The Last Perfect Summer of Richard Dawlish

by Caron Allan

  ‘You better bring it tomorrow, or I’ll have the law on both of you. She’s on the third floor, at the back. Room 302.’

  Without another word Dottie turned away and headed for the stairs. The ‘hotel’ reeked of old boiled cabbage and the sewer. The sooner she got Diana out of there, the better. The carpet ran out after the first floor, and the dingy wallpaper and lampshades ran out after the second. From the light fittings—empty of electric bulbs—hung ancient fly papers, the wrecks of the tiny corpses still embedded on the filthy strands. Everything was thick with dust and cobwebs. On the third floor, the corridor was dark and narrow, the floorboards uneven, and the one window at the front was so grimed over with dirt that almost no light shone through. Looking out through the glass, it was impossible to tell if it was midnight or midday. Probably this was really the servants’ floor from the building’s Victorian inception. Dottie had to lean in close to each door to read the room numbers in the gloom.

  She found the right door and knocked. Poor Diana, she thought, confining herself to this purgatorial place. Still, it should be easy enough to find a room for her at the rather nicer hotel where Dottie was staying, and if Diana had no money, well, her family certainly had plenty. There was a faint stirring sound from the room beyond the door, but no voice. No one came to open the door. Dottie knocked again. Still nothing happened. And yet she had to be in there, the woman had said so. Dottie tried the door. It opened. She stepped inside, unable to see anything much at first. She began to think it was a mistake, that this was nothing but an old storage space.

  ‘Diana? Are you there? It’s Dottie. Dottie Manderson.’

  There was a soft gasp from a heap on a bed in the corner. The curtains, heavy and dark, were closed over the single window, blotting out all the light.

  Dottie went forward and realised with a shock that the bundle she could see on the bed was in fact Diana herself, huddled, shivering, under a thin stinking counterpane.

  Chapter Four

  ‘DIANA!’ SHE CAUGHT her in an embrace, and was shocked by how thin, how insubstantial she was; there was nothing of her. Her hair hung loose, straggled and sweaty, her face glistened with fever. Her hands, burning hot, shook as she gripped Dottie’s shoulders in a hug. Tears sprang into the eyes of both. Any last-minute doubts Dottie had about whether she would be welcome now vanished.

  ‘Oh Dottie! Oh thank God, Oh...’ Even her voice was thin and lacked any strength.

  Dottie’s words jumbled and fought to get out. She couldn’t understand. ‘Diana! Why...? Why are you here? Why are you so...? Just... why?’

  ‘Oh Dottie! It’s all such a mess. I’ve no money, my dear, that’s the plain truth of the matter. I’ve been so ill. Oh Dottie, please help me. I’m so tired, I just can’t do anything.’

  Dottie could see Diana’s belly was very large. ‘How much longer have you got to go?’

  Tears of exhaustion continued to run down Diana’s face. ‘No one was supposed to know. Mother and Father were so angry, so disgusted with me... They sent me to Nanny Brown’s but...’

  ‘Yes, I know,’ Dottie said, ‘I went there. But you can’t stay here like this, you’re getting sick. You need somewhere clean and decent...’

  ‘Decent?’ Diana’s voice cracked with bitterness. ‘No, Dottie, this is God’s will for me, it’s His punishment. I’m a disgrace, I’m a whore... that’s what my father called me. I deserve to be punished. I shall die in my sin.’

  ‘What rot!’ Dottie said sharply. ‘Now I’ll help you to get dressed, then we’ll get you to a proper hotel. I’ve got a room at the Grand...’

  ‘Dottie, no, I can’t do it, I’m just too weak, I’m not well enough. The baby—Dottie—I just want to see my baby, that’s all. Then I can die happy.’

  Dottie was dismayed by what she was hearing. She couldn’t decide what to do, whether to call for an ambulance, or send for a taxi to take Diana to her own hotel. What should she do? Was Diana genuinely ill, or just depressed and guilt-ridden?

  She put a hand to Diana’s forehead. It was very hot. Diana sweated profusely but she was hugging herself, shivering. Dottie arranged the thin covers over her as best she could, pulling off her short jacket and laying that over the top.

  ‘Diana, is the baby coming?’

