Authors: Heather Graham
T
hey were not to wait as long as any of them had anticipated for Jassy’s baby to be born.
The doctor from Jamestown had promised to make it down to the hundred by the twenty-fifth of February, but it was only the fifteenth of that month when she felt the first startling pain.
She was out in the kitchen with Jonathan when she felt the constriction come around her, like a steel band tightening around her lower back. She had been bending over a pot of stew, and at first she felt as if she had merely stood over it too long. The last weeks had been wretched for her. She could find no such thing as a comfortable position, not to sit in, stand in, or sleep in. Rising was difficult, and walking had its annoyances, and she was ever in need of a chamber pot. She had grown very anxious and longed for the birth.
Straightening, Jassy held her hands upon her hips and stretched, and in a few moments the pain faded. Jonathan Hayes looked at her worriedly. “We can take stock of the spices later, milady.”
She shook her head, smiling. “We don’t know when the next ship is due, and I believe that we are running low on salt. Let’s continue.”
Jonathan went onward to assess the cloves, and Jassy
listened to him as he droned on, marking down the amounts of various herbs and spices in Jamie’s ledger. Suddenly she could hear Jonathan speak no more, for the constriction came again, and no little twinge, but an agonizing knot about her. She jumped to her feet, gasping with it, squeezing her eyes tightly shut.
“Milady—”
“I am all right,” she said, but the band constricted tighter and tighter. She fell back into the chair and looked at Jonathan. “I am
not
all right.”
“I’ll get help.” Jonathan grabbed his cloak from the peg and went racing out into the yard. The pain began to ebb again, and Jassy worried that she might have given poor Jonathan a false alarm. She started to rise again, then felt a flood of water cascade from her, drenching her skirts and petticoats. She gripped hard to the table, for the cascade came with another pain, this one more fierce than ever before.
The door burst inward, and a cold gust of wind followed Tamsyn into the kitchen. He came hurriedly over to her.
“It is the baby,” he said.
“It is too early!” Jassy protested.
Tamsyn smiled at her. “Jassy, girl, there’s none can tell a babe eager to enter the world that it’s too early. They will come when they choose to do so, and that’s a fact. You need to get up to your bed, like a good lass.”
“Then what?’
“Then, lass, you wait. Come, I’ll help you.” He set an arm about her shoulders. The door burst inward again, and Jamie was there. He stood, framed by the doorway, very tall and dark and forbidding. He looked at Tamsyn, and then his wife. He drew off his gloves as he came into the kitchen, tossing them upon the table. “Move aside, man!” he told Tamsyn, stooping low to sweep Jassy into his arms.
“No!” she cried, and she looked anxiously to Tamsyn. “Jamie, he studied at Oxford, please …” She hooked her arms around his neck, shivering. The birth water had
made her very cold. “I am soaking you,” she added in distress.
Jamie gave no heed to her sodden condition but stared hard at Tamsyn. He was not the same man he had once urged from the Crossroads Inn. He was clean-shaven, and he often smoked upon a clay pipe, but he seldom inbibed in anything stronger than ale, and he was frugal in that taste. Now, as he looked at the man, Jamie hesitated only briefly. He could not be sure of the man’s credentials, but Jassy trusted in him, and perhaps that was the most important thing. “Come along, then,” Jamie said.
Jassy whispered her thanks against his shirt.
He strode through the breezeway from the kitchen to the house, coming in by the dining room. The cold February wind struck them hard, and he felt her shiver anew. He saw Amy Lawton sweeping the hallway as he entered the main house, and he called to her quickly. “Go to the Tannen house. Fetch Molly. Where is Elizabeth?”
“I’m here!” Elizabeth called from the stairway.
“The babe comes,” Jamie said briefly. He strode on up the stairs with Jassy in his arms. In their room he set her down and instantly set upon the hooks and eyes upon her gown. She looked up at him, shivering miserably. He tried to pull the gown over her head.
“You shouldn’t be here,” she whispered. “I am a disaster.”
“Let’s get this off.” He pulled the gown over her head. She wore no corset or stays but only a shift and two loose petticoats. With the dress gone, she stood and backed away from him. “I can manage, Jamie, honestly.”
“Get over here!” he commanded her gruffly. “You cannot manage.”
“Jamie—”
Elizabeth had followed them into the room by then. She cleared her throat softly. “I’ll find a new gown,” she said.
