Page 103 of The Summer Country

“She gave it to me. You’ll see. It says, inside. You can change it, take off the filigree, cover the inscription. Just so long as she has it.”

“That’s easily done, isn’t it?” said the midwife, looking meaningfully at Charles. She reached for the baby and scooped her expertly up, and this time Jenny didn’t fight her. “Up you get, little one.”

Jenny’s arms fell to her sides, numb. Her stomach and her arms felt empty, desolate.

Charles rose, pressing a kiss to the baby’s forehead. “Good-bye, sweetling. We’ll be with you again soon.”

Jenny stuffed her fist into her mouth, trying not to cry out.

The midwife glanced down at her, not without compassion. “My sister Rachel will nurse her with her own. Don’t worry, she’ll be fed and cared for.”

“And free.” Charles’s voice was hoarse. He knelt down next to Jenny, holding her hands; it felt less like an embrace and more like a restraint. “Remember that. She’ll be free.”

Jenny stared up at him, almost hating him at that moment, wanting to snap at him, to push him away.

“It’s only for a time,” he said softly, as the midwife, with a nod, disappeared silently out the door. “We’ll have her back, I promise you that.”

Promises, promises, what were promises? He had promised so much and done none of it and her stomach was empty, her baby gone, farther away by the moment, and it didn’t matter right now that she had been a part of this, that she had agreed; her baby was gone.

Jenny turned her head into Charles’s side and wept, great, ugly, gasping sobs that soaked through his shirtfront and dripped down onto his buckskin breeches.

He held her and murmured nonsense to her, as though she were their child, the child they had lost. “Hush, hush, my love. Hush, hush. It’s only for a time . . . for a time . . .”

Light-headed and hollow, Jenny pushed away at last. “I’d best go back,” she said flatly. She felt like a husk, emptied of everything.

Charles smoothed the hair back from her face, looking at her with such concern and love that her stomach cramped, guilt and love and resentment mixed all together. “You’ll go to Nanny Bell straightaway?”

“Straightaway,” Jenny lied. It was so hard to hate him when she knew that he was suffering too. But she did, just a little. Hated him and loved him and wanted to hold him close and push him away, all at once.

“I wish I could see you back.”

“Oh, and no one would comment on that,” said Jenny, pushing up to a sitting position, even though it made her head swim. She looked down at her soiled skirt. “I’ll tell them the baby was born dead, on the road to Harrow. There’s no reason for anyone to doubt me.”

Charles wrapped his arms around her, holding her tightly, so tightly that Jenny wasn’t sure who was meant to be comforting whom.

“I’ll call on your mistress tomorrow,” he said, standing and reaching down to help her up.

“Don’t,” said Jenny. It wasn’t just that Master Robert wouldn’t like it. She wasn’t sure she could bear it, not right now, to see Charles and not be able to go to him, knowing their daughter was with strangers, far in the hills of St. Andrew. “Please.”

The walk back to Beckles felt endless, her legs like lead, her stomach cramping, blood seeping from between her legs. Step by step, she made her way, the sunlight blurring in her eyes. She hadn’t meant to take Charles’s advice, but she found herself going not to the house but to Nanny Bell’s hut.

“My baby—she was born dead,” she managed, and fainted, ungracefully, on Nanny Bell’s stoop.

When she woke, Nanny had a strengthening posset for her. Nanny didn’t ask any questions; no one did. Babies died, some by accident, some by design, and it was always better not to inquire which.

It was night by the time she made her way back to the big house, to her mistress’s chambers. The candles had been blown out in Mary Anne’s room, and Jenny was grateful for that. All she wanted was to strip off her soiled dress, curl up on her pallet, and drift into oblivion.

She was creeping across the room when a hazy voice came from behind the netting of the great bed. “Where were you? I wanted you. I called and called and only Queenie came.”

Jenny had thought she was beyond tears, but they came all the same, clogging her throat, making her voice thick. “My baby died.”

“Oh, Jenny.” She could hear Mary Anne pulling herself up against the pillows, her voice thick with sleep and laudanum. “You’re not hurt?”

Not hurt? She felt like she’d been flayed, her emotions raw and aching. “Nanny Bell says I’ll heal.”

“Thank goodness for that,” said Mary Anne, with real feeling. Clearing her throat, she added, “Well, there’s one good thing to come of this. You can nurse Ned.”

Jenny stood there, in the middle of the room, grateful for the darkness that hid her. The idea of holding another child, nursing another child . . . it made her whole body recoil.