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Everyone beamed and fussed, chatted and laughed, pleased that their lordship was ecstatic and happy there would be a little one brought into the home.
She was not due yet, for by her husband’s reckoning, if he had impregnated her their first night together, their child would come in the spring, three months hence.
Her concerns had greatly affected her appetite and she was thin, Godwin said too thin, so she didn’t show for the actual reality of her pregnancy. If only the baby would be late a few weeks…she could manage to fool them all when it was born looking like a full term infant.
She stared out the window of her bedroom and whispered, “Please let my reckoning be wrong. Let me have a few weeks, and then the baby would be seven months…yes, that would work.”
Time was not on her side and by her reckoning the baby was only a week late. Would that serve or had her luck run out?
As she saw the storm raging outside and felt those first awful pangs, she knew her baby was on its way.
The midwife fussed over her as Sara grabbed her wrist and said, “It is too soon…it isn’t right, the baby won’t be right…not due yet. Perhaps it will die.” She put on an act as best she could as she grabbed hold of the sheets and screamed in agony of mind and body.
“Whist now, m’lady, babies have no care for nature, they don’t hear the winds harshly blowing over Cornwall…baby says ‘tis time,” the midwife said gently. “Now don’t fret, you’ll do and so will the baby. I have birthed many a babe before it was due.”
His lordship had already been sent out of the room and paced with a frenzy he had never known before, but before he left his wife he asked the midwife, “It is scarcely seven months…scarcely…will our child survive?”
“There is no telling until the child is born. Out with you now,” the midwife took command.
Hours went by and finally he could stand it no more. He burst into the room and demanded, “My wife…how is she?”
“Fine, fine, her water broke and as this is her first, it will be a hard birth…and there is naught we can do but keep her comfortable ‘til the little one decides to join us. Now whist with you, m’lord.”
When he had left, the midwife said quietly, “From your size, m’lady…I think this babe is as close to full term as ever I have seen.”
“Yes, yes, it is obvious his lordship had me before our marriage then,” Sara improvised.
“Aye, but,” the midwife shrugged as though she had her doubts. “Well then…we’ll manage if keeping this quiet is what you be wishful of.”
Six more hours passed and a healthy son finally made his debut. He was a large, albeit wrinkled, boy child. The midwife roundly spanked him on his rump and he wailed with his objection. Godwin and all the household turned to one another with joy as they watched their lordship race up the stairs.
Commotion at Ravensbury turned into the sounds of a festival. The male child had given them what they needed, another Ravensbury to carry on.
* * * * *
Godwin’s son was brought to him and as he held the boy in his arms, all his dreams were shattered. Godwin was not only a good man, but a knowing one.
“But…he is so large…larger than most newborns at seven months. How can he be seven months?” he said out loud.
Dawning took hold. He was too worldly not to realize.
He had been used as a fool. He had believed himself Sara’s only love. He had believed no other had her…she was so young, how could anyone else have bedded her already?
He had waited all these months for his child, and this child was not his!
A lie…it had all been a lie!
He went to his wife’s room and looked at the midwife. “Leave us,” he said.
He waited for her to close the door at her back and turned to Sara, unable to go near her, he clasped his hands at his back and asked, his voice scarcely audible, “Whose babe did you birth today, Sara?”
“Godwin, he is gone…you are here. ‘Tis yours. You felt its first kick, you cared, you care still. He is your son.”
Her words ripped him apart. His eyes met hers and he knew in that moment she had never loved him. How had this happened? What had he done wrong? Why was he being punished so wickedly?
“Whose son is he?” he asked still, and felt his teeth grind.
“What does it matter?”
