Page 19 of The Incident at Ingleton (Beau Monde Secrets #3)

N early a week after she received the fateful letter from her father, Hester awoke with another one of her pulsing headaches. This time, her megrim had probably been provoked by a change of weather. When she peered out the window, Hester saw dark clouds overhead—the sort that might carry thunder, lightning, and high winds as well as rain. For some reason, stormy weather nearly always gave her a headache. She was probably in for a rough day.

All morning long, the storm clouds glowered overheard, withholding the threatened rain. At luncheon, both Hester and Rose toyed with their cold meat and salad.

“Are you unwell, too?” Hester asked her sister-in-law. So far as she knew, Rose did not get headaches like hers.

Rose pulled a face. “Everything hurts this morning. I think I may have some digestive upset.”

Frank’s face paled. “That’s all we need in the village. A bad case of dysentery.” He shuddered. “Is that what you have too, Hester?”

Hester shook her head but immediately regretted it, because the motion hurt. “This is just one of my usual sick headaches. I think it’s the fault of the weather. There must be a storm coming in.”

“Well, let me know if either of you need me to call on the apothecary,” Frank offered. “I’m happy to ride into Rocheford if necessary.”

But he did not have the opportunity to do so. Before he’d even finished his luncheon, a young boy came to the door with the message that a farmer working on a fence had suffered some sort of apoplexy. They’d sent for the surgeon, but when Mr. Wright woke up, he’d asked for a clergyman, too.

The problem was that Mr. Wright lived on a remote free-holding across the river, at least an hour’s ride away. Frank wavered for a moment, clearly torn about whether or not he should leave his wife and sister alone in their current ill-health.

“You had better go,” Rose advised him. “There’s no clergyman nearer to hand, is there? And you haven’t a curate you can send in your place. You need not worry about me, love. I’ll put my feet up and rest, like I’m supposed to, and I’ll be fine. I have Mrs. Potter to look after me now, remember?” Mrs. Potter was the monthly nurse.

“As for me, I only need a cup of my headache tea and a dark, quiet room to rest in,” Hester reminded Frank. “Go see this Mr. Wright. He probably needs your help more than we do.”

True to her word, Hester drank a cup of her medicinal tea. Then she went upstairs to lie down in her room with the curtains drawn, a cold compress on her forehead, and the door locked against any intrusion. Despite the throbbing pain, she easily fell into a natural, peaceful slumber, devoid of nightmares.

That afternoon, the storm broke. A howling gust of wind rattled the shutters and startled Hester out of her sleep. She sat up, so confused that at first, she didn’t even notice that her headache had receded. All that remained was the dull, tender, “bruised” feeling she sometimes experienced at the end of one of her attacks. If she was lucky, the headache would be gone entirely in another day.

Unfortunately, Rose’s condition had not improved. Hester found her pacing back and forth in the parlor, a grimace on her face.

“Is it a digestive ailment after all?” Hester suggested. She certainly hoped Frank was wrong about dysentery!

Rose shook her head. “It’s contractions.” She stopped walking and put a hand to her side. “Coming every five minutes and getting stronger.”

Hester clapped a hand over her mouth. “You’re in labor?” she squealed.

Rose gritted her teeth against the pain but nodded. Then she sighed as the contraction eased. “I’m not certain but... I think so. I think this might be it.” Her face displayed equal parts fear and exhilaration.

“Have you sent for your medical attendant yet?” Hester ran her mind over all the things that needed to be done. “What about Frank? Is he still away?”

“Yes, I sent for the surgeon who delivers babies around here, and no, Frank isn’t back yet. The rain may keep him away for a while.” She rested her hands on her rounded belly and stared out the window.

“Oh!” Hester hadn’t thought about the weather interfering with travel. She peered out the window. The rain fell lightly but steadily, a shower rather than a downpour, thank goodness. “It’s not too bad yet. Maybe he’ll still make it home in time.”

