by Gloria Cook
Everything to Finn felt skin-tinglingly odd. Intimidating. Scary. Frightening him more than ever. With alarming clarity he knew that he wasn’t in the throes of a nightmare yet it seemed he had been running back up the hill – just a length of several hundred yards and not at all steep – for hours in a kind of limbo world. The hedgerows, although draped in May blossom, bluebells, white wild garlic and cow parsley with shiny yellow celandines down near the ditches, broken in one place by a field gate, seemed to rear up either side of him, close in on him, and he half expected something suddenly to drop down in front of him and block his way back to his mother.
‘No! You can’t leave me, Finn,’ Fiona had screamed when he’d yelled in panic that he must run and get help.
He had found her on her knees on the bedroom floor clutching her huge belly, gritting her teeth, her pale hollow face flushed and grimacing in pain. A stab of fear had sent Finn’s heart thrashing so fiercely in his chest he thought his ribs would break. The woman down before him didn’t seem like his mother but some gargoyle-like version of her. ‘Mum, are you hurt?’ Had she hurt herself deliberately? She had so often cried out that she wished she were dead.
Fiona had motioned with a taut hand to give her a moment. After an endless time she let out a long desperate gasp, an ugly breath, and slumped forward, her rat-tailed hair swinging like a piece of ripped cloth hiding her face. It was a strange thought at the time but Finn felt heartbroken over the loss of her gleaming blonde hair that had once been immaculately sculptured into luxuriant waves or chignons. Fiona lifted her face to him and Finn got the impression he was looking down at a bewildered child and he reached out to her.
‘I’m in labour, Finn,’ she whimpered. ‘Help me up on the bed. After you left I was going to tidy up and try to cook us something, then I had a burning need to go to the bathroom. You may not understand this,’ she had heaved and puffed while he hauled her up to sit on the edge of the bed, ‘but my waters broke.’
‘There’s no immediate worry, is there?’ Finn had asked, reaching round to the dressing table and picking up her hairbrush. ‘Babies take hours to come, don’t they?’
‘I thought this one would – you certainly did, Finn – but I went straight into strong contractions and the birth is not far off.’
‘What?’ Finn’s gut constricted. He dropped the hairbrush and it hit the bare wooden floor with a thump that startled them both.
‘Finn, don’t,’ Fiona moaned. ‘Fetch some towels and bring over that box on the chair. I did manage to put a few things together that the midwife suggested. I’ve put back some money to pay her for this. I kept some of your baby clothes, they’re in there too, and some new nappies I bought before they sent your father away.’ She spat out the last words. It was her belief that Aidan, of previously exemplary character, had been too harshly dealt with for one single act of taking a bribe, and she hated all those on the urban council she suspected had anonymously and cowardly informed the police on him.
‘Midwife! That’s it, I must fetch her at once,’ Finn cried, springing to fetch the box for his mother. He was too keyed-up to consider that his sudden movements were alarming to her. ‘Blast, there’s no phone here! Where does she live? I know it’s in the village but where exactly?’
‘She left her address on a piece of paper. I think I left it downstairs.’ Fiona screwed up her face as another pain hit her back and insides, drawing her mouth back and revealing all her teeth and gums, perspiration shining on her lined brow. ‘But you can’t leave me, Finn.’
‘I have to, Mum,’ he had squealed. ‘I don’t know anything about the birth of a baby.’
Fiona’s hands flew to Finn’s shirt so forcefully the collar cut into his neck. ‘Don’t you dare think of leaving me alone!’
But he did, and guilt teamed up with his worries at deserting his mother and he prayed the baby would take a good while longer before making its entrance into the world. He was rushing home at his fastest but his legs seemed to be dragging him in slow motion. He rounded a bend and a large green shape sped straight at him forcing him to leap up into the hedge, his hands finding purchase on a blackthorn bush. All he saw of the young male driver in the sporty roadster was a wide white grin under a tweed cap. Jumping down to the ground, ignoring the thorns piercing his palms, Finn shook his fist at the retreating car. ‘Damn you, you bloody swine!’ he swore and shouted worse. ‘You nearly spread me all over the road.’
