Justice Is a Woman (14 page)

“There, there. It’s all right. It’s all right, dear.”

“Oh, Betty! Betty! I’m going to die.”

“No, you’re not. Don’t be silly.”

“You don’t know.” Elaine gasped for breath, then went on, “You don’t know what it’s

like. Never ...

never again if ... if I live. Never, never again. Do you hear me?”

“Yes, dear, yes.”

“I’ll make him swear, I will, I will, I’ll make him swear, never again. 0 h! ... The doctor came again at

half-past seven and after a few moments by the bedside he exclaimed brightly, “ Oh,

well, now you’re

showing progress. “ He turned to the nurse.

“This is good; she’s showing progress.”

“How ... how much longer?”

He looked down into Elaine’s face, patted her cheek and said, “It all depends on you, my dear. It all

depends on you. Just keep working at it. I’m very pleased with you. You’ve been a brave girl.”

“Oh, shut up!”

The doctor raised his eyebrows slightly, turned from the bed and looked at the nurse, and the nurse gave

a slight shake of her head as if to say, “Well, what did I tell you?”

Betty was standing near the dressing-room door and, although she did not beckon to the doctor, he

went towards her as if she had made some signal, and when they were close she

whispered, “Is it

coming?” and he whispered back, “It’s showing signs.”

“She won’t have to go into hospital?”

“No, no; I don’t think that will be necessary at this stage. If she’d only help herself a little more,

everything would be all right.”

“She has suffered a great deal.”

He looked at her quizzically for a moment; then, his voice still low, he poked his face towards her and

said, “That is what birth is all about, my dear.”

“Betty! Oh! Betty. Betty!”

She drew her fixed stare from the doctor’s face and hurried towards the bed and, bending over Elaine,

she took hold of her groping hands and said softly, “There, there, dear. There, there. It’s the last lap.”

“Rca ... really? You ... you mean that?”

“Yes, yes. Now try to let yourself go; sink into the bed and ... and when the pain comes hang on to me

and we’ll pull together.”

“Pull ... pull together.

Yes, yes, pull .. pull together. You don’t know what it’s like, you don’t, you don’t. “

“I’ve got a little idea.”

‘0.. h! “

“Now here it comes. Come on now!”

She had hardly finished speaking when she felt herself being roughly edged out of the way by the nurse,

and now she surprised not only the nurse and the doctor but also herself as she twisted her head round

and yelled, “Get out of the way, you! Leave us alone. Go about your business.”

There was a long pause before the nurse replied and almost as loudly, “This is my

business.”

“Well, you’ve made a poor show of it from what 133 I’ve seen. That’s it, dear, come on.

Come on,

press harder. Oh, that’s a good one.”

When Elaine’s body gave a great heave before sinking back into the bed, Betty almost

fell across her,

for Elaine was still gripping her hand and the long nails had embedded themselves in her wrists ..

And so it went on until two minutes before midnight, when the doctor, now in his shirt sleeves, the nurse,

looking very dishevelled, and Betty, almost as exhausted as Elaine, gave one combined sigh as Joe’s son

came reluctantly into the world and immediately voiced his indignation when he was held dangling by his

feet. And on the cry the door opened and Joe stood there, his weary face alight, his mouth open, his

eyes shining, until the doctor, turning from where he was placing the child in a warm towel that Betty was

holding out to him, jerked his head towards him and cried, “Presently, presently,” and Betty holding the

child gently to her breast, looked over the bundle and said, “A boy, a boy, a beautiful boy. Go ... go and

tell himself.” And she jerked her head upwards.

Joe did not move for a matter of seconds, but stood looking towards the bed, where the nurse and the

doctor now were both bending over Elaine, and Betty, speaking again and quickly now,

said, “Go on, go

on, she’s all right.”

