25. Cartmel Forest

Back at Mary Vale, Zelda cuddled Harry’s son in her arms. Marvelling at his silky soft hair and big blue eyes, she kissed his warm pink cheek. ‘He is so beautiful!’

Diana smiled indulgently. ‘He’s the spit of his father.’

Holding the gurgling baby up so she could smile at him, Zelda marvelled at how much Teddy had grown. ‘Aren’t you a lovely little boy?’ she cooed.

Teddy, who couldn’t quite smile yet, blew bubbles instead. ‘Cheeky!’ Zelda teased as she hugged him. ‘Oh, to think I’ll have my own baby to cuddle soon.’

‘Better get plenty of sleep: night feeding is a nightmare,’ Diana warned.

‘I plan to breast-feed, just like you,’ Zelda announced.

‘It’s the best thing to start with, if you can,’ Diana agreed. ‘Apart from the cracked nipples,’ she said with a grimace. ‘Sister Ada has some marvellous cream for that particular problem, but I’m sure you, little herb-mixer,’ she teased, ‘will whip up a salve to solve the problem.’

Fed up with being dangled and admired, Teddy turned towards the sound of his mother’s voice. ‘Oh-oh! He’s getting restless,’ Zelda said, as she passed the fretful baby back to his mum, who quickly unbuttoned her blouse so Teddy could suckle. Twirling his little feet in the air, the baby latched on and sucked noisily.

‘Heavens!’ Diana laughed, as she readjusted him in her arms. ‘Take it easy, darling, or you’ll be sick.’

Zelda gazed fondly at her friend, who now had a little colour in her cheeks and, though still on the thin side, had put on a little weight despite her son’s lusty appetite. As if reading her thoughts, Diana turned to Zelda. ‘Joking apart, Zel, I can’t thank you enough for the tonics you’ve made for me,’ she said with a grateful smile. ‘At first I thought, how can a bunch of herbs make me feel any stronger, but now I really think they have made a difference.’ At that, Teddy gave a loud hiccup. ‘And Teddy thanks you too.’

Modest Zelda blushed, but it was clear from the sparkle in her eyes that she was, in fact, delighted by Diana’s kind words.

‘Ada and Sister Mary Paul have been looking after you too,’ she reminded Diana.

‘I know! Sister Mary Paul slipped a meat pie into my room the other day, and a little piece of cake too, dear sweet woman that she is.’ Diana sighed as she again rearranged her baby on her breast. ‘I honestly don’t know how I would have survived without Mary Vale,’ she admitted with tears in her eyes. ‘Having you, Gracie, Ada, and all of my friends, and the babies too, I feel like I have a real family here. God knows how Teddy and I will survive struggling along on our own.’

Zelda laid a hand on Diana’s arm. ‘Don’t think about that now,’ she advised, purposefully changing the subject. ‘How is baby George?’

‘Adorable!’ Diana declared. ‘They’ve been sleeping side by side in adjacent cots since the day they were born.’ She gave an amused smile as she continued, ‘Now that they’re a bit bigger, I lay them down on the nursery rug for a little roll around; you wouldn’t believe how much noise they make, or how they try to grab hold of each other with their little fingers. It’s so sweet.’

Zelda laughed. ‘When they’re bigger and stronger, they’ll be rolling around on the floor like naughty lion cubs.’

Diana gave a wistful smile. ‘Sometimes I have the pair of them in my arms, one on the breast, the other on the bottle – it’s a bit of a juggling act – but I actually like the feel of two little boys in my arms.’ She paused before she added, ‘To be honest, I’m worried sick about what will happen to George.’

‘Has Father Ben found anybody suitable for him?’ Zelda asked.

Diana shook her head. ‘Not so far. He told me several couples were interested but had decided against it: they felt it was unfair to place a child of colour in an environment that was predominantly white. I can see his point, but I’d absolutely hate little George to go into an orphanage.’

‘Have you been in touch with Marie?’ Zelda enquired.

Diana nodded. ‘I write occasionally, but not as often as I promised; it seems wrong to keep going on about how adorable her baby is, like rubbing salt in a wound.’

Zelda nodded in agreement. ‘It might be painful to hear news of George if she’s in the process of trying to let go.’

‘Ada said more or less the same thing,’ Diana confessed. ‘She thought that Marie needed time to get over her loss, not to be constantly reminded of it.’

‘Poor Marie,’ Zelda said, as she rose to her feet, checking the time on the wall clock. ‘I’d better get back to work.’

‘What are you brewing up now, little Miss Magic?’ Diana teased.

‘I’ve just made a new salve for Frank that I need to pot and deliver to Ada,’ Zelda replied.

Diana smiled. ‘Who would ever have thought you would be on first-name terms with Frank Arkwright? You used to run a mile at the sight of him!’

