in my mouth.
My labor drags on for more than a day. I manage to keep down some food and water, but after sixteen hours I want nothing more than for my daughter to be gone from me. “What’s taking so long?” I ask Sabrina through a haze of pain.
She mops my forehead with a damp cloth and then flashes a nearly toothless smile. “Some take longer than others, dear.”
“Don’t call me that!” I snap, thinking of Mama and Aggie. Those are the last people I want to think about at a time like this.
“I’m sorry, Sylvia,” she says. Then she looks down between my legs. “You’re getting there. Slowly but surely.”
Jaida brings me a special treat: a bag of sweetened dates she found while out shopping. She pops a few of these into my mouth between contractions. “You’re going to be all right, Madam Joubert,” she tells me. “You are a very strong woman.”
“Call me Sylvia, please,” I tell her. I reach for her hand, giving it a squeeze. I don’t need a servant right now.
“Of course—Sylvia.”
It nearly makes me cry that Jaida is the one holding my hand, not Aggie or Alejandro—or Mama, Sophie, Henri, Rachel, Andre, Frau Braun, Connor, and so many others. So many people have come and gone in my life and yet in this moment when I need someone the most, all I have is a servant to take my hand and reassure me. My life is so empty—and soon to get emptier.
The contractions continue to become closer together, the pain so intense, worse than anything I’ve ever felt before. I look over at Jaida, who smiles reassuringly. “Am I hurting you?” I ask, thinking of how Aggie had nearly broken my hand.
“I am fine,” she says. “You must not worry about me and focus on your baby.”
“It’s time,” Sabrina says. “I want you to push when the next contraction comes.”
I nod and then turn to Jaida again. “In the nightstand is a blindfold. Put it on me.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You don’t have to. Just do it,” I snap and then feel bad for it. Jaida has shown me an abundance of kindness, much more than I deserve.
The blindfold is made of black silk that I bought before I became bedridden. Jaida ties it around my eyes, making sure that it’s tight enough so it won’t fall off. The silk is comfortable against my face, while at the same time it renders me blind. I won’t be able to see her now. I’ll never see her.
The next contraction comes and I push hard enough that I feel like I’m going to split in half. I think of the chicken I cut open to determine that I was pregnant and imagine myself splitting open in the same way. With the blindfold on, there’s only darkness and pain.
And then it’s all over. I hear Sabrina shout, “She’s out!” A few dreadful seconds later, I hear her cry. My daughter is crying. The sound of it makes me want to tear off the blindfold, to grab her and reassure her that everything is all right, that Mama is here. But I know I can’t; that’s my gift to her.
***
I don’t give her a name. Jaida urges me to reconsider this, but I refuse. A name would make her into a real person and then I’ll never be able to let her go. “It’s unlucky not to name a child,” Sabrina says.
“I don’t care. She’ll get a name when she’s in her real home.”
I keep the blindfold beside my bed, putting it on whenever it’s time to feed the girl. I try not to give in to the temptation to stroke the down along the girl’s head, to show her any affection. I’m not her mother, I keep telling myself. I’m just her wet nurse.
“I wish you would look at her,” Jaida says. “She looks so much like you.”
“Don’t tell me that! I don’t want to know. I don’t want to see her.”
That she looks like me only deepens my resolve to carry through with my plan. I want her to have a better life than I’ve had, to have the sort of life I wanted when I was living with Frau Braun—the sort of life Henri and I would have given our children. I wait until the girl falls asleep to give her back to Jaida. Once I’m sure they’re gone, I lift the blindfold.
Perhaps sensing my lack of attachment, the girl doesn’t put up much of a fuss. She never wakes me up by crying in the night. Sometimes Jaida gets up in the night just to make sure that the girl is still alive. “It’s the strangest thing,” Jaida says. “She doesn’t even cry when she’s wet or when she’s hungry. She just lies there.”
I want to tell Jaida that it’s because she’s my daughter. Like her mother, she tries to appear strong, even if inside her little heart is breaking. Again I want to abort my plan, to try raising her on my own. Then I remind myself that I can’t, that I’m doing this for her.
