by Betty Burton
‘She is all right, but we keep losing her. She is weak, very thin and undernourished, and underweight, but nothing that a few steaks and some iron tonic won’t put right. I’m surprised this didn’t happen earlier. Speak to her, sir, try to get her to respond. I’d like her to drink some sweet tea.’
The ‘sir’ the sister addressed didn’t need to speak. His smell, his breathing, the displacement of air when he moved told Eve who he was. ‘Dimitri. You missed your train.’ She didn’t want to open her eyes in case she was mistaken.
‘You see, Sister, only two days married and already she reprimands me. You go, I will attend. Come on, sit up, you have tea to drink.’ He put his hands under her armpits and hoisted her up against the pillows. ‘The sister is right, you are too thin. You will eat steak and like it. Now, drink tea, or I shall have it myself.’
‘Russians are so bloody bossy.’
‘Don’t use language.’
She drank. No tea had ever tasted so good. ‘I feel better already.’ It was then she felt the pads between her legs. ‘Oh my God! Was I pregnant? Dimitri, did I miscarry again?’ She slumped back against the pillows, not wanting to know the answer. Dimitri pressed the bell and kept his thumb hard on it.
When the hubbub died down and it was decided that this was not an emergency, the doctor stood resolutely beside Eve’s bed, whilst Dimitri resumed denting and creasing it and making her drink.
‘Major Vladim, there is no need to panic. Your wife is a healthy young woman, rather thin but otherwise healthy, but she must—’
‘Excuse me.’
The doctor withdrew his attention from Dimitri. ‘Yes?’
‘Oh, good. I thought for a moment I had become so thin that you couldn’t see me.’
Dimitri signalled to her with a frown, but he was holding back a smile. ‘I think maybe that Sub-Lieutenant Anders means that you should be addressing her as she is the one—’
‘Thank you, Dimitri. You don’t have to speak for me.’
Holding his palms protectively in front of him, he shrugged his shoulders at the doctor.
‘This is the first I’ve known about being pregnant. And if I am, then please address me.’ When she asked the question she was looking at Dimitri. ‘Am I still pregnant?’
‘Yes, Lieutenant Anders. You are carrying a baby.’
‘I’m sorry I was so rude to you. Do you think I won’t lose it?’
‘No. I see no reason why you should not have a full-term pregnancy, and a normal birth. It was what is known as a break-through bleed. Your husband says that you miscarried once before when you were in a weakened state – a two-months foetus. However, this time, your foetus is stronger, being more advanced. Your notes show that you have experienced a great amount of trauma… stress. Major Vladim tells me that you were out in the incendiary raid last night.’
Eve looked questioningly at Dimitri. ‘Was it last night?’
He nodded.
‘How strange.’
The doctor felt Eve’s pulse – ‘Not much wrong there’ – and pulled down a lower eyelid. ‘A little anaemic. Nothing very serious.’ He smiled for the first time. ‘I will ask Sister to bring you some beef broth which you will drink to the very last drop. You’ll see to that, Major?’
‘If she will permit me.’ He shook hands energetically with the doctor and said, ‘Thank you, very much. I thank you for such good news… that my wife will be well again.’
After he had left the ward, Eve looked up at Dimitri, who looked as though he didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry. ‘Four months! Four months!’
‘It is how many months we have been married.’
‘I know, I know.’
‘It was the night we made love after our marriage. You remember how good it was?’
‘I used a cap and cream. It shouldn’t have happened.’
Pulling back the covers, he laid his hand on her belly and gently caressed it. ‘Russians have very strong sperms. Your little contraption will not stop them.’ Moving close, he looked directly into her eyes with no levity in his expression, and took hold of her hand. ‘We made a baby. It is not going away.’
She tightened her grip on his fingers. ‘I know and I’m terrified.’
‘Of this little baby?’
‘Of what it will do to me.’
‘Eve, what are you saying?’
‘I was supposed to marry you and then get an annulment. But now there are three of us. How can we get divorced and forget the marriage of convenience with a baby?’