  ‘No, no, it’s not due for two more weeks at least. Or it might be one week, I-I can’t remember. I’ve lost track of the days. But no, not yet.’

  That was something at least, though Dottie knew from what her sister had told her that babies came when they wanted to, and not when the doctor said they were due. But it should be all right.

  ‘Have you had anything to eat or drink today?’

  Diana didn’t know. She tried to think about it, but she was muzzy-headed and not able to remember. In the end, she said in a questioning manner, ‘I think I had some soup for dinner?’

  ‘That would have been yesterday.’ Dottie was alarmed to hear it, but not particularly surprised. Diana was no longer taking care of either herself or her child, and she was friendless here, with no one to help her. ‘It’s well past lunchtime now. I’ll get some food sent up to you and call a doctor. Stay there under the covers and I’ll be back in a jiffy.’

  ‘Dottie dear, it’s very kind of you, but I deserve this, I deserve to suffer, for bringing shame...’

  ‘Diana, stop talking such damned nonsense! Think of the baby. You’re going to need all your strength.’ And she banged out of the room, slamming the door more loudly and with greater force than she’d intended.

  Downstairs, to the woman who ran the ‘hotel’, Dottie said, ‘I will give you an extra ten pounds if you take Mrs Dunne a boiled egg with bread and butter, and a pot of tea. Oh, and you must send for the doctor as a matter of urgency.’

  Grumbling, but getting out of her chair, the woman called after Dottie’s already-retreating back, ‘Mrs Dunne! She better not have that wretch here! Bringing shame on my establishment!’

  Dottie turned and made a show of looking around her. ‘It’s hardly the Grand, is it? Now get a move on, Mrs Dunne is very ill. You should have helped her, just out of common decency.’

  She didn’t stay to listen to any further complaints but ran back upstairs. Dottie went first to the filthy bathroom at the end of the corridor. She wet her handkerchief under the tap then returned to Diana’s room. She pulled one of the lank curtains back to allow a little light into the room. The windows had been painted shut, so there was no chance of any fresh air. She turned on the lamp by the bed and set about gently blotting the damp cotton on Diana’s face to cool her.

  Diana was lying back against the pillow. She was horribly still. Her eyes were closed, and her face so ashen, that if it were not for the rise and fall of her breast, Dottie would have thought her dead. A terrible sense of foreboding came over Dottie, and she felt as though she was ministering to a dead woman. Fearfully she thought that even though there had been so many discoveries in science and medicine, it was still all too common for a woman to die in childbirth, and Diana was by no means robust. How could a young woman from a wealthy and privileged background fall into such complete disaster? Dottie couldn’t seem to marry together this scrawny sick woman with the lively happy girl she had last seen on New Year’s Eve, talking so idealistically about a woman’s sacred duty as a wife and mother. She held Diana’s hand, sitting beside her on the narrow bed, waiting.

  Where was that boiled egg? Dottie had an urge to go to the head of the stairs and yell her head off. And where was that wretched doctor, too? Why wasn’t something happening?

  Diana groaned and clutched her stomach. Dottie gave her a startled look.

  ‘Is it the baby?’

  Diana shook her head, slowly, as if it cost her all her strength to do so. ‘I told you, the baby’s not due for...’ she broke off, crying out in pain, tensing suddenly then falling back against the pillow.

  ‘Well I’m no expert,’ Dottie said, ‘but I do know babies don’t always come when they’re supposed to.�
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  Diana, panicked, gripped Dottie’s arm. ‘You will make sure a really nice family get my baby, won’t you? I couldn’t bear it if they didn’t treat him or her properly. I want them to love him. Or her. And take proper care of him. It’s not his fault...’

  ‘Surely arrangements have already been made?’ Dottie couldn’t believe what she was hearing. ‘Isn’t there an adoption agency involved, or—or—something?’ She knew nothing of how these things worked, she realised.

  Diana’s face contorted in another spasm of pain. That made three in less than four minutes. Dottie had no idea how to go about delivering a baby. Education at her highly-esteemed private ladies’ college on such matters had been largely along the lines of, ‘And when the doctor arrives, he will tell you what to do.’ And for heaven’s sake, where was that doctor?

  ‘The baby’s really coming, isn’t it? But it’s too soon...’ Diana asked. Her face was bloodless, her hair stuck all round her face and neck. She looked terrified. Dottie knew she probably looked exactly the same.

