“I have come too late,” he said, gently. “It is turned at a position impossible for your sister to deliver and cannot be retrieved by forceps alone. Her pulse is weakening and I fear that there is only one recourse which will save her life.”
The urgency in his hushed tones had slowed her reaction to the point she could scarcely understand his meaning.
“I would wish to consult Mr. Giles, if possible,” he said.
“He is away at his uncle’s,” she answered. “We have sent word, but he has not yet come.” Her self-possession was gained only by tremendous effort, for her heart was sinking beneath the dread in the surgeon’s words. Mr. Turner placed his hand upon her arm.
“I shall need your help, Miss Phillips,” he said. “I have no assistant to call upon at my surgery and I cannot waste time. It will be a long operation and I do not wish you to be present–” his voice trembled here, “–but I must have you there, at least in the beginning. Mrs. Giles is distraught at the news and may not bear what comes next without you to help her.”
Her lips were pressed tightly together to contain her emotions as she nodded. “I will help you,” she answered, when she was able to speak.
He opened the door to the chamber and ushered her inside. Anna’s face bore the blank expression of shock; in her eyes, however, Kitty could see something burning in the form of unspeakable pain.
Mr. Turner had rolled up his sleeves and drawn a long apron over the front of his clothes. A stool was pushed nearby, the basin placed beside it. From the open bag, Kitty glimpsed the tools of his trade which awakened horror in Mrs. Allgood and Mrs. Servennia, the knives and forceps, the bottles of drugs more potent than a simple household remedy. She imagined them to be the representatives of others, the bone saws and long handled blades which gripped her own mind with nightmarish understanding in this moment.
Anna was quaking with fear, unaware of Kitty’s tight hold upon both of her hands.
“It cannot be true,” she whispered, so faintly that it was almost beyond Kitty’s hearing.
“You must be calm, Anna,” she said, endeavoring to make her voice as soothing as possible despite her fear. “You must think of the children and of William. You must be calm and be strong only a little longer and all will be well.” Her hand stroked Anna’s hair, its damp strands clinging to her fingers.
Gently, she urged Anna to lie back against the pillows. The woman’s ashen face was gazing at the ceiling, then at Kitty’s own with a look of despair.
“All of those things I laid aside,” she whispered, “all of those months–and it is come to naught.” A sob rose in her throat, her eyes brimming with tears. Hysteria would follow if she were not calm; Kitty’s hands closed around one of Anna’s, rubbing it softly.
“Hush, hush, dearest,” Kitty whispered. “All that matters is that you are patient and bear it only a little longer. I am here, Anna. Think of us and how we must need you.”
She turned to look at Mr. Turner; the surgeon nodded to her discreetly. She turned away and kept her grip upon Anna’s hands, aware of what was happening behind her.
He worked for an hour, then half of another. Anna’s breathing quickened with each discomfort, her low moans issued with her eyes now closed. Kitty soothed and held her sister’s hand; when she knew that Anna was no longer listening, she whispered in prayer to cover the sound of the surgeon’s labors.
“Miss Phillips.” The sound of the surgeon's voice startled her. He had paused in his labors when she turned; his face was pale, perspiration clinging to his forehead and lines of his jaw.
“If you would oblige me by going downstairs again,” he said. “I have need–I would wish to finish this operation in solitude, now that Mrs. Giles is calm.”
“I would wish to stay.” Her voice, speaking aloud again, sounded hollow to her ears.
“I know,” he answered. “But it is more difficult than I first believed. And I do not wish to inflict its sight on another.”
He had adjusted the sheets so Anna could not see his work, although such a maneuver seemed shocking to Kitty at first, given the absence of her brother-in-law. The sight of blood upon his hands and apron now made her quail at the thought of what must lie just beyond the sight of herself and Anna.
“Go, Kitty,” Anna whispered. “Go for a little while.” In Mr. Turner’s expression was something which also compelled her to obey. She rose from her knees and crossed the chamber to the door. The corner of her eye glimpsed the stains upon the bedclothes, the knife in his fingers.