‘Eve…’
‘I’m sorry, Dimitri. It wasn’t your fault any more than mine.’
‘No, I am sorry. I forget for a moment the agreement why you married me – to make me British citizen. I forget because I love you.’
‘Please, Dimitri, not now. Just leave me to get some sleep.’
* * *
The next day, the doctor came into the ward, felt her pulse, and listened to her heartbeat and that of the baby. ‘You had another little bleed during the night.’
Eve nodded. ‘It wasn’t anything much.’
‘I want you to remain here, under my care for a while.’
‘How long is a while?’
‘Maybe three weeks… a month.’
‘That long?’
‘We will get you through this, and you will have a fine, healthy baby. Now then, a Dr McKenzie has asked if I would give her permission to visit you. I have no objection. In fact, I believe it might be a good thing for you to talk to her.’
‘Yes, please.’
* * *
‘Janet, this is devastating. I still can’t believe it is true. I haven’t even had to alter the buttons on my uniform.’
Looking at Eve levelly, Janet said, ‘You became addicted to the banting and regurgitation.’
‘Please, Janet, that sounds so crude.’
‘But you’ve been doing it ever since you were so successful at it when you went to Spain.’
‘I liked the way I looked.’
‘It’s a dangerous practice, Eve. You are lucky your baby didn’t abort.’
‘Oh, thank you, Janet, I feel really lucky. If I had known it wasn’t the slimming that was stopping my periods, I would have been able to make that decision myself.’
‘Anger won’t help.’
‘Don’t lecture me. Just now I need all the anger I can get.’
‘You are being kept in here to stay calm and rested. If you haemorrhage again, the baby will be too small and weak to survive. Is that what you want?’
Eve stared off through the window that showed only bright April sky. ‘Two or three months ago, I would have said yes. Do you know what, Janet? Dimitri always had plenty of French letters, I have had a cap for years, and I have a box of pennyroyal, and here I am pregnant.’
‘I agree, that’s pretty damned bad luck. But we have to talk about the situation as it is.’
‘The situation is that I am terrified.’
‘It’s not the first time you’ve been terrified.’
‘Terrified of being cut off behind enemy lines with only a fast-flowing river to escape by. Terrified of trying to escape with two children – yes, but this is something I have no control over. This… this foetus is just there. I’m not able to make any decisions about it.’
‘Women do change when they actually give birth. Have you thought of that?’
‘Absolutely! My friend utterly rejected her baby. She wouldn’t even feed it.’
‘She must have suffered some kind of traumatic event.’
‘This is a traumatic event. I don’t want a baby, Janet. I just don’t want it.’
‘OK, so talk to me about why.’
‘I had never planned to be a mother. I refuse to go the way my mother went. She was a trainee teacher and she got pregnant with my elder brother without wanting to. She gave up her plans for herself. She had wanted a career… she had a brain, she was clever. I want to be a pilot, not a mother. I will go off my head if I have to sta
y at home and bring up a child. It’s just not fair. Dimitri can be a father and go on doing what he wants to do, but I can’t be a mother and get my pilot’s licence. I can’t fly our agents and drop them safely into France. It’s what SOE were training me for. It’s what I want to do. Is that “why” enough?’
‘OK, so let us run through the options available. Adoption?’
Eve was horrified. ‘No! Dimitri wouldn’t agree anyhow.’
‘But you agreed to marry him.’
‘That’s not the same. There is this third person involved here, and we can’t ask it.’
‘Have the child, keep it, and find someone you trust to look after it. There are thousands of children being brought up away from their mothers and fathers – evacuees.’
‘Evacuate a new-born baby?’
‘Mothers die at birth and their babies thrive with substitute parents.’
Eve gave Janet a wry smile. ‘I had a substitute parent – he was my brother.’
‘So, substitute parenting works; you grew up all right.’
‘Don’t make me laugh, Janet. I’m nuts, and you know that better than anybody. I don’t even know yet who I am.’
