Texas Born (55 page)

When Felicia returned to the bedroom,
Dorothy-Anne was awake and tossing restlessly. She tried to sit up,
but after a moment let her head drop back down on the pillow. Then,
suddenly, she grimaced and arched her back as another contraction
seized her. Startled, she opened her eyes widely and gasped from
the pain. Freddie grasped her hand in concern, but Mrs. Ramirez
seemed reassured.

'Good,' she said, checking her watch. 'A long
time has passed since the last. There will be time to rest before
the real labor begins.'

Dorothy-Anne collapsed back on the bed as the
pain passed. Felicia pulled away the sheet that covered her.
Gently, she began to probe with her hands. She frowned to herself
and, then, for the first time, began to worry. She was used to her
own and her cousin's wide generous hips, built to give birth. But
this woman's hips were narrow and bony. The opening would be small
and tight.

She gestured for Freddie to draw closer and
lowered her voice so that the young woman would not hear what she
had to say.

'The passage is narrow,' she murmured with
concern. 'She is very small.'

Small. The whispered word drifted to
Dorothy-Anne through a mist and set the swirling memories in
motion. Yes, she was small. She had signed the lawyer's papers with
her small, schoolgirl script then waited as they were witnessed.
Then the pin-striped attorneys had congratulated her on the gift
she had just received, and left. Miss Bunt had wheeled Great-Granny
outside to the sidewalk, and then Great-Granny motioned for the
nurse to leave them. The Fifth Avenue traffic moved downtown at a
brisk pace. For a minute, they did not speak.

'Dorothy-Anne,' Great-Granny said
finally.

Dorothy-Anne moved closer.

'Look up, Dorothy-Anne.' Great-Granny's voice
rose to an excited whisper. 'Look up at the Hale Palace.'

Obediently, Dorothy-Anne leaned her head way
back and stared up at the hotel. The thousands upon thousands of
tons of pale limestone seemed miraculously weightless. Like a
wedding cake it rose in majestic splendor, tier after tier of
terraces and balconies, until the twin towers broke off and rose
even higher to scrape the fast-moving clouds scuttling across the
bright blue sky. After a moment, she lowered her head and turned to
her great-grandmother. She looked at her questioningly.

Elizabeth-Anne Hale reached out, took
Dorothy-Anne's hand and squeezed it.

'It's
yours
,' Elizabeth-Anne
whispered, her aquamarine eyes shining brightly. 'The Hale Palace
is now yours, and yours alone. Happy Birthday, Dorothy-Anne!'

Dorothy-Anne awoke to the sound of rain
lashing the roof. Freddie was leaning over her, anxiety and fear in
his face.

She turned to him weakly, her face pale and
pinched. 'Is the storm letting up?' she whispered.

Mrs. Ramirez seemed startled to hear her
voice, but shook her head.

'My baby,' Dorothy-Anne said in a tiny voice.
She placed a hand on the mound of sheet at her waist. 'My baby will
be all right.'

'Your baby will be fine,' Mrs. Ramirez
assured her gently. She joined Freddie and leaned over
Dorothy-Anne, stroking aside a stray lock of the young woman's
moist hair. 'A woman is born to give birth, no?'

Dorothy-Anne nodded her head hesitantly.
While Freddie helped her lie back down, Mrs. Ramirez said, 'Now
that you are awake, I examine you internally. I was about to wake
you anyway.' Mrs. Ramirez turned to Freddie. 'I will need a pan of
hot water.'

Freddie nodded and moved toward the kitchen,
grateful to be of help. Mrs. Ramirez sat down on the edge of the
bed. She reached out for Dorothy-Anne's hands and held them. The
young woman's fingers felt cold and moist. 'Do you feel any
pain?'

Dorothy-Anne looked up into the woman's dark,
liquid eyes. 'Yes.'

'Where?'

Dorothy-Anne leaned forward and slowly
twisted around so that the sheet fell to her waist and exposed her
breasts, heavy and milk-filled.

