To Hear a Nightingale

by Charlotte Bingham

  Then she’d lie back on however many pillows had been allocated to her that night, and think of last September, and their honeymoon in Kerry.

  It seemed so long ago, now that she was about to give birth. Long ago and far away, too far away and too late now for anything ever to be the same again. She was glad that before she had left their little rented house on Dingle, with its plain wooden bed, its bright red bedcover and – and straw coloured drapes, she had touched every part of the bedroom, and lingered in every room in the place so that she could remember it forever, exactly how it had been. She had turned back at the door, before locking up, risking the bad luck that one last look was meant to bring, while Tyrone stood outside in a freshening wind, patiently waiting. She had looked long and hard, in order that her mind could photograph the whole place, and the memories it contained, so that now, as she lay waiting for the baby to be born, she could replay every golden moment of those sunlit far-off days.

  Because now, as the birth approached, Cassie found she was frightened. She had been told that she would find tranquillity in the short time before the baby was born, but she had failed to do so. She dreaded the idea of pain, and the thought of how the child was to arrive seemed dreadful. Sometimes, as she lay in in the mornings, with Tyrone gone to the gallops, she wished desperately for someone more knowledgeable than Erin to talk to, or Erin’s mother, Mrs Muldoon, who kept coming into her bedroom and regularly dowsing her with holy water.

  They would then both stand at the end of Cassie’s bed and look at her, as if she was a mare about to foal.

  ‘You’re a bit too large to my mind, Mrs Rosse,’ Mrs Muldoon would announce. ‘It’s all that Guinness Mr Rosse has been forcing down you. I doubt if that’ll do you any good unless the baby’s going to be a publican.’

  ‘Me mam says it might have got stuck,’ Erin would volunteer. ‘Sometimes they get their heads stuck, and then you have to go to hospital and they cuts it out of you. And you can never have a baby normally again. Isn’t that right, Mam?’

  Mrs Muldoon would nod, and refold her arms, and they would both of them stay standing at the end of her bed, keeping their vigil.

  It was the day of the Irish Derby. Tyrone had just come back from exercising the second string and was about to have his breakfast and get ready to leave for the Curragh when Cassie started. Tyrone had always lived in horror at the thought that he might be away racing when the birth began, and that Cassie would be by herself except for Erin and her mother. But as soon as Cassie told him, quite calmly, that she thought she was starting, Tyrone slung off his jacket and cap, and cancelled all other plans.

  ‘You can’t miss the Derby!’ Cassie cried.

  ‘To hell with the Derby!’ Tyrone said. ‘This is the event I wouldn’t miss!’

  Then he went to telephone the doctor.

  Between the contractions, Cassie lay and stared at the trees outside, moving soundlessly in the breeze behind the closed windows. The sun was already quite high in the sky, and 29 June looked as though it was going to be another scorcher.

  She tried to remain calm and practise her breathing, but she was still afraid. Afraid of the pains which had started, and the pain which was to come. She looked over to the door, and beyond it to the next room, which had been prepared for the home birth. But instead of feeling the intense excitement she had felt before in anticipation, now when she thought of the plain white bed and the rows of bowls, and instruments, and towels, she felt a terrible fear.

  Tyrone ambled back into the room. He was still in his old breeches and polished riding boots, and looked more handsome and devil-may-care than ever. Cassie looked at him and felt a kind of helpless fury. It was so typical of a man, that all during her pregnancy he had fussed around her when she was perfectly all right, and now when she needed all his love and concern, he looked as though he hadn’t a care in the world.

  ‘The doctor’s en route,’ he announced, ‘but I think we’ll get you next door just the same. Just to be on the safe side.’

  Mrs Muldoon was hovering in the background, doing her best not to look concerned but failing lamentably. Tyrone called on her to help get Cassie through to the next room.

  ‘I don’t need any help!’ Cassie retorted. ‘I can manage perfectly well by myself!’

  But she hadn’t gone farther than three or four paces when another and much sharper pain hit her, doubling her over. Tyrone and Mrs Muldoon caught her, and lifted her through to the bed next door.

  ‘How often are the pains now, Mrs Rosse?’ enquired Mrs Muldoon. ‘Sure they seem to be coming thick and fast.’

  They were, too. Much too thick and fast to Cassie’s way of thinking.

