‘I’ll come with you to talk,’ Ross said ominously, and she shook her head hurriedly. She needed time to think before she was alone with him.
‘No, stay and talk to Ruth. I’m going to take a shower.’
She caught Ruth’s startled glance but didn’t let their eyes meet. Ruth knew she had already had a bath that morning.
Ross didn’t try to insist, to her relief. Shrugging, he said, ‘Okay, don’t be long. I want to get away before this snow makes the roads treacherous.’
As she began making her way upstairs she heard him say to Ruth, ‘I’ve got a four-wheel drive, it can cope with any weather or terrain, and her sister is waiting anxiously to see her. Thank you again for...’
Dylan slipped into the spare bedroom and closed the door with a sigh of mingled relief, pain and confusion.
Was Ross telling the truth? Had his sister really told him not to sleep with her? It explained so much that had been hurting her, puzzling her, all these weeks past. Why on earth hadn’t Ross told her what Ella had said, though? If she had known, everything would have been so different.
She took a step towards the wardrobe where she had hung her clothes and doubled up with a grunt of agony as the pain in her back moved round to the front with a stabbing intensity unlike any pain she had ever felt in her life.
Groaning, she sank down on the bed, head down, trying to breathe the way she had been taught, fighting to regain control of her body in a struggle with the pain attempting to dominate it.
It subsided and she slackened in relief. Oooh, that was better. At least she could think again now.
How long had she had this back pain? Hours. Why on earth hadn’t she recognised it? She had read all about giving birth, she had been to antenatal clinic every month, she had talked to her midwife and doctor about what to expect . . . but she had totally missed one of the classic symptoms!
She had been so preoccupied with Ross, with her jealousy, her uncertainty, her hurt feelings, that she had not realised she was in labour.
She must have been in labour for a long time; the question was how much longer would it take? She was booked into a maternity hospital in the borders—much too far away. She would never get there in time, especially on roads blocked with snow, even if Ross tried to get her there.
The pain jabbed again, deep inside her, so painful that she could not sit still. She got up to walk about, trying to distract herself from it, breathing while she stared at her watch. How long since the last contraction? She had no idea—she hadn’t noticed the time.
She would have to wait until the next pain started and time from that; that would give her some idea how advanced she was in labour.
The door opened and Ross came in, stopped dead, staring at her. ‘What the hell are you doing, walking about like that?’
She told him and saw his face go white.
‘You can’t be having it now! There’s another month to go!’
‘You tell the baby that,’ Dylan said, sitting down again as the pain quietened and letting out a long, weary sigh of relief. ‘Could you drive over to Ruth’s friend Henry and ask him to come?’
‘What? Who?’ echoed Ross, looking at her as if she was nuts.
She laughed, feeling light-headed. ‘He’s a doctor.’
‘Right, okay,’ Ross said, turning and disappearing at speed. She heard him crashing down the stairs, his voice urgently talking to Ruth below in the kitchen.
She was surprised when he came back almost at once. ‘The phones are working again—Ruth has rung Henry but he is out on another call. His nurse said she would give him the message, but I think I should drive you to the nearest hospital.’
The pain had her in its vicious grip again by then; she closed her eyes, breathing rhythmically.
When she could speak again she whispered, dark-eyed with pain, ‘No. No, I can’t. It hurts so much, Ross, and the pains are coming faster and closer together. I don’t think there is time to drive to hospital.’
CHAPTER EIGHT
‘BUT you can’t have the baby here!’ Ross’s voice was harsh, his face tense. ‘It wouldn’t be safe. You’ll need help, a midwife, a doctor...someone who knows what they’re doing. A first-time mother has to have her baby in hospital.’
Dylan rubbed her back, face defiant. ‘No, I’m not risking a long drive. The pains come too close together, I’d be scared of having the baby arrive before I got to hospital.’ She groaned, sweat breaking out on her forehead. ‘If only the doctor would get here!’
Ross sat down next to her and turned sideways on so that he could massage her back. Dylan felt his strong, warm, muscular hands stroking firmly, rhythmically, pressing into her tense muscles, and sighed, relaxing, closing her eyes.
