The Days of My Life: An Autobiography

THE THIRD DAY

A LITTLE low cry – what was it? – I never heard it before, yet it went to my heart almost with a pang of delight. Alice, bring it – bring it. I cannot wait for all those snowy robes, and all the joyful, tearful importance of my dear, dear, kind nurse, my almost mother. Here in its little flannel wrapper – a little moving bundle, thrusting about its little limbs, turning round its little downy head with the first instincts of life to that kind bosom, crying its little wailing cry – oh, kindest heaven! – oh, God most wonderful! – it is mine, mine, my own child!

I felt neither pain nor weakness. I consented to lie still, because they said I must, and because I was happy beyond expression, and neither rebellion nor disobedience was in me. I lay quite still, pulling back the curtains to look at Alice as she put on those dainty little garments, one by one – to look at the moving thing upon her knee, the little hand thrust up into the air, the vigorous kicks and thrusts with which it struggled. It! a spark of sudden anger woke in me when some one said it– that was correct enough half an hour ago – but this was he, an individual being, my baby, my own, mine! I cannot tell to any one the rapture in which I lay watching Alice as she put upon him his first little robes. I was in a woman’s paradise – a moment which can come but once in a lifetime. What mother does not remember, after all her dread, her awe, her suffering, the heavenly rest in which she lay looking at her firstborn? I think there is no such ecstasy either before or after – it is all over – all over – the ordeal which frame and spirit have been trembling at, is past like a dream, and who remembers it? – and in that strange delicious luxury of ease and weakness, there seems no longer anything to desire. I do not know, – perhaps it is not an elevated idea at all, – but my best realization of unspeakable happiness was in that hour after my little boy was born.

When that most important toilet was finished, Alice brought him to me in the long white robe, rich with my own needlework, and the pretty close cap covering his little downy head. She laid him down on my arm, and drew a step apart, and looked at us both, crying for joy. “Bless you, my darling!” cried Alice, and then she fairly ran away with her bright glistening face, and I knew very well it was to relieve her full heart, and spend her tears.

And I lay here with my baby on my arm alone. He did not mind who watched him, as he knitted his baby brows, and twisted his baby mouth, and clenched his harmless fists, till I laughed and cried together in indescribable delight. Then a change came over me. I wanted some one to share my happiness – to show my treasure to. Some one – oh, what cold words these were! I wanted one – only one – to make my joy perfect. My heart expanded over my baby, with such a sense of want, of incompleteness. I cried aloud, “Oh, Harry, Harry, Harry!” Where was the father to see and bless this child? This blessing which every other mother had, I had cast away from me.

I could not put his infant into his arms – I could not watch the joy on his face to brighten the light upon my own. I wept now after another fashion. I turned my head aside that my tears might not fall upon my baby. “Oh, Harry, Harry!” I was content you should be away from me in the evil time, but it broke my heart to be alone in my deep great joy.

Alice could not see how I had been moved when she returned. I took care to conceal my tearful eyes from her, and indeed it was not hard to return to gladness, looking upon the face of my child. She brought me a cup of tea, and pretended she had only gone away to fetch it. “I did, indeed, Miss Hester,” she said, with a tearful smile that belied her; “though, to tell the truth, I had a good cry when I got down-stairs. Dear, do but look at him, with his sweet little fist doubled. Will you beat your mamma already, baby boy, and a son too? Darling, I’m sure you don’t know what to say for joy.”

“Oh, Alice, it is all beyond saying,” said I; “I don’t know why this should have come to me, when even you yourself – you who are always kindest, did not dare to ask a blessing for me; and after you said that, Alice, I never dared to ask one for myself.”

“I never meant that, Miss Hester,” said Alice, humbly; “I did crave for the blessing night and day, and here it is, bless his dear little heart; the sight of him brings back my pleasant days to me, dear. A woman never has such a joy as a baby. Do you shake your head at that, Miss Hester? My darling, you’ll come to know.”

“I do know, Alice,” I said under my breath; “I never was so happy before, nor so thankful, nor – so sad. If I do not die he will have nobody but me, and what can I do for him? Alice, did you think of what I told you to do? Do you remember, you were to write when all was over? I thought then I was sure to die.”

“Every one does, dear,” said Alice, cheerfully; “but there’s nothing about dying now, darling. We can’t have that, and, Miss Hester, have you ever thought what was to be the baby’s name?” Once more I was taken by surprise. Once more I turned my face away from him, that his sweet cheek might not be fretted by tears. I could say only one word – “Harry” – but that was enough for Alice. Her face brightened again, and she stooped over baby to give me time to recover myself. Alice was a wise nurse, and would not even notice my agitation; so I made an effort to subdue it, and was calm once more.

