An Enormous Yes (32 page)

Whatever else, he was kind. Nor were his skills as lover in doubt, or his generous, caring nature. Yet he was also a practised liar; maybe a
philanderer
, and clearly an irresponsible father. She couldn’t deal with all the contradictions, any more than with decisions; couldn’t even argue any more.

She sagged down on the bed and put up no resistance when he tucked the duvet round her shoulders; simply turned onto her front, as if to block him out. Her eyes were closing of their own accord; her ears registered vague rustling noises, as if he were getting dressed, then the sound of
footsteps
creeping to the door. But, once she had heard the click of the handle and more footsteps going down the stairs, everything went silent, as she sank into a near-coma of a sleep.

‘L
OVELY EVENING,’ THE
taxi driver commented, pulling up at the lights. ‘July’s not been bad at all.’

Maria made some vague response, hoping he wouldn’t talk all the way to Sutherland Street. She had too much on her mind to indulge in idle
chitchat
; seesawing as she was between desire and doubt, longing and suspicion, as regarded any possible life with Felix. If he had abandoned his own family, was he likely to stick with
her
? And, if Felicia was right and he’d turned up with another woman when visiting his wife, that was surely callous and insensitive. But suppose the daughter had inherited some element of the mother’s mental illness, she could well be distorting the facts. Besides, considering the amount of anti-Felix virulence she must have imbibed from Alice, she could hardly be counted as an impartial witness. And, in any case, was it really fair to blame him for events that had happened long ago?

A sudden stretch of bumpy road jolted her out of her reverie but within seconds she was back, reflecting on Felicia’s accusations. It was certainly untrue that the only thing Felix cared about was sex; he was as passionate about her art as he was about her body – a passion echoing her own. Maybe they
did
belong together and she
should
embrace her wilder side. On the other hand, how could she build her own happiness on the suffering of a wife and daughter, when her whole upbringing and education had stressed the sacred bonds of marriage, and the virtues of duty and service? Nor could she suppress the distressing thought that, had Felicia failed to waylay her, Felix himself might never have revealed his marital situation and simply established her in Cornwall under false pretences.

‘Traffic’s bad.’ The driver gave a shrug, as they slowed to a near-halt. ‘Always is on Fridays.’

His remark brought her back to Amy – her last day at work before she started maternity leave. It was high time she stopped obsessing about Felix’s
daughter and thought about her own. Perhaps she’d cook a celebratory supper, although first she’d have to check with Amy that she hadn’t made arrangements to go out with her workmates for a farewell drink or dinner.

Switching on her mobile, she was surprised to see six missed calls. Why the sudden flurry, unless they were all from Felix – whom she had left a mere ten minutes ago – trying to persuade her, once again, that Felicia’s account of things was biased and unreliable.

Mum, where
are
you? Please pick up. I think I’ve started labour!

Mum, help, for heaven’s sake! Something really awful’s going on. I’m bleeding now and –

Mum,
please
answer. I’ve rung Dubai, but I can’t get hold of Hugo, and Chloe’s out and I’m all alone.

Mum, I’m really worried. I’ve had to call an ambulance. The minute you get this message, come straight to the hospital. I need you, Mum – please come!

Barely able to control her agitation, Maria tapped on the glass partition. ‘Driver, I’ve changed my plans. Take me to the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital – and as quickly as you can.’

‘We can’t go nowhere quickly.’ He raised his voice above the noise of a pneumatic drill. ‘And we’re in trouble here, to start with. But I’ll turn off down the next side street and try to avoid these roadworks.’

His words barely registered, as gruesome images of Chloe’s dead twin shuddered through her mind. If Amy had suffered a haemorrhage, she too might have lost the baby. Or was it fighting for its life in intensive care? It would be premature at thirty-six weeks and, even at thirty-
nine
weeks, you couldn’t rule out a tragedy, as Chloe’s case so sadly proved. Besides, Chloe had rested far more than Amy, whose recent workload had been even more pressured than usual, as she prepared to hand over to her successor. As yet, she hadn’t attended a single antenatal class, or even made a birth-plan, leaving all such matters till the last month of her pregnancy. Now, it seemed, there wouldn’t
be
a last month.