When the door was closed, she let her gaze drop to the crumpled face peeping out from the folds of the

towel. It was topped with hair, dark hair. Its eyes were blinking, its jaws were working: it was alive, it

was a life. It was beautiful, oh, so beautiful. The pain that went through her heart now was from the

opening of an old wound, a remembered pain, a pain that was made up of frustration,

longing, need ..

and envy, i35 After the birth, Elaine was in a very weak condition. She remained in bed for nearly a

month and, contrary to what is the generally held theory, the memory of it didn’t fade, for hardly a day

passed but she recalled it and swore that she would kill herself rather than endure the same again.

At first Joe had assured her that she had no need to worry, that he was satisfied that it would never

happen again, but as the threat was repeated daily he became not a little irritated by it, and even more so

by the fact that his son never ceased to yell during his waking hours, and this he blamed on the artificial

feeding, for Elaine had firmly refused to breast-feed the child.

A week after the birth the nurse had left, to the relief of all concerned, and from then both the care of the

child and the nursing of Elaine had fallen on Betty’s shoulders.

Another maid had been engaged. Her name was Nellie Mclntyre.

Seventeen years old, her main work was to assist Betty in the bedroom and to help in the nursery.

A guest-room across the landing from Elaine’s bedroom had been turned into an

attractive nursery, but it

had one drawback: it wasn’t far enough away to dull the yelling of Master Martin

Remington. But, on

this morning, for once, the child was quiet, and he was gurgling at his mother as she held him in her arms.

“Isn’t he beautiful?” Elaine glanced at Betty, and Betty, smiling down on them both, said,

“Wonderful.”

“If only he would remain like this.”

“He wouldn’t be a boy then.”

“I wish he wasn’t; I would have preferred a girl.”

“Really?” Betty’s face showed surprise.

“I thought you wanted a boy.”

“No, no, Joe did;

although quite candidly I didn’t care much what it was when I was carrying; I only

wanted it to be over.

But oh God! if I had known . “

“Now, now, what did we say yesterday? No more going back.”

“It’s all right for you, you didn’t have to go through it.”

“And we’ve been through all that before too ... Now you’re better and you’ll be

downstairs within a day

or two, and I’d like to bet you’ll be dragging Joe to a dance before the end of the month, so let’s hear no

more of what you went through.”

“You’re hard.”

“Yes, yes, I’m hard, very hard.”

‘ Oh no! Now don’t you start. “ Elaine screwed her face up as her son wriggled in her arms, opened

his mouth wide and let out a high cry.

“Oh, take him, Betty. Take him. It goes right through my head.” Betty lifted the child into her arms and

rocked him, saying, “There now, there now, what is it?” And as she walked the room,

rocking him

gently, his crying subsided and she looked down on him and upbraided him gently,

saying, “Those are

crocodile tears; all you want is to be nursed. Yes, go on, laugh, laugh; you know I’m telling the truth.”

“Go and put him down in the nursery, Betty.”

“Well, if I do, you know what’ll happen.”

As Elaine sighed, Betty said, “I’ll take him for his morning visit upstairs.”

“Well, don’t be too long. And don’t let Mike get too near him with that filthy pipe in his mouth. The

other day the child’s clothes smelt strongly of smoke.”

“You’re imagining things; it was your own cigarette you were smelling.”

As Betty made for the door with the child in her arms she looked over her shoulder to where Elaine was

now lying back in a chair placed near the open window, and she said, “If you made an

effort to have a

stroll in the garden this afternoon it would do you good. The sun is lovely and warm.”

“This afternoon! I can hardly use my legs. Oh, you are hard, Betty, I’ve only been out of bed two

days.”

Betty closed the door behind her, crossed the landing and mounted the stairs to the floor above, and

when she pushed open Mike’s sitting-room door she found the room empty, so she called,

“Hello,

Mike! There’s a visitor to see you.”

Mike was turning from his work-bench when she came to the door of the adjoining room, and she said

to him, “I’m not bringing him in there among all the sawdust and shavings.”

“Who’s asking you to?” He came slowly towards her. Then gazing down at the child in

her arms, he

rubbed its hands with his first finger, and when the child gripped it, a look of pleasure passed over his

face and, glancing at Betty, he said, “He always does that. Does he do it to everybody?”

