Jean Grainger Box Set: So Much Owed, Shadow of a Century, Under Heaven's Shining Stars

by Jean Grainger

  ‘Madame Buckley? Are you well?’ The words sounded foolish to her ears, but she didn’t know what else to say. Moving towards the curtains, she pulled them half open, allowing in sufficient dawn light to see Richard’s wife alone in bed, a terrified expression on her face.

  ‘Something… something is happening,’ Edith gasped.

  Solange ran to the bed and, gently moving back the covers, discovered Edith’s water had broken. Her nightgown was soaking, as was the sheet and presumably the mattress beneath. Despite the pain, Edith was clearly mortified by the mess and was trying to cover it with her hands.

  ‘Please, do not worry, Madame,’ Solange said soothingly. ‘This is normal. Your baby is now coming. Please stay calm, and I will send for your husband…’

  ‘No!’ Edith screamed.

  Solange was unsure if the woman’s cry related to Richard or to the pain, but Edith was holding her hand so tightly, it would have been impossible for her to move away from the bed anyway.

  ‘No,’ repeated Edith, this time as a hiss. ‘Not Richard. I don’t want him seeing me like this. Not Canty either. Get Dr Bateman back.’

  ‘But Madame, I think there may be no time to send for him. I’m sure your husband will be here any moment.’

  Where was he? No one could sleep through these screams. Solange took a deep breath; she must stay calm.

  ‘If you will permit me to examine you, I think we will find that the baby is almost here. Please do not worry, everything is going to be fine.’ Solange was trying to measure the time in between the waves of pain that seemed to grip Edith with such savagery. She’d been present at many deliveries and could tell that this labour was very advanced. Had Edith been having contractions for hours and said nothing until she could bear the pain no longer? Was she that resistant to her husband’s presence?

  ‘Please Madame, please try to relax. I know it is difficult but please trust me, it will hurt less if you –’ Frustratingly, the English would not come to her. ‘Breathe slow and deeply,’ she finished, relieved to have recalled the words. ‘If you can try to relax, you are doing so well, and then the baby will be here very soon, and all of this will be over, I promise.’

  Edith’s response was another high-pitched scream. Mrs Canty appeared at the door, in her night-robe and bonnet. ‘Oh Lord above! It’s time, is it? Dr Richard’s gone out on a sick call, tonight of all nights, and he only in the door. I don’t even know where he is. What should we do?’ Mrs Canty’s voice was rising to a crescendo of panic.

  ‘Please, don’t worry, everything is perfectly normal. I have delivered many babies before.’ A white lie – she’d only ever played a supporting role, and that was when she was still in training – but she had to calm the old housekeeper down. ‘So Mrs Canty, if you can just help me by… No, there is no point now trying to get towels under her. I think the baby is coming soon. Please, go and wash your hands and sterilise some scissors in boiling water and bring them back to me. Now, Madame, please just breathe, oui, yes, very good, you are doing everything beautifully and very soon you will hold your baby in your arms.’

  Edith’s breathing became deeper and more even as she locked eyes with Solange. Then she screamed again.

  ‘Now, Madame.’ Solange attempted to infuse her voice with both kindness and authority. ‘The next time you feel the pain, you must push down very hard. Your baby is almost here. Just a few more minutes and all this will be over, everything will be well. Just keep your energy for delivering your baby. You are doing very well.’

  It seemed that Edith was beginning to trust her. As the next contraction came, she gripped Solange’s hand tightly and pushed with every ounce of strength she had.

  ‘Now Madame, the next one will be the one to deliver your baby. Try to pant, like this…’ Solange demonstrated and Edith followed her instructions. The next contraction began to build. Solange moved to the foot of the bed. Between Edith’s legs, the head of the baby was crowning.

  ‘Now, just push very hard, and the little one will be here.’ The infant came slipping from Edith’s body into Solange’s arms. ‘Oh, Madame, a little girl, a beautiful little girl!’

