She left him staring open-mouthed and dashed across the drive.
It wasn’t difficult to catch Mrs Shinwell. She could barely shuffle along, her body bent double. ‘Where do you think you’re going?’ Millie asked, catching hold of her arm.
‘Don’t try to stop me, Nurse. I’ve got to go.’ Tears ran down Mrs Shinwell’s cheeks, but her determined gaze was fixed on the gates ahead of her.
‘You can’t leave, Mrs Shinwell. You haven’t had your stitches out yet.’
‘I don’t care.’
‘But you could get a serious infection. Not to mention all the pain you must be in—’
‘I told you, I don’t care! All the pain in the world doesn’t compare to the pain I’ve caused the people I love…’
She stopped speaking abruptly. Millie stared at her. ‘I was right! You do remember!’
Mrs Shinwell hung her head. ‘I remember, all right,’ she mumbled. ‘I only wish I didn’t.’
‘Is that why you pretended you’d lost your memory?’
‘I just wanted some time to think, decide what to do next.’
‘And have you decided?’
Mrs Shinwell lifted her dark gaze to Millie’s. ‘Oh yes,’ she said. ‘I’m going to do what I set out to do on Christmas Eve, and walk away from it all. I only wish I’d stepped off that kerb a second earlier, then I wouldn’t be in this terrible mess.’
Millie gasped. ‘You can’t mean that!’
‘What do you know about it? You don’t know what I’ve done. I’ve ruined everything, they’ll all be better off without me—’
She burst into noisy tears. Millie reached into her apron pocket for a handkerchief and handed it to her. ‘Why don’t you tell me everything?’ she suggested. ‘It might make you feel better.’
‘I doubt it.’ Mrs Shinwell blew her nose noisily. ‘I doubt if anything could make me feel better. Not after what I’ve done. I’ve been so wicked…’
She started to cry again. Millie patted her arm. ‘It can’t do any harm, though, can it? Go on, tell me what’s happened. Right from the very beginning.’
Chapter 19
‘It was all my fault,’ Maia Shinwell explained, as she and Millie sat on the bench in the middle of the courtyard. Millie had already sent word with Mr Hopkins to let Sister Judd know that Mrs Shinwell had been found safe and sound. ‘I was weak and selfish, and I ruined everything.’
Millie held on to her hand and said nothing. It was hard to piece together Mrs Shinwell’s story, coming in short snatches between prolonged bouts of sobbing.
From what she could gather, Mr and Mrs Shinwell had had several happy years of marriage together. But then it had all started to go wrong.
‘We’d been trying for a baby for so long,’ she explained. ‘We kept telling each other it didn’t matter, that God would be good to us in time. But as time went on and nothing happened, it got harder and harder to pretend.’
She dabbed her face with Millie’s handkerchief, now crumpled in her fist. ‘I know Alex was disappointed that we couldn’t have a child,’ she sniffed. ‘I could feel him growing more distant every day. He worked all hours, sometimes all night. He said he had to work, to build up the business. But I knew it was just an excuse so he didn’t have to come back home to a silent house with only me to greet him. I don’t know if he blamed me or if he blamed himself, but all I really wanted was for him to put his arms around me, tell me he still loved me. I was so lonely. So unbearably lonely…’
Millie stroked the woman’s blunt, stubby fingers. ‘So you found someone else?’ she guessed.
‘A sailor from Stockholm.’ Mrs Shinwell’s face was blank. ‘I didn’t love him, not like I love Alex. But he was someone who noticed me, someone who cared – or seemed to, anyway. When I was with him, I could smile, and pretend everything was all right again. But that’s all I was doing – pretending. Our affair – if you can call it that – lasted all of a week before I called it off.’
‘What happened to him?’ Millie asked.
‘His ship went back to Sweden, and I haven’t heard from him since,’ she said firmly.
‘So he doesn’t know about the baby?’
She shook her head. ‘And I don’t want him to, either.’ A tear plopped on to her hand and she rubbed it on her skirt. ‘I could hardly believe it when I found out I was pregnant. It was as if God was punishing me, giving me my greatest wish and my worst nightmare at the same time.