“Alice, you will be sure to write,” I whispered; “and – well, you have seen other babies – do you really think he is very pretty, or is it only because he is our own?”

Alice satisfied me by a great many assurances. “Babies are not always pretty, darling,” said the impartial Alice; “I have seen the oddest little things, though their mothers were always pleased; but Master Harry is a noble boy! Look how big he is; why he’s quite a weight to lift already, and such a head of hair,” she continued, gently pushing back his cap to show the silky down beneath; “and look here, Miss Hester, what arms, he might be a month old, bless him, instead of half a day. Do I really think it? My darling, I never, all my days, was called a flatterer before.”

Nor had I the least inclination to call Alice a flatterer now, for, without any partiality, he really was a very beautiful boy, though he lay there winking, frowning, and making such pugilistic use of his little hands. I thought they were miracles, these little hands, when it pleased him to unfold them; such beautiful little miniatures, with their delicious soft touch, and tapered tender little fingers. I bent down my cheek to put it into the way of those natural weapons of his as he fenced about with them. I could have cried again with delight at those small blows. Then Alice pretended he was too much for me, and that she could not permit me to get excited; but I knew very well this was only an excuse to get him into her own arms; but I was as glad of Alice’s joy as of my own. I had given her much to grieve her kind faithful heart, it was time I gave her something to make her glad; and what could do that so well as my baby boy? I watched her walking softly up and down the room, holding him so daintily, so prettily upon both her hands, and then she removed him to one arm, and made a reclining couch of it, when he seemed to lie so easy, so securely with his head upon her bosom. I looked, and wondered, and envied. Only study and experience could give that facility, and I had a strong impression that I would be afraid to handle that little precious frame as Alice did. Somehow or other it seemed to complete Alice, and make her a perfect picture. The baby, with its long streaming white robes, nestled so sweetly into her breast, looked a necessary adjunct to her now. I wondered how I should never have perceived the want of it before. I called her to me, and told her what I thought. Alice smiled with real gratification. “I was thinking so myself, dear,” she said; “I am ten years younger since this morning. But it goes to my heart, Miss Hester, for it reminds me of old times.”

She put up her hand to her eyes softly, though she still smiled; but those sweet tears of Alice’s would never have chafed a baby’s cheek. Sweet resignation, pure love, the breath of a subdued and chastened heart was in them. She was thinking of those whom God had taken away, whom God would one day restore her to – they were different tears from mine.

When he fell asleep Alice brought him back to me, and laid him down upon my arm once more. I watched for a while his sweet breath, his closed eyes, his baby face in its first repose, and then a drowsiness crept over me, and I, too, fell asleep – it was such a sleep as I had slept once before, the day when my husband came. I knew I was lying here with my baby in my arms. I realized all the joy that was in my heart, but I dreamed that I was presenting his child to Harry, that I was telling him how I had named the baby already, that I was pouring out all my thoughts and all my desires into the only ear in the world that could hear everything that was in my heart, and there was not a care or a cloud upon me. Again they seemed only dreams. And this happiness was the truth.

When I awoke it was with a slight start, and I was strangely bewildered to see that Alice had lifted baby from my arms, had wrapped him in a great shawl, and was carrying him away. “Where, where are you going, Alice?” I cried in alarm. She was confused when she saw me awake, and hesitated for a moment. “My darling, I am only going to let little Master see the house he has come home to,” she said, with an attempt to be playful, which only called my attention to the tremble in her voice; “we’ll come back again this moment, dear,” and she carried him away down stairs. A suspicion of what it was came to me, and I listened eagerly. I heard her slow careful step descending; then I heard a suppressed exclamation. Neither my prudence nor my regard for my own health could restrain me; I was not able to subdue the wild beating of my heart, my breathless agitation. Did they think they could deceive me? – did they think his voice or his step could be in the house and I not know it? I raised myself up a little, and listened with my whole heart and might. Yes, he had come to see his child, and it was Alice who showed my beautiful boy to him – it was not I. I could hear his whisper; I thought myself that I could have heard and known it at any distance. I could imagine the scene; I could imagine his silent delight, his thanksgiving, his words of joy. I could almost fancy myself a clandestine spectator, a stealthy looker-on, beholding from behind a curtain the joy in which I had no share. Oh, it was bitter! dreadful! – he rejoicing over our baby below – I lying alone in my misery and weakness here. I did not think of him watching without the door, shut out from the house, while I was tasting first this exquisite and sacred joy. I thought but of myself, deserted, desolate, no one approving of me, no one commending me, my own very heart rising up in judgment, my every thought an accuser, alone and solitary, my husband only caring to know that I was safe, and desiring nothing more. I think I had such anguish in that moment as only comes to many, diluted through a whole life. How breathlessly I watched and listened – how conscious I seemed to be of every movement and every word; how I started at the faint sound of Baby’s voice, and had almost sprung from my bed to snatch him at least to my arms. I who was the only one who could still him, his mother, his nurse, the being upon whom his little life depended by nature. Why, even for a moment, did they take him away from me?