‘That’s wonderful.’
He went on kneading her, murmuring close to her ear, his voice persuasive, ‘Dylan, listen, you have to be sensible. I’ll drive you very slowly and carefully, I promise. Let me take you to the nearest hospital. You’ll be risking the baby’s life if you don’t, not to mention your own. I couldn’t bear it if anything went wrong.’
‘Why should you care? The way you’ve been treating me the last few months!’ she muttered, but knew he might be right. Maybe it would be wiser to go to the hospital? If only she had a clearer idea what to expect!
But she stopped thinking as the pain came surging back. She had to relax, so that she could do her breathing exercises, but she had been taken off guard and her body was too tense, fighting the pain instead of going with it.
‘Lean on me,’ said Ross, putting an arm round her and gently stroking her taut abdomen the way he had her back.
She let herself slump against him, surrendering to his hands, and her breathing slowed, deepened. The pleasure of having Ross touching her with such tenderness helped. When the pain went she stayed very still, not wanting him to stop. It had been so long since they had had such intimate contact.
There was a tap on the door at that moment, and Ruth asked, ‘May I come in?’
‘Of course, please do. We could use your advice,’ Ross said, relief in his voice. ‘She seems to be in a lot of pain.’
Ruth came in, looking sharply at Dylan, eyes skimming her from head to toe. ‘Is it really bad, Dylan?’
She nodded, saving her breath.
Ruth said, ‘I just tried to ring for an ambulance but there’s no bed available in the local hospital—they said there was no point in bringing you in as they had nowhere to put you. They suggested trying other hospitals in the area but they said your doctor should do that, so until Henry gets here there’s nothing else to be done, I’m afraid.’
‘The pains are coming every few minutes; she must be well into labour,’ Ross said flatly. ‘Unless this doctor friend of yours arrives soon we may find ourselves delivering the baby.’
Looking aghast, Ruth said, ‘How soon do you think the baby will arrive, Dylan?’
‘I don’t know! I never had a baby before!’ Dylan heard the ring of panic in her own voice and tried to sound calmer. There must be a local midwife, surely!’
‘Of course, and I already tried her number, but she was out on another call, too. I left a message on her answer-machine.’
‘We must do something!’ Ross broke out fiercely.
Dylan stopped listening to them. The process gripping her body made everyone else around her unimportant for a minute or two.
By noon the white snow blew in swirls and drifts which blotted out the leaden sky. An arctic wind rattled the bare branches in the garden; it seemed colder today than it had been yesterday. Even Fred was happy to stay locked in the shed with a net of hay to eat, and Cleo slept, curled nose to tail, in front of the glowing range in between visits upstairs to investigate the comings and goings of her owner and the two visitors.
‘Stay out of here,’ Ruth told her the third time, firmly shooing her out.
Green eyes slitted, black tail lashing, Cleo peered past into the bedroom at the woman making yowling noises on the be
d.
‘She knows what’s going on,’ Ruth said drily. ‘She’s kittened twice.’
‘A pity she can’t talk, then. We could ask her advice!’ Ross groaned.
Dylan laughed, perspiration-dampened hair clinging to her hot forehead. ‘She probably thinks I’m making a big fuss over nothing.’
Ruth laughed. ‘I don’t know about that. Cats hate being undignified, and giving birth is not a dignified process! She probably feels sorry for you.’
Ross wiped Dylan’s face with a cool, damp flannel. ‘Where the hell is that doctor? Could you try him again, Ruth?’
‘I just did but the phone lines are down again—not surprising with this wind howling. Maybe one day this country will bury all the phone lines underground and put an end to these winter problems. It’s the same every winter.’
‘You would choose to give birth just when we’re having the worst weather of the year,’ Ross said to Dylan, softly brushing her damp hair back from her face in rhythmic movements which were very soothing.
For such a big, powerful man he could be amazingly gentle. Dylan loved having him there, looking after her; he made it much easier to bear what was happening.
At that moment a male voice downstairs called out. ‘Ruth? Are you up there?’
‘Oh...the doctor...’ sighed Dylan, and Ross’s face lit up with weary relief.