He charged on up the last of the hill, picking thorns out of his flesh and tossing them down in anger. Finally he was pounding over the rutted ground, muddy still in places from recent rain, on the path that led to Merrivale. Guilt once more nagged at him. He should have supported his mother more and complained a lot less and perhaps she wouldn’t have moped so much, got so down. In her condition many women would end up the same, depressed and lonely, and ashamed to be reduced to living in a fetid dump on limited means, abandoned by family and friends. One or two friends had offered help but Fiona had only taken up Guy Carthewy’s offer, the only person she said she could truly trust. What a bloody great come down. He should have thought more about the baby; he had not even wondered if it would be a boy or a girl or what a baby would need.
The cottage appeared through the elm and beech trees that hid it from the road. A sudden wash of baleful wind pierced through his angst and cooled the sweat dripping off him. The house seemed to darken before his eyes and he lost focus. It must be exhaustion brought on by his ragged nerves, he reasoned, but things didn’t appear as usual. The glass windows in the quirky, mossy, flaking white walls were like spidery eyes, glaring at him darkly in the gloom. Finn had heard the rumours about Merrivale being haunted by two tortured souls despatched here by violent murder and also by a distant relative of Guy Carthewy’s who had died here. The old biddy in the general stores had gleefully told him all about it while trying to pump him for personal information when he had trailed to the village shop with the ration books, he feeling conspicuous to be carrying a straw shopping bag. Was someone watching him from among the trees? Finn shook his head and his sight cleared but he could have sworn he’d seen a shadowy form. The house now seemed as it normally did, run-down, uninviting and cheerless, even in early summer. Winter here didn’t bear thinking about, and as for the long-term future . . .
The front door hung out of true on its rusty hinges and was so difficult to open that he and Fiona kept it locked. Fiona ordered all the doors to be kept locked most of the time in fear of surprise nosy visitors. Finn sprinted round the rear of the property, crunching over the ash path that was partly encroached by a botanist’s dream of wild herbage. Thrusting aside an overgrowth of woody shrubs choked by ivy he knocked over a mouldy concrete urn, bruising his knee. The urn crashed, spilling out its long dead blackened plant, and he hoped the noise wouldn’t alarm Fiona. Finn’s best shoes slammed down over the patio of cracked quarry tiles and then with his heart threatening to rip apart he burst into the kitchen.
Without stopping to get his breath back, Finn shot up the stairs. ‘Mum, Mum, are you all right? I’ve got some help. She’s ringing the midwife now.’
‘Finn, oh Finn . . .’
His mother’s voice echoed weakly back to him. ‘Oh God.’ Finn stalled a second outside the bedroom door. ‘Please, Mrs Resterick, don’t be long.’
Dorrie was as fit and fast as she had been forty years ago and she surprised Finn by reaching Merrivale shortly after him. The instant Finn heard her call downstairs he went to the top of the stairs, relief paramount in him. ‘Thank God, come up, come up. Mum says she wants to push!’ he ended with a panicked squeal.
‘All we have to do is keep calm,’ Dorrie said, smiling confidently as she climbed up to him, but she was feeling far from relaxed. She had been in childbirth rooms but had never seen a woman actually giving birth. She would have to call on what she had heard over the years and her own experience of pushing her daughter into the world, her darling little Veronica, whom she had lost at just fifteen m
onths.
‘Thank you for coming, Mrs Resterick, I’m so glad you’re here.’ Fiona murmured breathlessly through her groans as a pain subsided. ‘I’ve done as much as I could manage to get things ready. This is no place for Finn.’ She was lying on the bed on her side, half covered by a sheet and her nightdress scrunched up above her bump. She was gripping the sheet with white-knuckled hands. Dorrie saw the baby clothes, baby bottles and teats and a tin of National Dried milk. Clearly Mrs Templeton did not intend to breastfeed. There were no other infant requirements. A pile of clean towels and a face cloth were on the washstand. ‘Finn has stoked up the kitchen range and put the kettle and some pans on for hot water.’
‘That’s good, Mrs Templeton,’ Dorrie said, putting down the bag of things she had brought and taking off her cardigan and rolling up her blouse sleeves, smiling a lot, as she was wont to do anyway, but this time hoping she was showing she was completely capable of taking charge. ‘Finn, bring up some hot water as fast as you can so I can wash my hands. Keep a look out for Nurse Rumford.’
