Novice Ruth was very sympathetic, but she looked a bit vague.
‘What can we do to help?’ she enquired.
‘It’s the fillipin toobs what’s crossed. They wants uncrossin,’ said Meg emphatically.
Novice Ruth looked as though she was losing the plot.
‘Fallopian tubes,’ I whispered.
‘Oh, I see. But how can they be crossed?’ she enquired innocently.
‘I’m tellin’ yer. Ve surgeon, ’e sewed ’er up wrong wiv her ’pendix an’ got ve toobs crossed. Vat’s why she’s sufferin’. Bin sufferin’ for years, she ’as.’
Novice Ruth looked down at her crucifix, and I saw a flicker of a smile play at the corners of her mouth.
‘I will examine Mavis,’ she said quietly. ‘Please follow me to the examination room.’
Meg gave me a triumphant glance and shot a look of pure venom at Trixie. Mave undressed as requested and lay down on the couch. Novice Ruth, an expert and experienced midwife, examined Mavis, asked several questions which Meg answered, and when she had finished the examination said, ‘Both you and your baby seem to be in perfect condition for thirty-two weeks of pregnancy. The baby is developing normally, and the heartbeat is good. You, Mavis, are perfectly fit. I have examined everything possible – heart, blood pressure, urine. I can find nothing wrong with you. If you are suffering discomfort, I think it is probably heartburn, or wind, which afflicts a lot of pregnant women.’
‘Heartburn? Wind? What about ve toobs?’ shouted Meg.
‘I was coming to the toobs,’ lied the saintly Novice Ruth convincingly. ‘I have examined them carefully, and can assure you that although they may have been crossed at the time of the unfortunate appendicitis operation, they have now uncrossed themselves. Nature is a wonderful healer. You have nothing more to fear from the Fallopian tubes.’
MEG THE GYPSY
The practice was extremely busy. Every midwife will tell you the same story. You can tick over comfortably for weeks, and then suddenly there are more women in labour than midwives to cope with them. Some say it is the phases of the moon, others say it is the local beer.
Trixie had been working all night. A delivery at 10 p.m. and another at 4 a.m. had left her exhausted, and she still had a day’s work to get through. An hour of sleep after lunch had helped, though the evening visits were heavy. At nine, a long luxuriant bath with her favourite salts had eased her mind, and she was looking forward to the bliss of sleep.
The telephone rang. Not me, thought Trixie. Someone else is on first call, and she sank deeper into the water, turning on the hot tap with her toes.
A moment later there was a bang on the door.
‘Trixie, old sport. You in there?’ Chummy’s voice sounded through the door.
‘Yes.’
‘I’ve got to go out. You’re on first call now.’
‘What! You’re joking. I can’t be.’
‘Sorry and all that. But Cynthia is already out on a delivery, and Jennifer has a day off. It’s up to you.’
‘I just don’t believe it.’ Trixie groaned and felt sleep enveloping her.
‘What did you say? Never mind, I can’t hang around.’
Chummy’s footsteps retreated down the corridor.
Trixie’s tired mind refused to take in the reality of the situation. She felt she might doze off in the bath, but forced herself to get out, dried and into bed, where she immediately fell into a deep and dreamless sleep.
At 11.30 the phone rang. Usually a midwife on first call will hear it instantly, be out of bed and alert within seconds. The subconscious will keep the mind half-awake, ready for action. But Trixie slept on. Eventually the persistent ringing penetrated her ears, and she awoke confused – someone had better answer that damned phone, she thought. Then she remembered Chummy’s bang on the bathroom door.
Horrified, she struggled out of bed and picked up the phone.
‘Yes. Nonnatus House here. Who is it?’
‘And about time, too! What d’you fink yer playing at? She coulda died afore you answered the telephone,’ a harsh female voice barked.
Trixie shook her head vigorously, trying to focus her thoughts.
‘Who is dying? What is the trouble?’
‘Trouble? The trouble is you. You lazy good-for-nothing.’ Trixie groaned and sank onto the wooden bench beside the telephone, but her training came to the rescue. Mechanically she heard herself say, ‘Please give me your name and address and tell me, as clearly as you can, what is the matter.’
