Philippa Gregory - The Little House

‘You go, Patrick,’ Elizabeth said. ‘I’ll look after Cleary Junior here.’

Patrick smiled weakly at her and followed the nurse. He still could not take in the fact that his baby had been born. ‘Right,’ he said. ‘Right.’

Elizabeth had already turned away. She was walking slowly down the length of the corridor, swaying her hips slightly as she walked, rocking the baby with the steady, easy rhythm of her pace. ‘And what shall we call you?’ she asked the little sleeping head. She put her lips to his ear. It was perfectly formed, like a whorled shell, surprisingly cool. Elizabeth inhaled the addictive scent of newborn baby. ‘Little love,’ she whispered. ‘My little love.’

It was nearly midday before Ruth woke from her sleep and nearly two o’clock before the baby was brought to her. He was no longer the scented damp bundle that Elizabeth had walked in the corridor. He was washed and dried and powdered and dressed in his little cotton sleep suit. He was not like a newborn baby at all.

‘Here he is,’ the nurse said, wheeling him into the private room in the little Perspex cot.

Ruth looked at him doubtfully. There was no reason to believe that he was her baby at all; there was nothing to connect him and her except the paper bracelet around his left wrist, which said, ‘Cleary 14.8.95.’ ‘Is it mine?’ she asked baldly.

The nurse smiled. ‘Of course it’s yours,’ she said. ‘We don’t get them mixed up. He’s lovely, don’t you think?’

Ruth nodded. Tears suddenly coming into her eyes. ‘Yes,’ she said weakly. She supposed the baby was lovely. But he looked very remote and very isolated in his little plastic box. He looked to her as if he had been assembled in the little box like a puzzle toy, as if he were the property of the hospital and not her baby at all.

‘Now what’s the matter?’ the nurse asked.

‘I bought that suit for him,’ Ruth said tearfully. ‘I bought it.’

‘I know you did, dear. We found it in your case and we put it on him as soon as he had his bath. Just as you would have wanted it done.’

Ruth nodded. It was pointless to explain the sense of strangeness and alienation. But she felt as if the little suit had been bought for another baby, not this one. The little suit had been bought for the baby that she had felt inside her, that had walked with her, and slept with her, and been with her for nine long months. It was for the imaginary baby, who had an imaginary birth, where Ruth had breathed away all the pains, where Patrick had massaged her back and held her hand and talked to her engagingly and charmingly through the hours of her labour, and where, after he had been triumphantly born, everyone had praised her for doing so well.

‘You want to breast-feed him, don’t you?’

Ruth looked at the sleeping baby without much enthusiasm. ‘Yes, I did.’

‘Well, I’ll leave him here with you, and when he wakes up you can ring your bell and I’ll come and help you get comfy. After a Caesarean you need a bit of help.’

‘All right,’ Ruth said.

The nurse gave her a kind smile and left the room. Ruth lay back and looked at the ceiling. Unstoppably the tears filled her eyes and ran out under her eyelids, hot and salty. Beside her, in his goldfish-bowl cot the baby slept.

In half an hour the nurse came back. She had hoped that Ruth would have broken the hospital rules and put the baby in bed beside her, but they were as far apart as ever.

‘Now,’ she said brightly. ‘Let’s wake this young man up and give him a feed.’

He was not ready to wake. His delicate eyelids remained stubbornly closed. He did not turn his head to Ruth even when she undid the buttons of her nightgown and pressed her nipple to his cheek.

‘He’s sleepy,’ the nurse said. ‘He must have got some of your anaesthetic. We’ll give him a little tickle. Wake him up a bit.’

She slipped his little feet out of the sleep suit and tickled his toes. The baby hardly stirred.

‘Come along now, come along,’ the nurse said encouragingly.

She took him from Ruth and gave him a little gentle jiggle. The baby opened his eyes – they were very dark blue – and then opened his mouth in a wail of protest.

‘That’s better,’ she said. Quickly and efficiently she swooped down on Ruth, propped the little head on Ruth’s arm, patted his cheek, turned his face, and pressed Ruth’s nipple into his mouth.

He would not suck. Four, five times, they repeated the procedure. He would not latch onto the nipple. Ruth felt herself blushing scarlet with embarrassment and felt the ridiculous easy tears coming again. ‘He doesn’t want to,’ she said. She felt her breasts were disgusting, that the baby was making a wise choice in his rejection.

‘He will,’ the nurse reassured her. ‘We just have to keep at it. But he will, I promise you.’

The baby had dozed off again. His head lolled away from her.

‘He just doesn’t want to,’ Ruth said.

‘We’ll give it another try later on,’ the nurse said reassuringly. ‘Shall I leave him in with you for now? Have a little cuddle.’

‘I thought he had to go into his cot?’

She smiled. ‘We could break the rules just this once.’

Ruth held him out. ‘It hurts on my scar,’ she said. ‘Better put him back.’

PATRICK came at visiting time at four in the afternoon with a big bouquet of flowers. He kissed Ruth and looked into the cot.

‘How is he?’

‘He won’t feed,’ Ruth said miserably. ‘We can’t make him feed.’

‘Isn’t that bad? Won’t he get hungry?’

‘I don’t know. The nurse said he was sleepy from my anaesthetic.’

‘Did she seem worried?’

‘How should I know?’ Ruth exclaimed.

Patrick saw that she was near to tears. ‘Here,’ he said. ‘Look at your lovely flowers. And dozens of bouquets at home – it looks like a florist’s shop. They sent some from my work, and my secretary told Radio Westerly and they sent some.’

Ruth blinked. ‘From Westerly?’

‘Yes. A big bunch of red roses.’

‘That was nice.’

‘And your little chum.’

‘Who?’

‘That David.’

‘Oh,’ she said. It seemed like years since she had last seen David.

‘And how are you, darling?’

‘I’m fine,’ she said. ‘My stitches hurt.’

‘Mother said they would. She said that we would all have to look after you especially well when you come home.’

Ruth nodded.

‘She said she would come down later if that was all right with you. She didn’t want to crowd us this afternoon. But she and the old man will come down this evening if you’re not too tired.’

‘Perhaps tomorrow?’ Ruth suggested.

‘They’re very keen to see the grandson,’ Patrick prompted. ‘Dad especially.’

‘All right, then.’

‘They asked me what we would be calling him. I said that we’d probably stick with Thomas James.’

Ruth glanced towards the cot. She had imagined Thomas James as a fair-haired boy, not this dark-headed little thing. ‘I never thought he’d be so small,’ she said.

‘Tiny, isn’t he?’ Patrick said. ‘Shall I pick him up?’

‘Better let him sleep,’ Ruth said.

They both gazed at the sleeping baby. ‘Tiny hands,’ Patrick said again.

‘I never thought of him like this,’ Ruth said.

‘I never really imagined him at all. I always kind of jumped ahead. I thought about teaching him how to fish, and taking him to cricket and things like that. I never thought of a tiny baby.’

‘No.’

They were silent.

‘He is all right, isn’t he?’ Patrick asked. ‘I mean he seems terribly quiet. I thought they cried all the time.’