  She cut the umbilical cord with the scissors and handed the wailing child to a tearful Mrs Canty, who wrapped the tiny body in freshly warmed blankets. Minutes passed as Solange waited for the placenta to follow. Surprisingly, Edith’s contractions continued. The pain should have ceased with the delivery of the child, but she seemed to be still in full labour.

  ‘What’s happening?’ Edith gasped, terror in her eyes. ‘Why is it not over? You said it would be over once it was born!’

  Solange fought the urge to panic; she looked again between Edith’s legs and was astonished to see another head crowning. ‘Madame, please do not worry, but there is… Yes, there is another baby. Please, you must push once more.’

  With a loud cry from Edith, the second infant slipped out quickly and easily and was also deposited into the waiting arms of Mrs Canty.

  ‘A little boy! Oh, Madame, how wonderful for you!’

  The two placentas followed, and finally, Edith lay back on the pillows, exhausted. Solange helped her into a more comfortable position, murmuring soft, soothing words in French. Then she changed the sodden sheets and replaced Edith’s nightgown with a fresh one. Throughout this process, the new mother avoided her eyes as if acutely embarrassed by what had just happened. She appeared self-conscious of her body, even in front of the woman who had just assisted her giving birth.

  Mrs Canty was busy wrapping up the babies and cooing over them. ‘Oh holy mother of God. Oh, missus, ye have a pair of beauties here and no mistake.’ She was wiping away tears as the lusty wails of the newborns filled the air. Solange took them from her, wrapped in their warm blankets, and brought them to the head of the bed, preparing to place them in their mother’s arms.

  ‘Félicitations, congratulations, Madame, they are beautiful. I am sure you and your husband will be very proud of them.’

  Edith looked down at her two babies and to Solange’s dismay, turned with difficulty onto her side, away from them.

  ‘Please take them away, I need to sleep now.’

  ‘Oui, Madame, of course, but perhaps you should feed them first? Then I can take them and bathe them?’ Solange suggested.

  ‘No, I shan’t be feeding them. Please attend to them and do not disturb me.’

  ‘But Madame, how will I…’

  ‘Canty knows where everything is.’ Edith settled down to sleep.

  ‘I wasn’t sure she’d go through with it,’ Mrs Canty whispered as she and Solange were wrapping up the infants once more, having put napkins on them. ‘But by God, it seems she is. She had some bottles and tins sent over from England a few weeks ago. Nestlé, it says on the labels. She told me that’s what the baby – well, I suppose it’s the babies now – anyway that’s what we’re to feed them. Not nursing her own babies, did you ever hear the like…’

  ‘Please, just leave.’ Edith’s voice had regained some of its lost strength.

  AN HOUR LATER, AS Solange sat dozing in the rocking chair with both babies asleep in the smart new bassinet beside her, Richard burst into the kitchen. ‘Oh Solange, thank God you were here. Eddie only just found me! I was up the mountain at Coakley’s farm. I should have left a note, but I thought there was still weeks to go… I’m so sorry you had to manage on your own but thank God you were here. So where is he? Or she?’

  The news that there was not one baby but two filled Richard with joy. She had never seen this quiet man so animated and excited. She thought of Jeremy and how he would have loved the children they would never have. So often in bed they had discussed names for their children. She, favouring English names to match their surname, he arguing for French. He had loved France and everything about it. Most of all, he had loved her.

  ‘Did you have no idea?’ she asked Richard as he stood gazing down in amazement at his sleeping twins. The babies were sharing th
e bassinet – there was only one of everything for the moment.

  ‘No. Bateman never spotted it, I suppose. Sometimes it can be difficult, depending on what position the babies are lying in. Edith must have got a real surprise.’ He gently stroked their heads.

  ‘Well, félicitations, Richard. They are beautiful. Do you know what they are to be called?’

  ‘Yes. We’d like to call the boy James, after Edith’s father; that’s what we’d decided if it was a boy. And Juliet, after my mother, if it was a girl. I suppose we will just use both.’

  He was beaming but seemed hesitant, almost nervous, to pick them up.

  ‘Go on,’ she whispered.

  ‘I’m afraid I’ll wake them,’ he replied.

