The Other Einstein(47)

“It won’t be long now,” Mrs. Kona?ek announced.

Not long? I had already been in labor for two days. I couldn’t endure this much longer. Mrs. Kona?ek had warned me that with a hip condition like mine, labor could be unusually protracted. I was so tired, yet the pain never let me sleep.

I looked up into the midwife’s familiar eyes; she’d delivered all my brothers and sisters and me, dead and alive, as well. “Think on something pleasant while your mother and I go out to the well to get some fresh water,” she said with a pat on my hand.

Something pleasant? Once, the pleasant distraction would have been Albert. After Schaffhausen, however, my distrust in him was too deep for innocent pleasure. How could I have faith in a man who couldn’t even take a short train ride to meet me in Stein am Rhein when I’d traveled across countries to see him? It didn’t matter that his letters since that time—letters I’d left unanswered for weeks—contained news of a near-certain job as a patent clerk in Bern, Switzerland, the position Mr. Grossman had mentioned in the Café Sprüngli, the very news for which I’d once longed. Understanding the condemnation in my silence, Albert strained to appease me, professing love in his letters and wondering whether the postman lost my replies in the mail, but his empty words no longer assured me. Once, Albert’s words would have been enough; now, I needed action.

I would have insisted that my silence continue to wordlessly scream my disappointment and anger except for Mama. In the fall, when everyone else returned to Novi Sad, she and I stayed at the Spire for the birth of the baby. It was the safest choice given that we hadn’t settled on the baby’s future yet. We allowed only a single, well-trusted maid to attend us in an effort to still Ka?’s wagging tongues, and consequently, Mama and I were largely alone for the first time in my life.

To my surprise, I found her domestic routines calming, and we soon established a quiet order to our days. I followed her throughout the house as she changed the linens, mopped the floors, hung the laundry, and prepared the meals. All the housework that Papa had shielded me from as he urged me on toward a professional life, a life of the mind and not the life of a housewife, I learned for the first time as a twenty-four-year-old woman. An unmarried and pregnant twenty-four-year-old woman at that. Yet Mama never shamed me; instead, with respect and caring, she initiated me into the traditional province of women.

It was on one peaceful afternoon, when we were sitting before the fire after preparing a fine stew for dinner, that she noted the stack of letters from Albert and the fact that I had not posted any in return. She asked, “Will you not answer him, Mitza?”

I looked up at her in astonishment. Mama never brought up Albert or the future. We existed in a bubble of the present, creating a sanctuary in a house never meant as a winter retreat. “No, Mama.”

“I understand your anger, Mitza. Albert is the one who led you toward sin, yet you must bear the burden of that sin alone. But please don’t saddle your child with that sin if you have a chance at giving that child a proper family—a mother and a father.”

I looked up at Mama in astonishment. Her advice directly contradicted Papa’s counsel to break with Albert. “I don’t know if I can do that, Mama. Not after his failure to visit all these months.” Papa had expressed his fury at Albert’s absence, and I assumed that Mama shared his sentiments, though she never mentioned it. I didn’t dare to explain to her the worse offense of his refusal to see me in Stein am Rhein; I might actually unleash Mama’s carefully controlled wrath with the information.

“Forgive Albert as God forgives us and embrace any chance He offers you to give your child legitimacy.”

Mama was right. Punishing Albert with my silence would only punish our child. In my anger, I had forgotten something so obvious. I began writing Albert back, and with Mama’s help and encouragement, I even sent him a Christmas package, only days before the pains began.

Now, there were no pleasantries. It was just me and the pain and the sound of my screams.

“Mama!” I yelled. She and the midwife were taking forever to get buckets of fresh water. I could hear a storm rage outside; wind whipped against the window, and a thunderclap sounded in the distance. Had they gotten hurt fetching the water? I prayed to God for their safety. The contractions were coming faster and faster, and I didn’t think I could manage alone. The pain seared through me, not just in the birth canal but through my back and hips. I felt like my body was being split wide-open.

They raced in and froze at the sight of me. Their expressions were worse than any of the pain I’d suffered. Something was horribly wrong. Mama muttered prayers as she set the buckets of water on the floor and kneeled next to me, and the midwife settled at my feet.

“Oh, Mrs. Kona?ek, the blood,” Mama said with a cry.

“What’s wrong?” I asked frantically.

“Pray to the Virgin Mother,” I heard the midwife say to my mother. She then addressed me. “Miss Mari?, your baby is not coming into the world headfirst as we would like. The baby is breech. I will have to reach inside and try to turn him.”

Mama gasped. I had heard of such births. Injury and death to mother and child were commonplace. How could this be happening to me and my baby?

The pain was excruciating, worse than any I’d experienced so far. Just when I didn’t think I could bear a second more, Mrs. Kona?ek said, “We have turned the baby, Miss Mari?. The baby is now crowning. If you push one last time, I think the baby will be out.”