‘Thank God for that! I was beginning to think he’d never get here.’
Ruth hurried out of the room. They heard her call down the stairs, ‘Yes, come up, Henry. Thank heavens you got here!’
She and Henry murmured together on the landing, their voices not quite audible, and then Henry came into the bedroom, his shrewd eyes assessing Dylan’s condition briefly before moving on to examine Ross.
‘Hello, there! You’re the husband, right? Glad you’re here with your wife. It always helps to have a father on call for support and comfort. But just for the moment I need to see your wife alone—why don’t you go downstairs for a few minutes while I examine her? I need to see just how far advanced she is before I decide what to do. You look as if you could do with a break, too. A trying business, childbirth. It can take a lot out of a fellow. Why don’t you make us all a cup of tea? I could do with one, myself.’
Ross glared back at him, saying fiercely, ‘I want you to find her a hospital bed. She can’t have the baby here; it isn’t safe. If anything goes wrong there won’t be anything we can do about it.’
Henry soothed him, using his best bedside manner. ‘Normally, of course, you’re a hundred per cent right. A first-time mother should be in a maternity ward, being looked after by a midwife, with lots of nursing back-up and all the most up-to-date equipment on hand for emergencies.’
‘Then get on the phone and find her a bed somewhere! ’
‘I’ve already tried to find a bed—the nearest available one is thirty miles off...’
‘Thirty miles!’ interrupted Dylan, face agitated. ‘No, I won’t go all that way, jolting about in an ambulance on dangerous roads.’
Henry gave her a rueful look. ‘My dear girl, there is no chance whatever of an ambulance driving here. They have too many medical emergencies to cope with. It’s a battlefield out there. The roads are littered with abandoned cars. Every operating theatre is working flat out. A woman having a baby is not a priority case, I’m afraid, unless her life, or the baby’s, is in real danger.’
Ross broke out, ‘I’ll drive her there. My car is a four-wheel drive; it can cope with these conditions.’
‘No!’ Dylan shook her head in terror. ‘It’s too dangerous.’
Henry made a face. ‘She’s right. It just took me over half an hour to get here. The roads are murder, I had to drive at a snail’s pace and my tyres wouldn’t grip on the mixture of ice and new snow. I kept skidding and sliding—it was like trying to drive on a skating rink.’
Impatiently, Ross insisted, his voice rising harshly, ‘I’ll get her there, somehow!’
‘No,’ Dylan groaned. ‘Please, Ross! Stop shouting. Haven’t I got enough problems without you being so belligerent and throwing your weight around?’
He looked at her uncertainly, his hands screwed up at his sides.
Henry studied her, face expressionless. ‘Your wife is right. She has enough to cope with, just giving birth, and she’s frightened. I understand how worried you are, but you’ll just have to face the fact that we can’t get her to a hospital yet. But we’ll manage somehow. Off you go and make that tea while I examine her, then I can give you a better idea of the situation we’re facing.’
‘I want the truth!’ Ross grated, scowling.
‘You’ll get it,’ Henry promised.
Ross looked at Dylan, trailed his fingers across her limp brown curls without a word, then went out.
She sighed. ‘I’m sorry he was so aggressive.’
‘Oh, I’m quite used to bad-tempered fathers-in-waiting,’ Henry said jovially. ‘The old tradition was for them to go to the pub and drink while their wives got on with it, which was quite useful because they were rarely much use and only got in the way.’
‘Well, I’d rather have him here than down at the pub!’
‘Of course you would. You need him, I know,’ soothed Henry. ‘In the old days it was much easier if you had a granny or an older sister helping out; they knew what to do and were often as good as a trained nurse. Today, the father is expected to share every stage of the birth, and some of them find the whole process terrifying. I’ve had them pass out! One young lad fainted on top of his unfortunate wife just as I was actually delivering their baby. I didn’t know which one to catch first.’
Dylan laughed. ‘Oh, I’m sure Ross won’t do that! He’s been wonderful, hasn’t he, Ruth? He’s coping better than I am! I’m afraid I’m not very brave.’
