Two Lives Begin
Abit of sailcloth was the only door between the surgeon’s accommodations and the rest of the ship.
The quarters were tiny and made smaller still by a cot jammed in the corner and the presence of both Hannigan and the woman attending Anne.
Llewellyn, he believed she was called. Wentworth could not help but note how woefully inadequate the accommodations were for the weighty purpose.
A cramped space was customary for a warrant’s berth, but even the air was fug and damp.
This despite Hannigan keeping a hatch partially open for ventilation.
Anne was covered from the waist down by a sheet, and dressed in only a shift, stained with sweat and the lace crushed around the neckline.
She lay on the surgeon’s narrow cot, her face flushed with exertion, her hair spattered against her forehead.
A man injured, in pain, was simple to endure. But his own wife…
Beside her stood Llewellyn, the carpenter’s widow woman who had been a last-minute addition to their misbegotten crew. A sturdy, no-nonsense Welshwoman of indeterminate age, she wiped Anne’s brow with practiced efficiency while murmuring encouragement in her lilting accent.
“Captain,” Hannigan acknowledged, not even looking up from Anne. “Your wife is progressing well, though we’ve some hours yet before the child makes an appearance.”
Then why was I summoned?
“She asked to see ya,” Llewellyn said, as if she read his mind. The woman stood aside, giving him space to kneel beside Anne.
He took her hand. It was cool despite the heat of the room. Her fingers tightened around his with surprising strength. Her face crumpled, and the woman said over his shoulder, “Another pain.”
Anne came back to herself and said, “Frederick, dear.” She kissed his hand. Her lips were hot. She blew out a breath and then said, “What a birthday celebration this is turning out to be.”
He smiled at her attempt at lightness. “Indeed. Though I confess it is not quite how I had imagined marking the occasion.”
“Nor I,” she replied, her voice stronger than he had expected. “But then, very little about our departure from Minorca has gone as imagined.”
Her tone hinted to the first bit of accusation he’d heard since leaving port. He admired it. It was a justified acknowledgment of their circumstances.
Before he could respond, Hannigan cleared his throat.”Captain, Mrs Wentworth needs rest between her pains. Perhaps you might return in an hour’s time? There is little to do now but wait.”
Wentworth hesitated, reluctant to leave Anne’s side, but she squeezed his hand reassuringly.
“Go,” she told him. “See to your poor old ship. I am in capable hands.”
He bent and kissed her forehead. The sharp, salty taste confirmed her exertions. “I shall return shortly.”
“Captain,” Llewellyn said as he turned to leave, “beggin’ your pardon, but have you a watch you might leave? For timing the pains, you see.”
“Llewellyn!”
They had been at one another the entire sail, so why would now be any different? Wentworth nodded, withdrew the watch, and placed it in the woman’s weathered palm. “Take care of them both,” he said quietly.
“That I will, sir. As if they were my own.”
The hours passed with excruciating slowness.
Wentworth found himself pacing the confines of his cabin, unable to focus on ship’s business yet unwilling to hover uselessly in the surgeon’s quarters.
Eyerly brought reports about the crew’s condition.
The extra ration had taken its toll, with several men nursing sore heads and fouler dispositions than usual.
Wentworth found it difficult to concern himself with such matters.
Every creak of the ship and every footstep in the passageway outside his cabin door might be news of Anne.
More than once, he reached for his watch.
Time stretched and contracted in strange ways, minutes dragging into what felt like hours, yet when he consulted the ship’s chronometer, he was surprised to find how little time had actually passed.
He found himself oddly thinking of the naval battles he had commanded.
The same strange helplessness punctuated by moments of frantic activity.
Lives hung in the balance of decisions made by others.
He, who had faced French warships without flinching, now found himself undone by the prospect of childbirth.
Twice he returned to the surgeon’s quarters, only to be assured by Hannigan that all progressed as expected.
Anne’s labour was neither unusually difficult nor remarkably easy but simply the ordinary work of bringing new life into the world.
On his second visit, in the dark of the lower deck, Anne seemed weary but determined, her eyes clear despite her exhaustion.
If this ancient routine did not progress, he and his child might not share a birthday.
“You need not worry so,” she told him, reaching for his hand during a rare moment of respite between contractions. “Women have been doing this since Eve.”
“Not aboard the Sir Richard,” he replied, attempting to match her light tone despite his concern. “I suspect you may be the first to give birth on this particular vessel.”
“Then we shall make history together, you and I.” Her smile faded as another pain began to build. “Though I confess I would rather have made it in more comfortable surroundings.”
Finally, a true complaint. Wentworth felt a surge of admiration for her fortitude. Immediately, Llewellyn was at his side, gently but firmly guiding him toward the door.
“Best leave us now, Captain. The real work begins soon.”
Wentworth woke with a start at the knock on his cabin door. He’d heard six bells rung, perhaps seven. “Come.”
The marine opened the door to Midshipman Hart. He stood before him, his young face grave. “Surgeon Hannigan requests your immediate presence, sir. There’s been a turn.”
Wentworth did not wait to hear more, pushing past the boy and striding rapidly toward the surgeon’s quarters. The passageways seemed longer than he remembered, the air thicker, the ship’s motion more pronounced. Above it all, his heart pounded.
He came to find Hannigan and Llewellyn bent over Anne; their faces set in expressions of alarm. The air was heavy with the metallic scent of blood.
“What has happened?” Wentworth demanded.
Hannigan glanced up briefly. “The child is born, Captain—a son—but Mrs Wentworth has begun bleeding. We are attending to it.”
“A son?” The word seemed to come from somewhere outside himself.