Patience was in the kitchen, seated before the fire. It still blazed, as if in expectation of warming more infant linens; but the eyes of the servant girl which gazed at Kitty from hollow sockets bore proof that she already knew otherwise.
“Might we put on a new kettle?” ventured Kitty, faintly. “When Mr. Turner–is finished, he will require I cup, I think.” To speak of such normal trivialities seemed unbearable.
“Yes, Ma’am.” Patience rose and refilled the kettle, its water evaporated over the fire’s heat.
“Have the children had their tea?”
“Yes, Ma’am. Tillie’s keepin’ them upstairs.”
“Has Martin returned?” Kitty ventured with hope.
“No, Ma’am. Mr. Giles must have been away from Chawton.”
Kitty did not proceed into the drawing room; she drew aside a chair at the table and sat with her forehead in her hands.
At the close of afternoon, the surgeon came downstairs. He had removed his apron and attempted to remove the traces of blood from his hands as best possible. He did not carry his bag, only the basin; its top was covered with a piece of folded linen stained in places from his labor. He placed it on a table in the corner of the room.
“Mrs. Giles is resting,” he said. “I have given her something to ease her pain and aid her sleep. I did not leave the child present, for I feared...she is not yet herself.” These last words he spoke with difficultly.
“I will speak to James,” said Kitty, “if William does not return soon.” Of what, she did not say, although she knew he would interpret it to mean the child's preparation for burial. The small coffin needed, the remains laid out. It did not bear to think about, knowing what lay beneath the cloth.
She poured a cup of tea for him, fearing it was stewed, but there was nothing else to offer him. He stood quietly before the window, then sat down across from her at the table. His hands rested upon its surface, his head bowed.
“Are you hungry?” she asked. “The cook has laid aside something for you–”
“I do not wish it now,” he answered. “But thank you.”
Neither of them spoke again, for a long moment. Kitty’s grief gave her silence; the fatigue present in Mr. Turner’s body excused his own.
He stirred. “I am sorry,” he said.
“You have saved my sister’s life,” she answered. “And you would have saved her child had it been in your power.” She ceased speaking as her voice trembled violently with this last statement.
“Miss Phillips,” he said, his own tones breaking. “Catherine–Kitty–” He raised his eyes to hers, revealing a look of anguish in the depths of dark blue.
Her heart beat faster with each degree of address, her lips unable to move in response to the sound of her name upon his own. The look between them lasted for an age to her consciousness before she turned away with trepidation of what might follow.
Neither of them spoke again, for the sound of the front door opening reverberated through the main hall. Footsteps crossed the threshold, hastily approaching the parlor and the dining room until the ever-increasing pace bore William Giles into his kitchen.
He had removed his hat, but still wore his riding coat; on his usually cheerful countenance, a look of hope and anxiety which rested upon Kitty first. She rose, trembling, from her seat.
“Dearest William–” she began, conscious of the ache in her tones. His glance traveled swiftly from her face to the surgeon’s appearance, then t
o the basin covered conspicuously near the threshold, as comprehension dawned with crushing misery.
He turned and fled the room without speaking or waiting for Kitty‘s words. They heard his steps thudding up the stairs to his wife’s chamber.
Kitty sat down again, her hands upon the table as if finding support in its frame. There was silence from above; silence in every part of the house, it seemed, as if hushed for the child’s absent life. To her, however, the room seemed crowded with unspoken words, like a sea-wind sweeping in from all directions before the storm.
“I will have James show me to a room in the servant’s quarters,” said Mr. Turner. “You must awaken me in the night if there is any need.” He rose from the table.
“Thank you,” she answered, her voice sounding far away.
He paused for a moment, his hand reaching across the table’s surface until it was but a breath from touching her own; then he withdrew it again, as if supposing the touch of such fingers which bore evidence of his grim task would be repugnant.