Another pain seized upon Jassy hard, and she gritted her teeth as tears stung her eyes and she doubled over.
“Little fool!” Jamie chastised her. He caught hold of her, taking her hands in his own. She gripped hard in return. Harder and harder. “Easy!” he whispered to her. “Breathe deep, Jassy. Easy, love, easy …”
The band of agony eased, and she went limp against him. He took the opportunity to strip her of her petticoats and shift, and Elizabeth came quickly over to assist him, and to slide the clean, dry nightgown over her head. By then Tamsyn, too, was standing in the doorway. Jamie stared at him hard. “All right, then, man. What now?”
“Now she must lie down and wait, milord.”
“That’s all?”
“That is all that can be done,” Tamsyn replied. Elizabeth drew back the sheets, and Jamie swept Jassy up and laid her out upon the bed.
Jassy caught his hand. “Jamie,” she whispered. “It’s too early.”
“Not so very early,” he told her encouragingly. He glanced at Tamsyn. He wished that he knew more about the birth process. He had learned so much in life. He could sail a ship, tramp his way through any wilderness, and survive off the land or the sea, but he didn’t know how to ease a single furrow of pain from Jassy’s brow, and he didn’t have any idea if the babe was really too early, if it could survive at all.
“Two weeks,” Tamsyn said, “if my old eyes don’t deceive me. I’m a-thinking this lad might have found his roots on the very night of your wedding, milord, and therefore he has chosen to come just a mite too soon. Things should come well enough.” He looked at Elizabeth. “Lady Elizabeth, if you would find Molly when she comes, have her tend to the water we need, and the cloths to wipe up his little lordship when he arrives, and for Jass—milady.”
“What can I do?” Jamie said.
“Why, milord, perhaps you should go and smoke a pipe and have a whiskey. It will be a while.”
Jamie shook his head. “I promised her that I would stay with her.”
“Then stay with her, milord,” Tamsyn said, and smiled
ruefully. “Cool her brow, hold her hand, and be at her side.”
It was exactly what he did.
The man, Tamsyn, seemed awkward at first about touching Jassy in Jamie’s presence. Then he seemed to shrug, realizing that Lord Cameron was in the birth room to stay, and that was that. Jamie knew that Tamsyn was aware of his doubt, and in the end Tamsyn squared his shoulders and spoke to Jamie as he worked over Jassy. Jassy winced and clung to her husband’s hand. Jamie’s flesh went white where she gripped against him, but he made no sound.
“We are in good stead,” Tamsyn said cheerfully. “She has come far already, and the babe is in the proper position.”
A sigh of relief escaped Jassy. Jamie looked at her pained features and knew that she was thinking of Joan Tannen aboard the
Sweet Eden
, and of the babe stillborn upon the vessel.
Her features screwed up into a curious mask. Jamie lay his hand upon her abdomen and felt the tremendous tightening in her womb. Her fingers shook, then dug into his hand again. “They come so fast!” she cried piteously.
And they did come fast. Elizabeth and Molly came back with the water and the cloths. Jamie wiped her face, and he spoke to her reassuringly each time that the pains subsided, but they came again and again, faster and faster.
She pleaded with him once to leave, but he met Molly’s eyes over her form, and Molly shook her head. A second later Jassy’s fingers crunched down upon his, and he held her, trying to take some of the pain away, trying to give to her some of his strength. At one point she seemed to sleep. Her grip eased from his. He stood, stared at Tamsyn, and paced the room, his hands locked behind his back. Elizabeth and Molly looked on.
Jamie threw his hands into the air. “Do something!”
“Do what, Lord Cameron?”
“Hurry this along. She cannot stand so much pain.”
Molly, Tamsyn, and Elizabeth all gazed at one another.
Elizabeth stepped forward, reaching for Jamie’s hand. “It is not so very long, Jamie. It has been just a matter of hours. Many more hours may go by before the babe comes; it is nature’s way. You do not understand so much about babes coming into the world.”
“And you do?” Jamie said.
Elizabeth flushed. “I was there when your sister bore your niece, My Lord Cameron, so, yes, I know something of it!”
Jamie lowered his head in acknowledgment. Elizabeth trembled slightly. She had never seen him even remotely humble before. She touched his arm. “I know that everything will be well, Jamie.”
Jassy screamed suddenly from the bed, awakened by the ferocity of another pain. Jamie flew back to her side, his face dark, his hands shaking. “Easy, Jassy, easy.”
