Queen (110 page)

    image of a perfect man. A boy child could be made to understand the

    nature of women, and be kind to them when he grew. He could be schooled

    not to hurt women, and not to make promises to them that he did not

    intend to keep. A boy child

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could learn of women's pain, and become the image of the husband she,

Mandy, had never had. She did not want to bring a girl child into this

world, for who would wish a woman's life on a poor babe? Yet she knew she

would be happy with whatever Queen gave her.

"How does it feel?" Miss Mandy asked quietly.

    "Heavy," Queen said, adjusting her weight again. Miss Mandy was always

    asking her how she felt. But presently, Miss Mandy's mind was on other

    matters. Her thoughts were metaphysical.

"No, I mean how does it feel in your heart?"

    Queen considered the question carefully, but it was so difficult to

    describe the complex emotions that engulfed her. She had never, for one

    moment, regretted the pregnancy, and when the physical difficulties of

    it made her irritable or tired, or when she felt ill, or when she

    couldn't do her work properly, she would sit somewhere, and talk quietly

    to her child, and would caress her belly so that he would learn the

    gentle touch of her hands. She wished she were a poet, or had been

    schooled better, so that she could communicate the pure wonder of it. The

    only words that came to her were simple ones, but honestly spoken,

    directly from her heart.

    "I feel-full up with him," Queen said. "Complete with love for him." She

    smiled.

    "There now, I think he's going to be a boy, too. I feel him growing

    inside me, kicking inside me, and I never want him to leave me. No matter

    how big he gets I will always think he's too little for this world."

    Miss Mandy blinked in the sunlight, and glanced at her Bible.

    "And now abideth Faith, Hope, and Charity, these three, but the greatest

    of these is Charity."

    They sat in silence for a moment. Bees hummed. Crickets sang. Butterflies

    danced by.

    "I envy you so much," Miss Mandy whispered. Queen looked at the old

    woman, and felt a surge of sorrow for her, for her aura was abject

    loneliness. She wanted to give Miss Mandy a gift, in return for the

    charity she had shown.

    She took Miss Mandy's hand and held it against her stomach. They didn't

    have to wait very long. The child was getting

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anxious to be bom. When Miss Mandy felt the movement of the kick against

her hand, a golden smile suffused her face, and a sharp pain stabbed her

heart. The child kicked again, a slight, dull thump, and Miss Mandy pulled

her hand away.

"Don't make it worse for me," she said.

So it was perfectly reasonable to Queen that Miss Mandy be her midwife,

and in any case Miss Mandy would tolerate no other. Miss Gippy was far

from convinced. What if something went wrong? What if the child had

problems? And who was going to clean up the mess?

    "We're nearly there!" Miss Mandy cried, and Miss Gippy's eyes popped out

    in amazement. Queen had given a shameless yell and an almighty shove, and

    the head of the baby appeared. Miss Gippy fell to her knees, and prayed

    for assistance or deliverance.

    "Get up off your knees, woman, and get me a towel," Miss Mandy ordered.

    Queen yelled again, and pushed again, and so it was that a child was bom,

    to three lonely women, who had no experience of such wonder.

    "Bless my cotton socks," Miss Mandy whispered, in awe. "It's a boy."

    The words lulled Queen, like a benediction. She lay back on the bed, in

    exhaustion, and elation, and triumph.

"Let me see him," she said.

    Miss Mandy and Miss Gippy were fussing over the tot, doing the things

    that had to be done.

    "In a moment, Queen," said Miss Mandy. "We have things to do."

    "Let me see him," Queen said again, but Miss Mandy didn't even reply. The

    baby was so darling, and so fragile, and yet she had to be brutal with

    him, to ensure his survival. She cut the cord herself, and cleaned him,

    and spanked him to make him cry, so that she was certain he would live.

    And there was so much else. She had to make sure he was complete, that

    all his tiny toes were there and his dear little fingers, that his ears

    were well formed, and touch his tiny, fluffy hair. And he wasn't really

    black at all, just a sort of milky coffee, and anyway, perhaps he would

    tighten a little as he grew. And she had to hold him to her, hold him to

    her breast, so that he

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would know that no matter who fed him, this was where he was loved. What on

earth was Queen making such a fuss about?

    "He's my baby!" Queen was shouting now. "He's mine. I want to see him."

    Every fiber of her was pleading for this part of her body to be returned to

    her.

    "Don't be so ungrateful, Queen," Miss Mandy said sharply. Oh, he looked

    lovely, wrapped in clean swaddling clothes of palest blue. This was how the

    darling baby Jesus must have looked, and Miss Mandy's soul magnified the

    Lord.

"I want my baby!" Queen cried. "Give me my baby!"

    Miss Mandy sighed, but came to Queen with the child, for he was whimpering,

    and might be hungry, and he was never going to be hungry, or want for

    anything. Miss Mandy would see to that. With matemal care, she put him into

    Queen's arms at last, and Queen stared at the tiny thing, and vowed she

    would never let him out of her arms again. She freed her breast, and put

    the child's mouth to it. Of all the pleasures life can give, this was the

    finest feeling, for she, who had given him life, was sustaining him. She

    could not isolate any of the thousand emotions that were punching at her

    heart, and as she stared at her son, she tried to see his future, and knew

    she would do everything in her power to make it blessed.

    "He's a very fine, very handsome boy," she heard Miss Mandy say, and nodded

    in agreement. "We must think of a very special name for him."

    Queen didn't even bother to look at Miss Mandy, for the matter was already

    settled. He would be called David, which meant Beloved.