It was not until he was gone that she began to cry. The first tear rolled down her cheek then drew away from her; the rest followed, now that she was alone with her grief in the silence of Marebrook Manor’s halls.
Chapter Nineteen
My dear Louisa,
I must bear grim news with this letter. Our sister’s child did not survive its delivery. After more than a day’s agony, she allowed a surgeon to be sent for; but it was too late, for the child had already expired. It was necessary to remove it by force and with a great reluctance she submitted to the instruments of the surgeon. He was obliged to cut apart her stillborn son and remove it by hand. William commissioned a small coffin and the child has been buried in the church cemetery. Had it lived, it would have borne William’s name.
Mr. Turner has been exceedingly kind and has done everything in his power to ensure Anna’s recovery, but her progress is slow. She is greatly dispirited by the child’s loss and has lapsed into melancholy. She will eat or drink only a little, despite entreaty. William worries, but has hope that her strength will return.
I continue to occupy the children with their lessons and games when I am not nursing Anna. Her serving girl has been of the best disposition and fortitude, greatly easing our burdens with her assistance. Her aid has greatly compensated for the loss of Anna’s housekeeper and I am persuaded that we shall manage well until I can find a suitable one.
I was surprised that you were not aware that Miss Harwick had taken a house in Essex, for she spoke as if she had informed her friends of her whereabouts when she left London. I suppose it is greatly shocking that she should come into the countryside just now, but she seems very content with her house and with society in general.
I shall request her to write you, if you wish, and inform you when she returns to London. I have seen nothing of Lord Grantly at all, I am afraid, so I cannot give you news of that family.
My love to the children and John.
With deepest affection,
Miss Catherine Phillips.
She laid her pen aside and folded the letter. The sound of Caroline’s faltering practice upon the pianoforte filled the house, along with the sounds of a quarrel between Frank and Lisbette. Kitty had promised to take the four youngest on an excursion to the pond before tea if they behaved themselves for the duration of the morning, a promise which felt very doubtful indeed.
Beiberry’s villagers had shared in the squire’s sorrow as best they could. A joint of mutton had been sent by Six Mile Grange to tempt the invalid’s appetite; a tin of Oriental tea leaves to promote good health from the widow Thompkins. Mrs. Jenner had called on two separate occasions to bring jellies and advice upon small household matters which touched upon the present pain by such accident that Miss Phillips could feel nothing but pity for her visitor’s kindness.
Lucy Foster called once with a basket from her aunt and a woeful face at the sight of Kitty.
“It is too unhappy to think that it should end so,” she said, half-sobbing in the midst of her sympathies. “I don’t know what happened, but my aunt spoke of it so terribly I know it was bad. It’s wicked to say, but it seems so–unfeeling–for God’s will.”
Gently, Kitty patted her hand. “There are some things we cannot understand,” she ventured. “They are set in motion by mortality and flesh and can only be changed by miracles. He does not always grant them as our human minds see fit; but we must endure such trials as a test of faith.” This was Kitty’s consolation to herself, although she felt its burden mightily in a sea of doubts.
“I am sure it's so,” answered Lucy, who still looked miserable. “I didn’t mean to seem so unhappy, Miss Phillips–indeed, I meant to be as calm as you–only I cannot help feeling all my aunt’s dreadful words to my very marrow. I wish she could have come instead, for she would have been as calm as anything.”
If Lucy knew anything of the village gossip regarding Miss Phillips’s would-be suitor, she did not share it; and such delicacy as grief prevented anyone else from speculating upon it for the moment. The representative of the house of Servennia was the last of the village acquaintances to call upon the squire’s family. Miss Hetta Harwick did not call at all.
Once these visits were concluded, there were household matters in need of attention, then correspondence to be written on behalf of her sister. In between these, Kitty had only her grief to occupy her, in a house where she must be comforter to all present.