  Solange reached in and gathered the tiny babies up, placing one in each of his arms. They stirred and instantly fell back to sleep. Richard Buckley looked at his children and Solange saw raw emotion on his face for the first time since she’d known him. He gazed at their tiny faces and fingers, amazed at the miracle of life despite all his experience of death.

  Eventually he spoke, ‘Thank you, Solange, from the bottom of my heart, for delivering them safely and for taking care of them until Edith has had her rest.’ He glanced at the bottle and tin of Nestlé powdered milk, still on the table. ‘Poor girl, it must have been exhausting for her.’

  ‘Of course,’ she replied. ‘I’m glad I was able to help. They are healthy little ones. They are enjoying the milk from the tins. I have never seen that before, but they are drinking it happily, so all is well.’

  He said, clearly a little embarrassed, ‘Well, to nurse twins would have been very difficult for her at first. I’m sure they will do wonderfully on the powdered milk for a day or two. I can’t tell you how grateful I… Edith and I… are for all your help. Now, if you don’t mind taking care of them for just a few more minutes, I’ve been in these clothes all night so I just need to clean up. I don’t want to asphyxiate my children. I won’t be long.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Was that Dr Richard I heard?’ Mrs Canty came bustling into the kitchen. Outside, the winter morning was brightening up at last. ‘He must have been over the moon with the little beauties, God bless them. Anything from herself above? Is she interested in looking at her children? Not a bit of it, I suppose, and you up all night. Here give them to me and let you go for a snooze.’

  Solange looked down at the two tiny babies, still in her arms from where Richard had handed them back to her. They slept soundly, their little fists bunched up tight. They were so pure, so innocent; they knew nothing of ugliness or brutality. For the first time since she had heard the news of Jeremy’s death, she felt something thaw deep inside her.

  All that morning, instead of sleeping as Richard and Mrs Canty insisted she must, she lay in bed thinking of the twins and hoping they were all right. When the quiet of the house was finally shattered by a newborn’s cry, she couldn’t stay in her room. She went downstairs to help Richard, who was attempting to feed one while the other bawled in the bassinet.

  ‘Mrs Canty is just gone for a few messages; we need a few things from the shop. I told her I could manage but…’ Richard was all fingers and thumbs.

  As soon as Solange picked up and cuddled Juliet, she stopped crying. She started to suck on her bottle and began drifting off to sleep again. Then she did the same with James, and soon both babies were fast asleep.

  ‘You have the magic touch with them, Solange,’ Richard whispered in awe as they slept cuddled up together.

  Gazing into the crib, she said, ‘I think they like to be near each other. They have been close for all this time and now to be separated – it must be a shock.’

  ‘MADAME?’ SOLANGE TENTATIVELY ENTERED the bedroom, having first knocked gently on the door.

  Edith was awake and propped up on pillows reading a letter that had arrived that morning.

  ‘Yes, Solange? Did you want something?’ she asked, still reading.

  ‘I was wondering if you would like to see the babies. I could bring them to you.’ She had contemplated simply walking into the room with the twins but had thought better of it.

  ‘No, thank you, not just now. Are they well?’ Edith asked as if enquiring about a distant relative.

  ‘Oui, I mean, yes, Madame, they are very well and so beautiful.’

  ‘Yes, I’m sure. I may come down to see them later. Although I’m sure they are better off not being disturbed from their routine.’ Edith paused in her reading and looked up. ‘Thank you for your assistance with the births. I am in your debt.’ Her tone conveyed dismissal.

  Still, Solange lingered. ‘Madame, I am always happy to help.’

  ‘Well, yes. It was good you were here.’ Edith returned to her letter.

  ‘And when you are ready for me to bring the babies to you…’

  Edith looked up again with a sigh. ‘Solange, not now, please. This is an important letter from an old friend of mine in Dublin. There are going to be changes in this country. Ireland may not remain the calm and peaceful place you imagine it to be. British imperialism will not be tolerated any longer. Now if you’ll excuse me…’

  This time, the implication that Solange was outstaying her welcome was too obvious to ignore.

