He looked up from the paper he was reviewing and took off his spectacles. “The baby?”
“Yes. I think he’s going to make his entrance on New Year’s Day.”
Henry wasted no time in helping me up from the chair I’d been sitting in, reading Mama’s diary once again. She had filled it with every detail she could think of, communicating with me in ways that others would never understand. Whenever I missed her, I filled my heart with her words. The book was beginning to fall apart from how much I had handled it.
It was a diary spanning fifty years, until Mama’s death in 1825. She’d told me about her happy marriage to Alpheus, Mariah and Abraham’s work at the cobbler’s shop, Hannah’s and Rebecca’s growth and eventual marriages. She’d even populated the diary with news about others I had known and loved in Williamsburg. Sophia and her father had eventually changed their minds and supported the Patriots’ cause after theDeclaration of Independence had been signed. My dear friend had married and moved to Philadelphia with her husband.
The last page had been written by my sister Rebecca upon Mama’s death, and she had inscribed a note sharing Mama’s heart.
She died on this day, March 29, 1825, after living a long and prosperous life. Theodosia Conant-Goodman was a woman of deep and abiding faith, loved and respected by all who knew her. Her joy was contagious, and her belief in all that was good and right inspired us daily. Until the moment she died, she kept the memory of my sister Libby alive for all of us. This book was her love letter to the child she lost too soon.
Henry set aside the diary and walked me out of the study, through the parlor, and up the stairs to our bedroom. The floors creaked as we went, reminding me how old this home had become. We had purchased the Montgomerys’ house on the Palace Green and had spent years returning it to its former glory. The study was our favorite room and where we spent the most time together. It was a little haven in our simple world, with a beautiful view of the back gardens that we tended together.
“Send for Edith,” I told him, “and Dr. Hutton, please.”
“How much time do you think we have?” He gently helped me into our bed, positioning the pillows before taking off my shoes. “Anna arrived less than three hours after your pains began.”
“There’s no way of knowing.” I placed my hand on his cheek and rubbed the worry lines around his mouth with my thumb. “Do not fret, husband. I’ve been through this twice before.”
Teddy and Anna had already been put to bed for the night. At the ages of six and four, they were easily tired from a long day of play. Edith had taken them to the park, and Teddy had tried out the new roller skates he’d received for Christmas, sohe was especially exhausted and had barely made it through supper without falling asleep.
“You know it’s impossible for me not to worry,” Henry said. “Are you certain you wouldn’t like to go to the hospital this time?”
“I’m most comfortable at home. This is how Mama had me and her mama before her. I’ll be fine. And besides,” I continued, “something tells me this won’t take long.” I hadn’t admitted to him that the pains had started about an hour earlier. “Please get Edith and send for the doctor.”
He kissed me and then left the room.
I settled into the bed, trying to make myself comfortable for the ordeal ahead. The Montgomery Home, as it was called by those who were working to restore Colonial Williamsburg with us, was the perfect house for our growing family. We were not far from the ocean I loved, and we were close to Henry’s work and the buildings we were helping to acquire for the foundation. The Rockefellers had been generous contributors, and it looked as if Dr. Goodwin’s dream would become a reality.
As for Henry, I sometimes pitied that his students, both male and female now, had no idea they were being educated about the American Revolution by a man who had lived and breathed the start of the war and had been hanged for treason. He taught his class with passion and zeal, but no one would ever be able to guess where it originated.
Nor would they ever guess that I had been there too. I was simply Libby Hollingsworth now, the content wife of a professor, a passionate supporter of women’s equality, and the mother of two beautiful children.
Soon to be three.
Another contraction wrapped around my waist as I thought about this child. Would he or she be a time-crosser? Neither Teddy nor Anna had been born with the markings, much to our relief. If we continued to have children, we might not be sofortunate with all of them, yet we longed to fill our home and lives with children. They were one of life’s greatest blessings and a natural extension of the love we shared. I prayed for this child fervently, that no matter what God chose for his or her life, they would know and trust Him.
Another contraction came just a minute after the last. I was getting close. There might not be enough time for the doctor to come.
Edith appeared with fresh towels and a basin of water. “Are you ready?”
I nodded as the contraction gripped me.
She set down her things and came to my side to push back my hair, her own pregnancy noticeable. I was so thankful she had been with me at each birth. She and Williams had taken a home nearby, and she came to work for me during the day. I had insisted she stop calling me miss or milady and asked her simply to call me Libby. We were friends, first and foremost.
I labored for another half hour before Henry returned with Dr. Hutton, and with Henry on one side of me and Edith on the other, I brought our second daughter into the world.
“It’s a girl,” Dr. Hutton said as he held her up.
My exhilaration fell at seeing her chest. There, over her heart, was a sunburst birthmark. The reality crashed upon me harder than I expected.
“She has your marking,” Edith said with a smile, not comprehending what it meant.
Somewhere, in a place I would not know until she was old enough to tell me, she was being born into a different family in a different year.
I looked up at Henry, and he gave me a slight nod, understanding, love and compassion filling his gaze. Tears gathered in my eyes as Dr. Hutton took care of our needs and Edith cleaned the baby.
“It will be okay,” Henry said, sitting close to me on the bedand rubbing one of my hands. “God is sovereign, Libby. We know that full well.”