With unsteady hands, she dialled her daughter’s mobile, only to get the message-service. Deliberately calming her voice, she said she was on her way, then phoned the hospital direct. However, despite being passed from person to person, no one seemed to know if a Mrs Amy Talbot had been admitted or not. Perhaps she was still in the ambulance, battling through the same heavy rush-hour traffic. Or maybe the baby had been born en route; delivered by some inept paramedic and already dead or damaged.

Hurry
, she urged the driver, under her breath; cursing every red light, every build-up of traffic, cursing London itself for being so invariably
congested. If only the hospital were near a tube, then she could go by
underground
, but even the closest one was quite a trek away. She would never forgive herself if she arrived too late to help Amy through some
unspeakable
crisis. And it was her own fault entirely, for indulging in that shaming sex; that inexcusable sleep. If she hadn’t been so focused on her own petty personal problems, she would have been home with Amy at the first sign of any trouble and could have taken charge immediately and provided some support.

More alarm bells began sounding in her mind as she recalled the
shockingly
high stillbirth rate in Britain and the chronic shortage of midwives, with its alarming link to maternal deaths. The mere thought of Amy dying made her sweat and shake, as if the cab had been involved in a collision and she’d been seriously hurt. And, if such a disaster should happen, however would she break the news to Hugo?

She snatched up her phone again. She must ring him anyway; say nothing more at this point than that Amy had gone into labour four weeks before her due date, so he must catch the next flight home. He was her designated birth partner and should be with her at this instant.

Pick up, pick
up
, she pleaded. It was late evening in Dubai, so surely he couldn’t be in court still. Perhaps he had switched off his phone and simply collapsed into bed, shattered by the strain of the last few days’
interrogation
by hard-nosed prosecutors.

She left an urgent message, then tried Amy’s number again, but there was still only the disembodied voice telling her to press the hash-key once she had finished her recording.

As she pressed it, she suddenly recalled her dream: Amy going through a protracted, painful labour, but with no baby at the end of it. Had it been a sinister omen? Even the fact she was wearing black – black for a funeral – seemed a disturbing portent.

She longed to speak to someone, just to dissipate her panic. If only Kate weren’t on holiday, she might have agreed to meet her at the hospital; helped her through this emergency. Felix would help – that she knew instinctively – and, despite all the recent problems, her whole mind and body still craved him, like a drug; a drug that might be dangerous, yet nonetheless offered ecstatic highs. But phoning him would only increase her turmoil – the last thing she needed at present.

In her isolation, she found herself praying – desperately, instinctively. There
had
to be a God: a merciful and powerful being who could save precious daughters, precious babies. But, if He existed, why had He failed to intervene when Chloe’s Simon was born dead, or when that mother on
the news last night died on her way to an out-of-town maternity unit, because her local one had closed its doors to any new admissions? At least that wouldn’t happen at a large, well-established hospital like the Chelsea and Westminster – would it?

‘Dear Lord,’ she begged, ‘I’ll do anything you ask, if you’ll only spare Amy and her child.’

The driver took a sudden jerky turn into Drayton Gardens. ‘This’ll bring us out on the Fulham Road, and then it’s only another hundred yards to the hospital.’

The minute he stopped, she leapt out of the cab, pressed Felix’s three tenners into his hand and, without waiting for the change, ran towards the entrance; only slowed by the revolving doors. There was a queue at the reception desk, where she fumed, first, behind a sharp-faced woman giving vent to a vociferous complaint, and then a doddery old fellow with very little English, trying to make himself understood.

Once it was her turn, she explained the situation, but the receptionist didn’t appear to know whether Amy would have been taken to the Labour Ward, or A & E, or – God forbid – had been removed to some other ward where women who had lost their babies were cordoned off from newly delivered mothers.

‘I suggest you ask at Maternity Reception – third floor, Lift Bank C.’

Maria knew those lifts from previous visits. You could wait an age for one to come and, even when it did, there were often long delays, as patients in wheelchairs or on crutches struggled in or out. Among the group of people waiting was a mother with a pushchair, containing a child who looked gravely ill. His skin was grey and waxen, his eyes closed and purple-lidded, and he lay unnaturally still. Yet at least he was alive, Maria thought; had survived beyond his infancy, beyond a few brief hours.

The lift ascended ponderously, but, having positioned herself close to the doors, she was able to dash straight out when it reached her floor.

The girl on Maternity Reception confirmed that Amy had been admitted and directed her to the Labour Ward. But, as she stood waiting at the
reception
desk, hoping to speak to a midwife, a patient on a trolley-bed was suddenly wheeled from one of the rooms and rushed along the corridor, accompanied by a posse of grim-faced doctors and nurses, all scurrying at a frantic pace.