‘It’s Meg, from Mile End, and it’s Mave, see. Mave’s in labour, and you gotta come quick.’
The clouds were lifting from Trixie’s tired brain.
‘But Mave is not due yet. Not for another month.’
‘Don’t you come vat one over me. You just get ’ere at the double, or I’ll report yer to the authorities for negligence, refusin’ to come to a woman in labour.’
Trixie was wide awake now. Mave was thirty-six weeks pregnant. A premature labour would be a serious matter, and dangerous for the baby.
‘I’ll come straight away,’ she said and put down the phone.
Trixie hastened into her uniform. But before going to the clinical room for her bag, she went to the Sisters’ corridor and knocked on Sister Bernadette’s door to tell her that, according to Meg, Mavis was in premature labour.
‘Go and assess the situation and inform me. If premature labour is established, she must be transferred immediately to hospital,’ were the instructions.
Trixie collected her bag and attached it to her bicycle. She had a three-mile ride, and a fine drizzle was falling, the sort that gets you damp all over. Her legs were heavy, and turning the pedals seemed like one of the twelve labours of Hercules.
She reached the Mile End Road, which is broad and straight, and cycled along it looking for the turning, but missed it, and had to go back. This can’t be happening to me, she thought. Once in the narrow street of identical terraced houses, the only light in a window led her to the correct address. She was met at the door by Meg.
‘Call vis straight away, do yer? More like a snail’s pace, I call it. You bin twenty minutes gettin’ ’ere.’
If Meg thought she could intimidate Trixie, she was in for a shock.
‘If you can get here any quicker on a bicycle, you are welcome to try. Now, cut the criticism and take me to your sister.’
In the bedroom it was hot and stuffy. A big fire was burning, and the windows were closed tight. Mave was lying on the bed moaning pathetically, clutching her stomach with both hands.
‘See, she’s sufferin’ somefink wicked. Bin like vis for a couple of hours, she ’as. Somefink wicked.’
Mave moaned and whimpered. ‘When’s ve baby comin? I can’t stand much more of vis. They’ll ’ave to take it away. Cut me open.’
Meg echoed, ‘She can’t stand no more. It’s ’orrible. Too much for ’er, with ’er weak constitooshun.’
Trixie took off her coat and sat down beside the bed.
‘Ainchoo goin’ a do nuffink?’ demanded Meg.
‘I am doing something,’ said Trixie, ‘I’m assessing the progress of labour.’
‘’Sessin’? Wha’choo mean, ’sessin’? She needs treatment. Dr Smellie in ’is book, ’e says the midwife should put ve woman on a birfin’ stool.’
‘Birthing stool! Where do you get that rubbish from?’
‘It’s ’ere in ’is book. You read it. You’re supposed to know about vese fings.’
Trixie glanced at the aged book.
‘That is two hundred years out of date. Don’t cram your head with a lot of stuff you don’t understand. No one uses birthing stools any more.’
Meg stared hard at Trixie, and recognition dawned.
‘Ain’t you ve one what called me daft?’
‘Perhaps I did, and I wouldn’t have been far wrong. Now be quiet with all your mumbo-jumbo, and let me get on with my job.’
‘Look ’ere, I’m not ’avin’ y
ou. You can send for someone what knows what to do.’
‘There’s no one else on call. I should be delighted to go back to bed, but there is no one else who could come. You’re stuck with me, and if you don’t like it you can lump it. Now be quiet. I want to examine Mave.’
Trixie pulled back the bedclothes and palpated the uterus. The head was above the symphysis pubis, but she could not feel anything else definitive. There seemed to be lumps all over the place. She stood still, thinking, head on one side.
‘Well, Miss Stoopid, what you goin’ a do now?’
‘I’m going to listen to the baby’s heartbeat,’ replied Trixie coldly, trying hard to ignore the woman’s insults. She took out her Pinards and applied it to the abdomen.
‘You better get on wiv this and stop messin’ abaht. My sister’s in labour, I tells yer.’