Mrs. Ramirez nodded to herself. There would
at least be no problem feeding the child. She glanced questioningly
at Dorothy-Anne, who reached gingerly behind her and touched the
small of her back. 'The pain is here.'

'Your back?'

Dorothy-Anne nodded.

Mrs. Ramirez flashed her an odd look. Then
she rose and pulled the rest of the sheet away from Dorothy-Anne's
body. The naked young woman shivered from the sudden chill.

'It will not take long,' Mrs. Ramirez said
apologetically. She heard Freddie's footsteps and turned around. He
was holding a pan of steaming hot water. She took it from him, set
it down on the nightstand and then, tightening her lips, she dunked
her hands into it. The water was scalding but she did not utter a
sound. She washed her hands carefully and shook them dry.

Wordlessly, Dorothy-Anne lay back, scooted
down on the bed and obediently parted her thighs. Mrs. Ramirez
knelt before her.

Dorothy-Anne could feel the woman's fingers
probing the warmth within her. She tensed, the fingers feeling
rough and foreign.

'I am being gentle,' Mrs. Ramirez whispered.
'Please. Relax. I will not hurt you.'

Dorothy-Anne smiled wanly and bit down on her
lip.

As she maneuvered her fingers, Felicia
Ramirez forced herself to keep from frowning. The cervix was still
not wide open, though it had dilated somewhat. They still had hours
to wait.

She leaned over Dorothy-Anne and placed her
ear next to the magnificently swollen belly. She listened for a
while and then nodded to herself with satisfaction. She could hear
the fetal heartbeat, strong and separate from the mother's own.
That was good.

She started to pull the sheet up around
Dorothy-Anne again when she remembered there was one more thing to
check. Years ago, when she had given birth to Caesar, her second
oldest, the old midwife had tested the position of the child.

Mrs. Ramirez lowered the sheet. With one hand
inside the mother, and the other on the swollen belly, she gently
felt for the child's position. Suddenly the breath caught in her
throat. Could she be doing it wrong? She quickly checked again. No,
it was true. The child was not positioned right. For a third time,
she repeated the maneuver, just to make sure. There was no
mistake.

She withdrew her hand and said, 'I go wash,'
nodding for Freddie to follow. Once in the kitchen, she turned to
him, her elbows crooked, her hands held up like a surgeon's about
to be gloved.

'Well?' Freddie demanded.

'The child lays sideways,' Mrs. Ramirez
hissed gravely, her eyes wide with alarm. 'It should come head
first, like this - ' She motioned with her hand as her eyes flashed
like embers in the candlelight. 'Your wife's baby, it lie like this
- ' She slashed her hand sideways across her belly.

Before Freddie could answer, they heard
Dorothy-Anne moan weakly from the other room and quickly returned
to her side.

'What is it?' Freddie asked.

'I heard you whispering,' Dorothy-Anne said
faintly. Her brow was still wet with sweat and her eyes glassy. 'My
baby . . . my baby is going to die, isn't it?'

Mrs. Ramirez looked at her sharply and
crossed herself. 'Do not speak of such things,' she hissed.

'No. I know it's true. I know it is. I'm
being punished and my baby's going to die.'

Surprised by her words, but aware his young
wife was almost delirious; Freddie smoothed the damp hair back from
Dorothy-Anne's forehead and spoke softly. 'Punished? What for?
You've never done anything that deserves punishment, darling.'

'Yes, I have,' Dorothy-Anne moaned. She felt
a wave of exhaustion, a need to escape her fear swept over her and
her eyes closed. But she fought sleep, determined now to speak, to
get the truth out into the open. 'You don't know,

Freddie . .. Only Great-Granny understood.
She protected me, but now she's gone, and I'll have to pay.'

'Dorothy-Anne, you're talking nonsense -
'

'No, Freddie. I have to pay now,' she said,
her breathing shallow and labored.

'But, for God's sake, what for?'

'Because . . . because I killed my mother. I
killed her, and now Great-Granny's gone . . . And she was the only
one . . . ' Her voice trailed off.

'The only one who what?'

'Who understood,' Dorothy-Anne answered, her
voice the merest, weary whisper.