Born of Woman

by Wendy Perriam

  She humped her parcels up again, trudged the last fifty yards towards the hospital. A tramp in a grimy coat which flapped around his ankles slouched past her, muttering to himself. She longed to wish him Happy Christmas, share existence with him. For the past two weeks, she had felt strangely insubstantial, except when she visited the hospital. The warmth and bustle of the ward, even the rules which Susie kicked against, made things real and purposeful. But once outside again, she felt herself fade and dwindle as the heavy-breathing winter evenings closed around her, and London’s seven million people were only empty offices, drawn curtains, deserted streets.

  She had never got up alone before on Christmas morning, the empty schmaltz of the chat shows making the silence louder, the uncooked and now superfluous turkey pale and cold with goose-pimples, Lyn’s presents piled unopened beside her bed. She had made him a Christmas cake, knitted him a sweater, a scarlet one this time. She hardly knew why scarlet, when her husband always hid in sober colours, but somehow it had seemed right and bright for Christmas. Now it looked merely desperate—bleeding because he couldn’t try it on. She had no idea where he was. She hadn’t even received a Christmas card. That angered her. He knew her address, knew how much Christmas meant to her, and if he had decided to ignore it, then she would harden her own heart. That ecstatic night at Cobham seemed almost like a dream now. She had been totally committed to him then, and he had repaid her by running off again. Served him right if she switched her concern and allegiance to Susie, put her and the baby first. She had little choice, in any case. Susie was an immediate problem, a vital swelling presence, whereas her husband had made himself a shadow and a stranger.

  The hospital had become a sort of refuge. She had got to know the nurses on the ward, helped them when they were short of staff, was always ready to talk to other patients who needed support or company, spent hours by Susie’s bed, trying to rally and amuse her. It wasn’t virtue or unselfishness. At Southwark, she was no one; on the ward she had a name, a role, a reason for existence. Besides, since Susie was carrying the baby which was going to be her own, then to be with her and concerned for her, was like caring for herself.

  She stopped to rest her arms again, glanced around her. Everything was dirty and deserted. Santa Claus had left shiny black dustbin-bags overflowing with rubbish instead of sacks of toys, dumped them in the gutters. A mangy dog was sniffing round them, the only living creature besides herself. The shops were locked and shuttered. There were no Christmas decorations, no holly wreaths on doors. The only seasonal reminder was a torn and flapping poster announcing road accident statistics for last year’s Christmas period. Only the sky had bothered to dress up. Ruffs of gold and scarlet were crinolined round the sun, fading into underskirts of pink and pearly grey. Yet, even that was deceptive. It was cold, despite the blaze. The North was deep in snow and sleet, and although the South was spared it, they still had thick frost and zero temperatures.

  Jennifer shivered on the pavement, made herself walk on. Susie needed her. Her parents were still hostile, had only relented enough to send her a scribbled ‘Merry Xmas’ on a Woolworths Christmas card. Sparrow was spending Christmas with his mother and three brothers in Sittingbourne. He hated hospitals. She had to make it up to Susie, be all relations at once—mother, lover, husband, mate. Lyn might be alone somewhere and moping, but at least he wasn’t eight months pregnant, lying in a shabby ward with fifteen hugely expectant mothers, coughing, groaning, snoring all around him.

  The sun had disappeared now, shut out by the beetling facade of the massive hospital building which was looming up in front of her with its stained and crumbling pillars, its grey forbidding stone. Jennifer faltered up the steps, pushed open the door, moved from frost to fug. Inside, the foyer swung with paper chains. A tall lop-sided Christmas tree stretched balding branches towards the visitors, as if begging for more tinsel. Three patients with paper hats atop their dressing-gowns had trespassed down the stairs and were mingling with the staff, all cheerful and transformed. Jennifer had visted twice a day for eighteen days and had rarely seen a smile before. Now people were chattering and laughing, singing snatches of carols. Christmas had affected everyone, even the normally stern receptionist and the new knife-edged Sister on the antenatal ward. She disapproved of Christmas morning visiting, but it had been introduced by a senior nursing officer who considered herself progressive, so she was doing her best to smile upon her giddy garish ward. Beds were askew with all the extra people, white counterpanes aflame with Christmas paper. Nurses with holly in their caps were munching chocolates, passing round mince pies. Balloons hung in every corner, bottles of Harvey’s Bristol Cream had taken over from specimen bottles. Children were screaming, the radio shrilling Silent Night. The other patients were surrounded by their families and hardly noticed Jennifer as she picked her way along the ward, dodging toddlers and trolleys. She stopped at Susie’s bed—still last one in the corner—stared in shock. It was tidy, made, unrumpled—not a sign nor trace of Susie. No books or papers littered on the coverlet, no fag-ends in the ashtray.