‘Be quiet, will you? I can’t hear a thing with you making all that noise.’
Meg rolled her eyes to the ceiling and sucked in her breath, indicating her total lack of confidence in the procedure.
Trixie listened carefully and counted a steady 120 beats per minute. She stood up, satisfied.
‘Well, the baby is quite healthy. Now I must ask you some questions. When did you first feel contractions, Mave?’
Meg answered, ‘About ten o’clock. Came on sudden. Terrible it was.’
‘Will you be quiet. I’m asking Mave. Not you.’
Trixie was too tired to be patient. She turned to Mave.
‘And how frequent are the contractions?’
Meg answered regardless: ‘All ve time. Can’choo see? She’s sufferin’.’
Trixie’s slender reserves of patience snapped.
‘Will you shut up and get out of here? Either you go or I will go. I’m not prepared to carry on like this.’
Trixie was taking a risk and she knew it. If she deserted a woman in labour the consequences would be severe. But the gamble paid off. Meg left.
Trixie could now devote her attention to Mave. She was puzzled because, although she had been observing Mave for at least twenty minutes, and although Mave looked and sounded as if she were in advanced labour, there appeared to be no contractions.
‘When did this start?’
‘About ten o’clock,’ Mave groaned.
‘And how frequent were the contractions? Did you time them?’
Mave looked pained.
‘They was all ve time. Never stoppin’. Meg says Dr Smellie says ...’
‘Never mind what Dr Smellie says. Contractions don’t just start and never stop. It’s not possible.’
Mave assumed her martyr’s expression.
‘You don’t understand. I’m dyin’. You don’t care.’
She hung onto her belly and rolled onto her side.
‘Stop all this fuss,’ barked Trixie. ‘You are no more dying than I am. I haven’t seen a contraction since I came into this house.’
‘That’s ’cause you don’t know nuffink. Meg, she says ...’
‘I won’t hear any more about Meg. Now tell me, when did you last open your bowels?’
‘What?’ Mave jerked round to face Trixie.
‘You heard. When?’
‘I’m not sure. Couple of weeks ago, p’raps.’
‘You are constipated. And what did you have for supper?’
‘Gooseberry pie and custard.’
‘Green gooseberries?’
‘Yes. Two ’elpin’s.’
‘Well, that’s the trouble, then. You’ve got gut ache. You’re not in labour at all, you old fraud. Getting me out of bed for a stomach ache!’ Trixie was furious. ‘Do you realise I have been working for forty hours with no sleep, and you wake me up for nothing. I will give you some castor oil and an enema, and then I am going back to my bed and leaving you to get on with it.’
That was the first of many false labours. During the next four weeks, twice a week, Meg called us out. Several times she sent Sid, their husband, with a message of impending disaster. Poor man! He stood cap in hand, his sheep eyes watering with embarrassment, muttering something quite unintelligible. Wearily we had to attend the call to assess the situation, but we knew that we were being led up the garden path. Meg was never grateful, nor even polite. She continued to tell us that we didn’t know our job, and we should read some of the books she had been readin’, an’ Mave should be confined in a darkened room, with a binding on her belly, an’ ’ad we got ve muvver’s caudle an’ ve birfin’ stool, an’ smellin’ salts an’ salt candle, an’ she ’ad jest got a book by Dr Jacob Rueff which was written in Latin in 1554, but she’d got an English translation, called The Expert Midwife, which says that ve baby’s cord must be cut with a special knife which was blessed by the Bishop an’ if it’s a baby boy ve cord must be cut long, because as ’e grew up it would make ’is penis long, see, an’ did we know all vis, wha’ she knewed? It was difficult to answer without giggling, and what with Doctors Smellie, Rueff and Coffin, the whole saga became an on-going joke around the big dining table each lunchtime, when we were all assembled together.
However, quite inadvertently, Meg did us a service, and I, for one, learned a great deal about the horrifying conditions in which women had given birth in previous centuries.
Sid stood at the convent door again. The market had just closed, and he was in his workman’s clothes. He was too conscious of his appearance to step into the hallway. Meekly he handed Trixie a note and muttered, ‘Meg, she says ...’ He shook his head sorrowfully, raised his eyes appealingly and left.
