Hope - Lesley Pearse [244]
Nell perched on the bed supporting the baby, so tired she felt she could drop to the floor at any minute, but she knew she couldn’t go back to bed until Betsy’s hunger was satisfied and she was back in her crib.
She could have understood Hope’s reaction better if she’d been informed officially of Bennett’s death. But the Captain clearly didn’t think he was dead, so why should Hope believe it to be so?
After some twenty minutes of feeding, Betsy fell asleep. Nell took her from Hope’s breast and winded her, then put her back into the crib. As she turned back to Hope, she saw she hadn’t even covered her breasts.
‘Can’t you even cover yourself?’ Nell said angrily. ‘Do you know how tired I am? Can’t you think of anyone but yourself?’
There was no reply, and Nell was so incensed that she slapped Hope’s face hard. But it had no effect – her sister just lay there as before, as if she couldn’t see, hear or feel anything.
‘You’re wicked,’ she shouted. ‘Even the most miserable wretches that end up in the workhouse will take care of their own. As soon as it’s light I’m going to send for Dr Cunningham, because I don’t know what to do with you any more.’
She left the room then, fearing she’d do the girl a mischief if she remained with her.
‘I don’t know what to do, Master Rufus,’ Nell sobbed when he dropped by the next morning. ‘I’m all in, I can’t do no more.’
Rufus had been in Keynsham collecting some corn for his chickens and on an impulse decided to stop off at Willow End to see Hope and her baby. The moment he saw Nell he knew something was drastically wrong. Her eyes were puffy with crying and she looked completely exhausted.
Then she related how it had been for her in the last ten days since Captain Pettigrew’s letter and began crying again, sobbing out that she was afraid Hope would end up in an asylum.
Rufus hadn’t seen Hope since the day she came over to the gatehouse, but Matt and Amy had called just a few days after Betsy’s birth and they’d reported back to him that both mother and child were doing well, in fact they said they’d never seen a happier new mother.
He hadn’t heard about the letter from Angus Pettigrew, however. If he had, he would have called immediately.
Rufus could well imagine that getting such a shock so soon after giving birth would be shattering, but like Nell he couldn’t understand why it would make Hope reject her baby.
Nell showed him the letter from Angus, but to him it didn’t sound unduly alarming, for there were only three or four lines about Bennett and the rest was taken up with what the Captain had been doing and the plans for yet another bombardment of Sebastopol.
‘He wouldn’t have written about Bennett’s sickness so lightly if he thought there was a possibility he might die,’ Rufus said.
‘No, he wouldn’t,’ Nell sobbed. ‘But it is suspicious that Bennett hasn’t written himself. Even if he was so poorly he couldn’t hold a pen, surely he would have asked someone to write for him?’
Rufus agreed on that point, but he had no intention of encouraging Nell to think the worst. ‘He probably did, but it just hasn’t got here,’ he said firmly. ‘Now, you go and rest, Nell. I’ll go and talk to Hope.’
Rufus walked into Hope’s room without knocking and went straight to the window to pull the curtains back. Betsy was asleep in her crib, but as he turned back from the window and saw how much Hope had changed since he last sawher before the birth, his heart sank.
She had been glowing then, her cheeks pink and plump, her eyes sparkling the way they did when she was a young girl. Now her face was thin, white and drawn, and her dark eyes were blank and lifeless.
He sat on the edge of the bed and took one of her hands in his. ‘This won’t do, Hope,’ he said gently. ‘I’ve read the letter from Angus and there is nothing in it to suggest Bennett is dead. You know perfectly well that post can be delayed for weeks coming from the East. And, as Nell says, bad news travels at twice the speed of good. If he had died you would have been informed by now.’
‘They’ve buried him without knowing