  ‘Ah, Mrs Winterton, we tried to contact you, my dear. That’s not so easy when you haven’t got a phone. Susan went into labour in the night.’

  ‘Labour? But she’s not due for four whole weeks. What happened. What …?’

  ‘Baby got impatient, I presume. Don’t worry, she’s all right.’

  ‘You mean, she’s … had the …?’

  ‘Oh, no. Baby changed his mind. We thought he’d be the first Christmas arrival with his photograph in all the newspapers, but obviously he doesn’t like publicity.’

  ‘Where is she?’ Jennifer cut through all the jokes. It was always jokes in hospitals, tinselling over danger.

  ‘We sent her up to the labour ward. The contractions started again an hour or so ago.’

  ‘Look, I must be with her. I promised her I’d …’

  ‘You’ll have to ask the Sister there. It’s her decision now.’

  ‘But I’ve been over it all already—with Sister Wilmot—weeks ago. She said as long as …’

  ‘Sister Wilmot’s off, my dear. She’s got four days’ leave for Christmas. Gosh! That’s a work of art.’ The nurse pounced on the patchwork bedspread which Jennifer had unfolded and was arranging on top of the hospital one. ‘Did you make it yourself?’

  Jennifer nodded. Susie’s bed looked bare and deathly pale—she had to brighten it up. She turned the top down, arranged a row of presents along the pillow. Her hands were trembling, her head spinning with a hundred fears and questions.

  The nurse was still admiring. ‘You are a clever girl! Susan won’t be coming back here, though—or not unless the contractions stop again. She’ll be moved to postnatal.’

  ‘Wh … where is she now? Where is the labour ward? I must go up there.’

  ‘Two floors up. If you take the lift, you’ll see the sign right in front you.

  They may be a bit chaotic, I’m afraid. We’re all short-staffed today. But there’s a little waiting-room just along the passage. It’s for husbands, really, but no one’s going to mind. Pop in there and ask the first nurse who comes in.’

  Jennifer was too impatient for the lift, took the steps two at a time, collided with a red-haired nurse at the top and started pouring out her story.

  ‘I’m sorry, dear, we’ve got four in labour at the moment, including an emergency with twins.’

  ‘But they said I could … It was all arranged. My friend’s on her own, you see, and …’

  ‘Well, hold on a moment and I’ll try and find Sister. She’s already missed both her coffee breaks, but if I’m lucky, I might catch her in her office. Wait in here, would you and I’ll see what I can do.’

  Wait, wait, wait—that’s all she was good for. Even the husbands’ room was empty. All decent caring fathers were present at the birth. It was a hideous room with puke-green shiny walls and a scrap of tattered carpet on the floor. The window looked out on a waste of rusting dustbins, which had vo
mited half their contents round their feet, and a blank brick wall with SCREW MAGGIE! daubed across it. The only picture showed a storm at sea; the only reading matter was the Ninth Pan Book of Horror Stories and a motor magazine already two years out of date.

  She picked up the magazine, tried to concentrate on Hot Rod Racing on the Utah Salt Flats, but souped-up Fords kept turning into foetuses. Supposing Susie were panicking, forgetting all her breathing drill, struggling, screaming, haemorrhaging … Susannah had had her baby on Christmas Day. It had lived and she had died. She remembered Molly telling her how Susannah’s coffin lay beneath the Christmas tree like a gigantic mocking gift, her empty bedroom sick with the scent of lilies. Thomas had eaten nothing for three days, just sat at the table, numb, while goose and turkey were carved and served and sent cold away again. All the Winterton babies had been born in cold and crisis. Lyn arrived in February in a blizzard, Matthew motherless in late-December, Thomas himself in November’s sleet and snow.

