Page 131 of The Christmas Retreat
It’s almost midnight and soon there will be a new day – the first one I must get through without my dearest, most beloved friend for, although I can barely yet take the fact in, she died this morning.
Perhaps it will help me to accept the awful truth, if I write down what happened. Yet I still hope this is a nightmare I will wake up from …
Arwen called for me in the early hours of the morning, having had a sudden rush of blood and gone into premature labour.
The midwife arrived very quickly and the baby, a girl, was born alive and soon began to cry very loudly for one so small.
But all my concern, and the midwife’s, was for Arwen. We sent for the doctor and he arrived speedily, but Arwen died soon after from a massive haemorrhage.
Placenta previa, the doctor called it, and he said it was lucky the child was born alive. I know they did all they could to save Arwen too, but secretly I would rather have had Arwen survive than the infant.
Arwen saw the baby, which she wanted called Frances – a favourite name due to St Francis of Assisi, who loved all the wild creatures – and Mary, after her own mother.
As I sat by her bedside, holding her hand in mine and watching as she grew as pale as her pillow, she whispered that the last months with me had been the happiest of her life, despite everything.
‘We have been happy – but for so short a time, Arwen. Please don’t leave me!’ I begged her.
‘You can’t measure happiness in time,’ she murmured.
Then she smiled at me and said she felt as if she was being swept out on a tide and it was so much easier to let go and drift away with it …
I begged her not to leave me, but she weakly pressed my hand and then, closing her eyes, gave a great sigh and was gone.
And now, so many hours later, I’m alone in the house at last, having asked the kind friends who came to comfort me to leave.
Even the baby has gone, for the midwife arranged for a local labourer’s wife who had given birth to twins, one of them stillborn, to take her for the present. I’m glad of this, because I need time to come to terms with my resentment against the poor little creature for taking the life of my friend, and learn to love her for Arwen’s sake.
Tomorrow I’ll have to face the arrangements that need to be made, but for the moment I sit here, looking at the photographs of Arwen in my albums – my dearest friend, the love of my life – and wondering how I will now face the future.
There was a final postscript, on 12 April, when Arwen was laid to rest in the churchyard of the beautiful old church they had both loved.
This morning Arwen was laid to rest in the churchyard of St Pol de Leon, the old church she had liked so much.
It had been decked with bright spring flowers, which reflected her youth, for she had been in the springtime of her life.
So many kind friends came from the artistic community that I was touched, but Edwin, at the last minute, felt he couldn’t face it and just sent hothouse lilies, which seemed very out of place among the tulips and daffodils.
Oddly, I felt a strange sense of relief when it was all over, as if I’d emerged from a bad dream.
The birds were singing sweetly and the day fresh and clear, with all the promise of spring – and I must steel myself to go on.
My Arwen was not here, under a coverlet of bright blooms in this churchyard. I felt her presence near me so strongly in the first few days after her death. But now … she was gone.
For her sake, I must take on the role of mother and guardian to little Frances – or Fanny, as the woman looking after her calls her – however unsuited to the role I feel.
None of this tragedy was her fault, but Cosmo Caradoc’s, so I will learn to love her for Arwen’s sake. In fact, I already do feel a growing bond with her, for I visit her every day, so that when she is weaned and comes to live in the cottage, I will not be a stranger to her. She is very small but seems to be thriving, nonetheless.
I named no father on the birth certificate, for I knew that that was what Arwen had wanted. Nor will I ever tell the child who her father was or the circumstances of her conception, for the same reason.
Edwin again offered financial help, which this time I have accepted, for I’ll need to employ a nursemaid so I can carryon working. Also, thinking ahead, it will be best if, when she is old enough, Frances goes to a private school in another area, where no one will know of her illegitimacy.
But I will do my best to teach little Frances to be proud of who her mother was.
Tears on the keyboard reallydon’tdo your laptop a lot of good …
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Safe Haven