  ‘It’s OK, Mrs Muldoon,’ Cassie gasped, propping herself up on the pillows. ‘My water’s haven’t gone yet, so we’re OK for yet awhile.’

  She saw Mrs Muldoon glance towards Tyrone, but his face remained quite impassive.

  ‘How long did Doctor Gilbert say he’d be, Tyrone?’ she asked anxiously.

  ‘I told you, Cassie McGann. He’s on his way.’

  ‘You’re quite sure?’

  ‘Perfectly.’

  ‘He’d better be,’ Cassie groaned. ‘It was all his idea for me to have it here at home. Like anyone normal, as he says.’

  ‘Didn’t I have all my six at home?’ Mrs Muldoon announced. ‘And wasn’t I up that evening getting Mr Muldoon his tea?’

  Cassie didn’t bother trying to reply. She was too busy trying to cope with the pain which had hit her so hard that it had made her sit bolt upright.

  ‘Jesus!’ she found herself saying.

  ‘That’s right,’ Tyrone said, ‘Just try and relax.’

  He laid her back on the pillows gently, while Mrs Muldoon wiped Cassie’s already sweating brow. There was a knock on the door and Tyrone went to answer it. Please God it was Doctor Gilbert.

  It wasn’t. It was Tomas. Cassie just glimpsed him through the door, before Tyrone shut it on them both. She heard their voices out on the landing, but couldn’t make out what either of them was saying. The room seemed to be coming and going, and for a while she thought she must have passed out. Tyrone was back at her side, sitting holding her hand.

  ‘Tomas is standing by with the hot water. We’ll need plenty of hot water,’ Tyrone joked, ‘because old Gilbert’s a great man for his tea.’

  Cassie smiled up at Tyrone, who was squeezing her hand and smiling back down at her.

  ‘Jesus God!’ Cassie suddenly yelled. ‘Jesus Christ Almighty!’

  ‘That’s it, my girl. That’s the way. You have a damn’d good swear while you’re at it.’

  ‘I’m not swearing, damn you, Tyrone! I’m calling for His help!’

  ‘Then call away. Call away, my love. You call away as much as you want.’

  Tyrone’s image was getting very blurred. The sweat was running down off Cassie’s brow and into her eyes. Mrs Muldoon was wiping it away, but Cassie was drenched, as the contractions got sharper and sharper, and then suddenly she felt herself soaked, and the bed soaked, as her waters burst.

  ‘Oh my God!’ she cried. ‘Oh my God! What is it! What’s happened!’

  ‘’Tis your waters, Mrs Rosse,’ Mrs Muldoon was saying. ‘And your baby’s on its way.’

  The baby was on its way. The baby was being born. She was about to give birth and there was no damned doctor. Cassie yelled and cursed and swore, words she never knew she knew, words she’d never even thought. Mrs Muldoon was placing another cold flannel on her forehead, and for some reason Cassie was biting Tyrone’s hand. She saw the blood. She tasted his blood in her mouth. The door was opening. It was the doctor! It wasn’t the doctor. She could see it was Tomas. Very vaguely. He was carrying a steaming hot jug. She was going to have a bath. The boiler had gone out. She didn’t want a hot bath. Not yet. She just wanted the pain to stop.

  The baby was moving inside her. She could feel it. It was making its way down her, shuddering its way out to be born. She could feel its size, and th
e convulsions inside her as the child made its way down her, faster. And faster. And the pain was worse. It was tearing her apart. She was biting Tyrone again, and again she tasted his blood – or perhaps it was her own. She was being torn apart, and she was bleeding to her death.

  Then she could see Tyrone suddenly more clearly and she knew it was a dream. He had on a sort of gown, some sort of gown like surgeons wear; it was a sheet, wrapped around him, and he had a mask over his mouth and nose. But she knew it was him because of those eyes.

  ‘Anyone would think!’ she gasped at him, feebly, ‘that you were going to deliver the baby!’

  The eyes smiled over the mask at her, and from behind it vaguely she heard Tyrone’s voice contradicting her. All the same he was scrubbing his hands and arms in what smelled like disinfectant.

  Cassie knew the doctor wasn’t going to get there.