‘At first I tried to pretend it wasn’t happening. I thought if I didn’t think about it, it might just go away. It wasn’t the first time I’d been pregnant, you see, but all the others had been lost. So many babies gone…’ Her voice trailed off. ‘But this little mite didn’t go. He hung on, growing and growing inside me.’ She put her hand over her belly, remembering.
‘Didn’t your husband notice?’
She shook her head. ‘I didn’t really try to hide it from him. I think part of me wanted him to know, to get angry with me. But he didn’t even notice. That shows you how far apart we had grown.’
Millie eyed her sceptically. She wouldn’t have believed it was possible to hide a pregnancy like that. But with her stocky figure swaddled under layers of winter clothes, who could ever have guessed? Heaven knows, even the experienced Casualty nurses hadn’t realised until she went into labour.
‘I suppose if there was no chance of you being pregnant, the idea wouldn’t even have occurred to him?’ she said.
‘It was more than that,’ Maia Shinwell replied. ‘Alex was hardly ever at home, and when he was he could hardly bring himself to look at me. We stopped sharing a bed months ago. He said he slept on the settee because he didn’t want to disturb me when he came home late from work. But I knew it was because he was disappointed in me.’ She took a deep, steadying breath. ‘I wanted to tell him, but I knew I couldn’t. He didn’t deserve that. He is a good man, a proud man, and it would have broken his heart.’
‘I suppose you could have tried to pretend that the baby was his?’ Millie ventured.
‘No!’ Mrs Shinwell looked shocked. ‘I could never have lied to Alex. I betrayed him once, and that was hard enough to bear. To live the rest of my life deceiving him…’ She shook her head. ‘It would have been too much.’
‘So you tried to kill yourself?’
Mrs Shinwell looked up at Millie, her eyes shining with unshed tears. ‘It was the only way out,’ she said. ‘I couldn’t bear to face Alex, to tell him the truth. I didn’t want to hurt him, to bring shame on him…’
She dissolved into shuddering sobs. Millie put her arm around her and tried to comfort her, but Mrs Shinwell pulled away. ‘No, I don’t deserve it,’ she wept. ‘I’ve been so selfish. I’ve hurt the man I love and tried to kill an innocent baby. The baby I’ve wanted for so many years. All I ever longed for was a loving husband and a family, and now I – I’ve lost everything.’
Millie stared at her, at a loss as to how to console her. How could she ever comfort someone whose world had come crashing down around their ears?
‘I should take you back to the ward,’ she said, rising to her feet.
Mrs Shinwell looked up at her, her dark eyes swollen and rimmed with red. ‘Before we go, do you think you could do something for me?’ she whispered.
‘What is it, Mrs Shinwell?’
‘I want to see my son.’
Chapter 20
‘He’s beautiful,’ Alex Shinwell said. He sat on a chair beside the cot, his stick by his side, cuddling little Gabriel. For once the baby was quiet, staring back up at him with unfocused eyes.
Jennifer Ryan looked from Mr Shinwell to the baby in his arms and back again. She hardly knew what to say. Was he really seeing what she was seeing?
Yes, Gabriel was beautiful. He looked just like an angel, with his downy fair hair and blond lashes framing eyes of the densest, deepest blue she had ever seen. There was no way on earth he could be the product of two dark eyed, dark haired parents.
And yet this m
an didn’t seem to see the truth staring back at him as he gazed adoringly down at the child.
‘My son,’ he whispered. ‘Do you know how long I’ve waited to hold you in my arms? There’s so much I want to teach you. I’m going to help you to walk, and to talk, and to read and ride a bicycle. And when you’re old enough, I’m going to teach you a trade, too. My trade, just as my father taught me. Do you think you’d like that, my boy? To learn how to use your hands and make fine furniture?’
As if he knew what was being said to him, the baby flexed his tiny starfish hands, his pearly pink nails catching the light. Mr Shinwell laughed and gently touched his palm, and the baby’s fingers clenched reflexively round his.