When Alice returned I did not say a word of my suspicions or discoveries. My heart sank when I heard the door close upon my husband, when I heard the step whose faintest echo I knew so well passing through the gravel path of our little garden. Till then I still retained an involuntary hope that at least he would request to see me. But he did not; he was gone, and his steps rang upon my heart with a dull echo as he passed out of hearing. I felt like one suddenly struck dumb – I could not speak, I could not shake off the weight and oppression upon my brain, and the bitter pang in my spirit. Already I felt a fever growing on me, but I did not complain of it. My lips were sealed; I could not say I was ill – I could not speak a word. The little one was laid in my bosom once more, and I held him with passionate tenderness; but even while I did so, I felt the sickness at my heart, and the cold dew on my forehead, and the fainting, failing sensation over all my frame. I did not speak; I seemed to be bound up within myself with a strange, terrible wakefulness and consciousness, like one in a nightmare. I felt as one might feel who saw a murderer slowly advancing towards him when there was help at hand, yet who was paralysed, and could neither move nor cry for deliverance. I held my baby close, till he cried and struggled, then I suffered Alice to take him away. I heard her questioning and calling me; she came and wiped my forehead, and stooped down to me, and begged me to speak to her. “Are you ill, darling? are you ill?” cried Alice. At last I said faintly, “I suppose so;” and she rang the bell in great haste to summon a woman who waited below, and send her for the doctor. I was growing almost unconscious; the only clear thing I recollect in the chaos of indefinite pain and trouble which overwhelmed me, was Baby’s little plaintive cry, and my anxiety to get him back into my arms. Faintly and dimly I could perceive Alice feeding him; and I did not feel quite sure whether my husband was or was not in the room in my strange, half-delirious state. I was not sure of anything; I heard strange noises in my ears – sometimes I thought I was lying in some danger, and something from which I could not escape was hurrying upon me to crush me to atoms; and then again I was at Cottiswoode – yet always here, always conscious of Baby and of Alice. Hitherto the many and great agitations to which I had been subject, or which I had brought upon myself, had done me no harm. As safely as though I had been living the most placid life had this great trial been surmounted; but it was different now. The cause was different; always before my husband had been but too anxious to change my mind towards him himself. It was a new and dreadful experience, this leaving me alone; and I was exhausted and weak, though I had not expected it; the long arrears of past suffering came back upon me now.

I suppose I must have been very ill for a few hours. I cannot tell; I remember only a vague and feverish wretchedness, an aching, longing desire to complain to some one, and a burning consciousness that I had no one on earth to complain to; I saw visions, too, in my illness; unhappy momentary dreams; glimpses of my husband rejoicing with strangers; placing my baby in the arms of another; always deserting and forsaking me. My heart was shocked and wounded; it was not an ordinary stroke, but a blow unexpected, which struck beyond all my poor defences, and laid me prostrate. Yet I could not have been long thus, for when I came to myself it was still the twilight of the same day. The room was darkened, and the candle burned faintly on the table at the extreme end of the little apartment, and there was a faint perfume in the room of some essence they had been using for me. It was June, a soft mild summer night, yet a little fire was burning in the grate, for baby’s sake, and by it sat the woman who had come to assist Alice, holding my child in her lap. The first sign I perceived in myself of recovery was the indignant start with which I observed that this woman, I suppose overcome by the heat and doing nothing, was nodding and dozing at her post. I was not aware at the moment of having had anything the matter with me. I looked up with a startled, indignant glance at Alice, who was bending over me anxiously. “Bring him to me, Alice,” I cried eagerly; “or, if I must not have my baby, do you keep him at least. She is a stranger; she does not care for him. Look, look, she has fallen asleep!” I saw the woman start and open her eyes with a guilty look as I spoke, and Alice said, “Yes, darling, yes,” as she bent over me and continued bathing my forehead. I put away her hand impatiently. “Take him yourself, Alice, or bring him to me,” I cried again. I had a shuddering which I could not restrain at my seeing him in the stranger’s arms.