Maria clutched the edge of the desk, her legs turning to tissue paper. Was that
Amy
in the bed, being sped to theatre with another haemorrhage? Or might she have developed pre-eclampsia – a life-threat to both mother and
child, and always linked to high blood pressure? As long ago as May, Amy’s blood pressure had been highish, and the shock of Silas’s sudden death might have pushed it up to danger level. Yet, despite constant advice from the midwives, she had failed to take things easy during the last two stressful months.

Maria shifted from foot to foot, feeling invisible in the current crisis. The air of tension was palpable: midwives darting to and fro; the receptionist urgently phoning for yet another doctor. And the situation wasn’t helped by the agonizing shrieks echoing from another room further down the corridor – some poor soul in labour, maybe all alone.

Hours seemed to pass before, finally, a skinny woman approached and gave her the ghost of a smile. ‘Hello. I’m Jean, the midwife looking after your daughter.’

‘Is she … she all right?’ Maria stammered, barely able to form the words.

‘Yes, but we’ve kept her in.’

What sort of answer was that? Hardly informative or reassuring. Still, at least Amy wasn’t in theatre, or bleeding to death. ‘Well, can I see her?’ Maria spoke with all the authority she could muster.

‘First, I’ll have to check with your daughter whether or not she wants that.’

Maria bit back a retort. After six desperate messages, begging her to come, wasn’t it obvious Amy needed her?

Jean was gone an unaccountably long time, causing Maria to worry on a different count. Perhaps Amy was so distraught she couldn’t face even her own mother. And why had Jean said nothing? Was she hiding some ghastly problem?

Once the woman reappeared, she led her along, with still barely a word, to a single room which, although large and light, looked bare, austere and clinical. Amy was lying on a high-tech bed, clad in a hospital gown and hooked up to some machine or other. Her face was pale and drawn, and tendrils of her long, dark hair, escaping from the chignon, lay dishevelled on the pillow. But the only thing that mattered was that her ‘bump’ was clearly visible – which meant she
hadn’t
lost the baby.

Her relief was so vast, she darted across to her daughter and enfolded her in an euphoric hug.

‘Oh, Mum, thank God you’re here!’

Maria prolonged the embrace, exulting in the fact that no calamity had occurred. Amy was living and breathing; still miraculously pregnant.

‘I need to check some blood results,’ Jean informed them, moving to the door, ‘so I’ll leave you two alone, OK?’

‘Yes, fine,’ Maria said and, as soon as she heard the door close, asked Amy to explain the frantic phone calls.

‘I’m sorry if I worried you but I was in a terrible state because, when I saw the blood, I thought I was losing the baby. I mean, I was having pains and everything, so, naturally, I imagined the worst. What made it really awful was that it happened in the office. Fortunately, no one realized, or I’d have died of embarrassment. I was in the loo, at the time, and I immediately called a taxi and went home. But when I couldn’t get hold of you, or Hugo, or anyone, I really started panicking.’

‘I feel dreadful, darling, not picking up your calls.’

‘It’s not
your
fault, Mum. This all came on out of the blue. And I realize now I overreacted, stupidly. You see, when I arrived here, they took me straight to Triage and a midwife examined my knickers and said there was hardly any blood at all, only a brownish discharge, and it was just a
harmless
“show” and not a haemorrhage.’

‘So you’re not actually in labour, then?’

‘Yes, I am. I’ve seen the doctor, too, and he gave me an internal and told me I was two centimetres dilated. So there’s a hell of a long way to go yet. In fact, most women would be sent back home at this stage and asked to come back later. But because I’m only thirty-six weeks, that’s classed as a “high-risk” delivery, so they need to keep me in. And I have to be wired up to this damned monitor all the time, so they can keep a check on the baby. And the minute it’s born, they’ll need to call a paediatrician – you know, to make sure it’s all right. They also gave me a steroid injection, which helps mature the baby’s lungs.’

Any relief Maria might have felt instantly capsized. A cot was standing by the window, prepared with sheet and blankets, but would her grandchild ever lie there, or be whisked off to intensive care with undeveloped lungs? ‘What’s that noise?’ she asked, aware of a sound that resembled a galloping horse, which she had instantly noticed on entering the room.