‘We’ve settled our differences,’ Zelda said. ‘He even brings me logs for the wood-burner these days.’

Seeing Zelda grimace as she struggled to her feet, Diana frowned. ‘Is your baby sitting on a nerve? Towards the end Teddy always lay somewhere uncomfortable,’ she recalled.

‘And this one too!’ Zelda chuckled. ‘Right where it hurts the most.’

‘Take care, dear. Don’t go overdoing it,’ Diana warned. ‘You’ve not got long to go now.’

Zelda supported her burgeoning tummy. ‘I’ll be careful,’ she promised.

After putting on her coat, Zelda hurried to her shed, where she collected the basket that she kept for gathering herbs. Feeling a little guilty that she hadn’t informed Diana that she was going for a walk in the woods, where she hoped to find the freshest stinging nettles for her tonic brew, Zelda set off down the back lane. It was a cold, bright clear morning, with perfect views of the surrounding fells. Feeling energized by the low-lying sun, Zelda lengthened her steps as she considered what other fresh herbs she might find in the nearby woods and meadows. Though the hedges were stark and bare at this time of the year, Zelda knew they would soon be teeming with primroses and snowdrops, and she had been told by Ada that the woods in the springtime were an ocean of shimmering bluebells.

Reaching the woods just under the shadow of Cartmel Fell, Zelda cautiously made her way along the winding pathways to a particular patch of comfrey, or knitbone, as the locals called it, which grew in abundance throughout the winter months and was marvellous for the treatment of burns, scalds and bruises. After snipping off a large number of comfrey stalks with her scissors, Zelda moved on along the path. Progressing beneath a canopy of majestic chestnut and oak trees, the shade from which made the narrow path slippery wet at this time of the year, Zelda carefully balanced her basket against her big tummy. Plodding on, determined to get to a bed of nettles that grew just further up the path, Zelda suddenly felt a little light-headed. Stumbling awkwardly, her foot slipped on a tree root and she tumbled to the ground.

‘ZUT!’ she exclaimed.

After getting to her feet, Zelda felt even more light-headed, and, chiding herself for overdoing it, she decided she would return another day to collect the nettles; but, as she turned to retrace her steps, a gush of warm water ran down her legs.

‘Oh, no!’ Zelda cried in horror.

Knowing she was a long way from the road and even further away from Mary Vale filled Zelda with alarm.

‘I have to get back,’ she frantically muttered as she hurried as fast as she could back up the path. ‘Oh, why did I come here in the first place?’ she raged at herself.

For months she had done her best to keep her baby safe, and now with only days to go before her due date she had decided to go for a long walk alone.

‘Stupid! Stupid!’ she scolded herself, stopping dead in her tracks as a pain in the small of her back literally took her breath away.

Unable to stand upright, she crouched low on the ground, waiting for the pain to pass; then, hardly daring to breathe, she rose and very cautiously set off again. She had gone no more than a few feet when another pain shot through her belly. Now truly terrified, Zelda placed herself firmly against the vast trunk of an ancient oak tree, which she pressed against as the pain surged through her pelvic region.

‘ARGGGHHH!’ she groaned.

Not daring to move, Zelda stayed exactly where she was.

‘What on earth am I going to do?’ she said out loud.

It was clear that walking increased the probability of starting off the pains, so, cautiously sliding down the tree trunk, she sat at its base and desperately tried to compose herself.

‘Oh, God,’ she groaned.

Even if she yelled for help nobody would hear her here in this wild wood.

Though she was panicking, Zelda took deep breaths to steady her nerves; then, feeling a little calmer, she slowly rose to her feet and almost crawled along the path. Just when she thought she might make it to the edge of the wood, another pain seized her, and this time she knew that she could simply go no further. An animal instinct gripped Zelda; casting her eyes frantically about, she spotted two huge oaks under which was a heap of dry autumn leaves. Feeling hot and starting to sweat, Zelda dragged herself to the spot and unbuttoned her winter coat, which she laid loosely over herself. Lying back looking up at the winter sky through the filigree of remaining leaves fluttering in the treetops, Zelda was startled by the flight of a Great Spotted Woodpecker, which flashed its bright red feathers at her before landing on a bough just above her head. Listening to the rhythmic tapping of the bird’s pointed beak, Zelda was gripped by another contraction that caused her to cry out. ‘ARGHHH! Help me!’ she wailed. ‘Please help me!’

With Sister Mary Paul’s measurements for this year’s Christmas tree clearly written down, Frank Arkwright attached Captain to the old farm cart and set off at a slow pace along the road that led to the forest. Frank smiled to himself as he recalled the old nun’s description of a perfect Christmas tree. ‘It mustn’t be too tall, or it will catch the ceiling, and it mustn’t block the front door, and cut it fresh so I don’t have to sweep up pine needles every five minutes. Oh, and it must have enough space around the base for all our presents.’