‘Of course you’re not nuts. And you do know who you are, Eve Anders. Not Lu Wilmott, not Mrs Vladim, not even Sub-Lieutenant Anders – you are Eve. You didn’t choose that name by accident.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘Even if you didn’t choose it consciously, you saw yourself as the first woman… Eve.’
‘Adam’s spare rib.’
‘Adam was a wimp. God had to give him somebody to show him what to do. God said, “Don’t you dare pick that apple.” Adam was so scared, he said, “Sure thing, God. Who wants knowledge anyway?” But what did Eve say? “To Hell with that, I want to know what’s going on.” So she picked the damned thing and gave all the rest of us a bite. Eve is the hero of the Garden of Eden story.’
‘Thank God for you, Janet. I’ll be all right now. I’ll stay here as long as I’m told to. I’ll eat and drink, I’ll get fat.’
‘Listen to me, Eve. This is your friend speaking, not the doctor. I think you have had enough hungers in your life… your missing father, your education, and then you “banted” your family and are now hungry for them.’
‘I’m not. I’ve just seen them. They are dropping to pieces. There is no longer any tranquillity there. My uncle is sick, but they won’t talk about it. My friend was raped… the rapist was found dead. I don’t think they wanted me. I was just the prize Aunt May wanted. I made her a bride’s mother for the day. She put on this great feast, and invited half the county, just so that they could see her being the Bride’s Mother. For God’s sake, I’m not even her daughter.’
‘Why did you go there?’
‘I wanted to make up for leaving them when I went off to Spain.’
‘You went off to the most dangerous place on earth at that time. Don’t you think that might have worried them – just a little?’
‘I know it did, but it was the only way I knew how to break away. Clean cut. Get away.’
‘Now turn the whole thing on its head. You return just as suddenly as you went. But you had changed. My, how you had changed – a slim, pale-haired WRNS officer with an impressive Russian in tow. You probably scared them to death. But what does your proud aunt do? She treats you like the princess you are to her. She wants to put a stop to the rumours about why you left. She wants to show you off. It was an act of love for you, Eve. Now she could let you go into the arms of this wonderful Russian whom everybody likes.’
Eve didn’t reply. She stared out at the bright blue sky until she almost drifted off into sleep.
‘I’ll go now. Get some rest. I’ll come as often as I can.’
‘Do you think the girls would come? Maybe just DB, and Anomie?’
Janet nodded, then rose and gave Eve a light, brushing kiss on the cheek. ‘Eve?’
‘Yes?’
‘Would you mind if I went to see your aunt? Do you think she would mind?’
‘Not if you give her enough notice so that she can put on a decent frock, and show you Roman’s Fields at its best.’
* * *
DB came. Eve was sitting outside in the sun. DB’s hair was very short and set in broad waves.
‘Brought you this.’ She tossed her a cardboard envelope. ‘It’s what they call a private pressing, a limited edition. Play it when you don’t mind crying.’
Eve read the label. ‘Mina de Beers – “Sophisticated Lady”.’ She turned it over. ‘Mina de Beers – “Strange Fruit”.’
‘That’s super, DB. I’ll have to get somebody to bring me in a gramophone.’
‘You don’t mind if I don’t say anything about… you know… the baby?’
‘I want to hear what is happening.’
‘I’m off on a tour again – Cairo, hence the short hair. The “dotty” music is proving such a good way of getting information out.’
‘Good luck. I hope there are enough people out there who will appreciate your voice.’
‘Hey, who cares now I’ve got a contract to record?’
* * *
Ken wrote Eve a letter, saying that he had had the best time ever at the Finishing School.
I can’t tell you where they’re sending me, but it’s back where I might get a chance to look for my girl.
My old skill at coffin-making will stand me in good stead. I can be a useful tradesman. If I’m itinerant, I shall be in a good position to know what is going on. I wonder how you felt going back. I shall soon know. Dimitri’s a good man, Eve. Give him a chance.
Ken.
When Electra came, she told Eve that she didn’t think the FiFi was working. ‘But I don’t want to give up on it. Even if we save just one, it will be worth it. Don’t you think?’
Eve guessed that Electra wanted what she was doing justified. To save just one life. Paul’s.
