Winter on the Mersey(2)
Dolly and Sarah looked at Rita now, as she lay whey-faced on the old off-white bed linen, her usually lustrous red hair dark with sweat, her face screwed up with effort. But her eyes were bright. ‘It’s coming,’ she gasped. ‘I remember this bit. Mam, hold my hand, will you? Help me through these last few pushes.’ Dolly immediately knelt down beside her and took her damp hand, just as another wave of contraction and pain broke and Rita’s face contorted as she let out a loud scream.
Sarah stood at the bottom of the bed, her eyes never leaving her patient. ‘Come on, Rita, that’s right, you’re almost there. One more push could do it.’
Rita lay back exhausted, drawing in air in painful gulps. ‘It’s taking ages, though. Is everything all right? You’d tell me if it wasn’t, wouldn’t you, Sarah?’
‘Everything is just right.’ Sarah spoke with authority, for all her young age. ‘It’s been pretty quick actually, Rita. It just feels like a long time but it really isn’t.’ Her eyes narrowed a little as they assessed her big sister, registering that she was tired but not dangerously so, and that the next contraction seemed to be building. ‘Right, here we go, give me a big, big push and …’
Rita let out a piercing cry and then fell back against the pillow, but it had done the trick. As her own cry faded away it was replaced by a higher, more penetrating one, the unmistakable sound of a new-born child. ‘Rita! She’s here, she’s here! It’s a girl!’ Sarah struggled to remain professional as she picked up her niece and wrapped her carefully in a towel, automatically checking her as she did so, while Dolly stood to admire her latest granddaughter.
‘Oh, Rita, she’s beautiful.’ She gazed at the little face, red and puckered and screaming, but a miracle all the same. ‘Are you ready to hold her? Can you sit up?’
Rita raised herself against the pillow and Dolly stepped across to slip another one in behind it so that her daughter could prop herself semi-upright. ‘Are you all right like that? Come on then, Sarah.’
Gently Sarah handed the little bundle to her sister. ‘You did all right there. Anyone would think you’d done it before,’ she smiled. ‘Made it look easy.’
Rita reached for her new daughter and gasped with joy at the sight of her. ‘Look at her hair. It’s dark like Jack’s.’ She bent in to give the baby a kiss. ‘If you turn out as good as your daddy you’ll never have to worry. He’s going to be so delighted to meet you. You’re perfect, you are. Look at your little hands.’ The baby’s tiny fingers curled around her mother’s thumb, gripping on tightly, as if her life depended on it.
‘We’ll send Pop to get a message to him,’ Dolly announced, standing up straight, easing her aching back. ‘He’ll be made up, so he will. Now, Rita, did you have a name or is it too soon?’
Rita paused and then looked her mother in the eye. ‘It’s all right, we decided on Jack’s last leave. If it was a girl she’d be Ellen, after his mother. So this is Ellen.’ She turned her adoring gaze back to the baby.
Dolly found herself for once unable to speak for the lump in her throat. Ellen Callaghan had been her best friend in the whole world. They’d laughed together, done their housework together, raised their children together on Empire Street. But Ellen had died in childbirth when not so very much older than Rita was now. Dolly had looked out for the Callaghan children ever since – even though all but one were grown-up, and indeed the eldest was married to Rita. She could think of no more fitting tribute to her beloved friend.
‘That’s lovely,’ she managed to say. ‘We’ll tell the priest as well. You just lie there and get your strength back. Here, it looks as if the little one is hungry already.’
Rita shifted herself so she could feed little Ellen, and it was all Dolly could do not to cry – with relief for the safe birth, with the unexpected emotion of hearing her friend’s name spoken aloud after so many years and also with wonder at this miracle of new life. Somehow, despite the terrible hardships they had all endured since war broke out, and the atrocities that were going on still, she felt blessed to be in this world at such a marvellous moment.
‘So you’re sure you’ve got everything on your list, Mrs Mawdsley?’ Violet Feeny pushed her horn-rimmed spectacles back up the bridge of her nose from where they kept slipping. ‘Can you fit it all into your basket?’
The older woman pulled on her gloves, ready to face the bitter wind outside the small corner shop. ‘Everything that is available, anyway. Such a treat to find some Oxo. Thank you, dear. I know you do your best. I expect it’s even more difficult with your Rita so near her time, isn’t it?’
‘Oh, we manage all right, don’t we, Ruby?’ Violet turned to the shy figure behind her. ‘I put out the stock and serve the customers and Ruby does the books – she’s clever like that.’
Ruby raised her head, shaking her cloud of pale blonde hair which made her look so much younger than she was. ‘That’s right, Mrs Mawdsley.’ That was enough polite conversation for Ruby – she found it excruciatingly hard, so she turned back to the long columns of accounts spread out before her.
Violet kept her cheerful smile in place as Mrs Mawdsley left, banging the squeaky shop door behind her, and then she slumped down on to the hard wooden stool by the counter. She knew her customer meant well – she was one of Dolly’s best friends and had nothing but goodwill for the Feeny family. Violet herself had long since been accepted as one of them, as she’d married Eddy Feeny and come to live with her in-laws while Eddy was away serving with the Merchant Navy. She loved living with them and she enjoyed helping out in the shop, but her feelings about Rita’s new baby were plaguing her.