She seemed to be in no pain, just terrified, but already losing consciousness; the baby was born in the ambulance, their little girl, perfect, beautiful, but dead. Laura died within ten minutes of arriving at the hospital.
They had been very kind, he said, and it was still something he was clearly grateful for. They took them off immediately, out of sight, Laura still on the stretcher, the baby carried by a nurse, and had refused to let him follow; but when he said, after sitting shocked and still in the emergency area, please, please, could he not hold the baby, a nurse had said it wasn’t usual. Why, in the name of God, was it not usual? Jillie wondered, struggling to maintain calm as the story was told. What could be more usual than that a parent would wish to hold a dead or dying baby and why should they not? Then, apparently, another nurse appeared and told him to follow her, and led him into a little room and said, ‘They’re just giving her a little wash, then we’ll bring her in,’ which they did. He had sat looking at her, at his daughter, so perfect and white and still, and tried to believe that it had really happened, that she would not suddenly draw a breath and cry, and he held her very close, trying to warm her for she was already growing cold, and telling her she was beautiful and he loved her.
And then they came for her and took her away and he didn’t argue, he didn’t have the strength, and they asked him if he would like to see Laura and he said yes. They led him to her, on a high bed, under a white sheet and again, she looked so perfect, so normal somehow, and he had taken her hand and kept turning it in his and kissing it over and over again, and then he had stood up and bent over her and kissed her face, the face he loved so much, the rosy dimpled face that was neither rosy nor dimpled any more but white and sweetly serene, and he sat and told her he loved her, that he would always love her, her and the baby, the baby they had agreed they would call Hope. That was what she carried with her – hope for their family and its future – and of course he would see they were never parted, but be together for the rest of time, lying in the little churchyard at West Hilton where Laura would be surrounded by people who loved her and would have loved Hope. Then a doctor came and said he must ask Tom to leave now, and he did so without arguing or without even questioning why, and when he went back to find his little daughter, his little Hope, she had been moved from the cubicle where they had sat together, and she was nowhere to be found for quite a long time, and he had hunted, increasingly desperate for her until the first nurse, the kind one, who had arranged for Tom to see her and hold her, had said she had been taken to the morgue but she wasn’t sure what would happen to her next.
‘What do you mean?’ Tom had said. ‘She’s my daughter. I want her to be with her mother and I want them to be buried together.’
And Tom suddenly became angry and walked out into the casualty area, shouting for a doctor. They kept telling him to be calm and to wait and he said he had been very calm and he couldn’t wait, in case they were taken away, Laura and Hope, and began rushing through all the doors into all the rooms and cubicles, and finally a doctor did appear and said would he please be quiet, and Tom said how could he be quiet, would the doctor be quiet if his wife and baby had both just died and he had no idea where they were? The doctor suddenly stopped and stood very still and said, ‘I’m sorry, Mr Knelston. So sorry, come with me.’ He had led Tom into what was obviously his own room and explained that post-mortems would have to be done, it was essential, so that they could try to discover what had caused the tragedy in the first place. ‘Post-mortems?’ Tom had said, staring at him. ‘You mean you’re going to . . . to . . .’ but he couldn’t even finish the sentence it was so horrible. The doctor said he could withhold his permission if he so wished, but it could be helpful to other women and other babies; and it was too much finally for Tom to confront or bear and he said no, no post-mortems. He wanted Laura and Hope kept as they were, quite perfect, and that as soon as he possibly could, he would arrange for them to be taken away to where he wanted them to be.
And that is where they now lay, Jillie discerned, after listening carefully and quietly for as long as seemed necessary; in the little churchyard at West Hilton, the village where Tom had been born and grew up and where he and Laura had been married.
‘And I hope,’ she said gently, ‘that is in some way a comfort?’
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Yes, of course it is. A very little way.’
She looked at his life, the bleak, solitary life of a young widower, loveless, childless, and she felt in that moment that she knew where her heart must lie, for she could feel it aching for him.
‘But,’ she said gently, after a long silence, ‘you said you wanted to ask me something?’
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Yes, if you don’t mind?’
And she thought how minding what he asked her would be the least, the very least of it. The very least she could do for him was answer, however difficult. And it was difficult, sitting in that cosy steamy café surrounded by smiling, happy people looking forward to Christmas.
‘Please ask. And I will try to answer.’
‘All right. Well, the first question is, could having the stitch – you know, the cervical stitch –’
‘Yes.’
‘Could that have caused it? Or made it more likely even?’
And filled with a relief that was palpable, that she moreover could pass on to him, she was able to say no, there was absolutely no way that the cervical stitch could have caused the condition that had so dreadfully ended the lives of Laura and her little daughter. She could see it was what he most wanted, indeed needed to hear, for he took a deep, almost life-giving breath and half smiled at her.
‘They did say it couldn’t have but I didn’t quite believe them, I had to know.’
‘Of course.’
‘Because I did read that it could be caused by, well, by previous surgery.’
‘Well, real surgery, a Caesarean section perhaps, could cause scarring and that in turn might affect the endometrium – that is the lining of the womb. But not a cervical stitch, no. Most emphatically not.’
He nodded and was silent for a bit, draining his already cold cup of tea.
‘And the other question?’
‘Oh. Well, that’s harder for you to answer, I’m sure. But – well, I have to know as much as can. I feel I owe it to Laura.’
‘Of course.’
‘So, the thing is, what I can’t help wondering. If she had had really good care, such as she might have had at St Thomas’, where you so kindly tried to get her a place, might they have detected it? And prevented it?’