Helen Forrester - Mourning Doves

‘Well, I never!’ Winnie exclaimed with interest. She wiped her hands on the towel tucked into her waistband, and then stood with arms akimbo, as she considered the situation. ‘Do you think it’ll be born here?’

‘I don’t know, Winnie – I don’t know much about these things. Mrs Woodcock seems in great pain.’

‘Well, of course, you don’t know, Miss Celia. You being a single lady, like. I’ll put the kettle on in case.’ She seized her largest kettle and went to the sink to fill it.

‘Mrs Woodcock is all wet, Winnie – and the hearth rug and the chair are soaked.’

‘Oh, dear.’ The cook looked knowingly at her young mistress, as she hung the kettle on a hook over the roaring fire. She was about to say something more, when Dorothy clattered down the stairs, with a giggling Eric bumping on her shoulder.

‘Missus wants you – now. There’s a right to-do up there.’ She jerked her head towards the staircase. ‘And this young man wants to see Tommy Atkins, don’t you, pet?’

Tommy Atkins, long, thin and black, was curled up on Winnie’s rocking chair. At the sound of his name, he pricked up one ear and half opened a green eye, perhaps suspicious that he was about to be dumped in the cellars to deal with a mouse.

Winnie was already taking off her blue and white striped kitchen apron, to reveal a spotlessly white one underneath. She looked a little grim, as she said, ‘Oh, aye. Miss Celia just told me.’

Feeling that Eric was better left with Dorothy, who had obviously captivated him, she said to Celia, ‘If you don’t mind, Miss, you’d better come up as well. If we got to move Mrs Woodcock, like …’ She stumped up the stairs and Celia followed her, her thin white hands folded tightly against her stomach, as she tried to quell the panic within her. She dreaded to think what might be happening to Phyllis – and yet the situation held a morbid fascination for her. Could a baby really arrive like Phyllis had told her they did?

When they hurried into the breakfast room, Phyllis was still sitting in the ruined chair. To Celia’s relief, she did not appear to be in pain.

Louise was patting the pregnant woman’s shoulder comfortingly, as she said briskly to Winnie, ‘Celia will have told you of Mrs Woodcock’s condition. Do you have an old oilcloth tablecloth downstairs?’

To Celia’s surprise, Winnie did not seem particularly mystified by the question. ‘Er … Yes, Ma’am. There’s one on the table I keep the bread bin on. I could wipe it down for you.’

‘Good. Open up the spare room bed and lay it on the mattress. Then get some of the old sheets from the sewing room and put them over it – in a pad, if you understand what I mean. Tuck them in well.’

Winnie smiled widely, showing a gap where a front tooth was missing. ‘Yes, Ma’am. We’ll have Mrs Woodcock comfortable in no time.’

‘There’s one basin on the washstand – better get a couple of tin ones from the kitchen as well. And tell Ethel or Dorothy to make a fire in the bedroom – it’ll be too cold for a newborn baby.’

Showing a surprising turn of speed, Winnie went to do as she was told, while Phyllis wailed, ‘I’m putting you to so much trouble!’

‘No, no, my dear. You can’t help it.’ Louise sounded calmer than she had at any time since her husband’s demise, and Celia realised with astonishment that all the women were thrilled with what was happening, including the usually lethargic Ethel, who had not even stopped to take off her sackcloth apron before sprinting off to get the doctor.

With infuriating leisureliness, the doctor’s wife received Ethel’s breathless message, panted out in her dark hallway.

‘Doctor’s still doing his morning surgery,’ she told the little maid, and, as if to confirm her words, an elderly lady accompanied by a young girl came out of a back room, followed by the cheerful voice of Dr Hollis. ‘Now, remember, three times a day – and plenty of rest.’

The old lady smiled faintly, but did not respond, and Ethel and Mrs Hollis made space for her to get to the front door. ‘Goodbye, Mrs Formby,’ Mrs Hollis said courteously to the patient, as she closed the front door after her.

She turned back to a fidgeting Ethel. ‘Do you know how fast Mrs Woodcock’s pains are coming?’ she inquired, and before Ethel could reply, she continued, ‘I don’t think Mrs Woodcock is one of our patients, is she?’

Ethel was sharp enough to realise the inference of the last remark. It meant, who will pay the doctor’s fee? She liked Mrs Woodcock, who was always polite to her, so she answered stoutly, ‘I don’t know about the pains, Ma’am. But she’s a real friend of Miss Celia, and it were Mrs Gilmore herself what sent me here.’

‘I see.’ The reply appeared acceptable, because Mrs Hollis said she would ask the doctor to step round immediately surgery was over. In about an hour, he should be there.

‘Thank you, Ma’am.’

Full of excitement, her need to find another job completely forgotten, Ethel opened the doctor’s front door and sped down the steps.

Immediately upon her return, Ethel was entrusted with the job of taking Eric home. At first, Eric objected strongly to being taken from Dorothy and the comfortable security of the Gilmore basement kitchen. He remembered that his mother was upstairs and he shrieked that he wanted her. Fortunately, from the distant confines of the spare bedroom Phyllis could not hear him. If she thought about him at all, it was with the confident expectation that he would be properly cared for in her friend’s house, and would soon be delivered safely back to Lily.

Ethel carried with her a note from Louise to Lily, Phyllis’s cook-general, explaining what was happening, and asking her to feed the children their lunch and tea, and to make sure that Mr Woodcock’s dinner was ready for him when he came home from work. It was possible, Louise advised her, that Mrs Woodcock would not be home for a couple of days. She added that she would arrange for Mr Woodcock to be informed, at his office, of his wife’s predicament.

While Louise hastily scribbled a note to Arthur Woodcock, Phyllis sat on the edge of the wooden chair in the spare bedroom. Winnie helped to divest her of her sodden clothes and then slipped one of Celia’s huge cotton nightgowns over the young mother’s head.

‘Arthur’s going to be awfully cross,’ Phyllis whimpered to Celia. She gave a small shivering sigh, and then winced as a roll of pain commenced.

Startled, Celia looked up at her. ‘Why?’ she asked. ‘It’s his baby, too!’ She had been inspecting the soft pad of old sheets Winnie had contrived in the middle of the bed, and now she shook out and spread over it another clean sheet and a light blanket to keep her friend warm. She was surprised at Phyllis’s remark; it contradicted all that she had learned from the many romances she had read. Didn’t men love their wives for producing their children?

Phyllis gritted her teeth and waited for a spasm to pass before she said hopelessly, ‘Oh, he’ll be cross about everything. For my being such an idiot as to get caught like this – and having to help Lily care for the other little ones. He always gets angry if his routine is upset, and Lily will have her work cut out with three children and the house to look after.’

Winnie interrupted the exchange, to get Phyllis into bed before the pain increased. She smiled benignly down. ‘Don’t you worry about your hubby, Ma’am. You just concentrate on the baby, and relax as much as you can between your pains. You’d be surprised how men can manage, if they have to.’

But Phyllis knew her husband too well to hope for anything other than constant complaints and weak bursts of sudden rage, and she closed her eyes to try to stop the tears rolling down her cheeks.