Finn wanted nothing more than to leave the labour room but he was afraid for his mother and couldn’t tear his eyes off her. The pain had ended and she seemed to have dropped into a stupor, panting with her mouth sagging open. A school friend’s mother had been paralysed giving birth and he knew women occasionally died during the agonizing process.
‘There’s no need for you to worry,’ Dorrie said soothingly, easing him out of the room. ‘I’ll call you if you’re needed. Could you look in the rooms for something for the baby to sleep in? Use your imagination, an empty drawer would do, and could you wash it well with some disinfected hot soapy water.’
Finn nodded eagerly, glad to have something to do. He hoped when he got downstairs he would hardly hear his mother’s cries and groans of pain. He’d had no idea a woman could grunt and howl like a wounded animal, in savage, primeval wails.
As Finn headed downstairs, Fiona screamed, ‘I’m going to push!’
Dorrie whipped to the bedside. Still on her side, Fiona was trying to shove down the bed sheet. Dorrie did it for her. ‘Wouldn’t you be better partially sitting up, Mrs Templeton?’
‘Noooo, I had Finn on my side and that’s how I’ll deliver this baby. Hold my leg up please.’ Fiona grunted, then she cried out and screwed up a grotesque face, making guttural noises deep in her throat as she bore down and down.
Quickly supporting the woman’s skinny white leg, Dorrie looked at the birth area and was shocked to see a tiny greasy scalp of fair hair. ‘I can see the head.’ The words were barely out of her mouth when Fiona screamed as if she was being torn apart and the whole head was out followed by the first little shoulder and then the other and then the rest of the baby slid out in a gush of stained waters. Releasing the mother’s leg, Dorrie caught the baby before it twisted at an angle and hit the bed. The baby cried lustily. It was very small but at a glance Dorrie thought it healthy and whole. Fiona flopped over flat on her back, panting as noisy as a steam engine. The baby let forth more startled cries.
Her core in knots of excitement, Dorrie carefully wiped round the baby’s nose and eyes, the most delicate thing she had ever done. Then with a feeling of spiritual awe that she had taken part in the beginning of a new life, she gently supported the slippery child on the length of her arm and hand and lifted it up. ‘You have a little girl, Mrs Templeton, congratulations. She’s absolutely beautiful.’
Dorrie’s smile had never been wider and she had tears of wonder in her eyes as she turned to the new mother.
But Fiona had closed her eyes and faced away.
‘Mrs Templeton . . .’
No reaction.
‘Mum!’ Finn had charged back up the stairs and now he peered round the door. His expression was utter disbelief. ‘It’s here!’
Dorrie flipped the sheet over Fiona to preserve her decency but not before she had glanced down, relieved to see Fiona wasn’t gaping open or bleeding profusely from the rapid birth. While swaddling the baby in a towel she said, emotion making her sound throaty, ‘You have a little sister, Finn. From what I can see she’s perfect.’
Finn crept in for a closer look. Dorrie placed the tiny girl, now making low whimpers, on her mother’s chest and then she lifted Fiona’s arm round her child. Fiona’s only reaction was to turn her head further away.
‘She doesn’t want to know her own baby.’ Finn’s voice was steeped in bewilderment and unease. ‘What’s wrong with her?’
‘Your mother is overwhelmed by the quick birth, and she’s exhausted. She’ll be fine in a little while,’ Dorrie explained gently, but she didn’t believe her last remark. Fiona Templeton seemed to have cut herself off from reality, and Dorrie knew all about depression and wanting only to be left alone. She had been the same way for several weeks herself when she had lost Veronica, and again years later when Piers had been killed. ‘It’s safe to leave the cord intact for a couple of minutes or so. If Nurse Rumford isn’t here by then, I’ll see to it. Now, Finn, dear, we could really do with that hot water.’
‘The baby’s gone quiet! Has she stopped breathing?’ Finn panicked, staring at the bundled-up deep pink face of his sister. There had been a time he’d hoped his mother would miscarry, but now the baby was here and had taken her first breath, and even though he hadn’t yet touched her he felt a bond with her. If his mother didn’t come round quickly from her stupor the baby would be depending on him, for life and safety and sustenance and possibly to keep her out of an orphanage – and against all his previous resentment and anger, he wanted that responsibility. He wanted to know his sister, to see her grow up. Now it seemed she had died.