    "I don't think that's entirely suitable," Miss Mandy said. Queen didn't

    respond, because there wasn't anything to say. His name was David, and she

    was feeding him. She wished the sisters would go away, so that she could be

    alone with him, and welcome him in private, as mothers should, but Miss

    Gippy was saying something, about King David, and Bathsheba, and adultery.

"We thought Abner," Miss Mandy said.

"Abner," Miss Gippy agreed. "A fine, biblical name."

Queen was puzzled. This had nothing to do with them. She

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was very grateful to the- sisters for their many kindnesses, but the name of

the baby was not their business.

"His name is David," she said.

    Miss Mandy thought she was being very difficult. She had taken Queen in,

    when many might have thrown her onto the streets. She had looked after her

    and delivered the baby. The very least Queen could do was to let her choose

    the boy's name, and yet she seemed insistent on a name that remembered his

    philandering father. Obviously, Miss Mandy sensibly decided, nothing was to

    be gained by discussing it now. Queen was tired, and in an emotional state.

    Miss Mandy had plenty of time, Abner didn't have to be christened for

    several weeks, and Queen would see reason after some rest.

    The sisters went about their business, to put sheets and towels in the wash

    to soak, and then to say their separate private prayers, thanking God for

    his many blessings, and at last, Queen was left alone with her boy.

    He was asleep, safe in her loving arms, and she promised him she would do

    her best by him, always. She told him how sorry she was that he didn't have

    a pappy, but his pappy had important things to do in the world, and she

    would be Mammy and Pappy for him.

    And then, from somewhere deep in her soul, sweet music flooded forth from

    her, wordless music that was her lullaby.

Six weeks later, in a simple, private ceremony arranged by the sisters at

the Lutheran Church, Queen watched with uplifting pride and listened with a

certain ambivalence as the minister sprinkled water on her baby's head and

christened him Abner.

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Miss Mandy was trying to steal her baby. Queen was sure of it; there was

no other explanation. It hadn't been so obvious in the early days, the

first few weeks. There was the trouble over his name, but Queen had not

put up too much of a struggle about that. She didn't want to appear

ungrateful for everything the sisters had done for her, and if it pleased

them to call him Abner, it was only a name. Queen had compromised, in her

own mind, that he was Abner David, but as the weeks went on, common usage

prevailed, and now he was simply Abner.

    From the very beginning Miss Mandy had been obsessive about the boy,

    worrying about his health, his feeding times, and his food. She asked

    questions that Queen thought were far too personal, about her diet, to

    be sure that Abner was getting good milk. She would sit holding him for

    hours while Queen worked. She talked to him endlessly about Jesus, and

    told him Bible stories, even though he was too young to hear. She fretted

    about him if he cried, and rocked him gently when he slept. She even

    changed his soiled linen.

    She would call for Queen when she thought Abner was hungry, and make

    Queen feed him in front of her, which Queen didn't like. She had

    protested the first time it happened.

    "He's starving, Queen," Miss Mandy said. "Where have you been?"

    "Pro'bly just got the burps," Queen replied. "He been fed. "

Miss Mandy referred to a notepad.

    "That was four hours ago," she said. "I have it written down. "

    Abner did seem to be snuggling into Miss Mandy's breast, as if he were

    hungry. Queen felt the milk move in her breast.

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Miss Mandy tickled Abner's chin, and made goo-goo eyes at him.

    "Poor little baby's hungry, isn't he?" she clucked. "Nasty Mammy won't

    feed him."

    "I ain't nasty," Queen chided. She took Abner and made to leave the room.

    "Do it here, Queen," Miss Mandy ordered. "You know I like to watch."

    Queen knew that. In the first few days, while she was still in bed, Miss

    Mandy had hardly left her room, fascinated by the boy, everything he did,

    and everything that was done to him. It hadn't seemed to matter then, to

    feed the baby in front of her. It was starting to matter now. She was

    being allowed less and less time alone with her son.

    "'Tain't fittin'," Queen said. "It's private business 'tween me and him."

    Miss Mandy laughed. "It can't do him any harm. And it pleases me."

    Queen, who had been trained all her life to obey orders, did not know how

    to avoid the instruction. She sat in a chair by the window, opened her

    blouse and bodice, and took out her breast.

    Abner fed happily. Miss Mandy nodded her head as happily, and started to

    sing a hymn.

    It happened every mealtime from then on, except at night, and sometimes

    even then. Miss Mandy would come into her room, without knocking, to

    check that Abner was comfortable. She would adjust the blankets in his

    cot, or make sure he was not wet, or rescue the pacifier she had bought

    him from the place on the mantelshelf where Queen had put it, and give

    it to Abner to suck.

    She washed him and weighed him. She dressed him in clothes of her own

    choosing, relegating the few that Queen had bought to the trash. She came

    home one day with an expensive perambulator, and every afternoon she

    would take him for a stroll in the garden while Queen worked, chatting

    to him, or singing hymns. She began to teach him. She would point things

    out to him, and say the name of them over and over again, and was sure

    his gurgles signified recognition. Sometimes she would take him in the

    pram for longer walks,

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down the street, to introduce him to the new, wider world that awaited

him. She did all the things a mother would do, and left very little for

Queen.

    Sometimes Queen protested, and then Miss Mandy would look aggrieved, and

    say that she was only trying to keep Abner happy while Queen was working.

    Queen's work was the excuse for everything, and Queen thought they

    deliberately found more things for her to do to keep her away from her

    baby.

    Queen grieved for her lost hours with her son. What she had thought would