  ‘I’m very much afraid...’

  ‘I know I’m not strong enough, but no matter what happens, you will stay with me, won’t you? Oh Dottie, please don’t leave me, I don’t want to be alone. Please...’ Diana’s hand gripped hers.

  ‘Of course I’ll stay, but don’t fret, you’ve a little time yet, and the doctor is on his way. He’ll help you. He’ll give you something for the pain, and he’ll tell you what to do.’

  ‘Dottie, if I don’t—if I don’t...’

  ‘Shush now, everything will be all right. We will have time to work things out later. Save your strength.’

  She heard the heavy sound of what could only be a man’s boots clumping on the stairs. This had better be the doctor. The door opened and in came an elderly man with the obligatory black leather bag. He let out a rather coarse oath, Dottie felt, as he caught sight of the woman in the bed, adding, ‘How long has she been like this?’

  Dottie fought her panic down. ‘I don’t know, I...’

  ‘For God’s sake, you stupid child, I should have been called hours ago! Out of the way.’

  But Diana clutched at Dottie, who had therefore to stay put as the doctor began his examination.

  ‘The child’s breached, this is not going to be easy. Have you attended before?’

  ‘Attended?’ Dottie repeated, bewildered. ‘Er, no, never.’

  The doctor huffed, unimpressed. He bellowed out the door, ‘Hot water, immediately, and clean towels!’ Dottie doubted anyone would hear, let alone comply. He turned back to the bed. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘A friend,’ said Dottie. ‘I only got here half an hour ago.’

  ‘I presume she’s not married?’

  ‘Er, no.’

  ‘You?’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘Are you married? Do you understand about this sort of thing? I don’t want some useless debutante fainting on me.’

  ‘I am not in the least the fainting type, thank you very much,’ Dottie snapped back at him haughtily, and hoped it was true. Her heart was in her mouth. Diana’s hand tightened on her arm as another contraction gripped her. ‘Besides, I’m not leaving her.’ She smoothed Diana’s hair back from her face and murmured something along the lines of ‘there, there’, for the sake of something—anything—comforting to say.

  The hot water and clean towels never arrived. In the end, Dottie had to go and fetch them herself, the precious time spent waiting for the water to heat on the stove weighed heavily and felt far too long. She was afraid she had been away too long, so long that...

  When she finally arrived back upstairs, she helped the doctor wash and dry his hands and prepare his equipment, then she settled herself on the side of the bed, her back to him, and helped Diana to take a few sips of water.

  For the next five hours the labour progressed, seemingly unending, yet Dottie knew five hours for the delivery of a first baby was a mercifully fast affair. There seemed to be nothing more to do than to continually urge Diana to take another breath, to try to stay calm, to breathe slowly and deeply. And later, to urge her to attempt one more push, to cling on for one more minute to her precarious thread of life. Never had Dottie felt so full of fear, nor felt so helpless in the face of an overwhelmingly inevitable outcome. ‘Almost there, not long now...’ How many times had she said that?

  In the end, she wasn’t surprised that it was all too much for Diana. The baby, finally arriving into the world, gave its first cry and Diana whispered, ‘I want to see him. Or her.’

  ‘It’s a little girl,’ Dottie said, and taking the tiny bundle from the doctor and wrapping her in her own jacket, she placed her by Diana’s side. Diana slowly turned her head on the pillow to smile and press a kiss against the baby’s cheek. ‘Hello, my darling,’ she said.

  ‘What are you going to call her?’ Dottie asked, entranced by the tiny fingers that gripped her own, and the wide eyes that seemed to regard her with ancient wisdom. There was no reply. She lifted her eyes from the baby’s face to look at Diana, looking for the answer to her question. But Diana’s face was a grey mask, her eyes staring at nothing, unblinking, unseeing.

  ‘Doctor!’ Dottie was on her feet, clutching the baby against her.

  He shook his head gravely, felt for the pulse that wasn’t there, and closed Diana’s eyes. Turning away, he began to pack away his things, then pulled the filthy bedlinen up over Diana, covering her face.

  ‘But...but...’ Dottie couldn’t form the words, too shocked for tears.