Dorrie reached forward and caressed the baby’s soft face. ‘She’s dozing, Finn, and that’s a good thing at the moment. Now hot water, please, without delay.’
Finn let out an almighty breath of relief coupled with the release of all the stress he had gone through so far today. Then he gulped and braced himself for he had a new set of woes ahead of him, realizing how the new responsibility, although he was glad to undertake it, would also weigh him down. Today he must become a man; all thoughts of his own life and future had to be set aside. ‘Right, hot water.’ He sped out of the room.
Dorrie remained still and listened for the sounds of bicycle wheels and Nurse Rumford ringing her bell, as she always did, to announce her arrival. She detected nothing except the various creakings of the old house. Feeling a little out of her depth now that the immediacy of the birth was over, she folded back Fiona’s stained sheet and cautiously felt about her bulbous stomach for indication that the placenta was about to be expelled. It could take several minutes for that to happen and there was no sign from the all-too-quiet Fiona that she was having another contraction. There seemed no danger of bleeding and so Dorrie covered the mother again, deciding to wait another minute. Among the things laid out in preparation for the birth was a small pair of scissors and surgical spirit. Dorrie swabbed the scissors with a wad of cotton wool in readiness should she need to cut the umbilical cord.
Moving round the bed she went to the spot Fiona was facing. Fiona’s eyes were open. ‘Can you hear me, Mrs Templeton?’
‘Yes,’ she answered miserably.
‘You’ve done very well, a beautiful baby girl, you must be so pleased.’ Dorrie had a passionate belief in encouragement being the best help in all ills. ‘You have some water here. Try to take a sip. I’m sure your mouth must be very dry. Finn is doing sterling work downstairs, I’m sure. He’s seems a very capable young man, you must be proud of him. Nurse Rumford will be here at any moment and you’ll soon be made comfortable.’
‘I didn’t ask him,’ Fiona murmured.
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘Finn went out to look for a job. I didn’t ask him if he got it.’
‘Well, he can tell you about it in a little while,’ Dorrie said cheerily.
‘He mustn’t get a job,’ Fiona whispered in desperation as if she was giving up all her str
ength. ‘I can’t cope with this baby. I don’t want it. Take it away . . . Just want to sleep . . .’
‘I’ll take her for now,’ Dorrie said, with sympathy. Poor woman, she thought, as she gathered the newborn into her arms. It must have been so hard facing this in her circumstances, without her husband at her side, wondering how she was going to manage in the future. She heard a persistent ringing and gazed down at the baby, now yawning, now opening her minute rosebud lips and turning her head as if searching to suckle. ‘Oh, thank God, now Nurse Rumford will make sure all is well with you and your mummy. Don’t worry, little one, I won’t desert you, your mummy or Finn.’
Four
Greg Barnicoat knew at once the house was empty. Although he was met by Corky waddling round from the back, Greg knew Dorrie wasn’t home. He had such a strong connection with his sister, although their physical characteristics were different. Dorrie favoured their dainty red-haired mother and Greg their strong-boned, statuesque father. ‘Hello, old chap, where she’s gone then? Where’s Dorrie? I suppose she’s left me a message. What’s this? You want to show me something? Lead on then.’
‘Well, well.’ Greg pressed down the corners of his moustache. Corky’s legendary nose had headed him straight to the three-tiered pagoda. Greg and Dorrie and their siblings had played out many Oriental dressing-up games in the folly. Genuine Eastern lanterns had been strung from the wooden decorative jutting eaves and citronella candles lit on summer evening to chase away troublesome insects. The pagoda had a cast-iron spire, on which Greg and his brothers had laughingly threatened to impale Dorrie and their sister Diana if the girls refused to allow them the lead in their joint games. The cat and dog squabbles had been won by the boys and the girls in equal numbers. The pagoda was a great source of comfort to Greg after enduring the horrors of Flanders trenches, and witnessing in the recent war the loss of so many vital young men under his command in North Africa. And there was the never-ending ache of losing his wife and son. A motorcar accident while holidaying in France had deprived Greg of his five-year-old son, Gregory junior, and his beloved homely wife, Caroline. Greg would never forgive himself for not avoiding the Breton lorry, although its driver had been speeding on his side of the road. Like Dorrie, he was on familiar terms with that dreadful inner hollowness of losing his soul mate. Greg thanked God every day that he lived in a place of so many happy, carefree memories.