  She slumped in a chair, her own stomach bloated and distended, cramping pains griping like contractions. She turned back to the Hot Rods. Ridiculous to panic. Susie had been doing well, all the nurses happy with her progress, doubly pleased that she had decided to keep her child. The rhesus antibodies had not increased at all and were causing no alarm. Even the minor rise in blood pressure had already stabilised.

  So why had labour started four weeks early? Was it labour at all? And why had no one come to fetch her now? Were they hiding something, had bungled something, trying to cover up? She opened the door, peered out. The silence was almost frightening. Everywhere else in the hospital were revels and whoopee; here only a stretch of tense and waiting corridor. The delivery rooms were just a few yards down, beyond hefty double doors labelled NO ADMITTANCE. Five babies struggling to be born, and she shut out like someone uninvited to a solemn and important ceremonial. She longed to be part of it, assisting and involved, instead of powerless in this footling anteroom.

  Had they simply forgotten her? Hours must have passed since she had spoken to that nurse. She glanced at her watch. Just six and a quarter minutes. She sat down again, scanned a list of cars for sale. All of them had names—Vauxhall Victor, Morris Marina, Alfa Giulia. The baby was still nameless. Susie was more concerned with the names of Spanish beach resorts. She herself had always favoured Susannah, if the baby were a girl—Susie’s namesake and more fitting than she had realised at the Harrods tea—Matthew’s child with Matthew’s mother’s name; a name which he and Lyn and Thomas had all paid tribute to, all woven into dreams.

  Yet, now she feared the name. It had been an unlucky omen from the start. Susannah’s death had left Matthew motherless, Thomas distraught; made Hester a servant, Christmas Day a tragedy. She erased the name, kicked it out. Susannah had died. This child might, must—please—would live.

  The door was opening. She sprang to her feet. It would be the nurse returning with news. Susie’s baby was born, safe, thriving, suckling, there.

  A tall man in a green gown over shirt-sleeves stumbled through the door. He sank into the only other chair and closed his eyes. Jennifer felt cold unreasoning anger fill the silence like a mushroom cloud between them. Anger because he hadn’t come to call her; resentment that here was a father who had been allowed in the delivery room, and who probably had his baby now, a named and breathing child.

  ‘Excuse me …’ Jennifer frowned at his smug and sprawling legs. ‘You haven’t seen a nurse, have you?’

  He opened his eyes, squinted at the light. ‘I’ve seen about a dozen of them. My wife’s just given birth to twins.’

  ‘Congratulations.’ Envy doubled.

  ‘Not yet, please. They’re only two pounds each and hardly breathing. They’ve just been rushed to intensive care.’

  ‘Intensive care? For babies?’

  ‘Well, they call it something different, but it’s life-support machines, just the same. They’re great, those things, unless your own kid’s on them. Then every second’s a nightmare. I know. We lost our first.’

  ‘Gosh, I’m sorry … Is your wife all right? Was it … bad?’

  ‘Not as bad as the first. That was murder. Forty-two hours in labour. Halfway through, they gave her an epidural, but the thing cocked up. She was in agony by the end. And it was all for nothing, anyway.’

  Jennifer pressed her cramping stomach with her hands. ‘I … I’m sorry,’ she said again.

  ‘These things happen, don’t they?’ The man shrugged and rubbed his eyes. ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘Same as you. Waiting for a baby.’

  ‘You don’t look much like a husband.’ The feeble joke was painful when he sounded so close to tears.

  ‘N … no.’

  ‘Your sister’s?’

  ‘No, my … Look, excuse me a moment, will you? I’d better go and check on her.’

  Jennifer stood trembling outside the door. The Special Care Baby Unit was just along the passage. She remembered now she had noticed the sign, but had preferred to blank it out. Babies with rhesus problems could land up there, undergo dangerous procedures like exchange transfusions—horrors she had read about and dreaded, decided to forget. Babies four weeks premature would be even more at risk—too small and weak to rally on their own.

