Unspoken: A story of secrets, love and revenge T. Belshaw (good books to read for beginners txt) 📖

‘I don’t mind,’ Miriam said. ‘We can always clean it up afterwards. I slept on the same mattress I had all of my babies on. There were a few stains, but they dried and…’ Miriam went quiet after receiving a hostile stare from Elsie.

‘Shall we put some sheets and pillows on the table then? It’s huge, you could fit two people on it,’ Edna suggested.

‘It won’t be the first time I’ve delivered on a table,’ replied Elsie. She pointed at Miriam. ‘You go upstairs and get some spotlessly clean sheets, a few pillows and a lot of towels.’ She turned to Edna. ‘You get me a bowl of hot water, some clean cloths and some disinfectant, if they don’t have any, I have some in my bag.’ She turned to Frank and seemed surprised to find him there. ‘As for you, well, I don’t know why you are here in the first place. A birthing room isn’t the place for men.’ She looked at me and tossed her head. ‘Babies are women’s business. Men shouldn’t be allowed to interfere, and I include doctors in that statement. What would they know about it?’ Her gaze returned to Frank. ‘Are you still here?’ she asked.

‘I was hoping to make myself useful,’ he said sulkily.

‘The best way you can do that, is by clearing off.’ Elsie pointed towards the back door. ‘Be gone, and don’t hang around outside either. You won’t like the noises coming from in here, so, I suggest you go for a long walk and when you’ve finished that, go for another one. This will take hours.’

Frank blew me a kiss, wished me good luck, and walked to the door.

‘Don’t go to The Old Bull either,’ said Elsie with a scowl. ‘Drunken men and new mothers don’t mix. She’ll need your support, not your drunken efforts to stand up by yourself.’

Miriam came downstairs with a pile of sheets and pillows. ‘Most of the clean towels are out on the line, I’ll just go and get them,’ she said, rushing to the back door.

Edna placed the enamel bowl that Miriam had used earlier, on the table, and tested the water temperature with her elbow. She tipped a capful of disinfectant into it and stirred it with her hand.

Elsie’s eyes turned to me.

‘Right, young lady. Up you get, and take your knickers off, you won’t be needing them.’

Edna and Elsie spread a sheet on the table and stacked three pillows at one end.

I took my pants off and eased myself onto the table. Elsie put one of her ham-sized hands on my chest and with more gentleness than I was expecting, pushed me back until my head was nestled into the pillows. I smiled at her but she wasn’t in the mood for pleasantries.

‘Right, open up. Let’s have a look at you.’

The last time I had been ordered to do that, had been by a dentist, but I did as I was told and she stuck her head between my knees. Something cold and metallic touched my bits and then I groaned as another contraction hit. Elsie fiddled about with whatever she had to fiddle about with, then her head appeared from between my open legs.

‘You’re further on than I thought, Alice. You’ll be a mother before tea time.’

She backed away and allowed Edna to wash my legs with the disinfected water, then she leaned over to examine my battered thighs.

‘What’s been going on here?’ she asked.

‘Pigs,’ I replied. ‘They thought I’d make a nice change for dinner.’

Chapter 57

June 1938

The time went slowly.

Every so often, Elsie would get me to spread my knees and she’d stick her head between them for a while, and then her face would appear, calm and reassuring.

‘Not yet, but things are moving on.’

I certainly wasn’t moving on. I had been on the table for almost four hours. I felt useless, I wasn’t allowed to do anything, I tried reading, but I kept dropping the book every time the contractions hit. By the time Miriam had picked up the book, wiped the cover down with a disinfected cloth and I’d found my place again, it was time for another one.

I almost began to look forward to the contractions, as at least they eased the boredom. I got severe cramp in my foot, twice and my right calf, three times, but Elsie was on hand to massage the painful limb for me. I wasn’t even allowed to do that by myself.

Miriam suggested we play music on my new gramophone, but less than one verse into the first record, Elsie told her to turn it off as she considered modern jazz music, the work of the devil and she couldn’t concentrate on what she was doing.

Miriam made tea, but Elsie only allowed me to have a quarter of a mug, even though I was thirsty.

‘You’ll only want to pee all the time and we don’t want to be traipsing back and forth to the lavatory all afternoon, do we?’

I agreed that we didn’t, but ten minutes later I found that it was either go to the bathroom or pee all over Elsie’s head while she was examining me.

When I was back on the table, I suddenly remembered I hadn’t asked Miriam about her date the night before. I say night, because she hadn’t come home by the time I went to bed.

‘Oh, it was lovely.’ Miriam closed her eyes and a look of beatific joy spread over her face.

‘And…’ I said, having waited a full thirty seconds for the juicy details to be imparted. Patience wasn’t on my list of virtues that afternoon.

‘Oh, it was lovely,’ Miriam oozed.

‘You already said that,’ I grunted, as another contraction made me arch my aching back.

‘Well.’ Miriam pulled up a chair and patted my hand. ‘He picked me up at—’

‘I know when he picked you up, I waved you off,’ I said irritably. ‘Come on, Miriam, get down to the nitty gritty. Did you get a smoochy kiss?’

‘We had