“I cannot bear this—”
“You will bear it. Breathe.”
“I cannot—”
“I command it, love. Breathe and hold my hand, and let loose of my son, madame.”
“Let loose of your son!”
Her eyes opened in a flash of temper, and Jamie laughed. “Aye, lady, come now. You dally here!”
She lay back, telling him that he was a vile knave. When the next pain seized her, she swore like a dockhand and dug her nails into his hand, but she did not cry or weaken or scream. The pains were coming very, very fast.
Tamsyn realized that they would not be waiting hours and hours. The babe was coming before nightfall.
Lord Cameron’s face was ashen as he watched over his wife. Tamsyn lightly touched his arm. “The babe comes soon.”
Jamie started, sitting up. Molly awaited the child with swaddling, and Tamsyn talked to Jassy. “You never could wait for anything, lass. You never did learn patience, and you never could do things in half measures. You couldn’t marry a merchant, but you had to have a fine lord, and that, lass, you did in a hurry too. Seems that this little
lad will be one like his mother. Now push, Jassy, love. Give him a push.”
“I cannot!” She fell back in exhaustion. Jamie caught her shoulders and pressed her forward. “Jassy, ’tis Tamsyn talking to you, and you must give him heed.”
“Oh!” she cried out, and she tried to escape his hold and give up. He would not release her, and she was forced to bear down.
“I see a very dark head!” Molly cried enthusiastically.
“Again!” Tamsyn persisted.
“Jassy, I will have my son now!”
“A daughter,” Jassy said argumentatively.
“Push!” Jamie said gratingly.
And the baby came from her. It was the greatest relief that Jassy had ever known. Life spilled from her in a great, heavy gush, and the pain was numbed.…
And she heard the cry, the sharp, plaintive wail that came from her newborn infant. Sharp, plaintive, and very lusty.
“A son, at that!” Tamsyn laughed. “And very much alive and well.”
“Oh!”
A son …
Just as Jamie had commanded.
The squalling infant passed from Tamsyn’s hands to Molly, who quickly and tenderly swept him into swaddling and began to clean his little face. Jamie quickly and vehemently kissed Jassy fully upon the lips, running his knuckles over her cheeks. She was dazed, but still she thought that he looked upon her with great tenderness. But he was up then, and demanding his child from Molly. He stood in the candlelight and stared down upon the tiny new life, lifting away the covering and inspecting every bit of the child. He smiled, and he looked striking when he turned back to his wife with pleasure and exuberance.
“Perfect, my love. Ten fingers, ten toes, a stubborn chin, blue eyes, and very dark hair, I
believe
. It’s quite sodden.”
The new Cameron howled, and Jassy saw a tiny fist protrude from the coverings. A sharp sensation stung her breasts, and she felt them swell. “May I see him?” she whispered. She tried for the strength to sit up but was exhausted. Despite the cold of winter, sweat trickled through her hair and dampened her forehead.
“Jassy, one more time,” Tamsyn said to her, and she looked at him in confusion. “One last time, love. The birth sac must come now. Push for me, lass.”
It was not so hard that time. She was so anxious to see her son. She gritted her teeth and bore down, and again she felt the most wonderful sensation of relief. She fell back, closed her eyes, and breathed in exhaustion, but when she opened her eyes again, Jamie was hovering over her, and he very carefully placed the baby into her arms.
The love that swelled in her heart was instant and total. He seemed very tiny, but he was perfect. His mouth was open and his screaming was probably quite horrible, but it was delightful to her ears. His eyes
were
blue, a dark blue, like Jamie’s, though she knew they might change and take on her lighter hue. His cap of hair was all Jamie’s, though, very dark and rich and in startling plenty for a newborn. She loved his little gnome’s face, wrinkled and pink and knotted up in the effort that drew forth his lusty howls. She, too, pushed the swaddling back. He
was
quite perfect. He was long and was very certainly a little boy, and though he wasn’t chubby, he didn’t seem to have suffered the loss of the extra weeks he should have spent in the womb.
She started to shake. Her nightmare vision was really at rest. Her son had been born alive, and he was beautiful.
“Oh, Jamie!” she whispered, and she was afraid she was going to burst into tears. “He is … fine.”
“He is magnificent,” Jamie corrected her. He gently touched his son’s cheek with his finger, his hand seeming huge against the tiny face. Then he brushed her lip with his thumb, and she looked into his eyes. “He is magnificent,” Jamie repeated.