  A nurse dashed past, followed by the younger red-haired one she had spoken to before.

  ‘Stop—please stop! How’s my friend? What did Sister say? Did you sort it out?’

  ‘Well, no, I’m sorry. She said there’s nothing in the notes, so she can’t allow you in. We’ve got a newish doctor on and he won’t hear of it unless it’s down in writing. He’s a bit of a tyrant, I’m afraid. Don’t worry though—your friend will be all right.’

  Jennifer flounced back down the stairs. They were treating her like a child, a total fool. She would go and drag the Sister out from Susie’s previous ward. She might be new, but at least she had the details of Susie’s case, was aware of the special circumstances. She would insist she took responsibility, spoke to the labour ward herself and sorted out the muddle.

  The reek of turkey fat had taken over from the smell of disinfectant. They were serving Christmas lunch. A long white-clothed table had been set up in the centre of the ward, with most of the pregnant patients sitting round it, one or two in wheelchairs. There was no sign of Sister, though a whole bevy of new nurses was rushing to and fro with plates and glasses, and a moustachioed doctor in pink frilly hat and apron was carving a gigantic turkey.

  ‘Pity I’m not a breast surgeon!’ he joked, as he hacked off slices of white breast-meat, nurses giggling and frothing all around him.

  No one noticed Jennifer as she dithered at the door. There was too much noise and razzmatazz. Children were pulling crackers, blowing whistles, husbands pouring wine and humping chairs.

  ‘Anyone want stuffing?’ bawled the doctor, spooning out sage and onion from the butchered turkey. ‘I’m ready if you’re willing! Ha ha!’ Today was just a joke to him, a caper. If a baby died, a mother died, the Christmas revelry must still burp and bubble on. It was like those Christmas chat shows—all emotions banned except tinselled bonhaomie.

  Jennifer turned her back. If she ever prised a nurse away from that stupid sozzled doctor, she would still need Sister’s sanction. And Sister was probably dealing with some crisis and would only tell her sharply there were other patients besides Susan Grant. She trudged upstairs again, turned the other way from the labour ward, towards Special Baby Care. For all she knew, Susie’s baby might have been born already, rushed down here and shut up in a box. She pushed at the heavy door. She must see those life-and-death machines herself.

  ‘May I help you?’

  ‘Yes. H … have you got a baby Grant here?’ How could a nurse that young be left in charge? ‘Here, let me look myself.’

  ‘I’m sorry. No one’s allowed in here except the parents.’

  ‘I’ve got to check. My friend’s gone into labour. I was told I could be with her, but all I’v
e done so far is hang around, and I’ve no idea if she’s even …’

  ‘I’m sorry, this isn’t the labour ward. You’ll have to go and ask up there.’

  ‘I’ve been up there, for heaven’s sake, and no one told me anything. I may as well not exist, for all they care.’ Jennifer’s voice was rising. She was sick of being treated as a nobody after weeks of centre-stage. Fame was like champagne, frothy and expensive, but exploding into nothing once the cork was drawn, leaving only hangover and headache in the morning. She had been relieved before to escape the whirl and hubbub, retreat on to the sidelines, especially since Edward Ainsley’s action had turned fame to notoriety. Several people had recognised her when she visited the ward, asked about the book, steered the conversation in the direction of the lawsuit. She had always tried politely to brush them off, play the whole thing down. But now she wanted fame, for the power it brought with it—power to open doors, dispense with rules, override the doctors.

  ‘Look, don’t you realise who I am?’

  The nurse turned away. ‘I’m sorry, we’re extremely busy. If you’ll excuse me, I must …’

  ‘No, I won’t excuse you.’ Jennifer heard herself sounding shrill and vixenish. She never made scenes, never flung her name about or answered back like Susie. ‘I’ve been waiting five fucking months for this baby to be born, and now when she’s actually having the kid, I’m not even allowed to …’

  ‘Whatever’s going on?’ An older and more senior nurse had swept through the door and took Jennifer by the arm. ‘Who are you, my dear—a patient or a …?