  Of course the doctor was going to get there. Tyrone, thorough as ever, was getting himself ready in case he didn’t. And why not? Cassie thought, somewhere in her mind. Why not? He’d delivered what was it? Over twenty foals in his time, and all without the vet. He’d delivered all those horses.

  Cassie screamed.

  ‘Jesus, my God, I’m going to die!’

  Tyrone was bending over her, wiping the sweat off her face, and kissing her cheek.

  ‘Breathe in and out, and in and out. And put your hands over your nose and mouth. It has an anaesthetising effect. That’s why birds put their heads under their wings.’

  He was putting her hands to her face, and Cassie felt her own breath against them, and heard it, deep and regular. She was still alive. She hadn’t died yet.

  Now Tyrone was talking to Mrs Muldoon. If he was talking, then there was nothing to worry about. They were talking and having a chat. Except Tyrone bent down. He’d gone. He’d disappeared.

  ‘You’re about to have it, Cassie.’

  There he was. Cassie smiled at him. Oh my God the pain!

  ‘You’re just about to give birth. Now do exactly as I say. You can make as much noise as you like, but do as I say, and you’ll be fine, my love. You just do as I say. Push when I say push. And stop when I say stop. Just do as I say and you’ll be fine.’

  Tomas came in with another steaming jug. Cassie bit her own hand. I’m biting my own hand. Someone’s shouting to push. She pushed. Now to stop. Cassie stops.

  ‘Christ! What a way to give birth! Dear God in heaven!’

  She swore again. That’s me. Cassie. What am I saying? Please dear Mary Mother of God! Please help me!

  Push, damn you! I am pushing! Push again! Push! I’m being torn apart! Dear Christ, help me! Dear Christ!

  Tyrone’s shouting! That’s Tyrone shouting, I can hear him! What’s he saying? It’s a girl! It’s a girl! It’s my little girl!

  There was the sound of a smack, and she could see a baby, her baby, upside down and still attached to her. And then Cassie suddenly found she was laughing, and crying, and crying and laughing all at once.

  ‘It’s a little girl, Cassie McGann!’ Tyrone was shouting. ‘A little girl! We’ve just had a little girl!’

  What she then remembered was Tyrone, with tears running down his face and the sweat pouring off him, kissing her and putting the little naked sticky wet baby in her arms for her to touch and hold. And then taking it away again. She remembered then the baby in her arms again, wrapped in a blanket, and she remembered, as she would for the rest of her life, the little fingers and the tiny, tiny features of the scrunched-up face which was the loveliest face she’d ever seen. She held it, not daring to hug it; she held her, her baby, as if she was made of glass, and looked with wonder on the new life which had suddenly entered theirs.

  Doctor Gilbert arrived an hour and a half later. He was surprised that the baby had arrived so soon, but he had only got the message a quarter of an hour ago. His car had broken down and he had gone to the garage to pick it up. Unfortunately, he had neglected to leave word at the surgery where he was or how long he’d been gone. It had been one of those days, what with everyone bothering him for sick notes, so that they could get to the Derby. Still, judging from the outcome, Doctor Gilbert observed with a sniff, it seemed he hadn’t been missed.

  ‘Not only that,’ he added, ‘but that’s the neatest umbilical I’ve seen outside the Rotunda.’

  In the ensuing silence Tyrone suddenly got up, and walked to the window. Doctor Gilbert watched him with what Cassie thought was compassion on that old lined face. And then he turned back to take another look at the baby to make sure that all was well.

  Tomas knocked at the door.

  ‘More hot water!’ he called.

  ‘We’ve no need of any!’ Mrs Muldoon shouted back. ‘So off with you and turn it into some tea!’

  Doctor Gilbert straightened up.

  ‘Everything’s fine, Tyrone. You did a grand job. So if I were in your shoes, I’d be off downstairs to open a bottle to wet the baby’s head, while I have one more look at the patient.’

  Tyrone kissed Cassie and was gone, taking Mrs Muldoon and Tomas with him.

  Doctor Gilbert examined Cassie thoroughly, and pronounced all was well.

  ‘I’d have done better to have been a vet,’ he said, closing his bag. ‘There’s a lot more need for a good vet in these parts than there is a doctor. What’s the baby to be called?’

  ‘Josephine,’ Cassie replied. ‘Josephine Katherine McGann Rosse.’

  ‘Good enough,’ he replied. ‘She’s a nice strong infant. About eight, eight and a half pounds I’d say.’