  Already heading for the door, the doctor patted Dottie on the shoulder. ‘I’m sorry, my dear, there’s nothing more either of us can do for her. She was so weak with fever and malnutrition, I’m afraid this is just what I expected. I’ll send a nurse over to do what’s necessary and she’ll take the child too, and see that arrangements are made. There’s a respectable orphanage not far from here. They’re used to dealing with bastard babies.’

  Dottie clutched the baby even closer. Fighting for composure, she said, ‘She’s not going to an orphanage! And that’s final!’ Her voice sounded in her ears, her words had a fiercely defiant ring to them.

  The doctor shrugged and left.

  Beside her, under the filthy sheet, Diana lay unmoving. Dottie’s hope that she would not really be dead, that the sheet would somehow miraculously rise with a newly taken breath, was a forlorn one. Dottie sank down onto a wooden chair to wait for the nurse. Every few seconds she cast an anxious glance down at the baby she held in her arms. The little one still stared contentedly at Dottie. How long would it before the baby needed feeding? What on earth did one do?

  It felt like an age before the nurse bustled in, an older woman, probably a grandmother, Dottie thought, who had seen many babies born, and knew exactly what to do.

  The nurse took one look at Dottie and said, ‘My dear, what you need is a good strong cup of tea.’

  With that she left the room again, returning five minutes later with a tray bearing a pot of tea, two cups, a jug of milk and a plate of bread and butter, neatly sliced and neatly spread. Her kindness brought Dottie to tears. The nurse put an arm round Dottie’s shoulder, patting and tsking at intervals. At last Dottie’s sobs subsided and she was left hiccupping but calm. And still the baby lay in her arms, quiet and staring.

  ‘Good little thing, isn’t she?’

  Dottie nodded. ‘And she’s not going into an orphanage, either! I’m taking her back to my hotel with me, and—and...’ she blurted out.

  ‘Got family, has she? They’ll take her in?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Dottie, and hoped to God it was true. She would take the child herself if she had to, not that she had a clue how to go about such a Herculean task.

  The nurse indicated Diana’s body. ‘Next of kin, are you?’

  Dottie shook her head. ‘Just a friend. She’s my—she was my sister’s sister-in-law. My sister’s husband’s sister.’

  ‘I see. Your brother-in-law’s sister?’<
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  ‘Oh yes.’ Why hadn’t she just said that to begin with, it was so much clearer. Dottie shook her head, but her thoughts were still scattered all over the place. She kept thinking... she kept seeing, and hearing Diana’s voice... The nurse patted her again.

  ‘Now my dear, you’ve had a nasty shock, and I don’t doubt, looking at how young you are, that it’s your first such. Now you just move your chair around this wee bit so you’ll have your back to me whilst I just see to a few things about the poor lady. And you drink up your tea, there’s nothing like a good strong hot cup of tea for steadying you down after a shock, I always say.’

  ‘That’s what my mother says,’ Dottie responded, getting to her feet.

  ‘Well now,’ said the nurse, turning the chair to face away from the bed, ‘Your mother sounds like a jolly good sensible woman. Now I’ll take the baby, and just give her a check over, make sure she’s perfectly healthy, though I daresay the doctor did that already. You drink your tea, my dear.’

  Reluctantly, Dottie allowed the nurse to take the baby from her, the transfer done a little awkwardly on Dottie’s part as she was still nervous, and uncertain of the correct way to handle such a tiny infant. The nurse lay the baby on the end of the bed, and began to unwrap the coat. Dottie resumed her seat, and drank her tea, shutting out everything except the hot tea going down her throat, a little too hot, but it began to revive her.

  ‘Aren’t there any things for the little one?’ the nurse called over her shoulder.

  ‘I couldn’t find anything,’ Dottie answered. Diana had few possessions in the room, and none of them was suitable for a newborn baby. Dottie wondered if Diana had even thought for a moment of surviving beyond this day. What would have happened if Dottie hadn’t arrived? How had Diana imagined she could give birth all alone? What had she prepared for the arrival of her baby? Diana had surely not been in her right mind, but in the depths of despair brought on by guilt and grief.

  The nurse said nothing, but wrapping the little one in the coat once more, she lay the baby on the floor. ‘She’s perfectly fine. Now you have your tea. Let the baby have a little nap.’