“Of course, you didn’t. Your body has taken over. Don’t you know what that means?”
She shook her head, bewildered.
“That baby is in a hurry to push its way out. Have you sent for the midwife?” He urged her toward the bed, half carrying her.
“I have no money to pay her,” she gasped as another stronger pang overtook her.
He cursed under his breath as only a soldier would, tucked her in the bed, and limped toward the door with astonishing speed, leaving Esther bereft. Even the presence of this odd man had been a comfort. Now she lay back, alone in the gathering darkness.
CHAPTER5
The woman’s relief when I brought the midwife ought to have been enough.Her fear-darkened eyes haunted Doug, however, and he leaned against the wall across from her door, able neither to enter the room nor to leave. He ought to leave; he reminded himself that none of this disaster was of his making, nor did it concern him. The Marsh Candle Works did.
Still, he knew Mrs. Potter would see to the work and, besides, the dour old midwife had muttered, “this won’t take long,” after one look under the lady’s gown. That action drove Doug from the room. He didn’t know much about birthing babies, but he knew men didn’t belong there, especially not chance-met strangers the mother would never have given a second look to under normal circumstances.
A shout—not the first—sent shivers down his spine and brought images of Portugal to mind. Camp followers gave birth in the open or in tents incapable of muffling sound. He remembered more than one who screamed and carried on only to turn up delighted when the little one appeared. There had been others less joyful and at least one that ended in catastrophe for mother and child. The unfortunate ones seemed quieter in his memory; perhaps moaning and shouting was a good sign. At least she had the strength to do it.
What do I know about childbirth?It occurred to him then that he probably knew much more than the woman laboring on her narrow cot to deliver. He pulled a watch from his pocket; what felt like hours had been a mere forty minutes. He rested his head against the wall. It could take all day. But perhaps it already had. Surely, since her waters broke—
Another sound brought him upright, leaning heavily on his cane. Doug had heard lustier cries and stronger voices, but the little one made a good show of complaining at being dragged out of its comfortable nest. A spasm of pain shot up his back when he stepped to the door, the product of his headlong rush for help.Foolish, Marsh. Damned foolish, and she is not even your problem, a voice in his head complained. He ignored both the voice and the pain and opened the door.
The midwife looked up from the table where she bathed a ruddy bit of humanity and wrapped it in toweling torn from what was once a coverlet. She scowled up at Doug. “Interrupting, are you? Here. Take your son while I see to the afterbirth.”
He opened his mouth to explain, but she ignored him. “Your woman did well enough for a softly bred girl. Better’n I expected,” she grumbled, thrusting the little bundle at Doug, who grabbed it with his free arm and tottered onto the only chair in the room, dropping his cane and wrapping both arms around the little body.
Unfocused eyes blinked up at him, a tiny tongue slipped in and out of the baby’s mouth, and Doug’s heart turned over. Helpless and vulnerable, this mite did not yet know to fear the world, to dread hunger, or to anticipate pain. A fierce determination that he never would shook Douglas Marsh to his core. This boy and his mother were not Doug’s problem, and yet he mooned down at the infant, oblivious to anything else.
“I’ll take my pay.” Doug looked up at the woman tucking a stray lock of coarse grey hair into her bandana and couldn’t tell whether it had been minutes or an hour. He studied her for a moment and saw with relief that she looked clean enough. Why that suddenly mattered, he didn’t want to examine too closely. He shifted the baby, who had started to make little mewling sounds to one arm, and reached in for the coins he’d promised.
“Wants ’is ma,” the woman said, counting her pay. “Not hungry yet but best for her if he nurses right away. Clean enough birth. There shouldn’t be too much bleeding.” She shrugged. “If there is, not much I can do. Good luck.” She turned on her heels.
“Please bring him. I want my baby.” The voice from the bed sounded weak.
Doug ignored the slamming door, reached for the cane, and struggled to his feet, baby firmly held against his chest with one arm. He lurched to the bed.
“Sorry. I have to sit,” he murmured, perching on the edge of the cot and gently lowering the little bundle to his mother’s arms.
“He’s crying.”
“He’s hungry.”
“Already?” Tears washed down the woman’s cheeks.
Doug felt ashamed for feeding her fears. “She said he needed to nurse, not that he needs food just yet. Can you sit a bit higher?” He glanced around for something to put under her head and found a half-mended coat next to the bed.
“No. Not that. I—”
“You take in mending?” Doug was already removing his coat.
Her eyes widened. “When I can. How else am I going to feed him?”
He folded his own coat and lifted her so she was a bit upright. “You are going to drink the milk that’s delivered and eat the cheese. It feeds you; you feed him.”Will it be enough?His hand hovered over the opening of her gown and pulled back. “Can you manage it?” he asked.
She could, but her cheeks went red when she opened the gown and put the baby to her breast. Luckily, the lad knew what to do because Doug certainly couldn’t show him. He turned his head away and spoke to the woman behind him. “I should go.”
“I—that is, I don’t know how to thank you. I don’t know how I could repay you, but— when I recover—”
Her words had an edge of desperation to them. “You owe me nothing, Mrs. Linder. It’s the least I can do for a fellow soldier. If your husband was here, he would take care of you.”