Every day Eve had to take gentle exercise, just walking around, keeping her legs moving. After four weeks, she asked if she could leave.
‘It would be safer to wait a while – make sure you and the baby are both quite well. Why not stay with us, and let us deliver the baby?’
There came a day when the buttons of her cotton dressing gown would hardly fasten. It seemed that almost overnight, her body had taken on the figure of an expectant mother. When she took a bath, she actually looked down at herself critically. Her breasts had become swollen, her nipples large and darkened, and her belly swelled out like the dome of a silver serving dish. Running her hands over it, she felt the baby move.
My God! I really am pregnant.
Dimitri didn’t write from Scotland every day, but quite often, the letters arriving in batches. She didn’t write back, except for a postcard now and again to say that the baby was well and moving. Although she had plenty of time to write, she didn’t know what to say.
Then one day a nurse came to say that there was a visitor.
‘May! What are you doing here?’
Giving Eve a tentative hug, May said, ‘I’ve come to see you, you daft thing. Here, I got you a jar of malt, some honey, cod-liver oil, and some of Ted’s strawberry cordial to take after it, and I’ve give the nurse a block of butter that’s to be give only for you.’
‘Oh May. I don’t know what to say.’
‘You don’t have to say nothing. I said to Ann, “I thought there was something wrong when she wasn’t eating proper. She was having the sickness and didn’t want anybody to see.” And Ann agreed. “You just remind her what I said, I an’t never been wrong yet about girls who’s expecting. It shows in their eyes.” Don’t they ever give a visitor a cup of tea in this place? Hold on, I’ll go and ask that nurse. I give her a pot of honey for herself, so she won’t mind.’
May had arrived like a whirlwind and took over. She’d gone to see the matron and asked her to see that Eve was given all the supplements she had brought in. And she’d shown her the layette she had brough
t in for taking the baby home. ‘I want you to send me a telegram as soon as she goes into labour, and I’ll come down and be with her. Don’t say no, because I shall come anyway. I’ve brought a good many babes into the world.’ The matron had never encountered a will stronger than her own. This was her hospital, but she wasn’t averse to a bit of flattery from a woman who said that she only ever wanted to be a nurse and finish up as Matron in a good hospital. ‘The best in the whole county, and I know, I’m Hampshire born and bred.’
‘Have you been knitting, Eve?’ May asked her now, spreading out the tiny clothes for Eve to see.
‘You know I can’t knit.’
‘I said to Ray, do you think I should go for white, seeing as we shan’t know whether it is a boy or girl until it’s too late to start knitting. Ray said, “Do yellow.” Do you know, I never thought of it. Look, an’t these just the prettiest things you ever saw? I know it seems a lot, but the first weeks they get through them like anything.’
Then she calmed down. ‘You’re looking just like your old self… I was going to say “Lu”, but that Janet friend of yours said you wanted to be called Eve now. Well, I don’t mind. It’s you whose name it is. She explained to me that it was important.’
A wards-maid came in with a teatray set up. ‘You must be somebody’s fav’rite. Visitors don’t usually get anything.’
‘That’s really nice. It’s not that I was asking for any preferential treatment, but I have come a long way on the train.’
When the girl had gone, Eve said, ‘And what else did Dr McKenzie say besides that I want to be called Eve?’
‘Well… she did sound me out about how I would feel if the baby came to live with us. It’s out in the country, and as safe as houses – as you well know. We don’t want for nothing in the way of decent food. It’s the one thing that being a smallholder has over the rest these days. You’ve seen for yourself how little Bonnie and Anthony are thriving. Never a want of somebody to see to them. The baby would have ready-made cousins living in the same house, and, of course, you know how much room we’ve got there. It could have a proper nursery – next to your old bedroom, if you like. Then you and Dimitri could come down any time you wanted.’ May had been handling and smoothing the baby clothes as she had been speaking. Then she collected them together, returned them to the bag, and went silent. Eventually, looking up at Eve, she said, ‘Lord, Eve, I’ve run out of steam.’