It was just after lunch, morning visits were done, the practice was reasonably quiet, and we had settled down in our sitting room for a nice, peaceful afternoon. Trixie burst in, note in hand.
‘I won’t go. It’s that infernal woman again.’
Cynthia looked up from her book.
‘Try telling that to Sister Julienne.’
‘But it will be another false labour.’
‘Very probably. But you are on first call, and you can’t refuse to go.’
Trixie sighed noisily, defeated by the facts.
‘Well, I won’t stay long, that’s all.’
Grimly she cycled the well-worn path to Mile End. Meg was at the door.
‘Oh, it’s you, is it?’
‘Yes. I’m sorry to say it is.’
‘Well, I ’ope as ’ow you knows what yer doin’ vis time, because Mave’s in labour an’ we don’t want no bunglers.’
‘Speak for yourself,’ said Trixie drily.
She went upstairs to the bedroom. It was pitch dark inside, so she went straight to the curtains and drew them back. Daylight flooded in.
‘Don’t do that,’ shouted Meg.
‘I must see what I am doing.’
‘It’s dangerous.’
‘Yes, it will be dangerous if I can’t see.’
‘I mean, a woman in labour must be confined in a dark room.’
‘Rubbish.’
‘Don’t you rubbish me.’
‘I will if you talk rubbish. Now I’ve come to look at Mave, not to talk to you.’
She went over to the bed. Mave was sitting up, looking quite comfortable.
‘Meg gets worried. I ’ad a few pains an hour ago, but they’ve gone, an’ I reckons as ’ow you can go home now.’
Trixie ground her teeth crossly.
‘You’ll cry wolf once too often.’
‘Wha’choo mean?’
‘I mean if you carry on like this, you’ll call when you really need us, we won’t believe you, and we won’t come.’
‘That’s negligence,’ shouted Meg.
‘It’ll be your own fault.’
Both women sucked in their breath – ‘shockin’, a disgrace, I tells yer. Vey don’t care, vey don’t. Can’t trust no one.’
Trixie ignored them and sat down beside Mave.
‘I must examine you, and then I shall go. Lie flat, please.’ She palpated the uterus, and could feel a head low down, which satisfied her that the wom
an was close to full term, but not necessarily in labour. The foetal heart was very vigorous and could be heard in several places. Just then, the uterus tightened, and Mave gave a slight moan. Trixie sat still with her hand on the uterus, and took out her watch, counting about fifty seconds before the tightening relaxed.
Meg opened her mouth to speak, but Trixie silenced her.
‘Would you go and make a cup of tea, please? Mave looks thirsty and needs a drink.’
Meg, grumbling about not being anyone’s servant, left the room.
Trixie sat quietly. Ten minutes later she felt another contraction, slightly stronger than the first.
‘You are in labour, Mave. And this time it is not a false alarm. Your baby will be born today.’
Meg came in with the tea.
‘I’m in labour, Meg. Our baby’ll be born soon.’
Mave looked unusually cheerful, but Meg turned white, and the teacups rattled in the saucers so much that they nearly fell out of her shaking hands.
‘I must go to the telephone on the corner to ring Sister Bernadette,’ said Trixie.
‘You’re not leavin’ ’er. That’s negligence, that is,’ shouted Meg.
‘It would be negligence if I didn’t go. I’ll be back before the next contraction comes. You two have your tea, and you can discuss my negligence while I’m gone.’
Sister Bernadette said she would come straight away. A primigravida of thirty-eight years requires careful treatment. Mave had been told quite categorically that she should have her baby delivered in hospital, but she had refused. The fear of hospitalisation was so entrenched in working-class women of limited education in those days that nothing could shift it. They associated hospitals with the old infirmaries that were converted workhouses. Very likely if she had been taken into hospital, Mave would have been so tense and terrified that the psychological strain would have had a damaging effect on labour. So a home delivery, with an experienced midwife and if possible a doctor present, was the best compromise.
Farewell To The East End Page 9