Anna remained in bed, too ill to move in the days following the birth. Gone was her characteristic strength and lively character; fear and misery had gripped her in the hours after the child’s loss. Its death and burial seemed beyond her comprehension, yet, the act of grieving for it had consumed all her thoughts until she lay gazing at the window of her chamber, scarce speaking to anyone of anything.
“You must try, Anna,” said Kitty, stroking the bedraggled locks which framed her sister’s face. “Your friends are greatly concerned for you. They cannot bear to think of you as inconsolable. No one here can bear to see you in such pain.” Anna did not respond; after sitting long in the room’s silence, Kitty rose and quietly left the room again.
Mr. Turner had meant to shield herself and Anna from the results of his work, not knowing that it was Kitty’s hand which prepared the lifeless infant’s remains for burial. She had seen his efforts, with a sense of pain for what he must endure by such work. A repulsion for such a grisly task of mortality which was tempered by a deep pity for the life which would never be.
It was not her first time to see death; nor to feel the touch of cold flesh beneath her fingers, the blue veins empty of life beneath the grey. She wrapped it in a piece of embroidered muslin with the same tenderness of motion she had bestowed on the still figure of her mother.
The surgeon returned a few days later to consult with Anna and the squire on her condition. Kitty glanced from the school room window as Amelia practiced her music and saw his horse being led to the stables by Martin. Its owner no doubt already in the midst of examining his patient.
They had not spoken since the evening of the tragedy; he had not lingered to breakfast in the kitchen but had gone to his surgery as soon as ascertaining Anna was well enough to be left in her family's care. Kitty had come downstairs to find only a teacup left upon the table.
"That will do for today, Amelia," said Kitty. "You have practiced long enough; go and review your history lesson with Juliet, if you please." Her niece obeyed swiftly, abandoning the dreaded instrument for a less disagreeable task.
Kitty slipped downstairs hastily. Mr. Giles would consult with the surgeon, of course; they would speak downstairs in the hall and then he would be gone and she might learn all that he said from her brother-in-law a moment later.
If she waited in the parlor, she might hear a moment of their conversation without facing the surgeon himself–for such a meeting, she did not yet have the courage. Her hand turned the knob and she entered with the intention of waiting
beside the door; however, the error of her choice was revealed to her as she crossed the threshold. Standing at the table near the window was Mr. Turner himself.
He turned at the sound of a footfall, gazing at her figure standing in the doorway. “Miss Phillips,” he said.
“I did not know you were here, sir,” she answered, her voice betraying her surprise.
“The servant showed me here. I have seen your sister already,” he answered, “and I am waiting to speak to your brother-in-law regarding her health.”
William must have been detained by something, she surmised. It was by a mere chance of fate that Mr. Turner should be in the very place she did not expect him.
“He is but a moment delayed, I am sure,” said Kitty, hiding the flustered emotions which tempered her voice. “Only a matter of importance would detain him from knowing the state of Anna’s health, for he is much concerned.”
She had not ventured from her place a few steps from the doorway; he remained near the table, without drawing closer. Neither seemed inclined to sit upon the sofa or chairs within the room. There existed between them a hesitation which strained against companionable exchange.
“Theirs seems a happy marriage,” he ventured, after a period of silence. "I have seen such tender regard between them on each occasion we have met that I should call them the happiest couple in the village."
“There is a closeness of mind between them, indeed," said Kitty, relieved to have any subject spoken of between them and seizing it readily. "Hers is a lively, youthful character; he possessed a gentle manner which was greatly drawn to her charms.”
She blushed after speaking these words, ashamed of being so open with regards to her sister’s marriage, and lapsed into silence again.
“Conversation is ... to be greatly regarded,” he replied, at length. "More so than anything else in marriage, I suppose."
This provoked a faint laugh in Miss Phillips. "I believe the opposite is true more often, sir," she answered. "History and society would prove that a man is more content with beauty and a little conversation then by a great deal of conversation and little beauty."
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