yes, grazie, Santina.’
He whipped straight back to his writing. The smoky steam swirled up from the narrow silver spout.
‘Lapsang souchong, yes? You remembered?’ he asked without taking his eyes off his letter.
‘Yes,’ I answered, wondering how he could drink something that smelled like a bonfire.
‘That’ll be all.’
I left and closed the heavy squat door behind me.
The remaining months of Adeline’s pregnancy ripened throughout the summer. As the days lengthened so did her energy. Several times I’d walk past the studio door, finishing up my chores of the evening, only to notice the lights still on and the soft smudge of a brush dipping into paint and caressing the canvas. I’d listen to the quickening strokes, wondering whether this infinite burst of energy was healthy. The next morning – I think she can’t have slept more than a handful of hours – she declared that we were to visit the ladies pond in the heath. I almost dropped her egg as she did so. Then I caught the Major’s eyebrow rise up and lower over the top of the newspaper.
‘Henry, don’t be tiresome. Now is the time to listen to my body. I’m listening. You’d do well to do the same. It needs water. A great deal of it. This morning.’
He let out a sigh. The corner of his paper flickered on the last whispered trace of it. I placed a silver rack of fresh toast at the center of their breakfast table and, as usual, pretended not to hear very much at all.
‘Adeline – you’re the size of a modest whale. What on earth do you hope to achieve by thrashing around in freezing waters in this condition?’
I scooped another spoon of marmalade into a small ramekin and set it beside the toast, spreading the sounds of their conversation into a distant periphery.
As I reached the door I heard my name and spun back toward them.
‘That’s settled then, yes, Santina?’
‘Pardon, Major?’
‘What I just said.’
He hated to repeat himself. I hated asking him to.
‘I’m sorry, I didn’t hear.’
Another sigh. Deeper this time. He flopped his napkin beside his plate.
‘After breakfast you’re to accompany my bride to the pond. If she will not be convinced to avoid the icy bathing, then so be it. If you are there you may offer assistance should she need it.’
I skipped through most of the key words as he spoke, but the thought of me standing at the water’s edge in charge of a heavily pregnant artist, who, to my mind, had never done a thing that anyone had ever insisted of her, sent cold trickles of fear down my neck.
I nodded, of course.
Adeline charged through the forest with long strides, ducking under low hanging branches, swinging her long limbs over stony patches. Her leather satchel lifted with each step, her towel draped over one shoulder, percussing her steps with a nonchalant swing. Meanwhile, I rambled behind her, walking eight steps to her three, tripping over unexpected stones, holes, muddy patches. I hated the feeling of being a stranger amongst this lush green. It reminded me of trekking light-footed amongst the mountainous wilderness of home. That was another life now. A twang of sorrow tugged. I ripped my attention away from the memories, feeling the prick of their thorns but tearing away, just as Adeline did with every bramble catch of her towel. The paths inched in again and led to a wooden gate. Adeline creaked it open and we followed the stony ridge. I could make out a jetty just beyond several oaks. As we turned, the glassy water opened up before us, shafts of morning light streaking through the branches of the trees that surrounded it. The bottle-green water lay still, save for tiny ripples left from itinerant dragonflies. The reflections of the surrounding leaves dappled the surface with forest greens, ochre, sienna and emerald, all crafted with exquisite perfection as in the hands of a skilled oil painter. I noticed I couldn’t move.
‘Yes, Santina – it is simply breathtaking. My very happy place. Come on!’
And with that, she reached down to the bottom of her shift and with one lithe movement lifted it clear off her body. She placed her hands on her naked hips. I wished my eyes weren’t settling on her breasts, paper-thin porcelain streaked with threads of blue, ready to nourish. In the last few days I had noticed her pregnant belly drop toward her pelvis. I knew her time was soon. Spidery thin pink lines streaked out from her belly button.
‘Have you ever seen a naked pregnant woman, Santina?’
I shook my head, feeling the heat of embarrassment color my cheeks.
‘Isn’t it wonderful and ghastly?’
I wished some words would come to my rescue rather than this mute stupidity.
‘That’s why I must simply come here today. If I feel any heavier I may never walk again. It is a horrid feeling. And amazing of course. Henry felt it kick last night. The little monster churned across my entire belly. I saw an elbow, I think.’
She spun toward the water, reached the end of the jetty, stepped off and disappeared. I’d like to think I didn’t hold my breath. I looked around for other bathers but none were to be found. I counted the seconds till she resurfaced, my chest tightening. Then her head rose with a spray of water. I sat down upon the jetty and watched her head bob over and under the green ripples, pretending that it didn’t look like the perfect thing I should like to be doing at this very moment.
A week later the baby came: small, pink and loud. Perhaps I was the only one who noticed Adeline not sleeping for those first three days. No one else seemed to pay any mind to her manic delight. The Major was transfixed with the babe. The midwife was cool and brusque. Adeline was a woman possessed with a frantic happiness. It made me feel uneasy. I watched her hold the tiny baby to her bare breast, sometimes not noticing when her nipple fell out of the babe’s mouth, or the wails as she flailed to re-attach. I heard the cries through the night. I wasn’t convinced they were those of a mother adjusting to her new reality.
On the fourth day we awoke to an almighty crash. I ran to my window. Down in the garden I saw that the roof of the Major’s beloved greenhouse had collapsed. Jagged panes were strewn around a body.
It was Adeline’s.
I watched the Major follow the ambulance crew out of the house. He shot me a fleeting glance as he left. I mustered a nod that I hoped would reassure him Elizabeth was in good hands. New End Hospital emergency department was only a few streets away, and that was some comfort. The door closed behind him. I held the screeching baby closer to my chest. I’d never felt quite so alone.
Elizabeth wailed into my ear as I carried her down the darkened hallway toward the nursery. I found several glass bottles in a neat line upon the wooden dresser, left by the midwife earlier. I cared little for that woman, but now her disinfected approach to infants was the one thing that would carry me through the night with the child.
I laid Elizabeth into her cot. She protested, jerking her limbs with deepening cries, leaving intermittent gaps between wails where her breath filled
