A Loveless Marriage

Chapter 34: Mary

The darkness was cut by a piercing wail. It was a cry that stilled my breath. Moving the candle closer, I saw her, red and screaming at the world. It was a beautiful cacophony.

"A fine pair of lungs," Dr Harley said. "And a fine healthy girl."

He handed the baby to me. I marvelled at the life before me, balled up and screaming. Perhaps she had the right view of the world or perhaps she was just angry to be ripped from her warm, dark home. I wrapped her quickly and handed her to her tired mother.

"Look what you have done, Bessie," I said with smile. "Look at your beautiful daughter."

"Oh Mary," she whispered. "How I love her."

We were on first-name terms by this point of course. You simply cannot stay together until past midnight, bringing a child into the world without knowing each other's first name. Doctor Harley washed the blood from his hands and gave a sigh of contentment.

"Just need to make sure she has safely delivered the afterbirth and then I will drive you home, Mrs Taylor."

I wondered what the servants would say, to see me arrive home in Doctor Harley's automobile the same time as they returned from their ball.

"I'm going to call her Amelia after her grandmother," Bess White said. "And Mary after her godmother, if it is not too much of a liberty to ask you?"

"I would be delighted," I said.

The rustle of paper in my pocket reminded me of the letter I had not read. There seemed no better time to open it, to see if there was a chance I could ever be a mother or if this happiness would be something I would need to turn away from. I trembled as I read the words, the doctor's reassurances that he did not think my mother's ailment would pass on to me or my child. In fact, he added quite unnecessarily that he thought motherhood was good for most young women as it fulfilled their purpose in nature. I huffed at the arrogance of the man, then looked back at mother and child. I had never seen such pure love before. That could be ours, Fred and I, that pure love.

It was late when we returned and the servants were laughingly getting of the charabanc when we arrived. Colette flew to my side.

"Madame, has something happened? Are you unwell?"

"Nothing like that," I said happily. "I just helped deliver a baby!"

"Sacre bleu!"

"Dr Harley was magnificent," I said. "The poor man was dragged from his dinner to help and didn't stop all evening."

"Let me fix you a plate, doctor," Mrs Greshaw, the cook, said to him, in a far merrier mood than normal. "There's a cold chicken pie in the pantry."

"And we should all have a glass of champagne, to celebrate the birth of my new goddaughter."

There was a roar of approval. So all of us, servants, mistress and doctor, made our way cheerfully to the house as if part of a jolly party. Colette hurried me upstairs to help me change into more suitable clothes for eating a cold supper past midnight, as if such an outfit existed.

My heart brimmed with happiness. I could not wait for Fred to return, to tell him of Bessie's baby and to tell him I was ready for our own. To no longer need the Dutch pessary to save myself from conceiving would be a joy of its own. I imagined the grin he would give, the wicked suggestions he would make, the kisses, the embrace. We would find such happiness, such strength in parenthood.

"Madame, did you leave the lights on this evening?" Colette asked, pointing down to the light under the door.

"One of the maids must have done it before they left," I said, opening the door. I took three steps into the room. It was then that I saw him. Crumpled on the floor, pale in a dark pool of red.