This goes on for five months. By then I can feel that the girl has grown, that she’s healthy and strong. When my hand inadvertently brushes against her head, I feel the wispy curls that are probably red, though a lighter red than my hair. Tears stain the blindfold as I imagine braiding her hair the way I used to braid Aggie’s. I see her in a French braid, a ponytail, pigtails, and even looping braids like I wore to the spring festival in Frau Braun’s village. I want to be the one who styles her hair, who sends her off to school, who takes her to play in the park.
“Jaida!” I scream.
“Is something wrong, Madam Joubert?” she asks an instant later, as if she’s been standing here the entire time. “Would you like me to take the blindfold off?”
“No. Take the girl to the nursery. I’m going out.”
As soon as Jaida and the girl are gone, I get out of bed. My legs are still weakened from so much time in bed, so I have to put a hand to the wall to support myself as I walk. From the closet I pull out a dress and slip into it. I don’t bother with my hair or makeup, unconcerned with how I look at this moment. I’ve lost enough weight now that I can fit into my jacket again and can comfortably fit a pistol inside of it. I’ll need this for where I’m going.
I’ve waited too long already to do this. I have to put things in motion or I’m never going to be able to go through with it. Gripping the railing of the stairs, I make my way down to the street. My feet grow stronger with each step, becoming more accustomed to working again.
Having spent so much time in the shadowy world of selling guns, I’ve spent enough time in seedy bars to have overheard plenty of rumors—such as where to find a lawyer who arranges adoptions. His office is near the Place Pigalle. This area features two kinds of scum: prostitutes and artists. I’m not interested in either one, only in the lawyer’s office above a café.
Edward Souray reminds me of Mama just before her death: thin to the point of bones visible against his wrinkled skin and nearly hairless. His black suit hangs off him as if he’s shrunk three sizes since putting it on. When he speaks, his voice is a low whisper I have to strain to hear. “You want to give your child for adoption?”
“Yes. But I want her to go to a good home. I don’t want her to go into an orphanage.”
“I think that can be arranged. There are a number of wealthy families who are looking to adopt a child for one reason or another.”
“I’d prefer it if they don’t tell her that she’s adopted. I’d like her to think that she’s their natural daughter.”
“We can make that part of the agreement.”
“And I don’t want to know who adopts her. I don’t want to know where they live or what name they give her.” I stop to wipe at my eyes with a handkerchief Souray offers to me. “I’ll have my servant bring her to you.”
“If that’s what you wish.”
“How long before you can find a home for her?”
“It should only take me a week or two to make the arrangements. I have one family in particular in mind. The wife recently had a stillborn child. They’re quite wealthy and with an excellent reputation.”
“I don’t want to know any more!”
“I’m only trying to assure you, Madam Joubert, that they will provide a suitable new home for your daughter.”
“I understand. You aren’t going to tell them who I am, are you?”
“No. That will remain in strict confidence.”
“Good.” I reach into my pocket to produce a sack of coins, enough to buy this entire building. “There’s one more thing: if an Italian man comes around asking about me, or a middle-aged blond woman, you aren’t to mention anything about this to either of them.”
“I understand. I assure you that this will be confidential. You have my word.”
The word of a sleazy lawyer isn’t much, but at this point it’s about all I have. When I return home, I make sure Jaida has the baby put away before I slink into my room. After taking off my coat, I lie down on the bed and let myself cry.
***
As Souray said, he didn’t need long to find a suitable home. The family he had in mind during our meeting leaps at the chance to adopt a baby girl. They agree to the contract that they will not divulge to the girl that she’s adopted. There are also details given about me, so they can’t ever contact me.
I don’t want my baby going to the Place Pigalle, though she’s far too young to know anything about prostitutes or artists. Instead, the meeting will take place near Notre Dame cathedral. Despite my hatred of the church, this is a well-known location easily accessible to both sides and completely neutral.
“Are you certain about this, Madam Joubert?” Jaida asks me.
“Yes. You have to take her there.”
“Me?”
“I can’t let them see me. They can’t ever know who I am.”
Tales of the Scarlet Knight Collection: The Call Page 115