‘Of course, you might not want to spend your life up to your elbows in sawdust,’ Mr Shinwell went on. ‘You can be anything you want, my son. You could be a doctor, or wear a suit and tie and go to work in an office. You could even sweep the roads, if that’s what you want. As long as you’re a good man, and honest and happy. That’s all I really want for you.’
He looked up at Jennifer. ‘That’s all any father would want for his child, isn’t it, Nurse?’
‘I—’ But Jennifer was saved from replying as the doors flew open and one of the senior students, Nurse Benedict, came in pushing a dark-haired woman in a wheelchair.
Jennifer caught the flash of recognition that passed between the woman and Mr Shinwell.
‘Alex?’ the woman whispered.
For a moment no one spoke, and Jennifer could feel the air crackling with tension. Then Mr Shinwell smiled and turned to show the baby to his wife.
‘Look, Maia,’ he said. ‘We have a fine boy.’
Jennifer and Millie exchanged glances. She could tell the other nurse was as startled as she was.
‘Oh, Alex!’ The woman burst into tears. ‘Alex, I’m so sorry—’
Mr Shinwell frowned. He seemed genuinely surprised. ‘Why are you sorry, when you’ve given me such a beautiful son?’
‘But—’
‘Maia, please.’ Mr Shinwell leaned forward and placed the baby carefully into her arms, then brushed the tears from her cheek. ‘I don’t need to know, all right? We have both made many mistakes, but it isn’t important. All that’s important is that God has granted us this wonderful gift. He has chosen me to be this baby’s father, and how he came into this world doesn’t matter.’
Jennifer gruffly instructed the pro to keep an eye on the family reunion and walked away so no one would see the tears that pricked the backs of her eyes.
Alex Shinwell was right. God had chosen him to be a good father to the baby and nothing else mattered.
Chapter 21
It was seven o’clock in the morning on the first day of the new year, and Helen was coming wearily off night duty. Thank God there had been no surgical emergencies overnight, so she’d been able to snatch a few hours’ sleep.
She was surprised to find Ryan in their room, dressed in her uniform and fastening up her hair. She seemed remarkably chipper – Helen could have sworn she’d heard her humming to herself as she let herself into the room.
‘Shouldn’t you be on duty?’ she asked.
‘Sister Parry’s off, so I don’t have to report until eight. Happy new year, by the way.’
‘Happy new year to you, too.’ Helen’s gaze fell to the box sitting on the rug. ‘You’ve decided to do something about it, then?’
‘Yes, I have,’ Jennifer replied, through a mouth full of hairpins. ‘And I want you to help me,’ she added.
Helen took a deep breath. She had been dreading this. ‘Are you going to open it?’
Jennifer fastened her last pin in place. ‘No,’ she said. ‘I want you to help me take it down to the stoke hole. I’m going to burn it.’
Helen was shocked. ‘Are you sure? Once it’s gone, you’ll never know—’
‘It doesn’t matter.’ Jennifer’s voice was firm. ‘It’s not important.’
‘I thought you wanted to know who your real mother was?’
‘I know who she was,’ Jennifer said. ‘She was the one who taught me to walk, and to read, and who picked me up when I fell down and kissed me and made everything better. That’s what makes a real parent.’
Helen nodded. She was glad Jennifer had finally come to realise that. ‘What changed your mind?’ she asked.
‘Something someone said last night,’ Jennifer shrugged. ‘So, will you help me with the box?’
‘Certainly,’ Helen said.
Down in the basement, they stood together in front of the fiery mouth of the stoke hole and watched it consume the box. Helen took a sideways glance at Jennifer. Were those real tears, or just caused by the acrid smoke billowing up the chimney?
‘I have to go,’ she excused herself tactfully. ‘I need to go to bed.’
‘Of course.’ When Jennifer turned to look at her she was smiling again, all trace of her tears gone. ‘And I must go and telephone my father to wish him a happy new year.’
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Copyright © Donna Douglas 2013
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First published in Great Britain in 2013 by Arrow Digital
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