Anatomy: A Love Story(58)

Isabella kept her hand on her belly. “The father? No. He enlisted. His regiment moved down to Yorkshire. I was supposed to join him, but—” She gestured down to her stomach. “We were supposed to get married too.”

“It’ll be two of you joining him in no time at all,” Hazel said. “Family together soon enough.”

“He wasn’t always a soldier. He was a dancer at the theater with me. Jack worked there too. In the rafters. He was always kind to me.”

Hazel smiled. “He is kind.”

“But then the theater closed with the fever and now my Thomas is away and I just don’t know how I’m going to get through this.” Isabella’s hands shook, and another convulsion took hold of her. “It hurts so bad! They didn’t tell me it would hurt this bad.” A halo of sweat had appeared along Isabella’s hairline. “I just knew I couldn’t go down to the poorhouse hospital, with the things I’ve heard, women crying and lying in their own sick. I just didn’t know what I was supposed to do.”

Hazel tried to make her voice sound as confident as possible. “Isabella. I need you to listen to me. My name is Hazel Sinnett. This baby is coming, and you and I, we’re going to get through this together.” Hazel lit the rest of the candles in the laboratory. “Where is Iona with the water?” she muttered.

On cue, Iona burst through the door, bearing a basin. Jack trailed behind with several rags, looking slightly queasy.

“Oh, marvelous. Iona, set the bucket there, and help me. Jack, help me too. We need to get her onto the table.”

The three of them gently guided Isabella until she was lying flat on Hazel’s workbench. “Uh, Iona, if you could—my copy of Beecham’s, please?”

Isabella’s panicked eyes went from Hazel to Jack to Hazel again. “A book? What’s the book for?”

“Nothing! Nothing,” Hazel said, frantically flipping through the pages. “Just checking one thing. Yes. Yes, fine. Here.” Hazel pulled dried valerian from one of her jars. “Chew on this. To help the pain. Deep breaths, that’s very important. You’ve got to keep breathing. Lie down this way, with your legs up this way. Remember: keep breathing.”

“You’ve done this before, right? Delivered a child?” Isabella asked when Hazel had set up between her legs.

“Not in the formal sense,” Hazel said. “But I’ve read a lot about it.”

Isabella’s response was swallowed by her crying out from the pain of her next contraction.

“Here’s what we’re going to do,” Hazel said. “You are going to look at me, and tell me everything you’re going to do with your baby and—and Thomas in Yorkshire. And every time you think of something, you’re going to give me a good push. Do you understand?”

Isabella nodded weakly.

“Good.”

“We can—we can walk in the park.”

“Good. Push.”

“We can teach her how to read,” Isabella said. “It’s going to be a girl. Thomas and I always knew we would have a girl.”

“That’s a good one. Big push for me.”

“We can take a trip to the lake.”

“Push! And, Iona—fresh water, please!”

The labor continued as the candles burned themselves to stumps. Iona had to run back to the main house twice to replace the tapers so that by the time Hazel was reaching between Isabella’s legs, she had enough candlelight to make out the bright red infant fighting her way into life, her hair already visible, slick and dark. Sometime during the second hour, Jack had disappeared.

“Oh, goodness. This doesn’t look anything like the diagram,” Hazel murmured.

“What?” Isabella shrieked.

“Nothing! Nothing! Just lie down. It’s all going to be fine. We’re so close now. I can see her head. Isabella? Isabella, can you hear me? You’re going to be a mother.”

Isabella nodded her head, but tears continued to stream down her cheeks. “I just wish Thomas was here,” she said, almost whispering.

“You’re going to be with him so soon. One last push now.”

Isabella screamed. And then that scream became two, the sound of a living infant screaming at the cold new world she had just joined.

Hazel wrapped the baby in a clean cloth and gently lowered her onto Isabella’s chest.

“You were right,” Hazel said. “She’s a girl. She’s beautiful, just like her mum.”

The baby was beautiful—round blue eyes and a cry that merged with Isabella’s grateful laughter.

“A baby girl. I have a baby girl.”

“You did it.”

Isabella looked up from her daughter to Hazel. “You did it too. I don’t know what I would’ve done if it weren’t for you, I swear.”

Isabella and the child rested then for an hour, while Iona fetched a few slices of buttered bread for all of them. Hazel graciously accepted and ate her slice. She hadn’t realized how hungry she was. It had been hours since she last ate.

Jack returned just as Isabella was beginning to stir again.

“Isn’t she beautiful?” she said to him. “My baby girl.”

Jack pulled something from behind his back. It was a square music box, with bright painted sides. “I wanted to be the first one to give your baby a present.”