‘With first mothers fear is the worst enemy. They don’t know what to expect so they panic a bit. Easy to understand. You’re always afraid of what you don’t know,’ said Henry. ‘Well, let’s see how your baby is doing.’ He smiled at Ruth. ‘Is that a hot water bottle in bed with her?’
‘It helped her backache, and I thought it might help the pain—wasn’t it the right thing to do?’
‘Of course it was. Don’t often see them in modern houses, with all this central heating, but they are a real boon. I can warm my stethoscope before I put it on her tummy. It can be quite a shock to the system, a chilly stethoscope, especially in this sort of weather.’
By the time Ross brought up a tray of tea Henry had finished his examination and was talking quietly to Ruth while Dylan lay back with closed eyes, resting after her latest contraction.
Ross’s hard grey eyes flashed to her, then moved on to Henry, his brows lifting anxiously.
‘Is she okay?’
‘She’s fine—she’s doing very well.’
Ross’s tension relaxed a little. ‘And the baby?’
‘Baby’s fine, too—positioned perfectly for a straightforward birth. Don’t worry. Dylan is a strong, fit girl, with excellent muscle tone. I gather she is a trained dancer, so she could cope very well with giving birth,’ Henry told him in a reassuring voice. ‘It won’t be long now—another hour or so, I’d say—and I don’t anticipate any serious problems at all.’
Ross gave a long, audible sigh of relief. Ruth poured the tea and handed Henry his cup.
‘Have you had lunch?’ she asked him, observing the tired lines around his pale eyes, the weary droop of his lips.
He shook his head. ‘Not yet, and I’m starving. I’ve been working flat out for most of the last couple of days; I’ve had very little sleep and not much to eat, either.’
‘I could heat up some soup and grill a steak for you.’
His face brightened. ‘Would you, Ruth? That sounds wonderful; I would love a steak. I don’t suppose you’ve got mushrooms and tomatoes to go with it?’
Her eyes amused and affectionate, she nodded. ‘Of course—and some chips?’
‘Marvellous. Ye
s, please!’ he said with enthusiasm.
Ruth raised her brows at Ross. ‘Does that suit you too? I have plenty of steak in the deep freeze and I’ve been thawing some of it, which should be ready to cook by now.’
‘Thanks, that would be terrific.’
Henry cheerfully told Dylan, ‘Afraid you can’t join us—eating interferes with the birth process. Can’t have food being digested while baby is trying to be born.’
‘I couldn’t eat anyway. I’m not hungry.’ Dylan looked across the bedroom at the window, where snow eddied in great white flakes against a sky which had suddenly turned bright blue. ‘Look, the sun has come out!’ she murmured, her mood lifting a little. Odd how much better you felt when the sun was shining. Why was that?
After Ross had finished his meal he went back upstairs to sit with Dylan while Henry and Ruth sat in the kitchen drinking coffee.
‘You’re looking a little better now. You obviously needed blood sugar,’ Ruth said, watching the ruthless sunlight picking out deep-bitten lines in his face.
‘I’m old,’ he said without regret.
‘Nonsense! You’re nothing of the kind! Middle-aged, that’s all.’
He grinned at her. ‘What a nice woman you are! Why didn’t you ever marry when you were young, Ruth?’
She looked out of the window, a little sadness in her eyes. ‘Oh, there was this boy, when I was eighteen... He was called Joe; I’d known him most of my life. He lived at Oak Farm, we saw a lot of each other one summer, fell in love. We got engaged and planned to get married the following spring. His parents were pleased; they offered us one of the farm cottages. My mother started planning the wedding. We had a little holiday together, just a weekend, staying with his older sister at Scarborough. One morning he got up very early and went for a swim. The water was very cold. He drowned.’
‘How terrible,’ Henry said heavily. ‘What a waste of a life.’
Ruth sighed. ‘Yes, it was a waste, and so stupid. It need never have happened. He was never a strong swimmer. I don’t know what made him go to the beach on his own at that hour. It seems he got cramp—a local fisherman saw he was in trouble, and tried to save him, but Joe went under before the man got to him.’
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