“No, no,” she lied firmly; ‘he never does it to me. “

“Well, well. By!

he’s growing every day, isn’t he? “ He now moved slowly towards the big leather chair near the

window and when he was seated he held out his arms, saying, “ Let me have him. “ After placing the

child in his arms, she seated herself opposite and listened to him talking to it.

“Hi! young fellow-me-lad. By! you’re going to be a spanker, and you know what ? As

soon as you

can toddle you’re going into that room over there.” He nodded towards the workroom.

“I’ll put a knife into your hand and I’ll have you whittling before you can talk, and if I have anything to do

with it you’ll grow up like your namesake, your greatgranda, at least in some ways.” He now looked

under his brows towards Betty and laughed as he added, “He was a caution, was me da.

By! aye, he was a lad all right. When he was my age if he wasn’t hitting the bottle he was chasing the

lasses, or he was running 139 from me mother because she was chasing him, and many a

time if she had

caught him she would have murdered him at that. “ He put his head back now and

laughed; then he

asked, “ Have you ever seen anybody as daft as our Joe over a hairn? “

“Oh yes.”

“You have?”

“Oh yes, yes, Mike; I’m looking at him now.”

He did not take his eyes off her during the silence that followed this remark, and when he spoke again

there was no jocularity in his tone as he said, “I’m goin’ to tell you something. When you first brought

him up here and I saw him in your arms I thought to me self It should be hers, she’s a lost mother.”

“Oh Mike!” She was on her feet now, standing with her back to him and looking out of

the window.

“You shouldn’t say things like that.”

“Why not, lass?”

“Because’ she turned her head quickly to the side and looked back at him ‘they’re

hurtful.”

“I didn’t mean it to be hurtful. I’m only telling you, lass, I think you’re lost; you should be married and

have hairns of your own.”

“Chance is a great thing.”

“Then all I can say is, there’s a lot of bloody fools walking around.”

“What if I don’t want to get married?”

“Aw, if you were to tell that to the cat it would scratch your eyes out. Every woman

wants to get

married.”

“No, they don’t.” She was facing him fully now.

“There’s scores, hundreds of women who don’t need marriage, just as there are men

made the same

way.”

“Then they’re not bloody normal.”

“To your way of thinking they may not be, but nevertheless it’s a fact.”

“Are you one of them, is that what you’re saying?” She swallowed deeply before she

replied, “No, I’m

not one of them.”

“Then you want to be married?”

Whatever her answer would have been to this she wasn’t called upon to make it, for a tap came on the

door and when she said, “Come in,” the door opened quickly and Ella as quickly came

across the room

and said in a loud whisper, “It’s ... it’s Lady Ambers. She called; she asked for you. I ... I said you

were upstairs, and when I went you weren’t there. And the missis, she told me to take her up, and she’s

with the missis now. I ... I thought I should tell you.”

“Thanks, Jane. Thank you. I’ll be down directly.”

“Lady Ambers! My! my! we’re going up in the world. That’s the old girl that wants you to go along

other, isn’t it?”

“Yes, that’s her.”

“She’s likely come for her answer. What are you going to do?”

“What do you think?” She lifted the child from his arms and as she walked hurriedly

towards the door

he called after her, “Don’t you dare. Do you hear me?”

She made no answer, but hurried down the stairs and made her way to the bedroom,

pausing for a

moment before opening the door and entering the room. Lady Ambers was sitting

opposite Elaine and

she immediately cried at Betty, “Oh!

There you are. There you are. And the child in your arms. It suits you. Why haven’t you come to see

me? I wrote to you; didn’t you get my letter? “

“Yes, and I answered it.”

“Well, I never received a reply. Likely it wasn’t posted at this end, or if it was, somebody nicked it at

yon end; you can’t trust anybody.

Let me have a look at him. “

When Lady Ambers craned her wrinkled neck up out of her mink stole Betty did not bend towards her

but said, “I think his mother is the one to show him off,” and with that she placed the child on Elaine’s