  He put his bag down and sat away from the bed, rolling himself a cigarette.

  ‘And there are no complications, to yourself or to the baby. You’ll be back to normal in no time at all.’

  He lit his thin cigarette, drew on it, found it wasn’t alight, and relit it.

  ‘I apologise again for my absence. But then it really has been one of those days. Still, I shouldn’t imagine you missed me. With a man who can cope like your husband.’

  Cassie smiled, wearily but happily, looking at the baby which slept in her arms.

  ‘Knowing Tyrone, Doctor,’ she said, ‘and his love of drama, I shouldn’t be at all surprised if he hadn’t had the whole thing planned. He’d probably have been extremely disappointed if you had actually shown up.’

  Doctor Gilbert puffed on his cigarette, while he stared at the ceiling. Then he got up, collected his bag and went to the door.

  ‘No,’ he replied. ‘No, no, no I don’t think so. You see, what he did was remarkable. Agreed, at the best of times. But why I think you’re wrong, and what is even more remarkable, is that this is the room, you see, where his mother died giving birth to him.’

  Chapter Twelve

  ‘If I didn’t know you better, I’d say you’d strayed out on the balcony,’ Tyrone said to Cassie, looking at Josephine’s red hair as he kissed the baby and her goodbye. He was about to leave for America and the Keeneland Sales.

  ‘Which according to Erin,’ Cassie smiled in reply, ‘means you think I’ve had a lover.’

  For Erin had made precisely the same comment when she caught first sight of the baby, and Cassie had to ask her what she meant by it.

  ‘It means a girl’s done something she shouldn’t with someone that she shouldn’t, Mrs Rosse, and when she shouldn’t,’ Erin had answered. ‘And usually at a hop.’

  ‘What in heaven’s name is a hop?’

  ‘Sure it’s a dance, isn’t it? Like a ceilidh really. Except now they calls it a hop.’

  Cassie looked at the baby lying fast asleep in her wooden cradle, and then held Tyrone tight once more, her arms round his waist.

  ‘How long are you going to be away? I don’t think I’ll be able to live without you,’ she whispered.

  ‘You’ll have Josephine.’

  ‘I won’t have you.’

  Tyrone hugged her in return then kissed her softly.

  ‘It’s probably just as well I’m going,’ he said. ‘I coul
dn’t live in this house waiting for six weeks until we can make love again.’

  ‘Is that how long you’re going to be away then?’

  ‘Give or take a day,’ Tyrone replied, buckling up his battered old leather suitcase. ‘After Keeneland, I’ve got some stud farms to visit while I’m in Kentucky, then I go to Maryland and Pennsylvania, then up to Canada to see some more youngsters, and back to Saratoga for the August sales.’

  Pennsylvania, Locksfield, Penn. Mary-Jo and their childhood days. All the memories suddenly started flooding back. As if it was yesterday, Cassie could see the battered old station wagon pulling up in a cloud of dust in the station yard, and all the kids falling out of the windows in their rush to greet her.

  ‘You didn’t tell me you were going to be in Pennsylvania, Tyrone,’ Cassie said, helping him pack the smaller of his two cases.

  ‘I didn’t know myself until yesterday, Cassie McGann.’

  ‘Would you have time to pay someone a visit?’

  ‘You know how big Pennsylvania is?’

  ‘You bet,’ Cassie smiled as she scribbled down the Christiansens’ address.

  She folded the piece of paper and tucked it in Tyrone’s wallet.

  ‘Just in case you’re anywhere near Locksfield,’ she told him. ‘Or even if you’re not, maybe you could just give them a call. It’s Mary-Jo’s family. You remember, I told you all about them.’

  Tyrone looked at Cassie, and wondered how he was going to bear to be separated from her for the next six weeks. He found it hard enough when he had to go away from her for a day. But a month and a half! It was an intolerable notion. Particularly intolerable now they had their beautiful little girl.

  ‘You take care of yourself, Cassie McGann,’ he warned her, as they both stood by the front doors, trying to delay his departure.

  Cassie had little Josephine cradled in her arms, and Tyrone kissed them both once again.

  ‘And you take care of your mother, Josephine Rosse. I don’t want her to get into any mischief.’

  ‘And the same applies to you, Mr Rosse.’