  Chapter 2

  The weeks that followed were cold but bright. Solange wrapped up the babies well and took them for walks around the garden in their pram. The crocuses that bloomed in profusion around the trees delighted her. Her life had altered so irreparably and so often in these last months that she had lost all sense of continuity and this garden gave her an anchor to cling to in an ever-changing world. It was a comfort to know that spring had come again as it had always done, irrespective of the turmoil in human lives.

  Yet the main distraction from her own sorrows came in caring for James and Juliet. She was deeply grateful that the endless demands of two such healthy infants gave her so little time to brood over all she had lost. The twins seemed never to sleep simultaneously and were always hungry. Richard insisted that it was not expected of her that she care for them, but given the continued lack of interest their mother showed in them, there seemed to be no other option. He was so busy with the practice, and Mrs Canty, although a great help, had the household to run. Besides, Solange wanted to look after them. She could sit for hours just holding them and kissing their downy heads.

  After Jeremy’s death, she had moved as if in a trance. Presumably, she had slept and ate, but if so, she had no recollection of it. Life had stretched out in front of her as an endless, colourless void of time without him in it until she herself died. Over and over, she thought how things should have been different. He was a doctor, not even on the front line, yet he was dead. She thought of her Maman and Papa, too – so full of life and fun. Her mother’s flashing eyes that could make her adoring husband agree to anything she wanted, and her father, who loved his sons and his only daughter with all his heart. But then Maman had got sick and died – a simple cut on her foot that had turned to blood poisoning. Papa was killed a short while later, shot by a German soldier in reprisal for some imagined slight. Her older brothers had fallen at Verdun, dying side by side as they had lived since early childhood. To be left entirely alone in the world was a terrifying prospect. Yet in those early weeks, all she had thought about was how she could manage to live without Jeremy.

  She was by no means over her loss – she doubted she ever would be, but the twins had become her new reality, and she adored them more with each passing day.

  Sometimes, she felt guilty for loving them as if she was their mother, yet Edith showed only the most cursory of interest in the babies. Once a day – or, on rare occasions, twice – she would descend into the kitchen to glance into their pram. She would enquire as to their health and whether they were eating or sleeping properly but without any sign of genuine concern. She never picked them up or even looked too closely at them. It really was as if Solange were their mother
and Edith a gracious employer enquiring after her housemaid’s children – something to be done as a matter of form, rather than stemming from any real desire to know.

  Richard loved the twins and often gave them their bottles; occasionally he even changed a napkin – though not with much success. He asked daily if Edith had been down to see them, and if Solange thought that perhaps this was a question he should be putting to his wife, she gave no indication of it.

  Time and again, Solange wondered how the Buckleys’ marriage survived. Their union could not even be described as one of convenience; the entire household seemed to be a source of annoyance to Edith. Solange had long ceased to imagine that Edith’s initial coldness to her had sprung from a natural caution; it was clear to her now that Edith’s ennui extended to everyone in her life. Time and again, she witnessed Richard trying to get closer to his wife, but each time Edith rebuffed him – avoiding him whenever possible and engaging in brittle conversation with him only when it was necessary. The letters kept on coming – two, sometimes three, a week, from her friends in Dublin, all of whom were, it seemed, involved in the struggle for independence. It was the only subject on which Edith seemed close to animated and, perhaps because her husband showed no interest, she would often explain to Solange certain points regarding Irish politics.

  Last week, Edith had summoned Solange to her room.

  ‘Ah Solange, thank you for coming up. I think we need to talk, to clarify some things. Tell me, are you happy here?’

  Solange was nonplussed. ‘Oui… I mean, yes, of course, Madame. I am very happy and grateful to you and Richard for…’

  ‘No, I know that, but I think if you are happy to stay, we should formalise the arrangement. You are looking after the twins, no doubt admirably, and, therefore, we should be paying you. It is not reasonable of us to expect you to work for nothing. Now if you don’t wish to do it, then of course there is no obligation on you; we will simply hire a nurse to come in. Please don’t feel pressured due to some sense that you owe us something. That is simply not the case.’