‘I’ll do mi best, Sister,’ Frank had good-naturedly promised.

Enjoying the clear bright winter day and the nearby smell of a bonfire burning damp leaves, Frank felt a pang of guilt. He knew he had done his bit for the war effort when on active service: nobody could have been more committed than him and his unit. He had lost an eye serving his country, but he was always haunted by the thought that he should (even now) be fighting at the Front, something he had confessed to his commanding officer before he was discharged.

‘I don’t think so, son, not with only one good eye,’ the officer had barked.

His answer may have been brutal in its delivery, but Frank knew that the officer was right – his eyesight wasn’t good enough to aim a rifle and kill a man – nevertheless guilt was always there.

‘Looking on the bright side,’ he thought to himself, ‘thanks to the talents of clever little Zelda I look a damn sight better than I used to.’

The lass had come up with an amazing ointment that had slowly healed his inflamed skin, and to this day Frank could never understand why she had gone to so much trouble for him. Over time, as their friendship grew, Zelda had blushingly admitted to Frank that she had initially been petrified of him.

‘So why put yourself out to help a miserable bugger like me?’ he had teased.

‘I have the knowledge right here,’ she had exclaimed as she tapped her head. ‘So why not use it? Also,’ she had added guiltily, ‘somebody in my country caused you this terrible injury. If I can change things for the better, then I will feel less responsible.’

Seeing her bright, little earnest face aflame with emotion had touched Frank deeply.

‘I think you’ve got a heart of gold,’ he had told her gruffly. ‘A right proper little Florence Nightingale!’

As old Captain clip-clopped down the lane, Frank lit one of his roll-up cigarettes; then, just as he was settling himself more comfortably on the wooden seat, he heard a high-pitched cry that caused Captain to shy and shake his harness. Clicking the horse into a trot, Frank wondered if the sound was that of an animal in pain.

‘Perhaps it’s a hare caught in a trap,’ he wondered.

Another loud cry coming from the nearby woods convinced him it was not an animal but a person in trouble.

‘Eh up, boy,’ Frank urged the horse, which responded to its master and trotted on even more quickly.

When Frank reached the forest, which he had explored daily as a boy and knew like the back of his hand, he tethered the horse to a tree before setting out along the forest path that Zelda had taken less than two hours earlier.

Meanwhile poor Zelda, half crazed with pain, was lying on a soft bed of leaves, gasping for breath. When another contraction engulfed her, she simply hadn’t the energy to scream any more; instead she rolled on to her side and grunted like an animal. And that’s how Frank found her.

‘Jesus Christ!’ he cried, as he rushed towards her writhing body.

‘The baby’s coming,’ Zelda gasped. ‘Help me, please help me, Frank.’

The sight of her small pale face and her enormous dark eyes full of pain brought tears to Frank’s manly heart. Leaning down, he gently stroked her damp, tangled red curls.

‘Don’t you go fretting yourself, lass, I’ll have you back home in no time,’ he soothed.

‘No!’ she yelled. ‘The baby’s coming now, you’ve got to help me,’ she implored.

Frank gazed at her in horror. He was a soldier and a farmer; how could he deliver a baby in the forest all on his own?

‘I’d be better off facing a shooting squad,’ he thought grimly.

As Zelda stiffened and her back arched to ride the pain, Frank gripped her hand in his; barely noticing the blood she had drawn with her fingernails, he smiled and said, ‘You’re a natural. Almost as good as my best ewe.’

Zelda smiled weakly. ‘I’ve never been compared to a sheep before.’

‘You’re bonnier,’ he said kindly.

In the brief time they had before another contraction consumed her, Zelda asked Frank to lay her coat underneath her body so that she didn’t give birth in a bed of leaves. As he tenderly arranged the coat, Zelda gripped his hand hard.

‘Do you think you can do this, Frank?’

Looking her straight in the eye, Frank didn’t flinch as he spoke the honest truth. ‘I’ve delivered puppies, kittens, a couple of foals and about a hundred lambs. I can do this, lass, I promise.’

Seeing his steady gaze and trusting completely in him, Zelda lay back and for the first time relaxed; if she were going to give birth in a forest with Frank Arkwright acting as midwife, then so be it, she thought to herself. Less than an hour later Zelda, under Frank’s vigilant care, pushed her baby into a world loud with the call of woodpeckers and blackbirds. Gathering the little wet bundle into his arms, Frank almost wept with relief when the baby flailed its tiny arms in the air and wailed.

‘A girl!’ he sobbed as he handed her to Zelda.

‘A little girl,’ Zelda sobbed too. ‘Izaak’s beautiful daughter.’