“Yes, and a fine one,” Llewellyn confirmed without looking up from her work. “Born a bit after the ship’s bell struck seven.”
Just then, the bells struck eight times to mark midnight. The woman smiled. “There now, see? He shares his father’s birthday for sure.”
Midnight. His birthday was done. But such a fine gift his wife had given him. The scene should be joyous, but Wentworth could feel only cold fear as he looked at Anne’s pale face.
“Will she—” He could not complete the question.
“I can promise nothing, sir,” Hannigan replied, his tone neutral. “We both are required here. Perhaps you might see to your son while we attend Mrs Wentworth.”
Only then did Wentworth notice the small bundle placed in a makeshift cradle fashioned from what appeared to be a sea chest drawer, padded with clothes. He moved toward it as if in a dream, looking down at the tiny, red-faced creature within.
The boy was indeed red, like a boiled lobster, and not much bigger.
His features were lost amid the wrinkles and the swollen newness of his face.
But he was breathing, wailing in fact, his tiny chest rising and falling with surprising strength.
Wentworth watched; one small fist escaped the swaddling and waved in the air with what seemed like indignation.
“He has a temper, that one,” Llewellyn remarked, sparing a glance from her work. “Came into the world howling like a gale.”
Wentworth reached out hesitantly, touching one finger to his son’s tiny hand. The minuscule fingers immediately curled around his thumb. The grip was no more noticeable than a fly on his skin. So small and yet the strongest forces he had ever encountered.
“Anne wanted to name him Edward. After my brother.”
“A fine, strong name,” Llewellyn agreed. “Now, if you’ll take the little gentleman to your cabin, Captain, we will see to your wife.”
Wentworth looked. “I cannot leave Anne.”
“You can, and you will,” the woman replied, her tone brooking no argument despite his being in command. “The best thing you can do for your wife now is care for your son and let us do what needs doing.”
Hannigan nodded in agreement. “We will send word the moment there is any news, Captain. I give you my word.”
The thought that someone else would be more fit for this duty crossed his mind. Was there anyone but himself and Eyerly amongst this flock to take care of Edward?
Wentworth gathered the small bundle that was his son, clasping the boy against his chest, taking care that the buttons of his coat did not scratch. The child seemed impossibly light yet somehow weightier than anything he had ever carried.
The hours that followed were the longest of Frederick Wentworth’s life. He sat in his cabin, holding his newborn son. He watched the boy’s changeling face become softer and more childlike over time. At every noise, he glanced at the door, expecting the worst.
Edward slept for the most part, waking occasionally to emit a forceful cry before settling again after Wentworth clumsily adjusted his position.
The captain found himself speaking to the boy, telling him about his mother, about the Laconia, about Minorca and the home they had left behind, about the uncertain future that awaited them in England.
Gabbering on was nonsense, of course, as the boy could understand nothing.
But he admitted to himself that speaking aloud helped calm his own fraying nerves.
“You have chosen an inconvenient time to join us, Edward,” he told the sleeping infant. “Though the navy has never been particularly concerned with convenient timing either. You’ll learn that lesson early.”
The boy’s only response was to yawn, his tiny mouth forming a perfect circle that Wentworth found curiously fascinating.
“You’ll be a vigorous, shouting, clambering child in just a short time,” he continued, studying the delicate arch of his son’s eyebrows, the translucent quality of his eyelids. “And then a young man. Perhaps you’ll follow me to sea, though your mother might have other ideas.”
The thought of Anne brought fresh anxiety. What was happening in the surgeon’s quarters? Why had no one come with news?
As if in answer to his unspoken question, a knock sounded. Before he could call them to enter, the door opened to Hannigan standing before him, his surgical apron stained with blood.
“Annie?” She would be mortified with his use of her Christian name in this instance. It did not matter.
The surgeon’s face, which had been set in lines of professional gravity, relaxed into a tired smile. “The bleeding has stopped. She is weak, but she will recover with proper care and rest.”
The relief was so intense that he feared his legs might give way. He steadied himself against the doorframe, careful not to disturb the sleeping boy.
“Thank God,” he said simply.
“Indeed,” Hannigan agreed. “It was a near thing, Captain. I won’t deceive you on that count. But your wife has a stout constitution.”
“May I see her?”
“Briefly. She is exhausted, but she asked for you and the child before she drifted off. She is sleeping now.”
Wentworth followed the surgeon back to find Anne looking alarmingly pale against the faded bedding but breathing steadily, her chest rising and falling in the rhythm of deep sleep. Llewellyn was tidying the space; all evidence of the crisis had been removed except for the lingering scent of blood.
“She’ll need careful tending in the coming days,” the woman whispered. “But she’s through the worst of it.”
Wentworth stood beside the cot, holding Edward so that if Anne were to open her eyes, she would see them both immediately. But she slept on, her body claiming the rest it desperately needed.
“The Lord indeed does giveth,” Wentworth murmured, recalling the biblical phrase from his childhood. Today at least, the Lord had given. Given him a son and given him more years with his darling girl. For that, Wentworth felt a gratitude beyond expression.
“You should rest too, Captain,” Hannigan suggested. “Mrs Wentworth will likely sleep until morning. Llewellyn will remain with her, and I’ll have something brought to your cabin for the boy.”
Wentworth nodded, his eyes still on Anne’s face. “I shall return at first light.”
“As you wish. And Captain,” the surgeon hesitated, then continued. “Congratulations on your son. He is remarkably strong for someone born in such circumstances.”
“He is a Wentworth,” the captain replied simply, as if that explained everything. And perhaps, he thought as he carried his sleeping son back to his cabin, it did.