“The heir is lively, is he?” he asked, and he moved behind her and spread his own hands lightly over her. The baby was indeed making his presence felt with little regard for the comfort of his mother. And as often happened, Lucas felt almost dizzy with the realization that a fully formed child was just beyond the touch of his hands, curled up inside his wife, awaiting birth. How was such a miracle even possible?
“I think we had better go back inside,” she said. “I do not feel... right. But is that a peevish note I hear in my voice? I am so sorry, Lucas. I know I am very difficult to live with these days.”
“My God, Phil,” he said irreverently, setting an arm firmly about her and moving her in the direction of the front doors. “You are bearingmy child.I believe you are entitled to some shortness of temper.”
His mother-in-law and Aunt Kitty were both in the grand hall when they stepped inside, almost as though they had sensed that they might be needed.
“Philippa is not feeling quite the thing,” he said.
Her mother hurried toward her. “Pains, Pippa?” she asked.
“Not really,” Philippa said. “Are they not supposed to be bad? These are just... a nuisance. I am sorry. You must all be so tired of my complaining.”
“I’ll take you upstairs,” Lucas said. “Perhaps if you lie down for a while, you will feel better. Will you come too, Mother?”
They were in Philippa’s dressing room when she suddenly exclaimed and then wailed, “Mama-a-a.”
“Oh dear,” the dowager said, her voice quite calm. “Have your waters broken?”
His wife, Lucas saw in some horror, was standing in a puddle of wetness. Aunt Kitty, who had been hovering in the doorway, stepped inside. Philippa’s maid had appeared, as though from nowhere, and hurried toward her lady.
“Luc,” Aunt Kitty said, taking command. “Out! Now! Go away. Stay away. Make yourself useful and send for the physician. This baby is on its way.”
Lucas did not need any further urging. Like the craven coward he was, he fled.
—
Everything was a blur of discomfort and clawing fear for Philippa. Aunt Kitty prepared her bed and her mother and her maid undressed her and cleaned her and laid her down. It was strange, some remote part of her mind told her, that one had nine months in which to prepare and brace oneself for what one knew would happen, yet when the time came one thought in some panic that one was not ready at all, that one did not know what to do or how one was going to be able to bear the pain when it came.
She felt bloated and uncomfortable and quite unwell. But where was the pain? Or rather, where were the pains, which she had been told would be regularly spaced, the interval between gradually becoming less as the intensity of the pain grew more intense? She waited for it all to start. Please,please,now that something had happened, let it not be a false alarm. But how could it be when her waters had broken?
The physician arrived in company with the midwife. The doctorexamined her, announced that the birth was imminent, and sent her maid scurrying for hot water and clean towels and blankets. Mama and Aunt Kitty were both still in her room. Philippa could hear their voices. And then—
Oh, and then she felt the undeniable urge to push and did so while the midwife hastily positioned her and the physician appeared from wherever he had been a moment ago.
Her daughter was born all in a rush and squawking indignantly, and Philippa was weeping and holding out her arms. It had all been so quick, and without all the rumored horror of pain she had worried about.
A daughter! She had a child. She and Lucas.
Where was Lucas?
—
Lucas had been pacing outside Philippa’s bedchamber even though everyone who had spoken to him had warned him that it would be hours yet before he could even begin to expect any news from within. But as a pulse pounded against his temples, almost deafening him, all the news he really wanted was that his wife was alive and not in unbearable agony. He tried not to think of his mother dying in childbirth. Hours of this would surely kill him. What, then, would those same hours do to her?
Did all expectant fathers go through this? He tried not to think of his own father.
But then, all those supposed hours of waiting be damned, he heard an unfamiliar squawking and stopped abruptly. A bird?In the house?The sound was repeated, and he knew it was coming from the bedchamber. He set a hand against the wall to stop himself from collapsing.
Not a bird. A baby.
It was a baby.
By the time Philippa wondered where he was, Lucas had been barred from the bedchamber until his wife was finished with the afterbirth process, whatever that was, and had been admitted to the dressing room instead. There he met his daughter, who was being sponged off by the midwife and then swaddled in a warm blanket. She was all large feet and hands and red, angry face, as far as Lucas could see. She was also the most beautiful creature he had ever set eyes upon. He lost his heart for the second time in a year.
But surely he ought to have met her for the first time when she was being held in his wife’s arms?
“Philippa?” he asked his aunt.