“I hope so, because the Old Bridge sometimes gets underwater in heavy rains. The bridge really needs to be rebuilt, but it’s technically outside our parish, and no one seems to listen to complaints—ah!” Another contraction must have struck Rose, because she snapped her mouth shut, grimacing at the pain.

“Is there anything you can do for the pain?” Hester wondered. She could not help imagining how she would feel if she were in Rose’s position. Of course, if she married, she might very well face the pains of labor someday. She wasn’t at all sure how she felt about that prospect.

Rose waited to speak until the contraction ended. “Mrs. Potter recommends walking during labor as long as I can. She said I should try to relax between contractions. As if anyone could relax when they know there’s more pain coming!”

Why didn’t people take laudanum during labor? Hester wondered. She did not care for all the effects of the drug, but in Rose’s current state, relief from pain might be worth a clouded mind or strange nightmares. But this didn’t seem like the right time to ask such questions. There were more practical concerns at hand.

“Can I get you anything to eat or drink?” She had no idea whether women in labor were supposed to eat, but standing aside and watching Rose suffer made her feel worse than useless.

“A cup of tea, maybe?” Rose suggested. “Oh, and could you fetch a blanket from the linen closet? I keep shivering, too.”

For the next half-hour, Hester alternated between helping Mrs. Potter prepare the delivery room and running errands for Rose. There was no room in the vicarage for a separate birthing chamber, so Rose would deliver in her own bedchamber. Mrs. Potter changed the linens on the bed and put a separate set of clean sheets on the dressing table, so that the bed linens could be changed again as soon as the birth was over. Hester helped the nurse take down the hanging bed curtains to allow the air in the room to circulate.

“Normally, we’d open up the window,” Mrs. Potter explained, “But we’ll have to wait until the rain lets up to do that.”

Glancing out the window at the steadily driving rain, Hester had to agree.

Lady Inglewhite arrived not long after that. While she comforted Rose, Hester played the part of an ineffectual bystander. This must be why men often weren’t allowed to attend childbirths, she decided. They wouldn’t like having to admit that there was nothing they could do to help!

Then they waited. Hester had naively assumed that the beginning of true labor meant the baby would arrive today. Lady Inglewhite and Mrs. Potter enlightened her on that point. Her eyes grew wider as she listened to the two women exchange stories of long, difficult labors they had attended or heard about. They had the wisdom or courtesy to refrain from sharing such anecdotes within Rose’s hearing, but Hester heard enough to horrify her.

As day turned into night, the gentle rainfall turned into a downpour. The wind howled around the house and sent rain lashing against the windows. And still neither Frank nor the surgeon appeared. Where were they?

“Frank won’t be able to travel in that weather.” Rose sounded as if she were near tears. “By now the bridge will be underwater.”

“He could go the long way around,” Lady Inglewhite suggested. “The New Bridge never gets flooded. But it might be best for him to stay safely under a roof and wait out the storm. It can’t last forever, Rose.” She took Rose’s hand, wincing when the laboring woman squeezed hard during the next contraction.

“Is there nothing I can do?” Hester wondered.

Under normal circumstances, she might have been sent out of the way. Unmarried girls did not often assist at childbirths. Traditionally, that was work for wives and widows. But she couldn’t simply close her eyes and ignore Rose’s travail.

“Why don’t you read to me?” Rose said. “Something simple?”

“You might read the Psalter,” Lady Inglewhite suggested.

Though Hester was not particularly devout, this seemed as good a suggestion as any. She fetched her Prayer Book and began with the first psalm.

In the next break between contractions, Rose turned to Hester. “Try reading the De Profundis .” She must have seen the confusion on Hester’s face, because she immediately clarified: Psalm 130.

Hester flipped through the gilt-edged pages of the prayer book until she found it. “Out of the depths I cry unto thee,” she intoned. She had no idea whether her reading was at all helpful to Rose, but she herself drew a surprising comfort from the familiar rhythm of the psalm. “I look for the Lord; my soul doth wait for him...” Yes, she could see why Rose had thought of this passage.

She read onward, not particularly caring what she read so long as she could keep the even flow of words going. And still they waited. For the storm to end. For Frank to come home. For a successful conclusion to Rose’s travails.

*

At four in the morning on the tenth of July, Rose’s baby finally made his grand entrance into the world. By then, the thunder had rolled away and the rain clouds had started breaking up, leaving only a few desultory showers. Little Alistair Bracknell took his first breath and promptly began screaming.

“Here, you take him, deary.” Mrs. Potter handed the wet, slimy newborn to Hester.

Startled, Hester came very close to dropping her nephew, but Lady Inglewhite helped her clean him up and wrap him in soft, unbleached cotton.

Everything had gone very well. The surgeon, Mr. Newman, reached the vicarage before nightfall, despite the heavy rain. Not that he’d had all that much to do. Though he carried with him an accoucheur ’s bag of tools, he had never even needed to open it. For the most part, he sat back and gave Rose space to labor as she felt best. Everyone agreed that for a first birth, all had gone surprisingly well.

Except that Frank hadn’t returned in time for the birth. Mr. Newman assured them that he’d probably been detained by the state of the Old Bridge. Crossing it had been difficult enough when the surgeon tried it; it would have gotten worse by the time Frank reached the river. Everyone agreed that was a perfectly plausible explanation. Even so, Rose bemoaned his absence until her attention was taken by more urgent matters.

Now, after all the cleaning and crying and struggles to nurse were over, both Rose and the baby slept soundly. Baby Alistair had been wrapped in swaddling bands and tucked into a rocking cradle. Later, he would be moved into the nursery, but for now he shared his mother’s room.

Hester settled into a rocking chair in the corner of the room, having promised to keep an eye on the baby. But, having stayed up all night with everyone else, she soon drifted off to sleep. She dreamed about baby ducklings carrying umbrellas while they splashed in puddles. Why, she wondered, did they bother with the umbrellas if they were going to jump into a puddle anyway?

“Hetty,” a familiar voice whispered, “is everyone well?”

“Hmm?” She blinked away visions of ducklings and looked around the room. The curtains had been drawn to allow mother and baby to sleep, but morning light filtered in around the edges. And there was Frank, finally. “Oh, you’re back!”

“I am so sorry to have missed this.” Frank stepped over to the bed, studied his sleeping wife for a moment, then leaned down to brush a kiss against her forehead.

Embarrassed, Hester averted her eyes. “I should probably go to bed and get a proper nap.” Frank might want time alone with his wife and child.

He straightened up and turned towards Hester. “Before you go, there’s something I need to tell you.”

“Yes?” She smothered a yawn.

“I heard a rumor that Neville Butler is still in the area.”

“What?” Hester stared at her brother. “But he left. Didn’t he?” He’d been gone for days! She’d practically celebrated his exit.

Frank nodded. “That’s what I thought, but apparently, he didn’t go far. He’s been seen just a few miles away. Someone told me he’s staying at the Gray Goose Inn. It’s probably nothing to worry about, but I thought you should know... just so it won’t be a surprise if you run into him.”

Or if he plays some new trick. Hester didn’t voice her suspicion. The worry lines on Frank’s face suggested that the possibility of further retaliation troubled him, too.

“Don’t worry too much, Hetty.” Frank stepped away from the cradle so he could rest a comforting hand on her shoulder. “You ought to go take that nap. You look done in.”

“I am,” she admitted. “Childbirth is hard work for everyone.” Rose had suffered the most, but they’d all experienced a year’s worth of anxiety, hope, and joy in a single night.

Hester rose to her feet and took hold of Frank’s hand, giving it an affectionate squeeze. “Congratulations on becoming a father, by the way.” He was the first of her siblings to make the step into marriage and parenthood, so this felt like a new era for the whole Bracknell family.

She yawned again, then crept down the hall to her room. Never in her life had a soft pillow felt so well deserved.