Snowbear

A Mansfield Park and Pride & Prejudice fanfiction

Chapter Twenty-One:

Mrs. Norris wasted precious little time taking the tale to Sir Thomas, but where she expected commendation, primarily for herself, she discovered nothing but a distracted air – "I thank you for informing me of this development, Mrs. Norris" was about all she received by way of brotherly adulation – his pity and concern immediately being granted to an absent Fanny rather than lying with the messenger detailing her present condition.

It took some effort to dismiss the offended woman – fancying herself very ill-used and unappreciated in light of her services rendered – from his study.

If permitted, if Sir Thomas had not made a point of gently but firmly sending her off in order to allow him to think a moment, she would have gone on speaking of Fanny's irresponsibility and scatter-brained ways as if the poor girl had mislaid a silk stocking or a valuable pair of gloves rather than come to be with child in the same manner countless generations of women before her had. She would hardly be the first or last.

But perhaps Mrs. Norris was reminded, though she would not have owned to it if she were, of Fanny's namesake, her least-favourite sister. She had always been privately convinced, despite there being no evidence to support such a theory, Frances conceived Fanny's brother William on the wrong side of her marriage vows, thus creating the need for her infamous elopement with then Lieutenant (latterly sunk under a mere Mr.) Price. That Fanny was in fact a married woman – and to Tom, who'd once been and probably still was, considering she had never liked Edmund much and would never grant her unreserved favour upon one of the Price boys, their aunt's favourite nephew – wouldn't have done much to smooth over the effects of an already largely irrational prejudice...

All the same, you might have supposed, from her look of being as one severely snubbed, she'd came in and told him Baddeley was pocketing the silver (what pieces of it had been recovered from Wickham's thievery) and was expecting a tangible reward for her vigilance, rather than that Sir Thomas was to expect his first grandchild.

And, really, if there was to be prize money or strong commendation for such a thing, it – in all fairness – ought to have gone to Lady Bertram, even if she wasn't the one to carry the tale to her husband's ears – she was, after all, the only who'd noticed.

But as soon as she was finally gone, as soon as he was sure she was not lingering on the other side of the door, Sir Thomas stood and walked from the window to his desk, then to his shelves, and then to the window all over again; he lifted the curtain by the tasselled fringe, then set it back down and paced the length to his desk and stared vacantly at the stack of paper and the little glass ink-pot upon it.

He closed his eyes and rubbed them with his thumb, pressing hard until bursts of reddish light seemed to blob and puddle in the darkness behind the clinched lids.

The paper and ink were blurry when he looked at them again.

Settling on what he meant to do at last, Sir Thomas dragged the chair back and seated himself, reaching for his quill, the tip of which proved dull.

Scrapping at it with his penknife until it was suitable for the writing of a short, shaky missive, he whittled through gritted teeth. Finally, ink upon his fingertips and a scowl on his face, he rang for Baddeley and handed him the folded note addressed to Edmund.

"Have Dick take this to Thornton Lacey today at his earliest convenience – but with some haste, if possible. It pertains to an important and rather delicate matter."

So, it was Edmund, having come to Mansfield Park the moment he read his father's note and waited pacing in the foyer, who met Tom at the door that evening and – pulling him aside – rather peevishly informed him of Fanny's being with child.

The idea of imminent fatherhood first surprised, then intrigued, then subsequently delighted Tom, whose expression, behind his mask, went through what would have been a rather comical range of emotions before settling upon a pleasant smile – a smile which faded almost to nothing at Edmund's next remark.

"How did this happen?"

Tom looked at him askance. "You're not serious?" Then, when it was plain he was, "By Jove, you are in earnest! Well! Come now, did our father never explain it to you? Poor Mary."

"Do I strike you as being in a playful mood, Tom?" his brother demanded, unmoved. "The least you can do now is be honest with me."

Rolling his eyes and regarding his cubicles with sudden interest – an action which seemed all the more pointed because he had to bow his head lower in order to see them from behind the slits of his mask – Tom sighed, "It didn't involve a visit from the angel Gabriel, if that's what you're asking me, Reverend Bertram."

Several seconds slipped by in silence, Edmund too cross to speak. And then, very softly, "Tom, how could you? Fanny was easily the most innocent girl in our family – she knew nothing of men. She made a great sacrifice for you, agreeing to end your curse. Wasn't it enough?"

Affronted, Tom said, "And I suppose by your 'great sacrifice' you mean her rejecting Crawford's offer? You know, Edmund, one of these days you are going to have to let that go. Besides, if I'm to be harangued for ending her innocence, as you would have it, you must also allow he would have ended it sooner." And he thought, but was unable to bring himself to add aloud, Edmund, if you knew – if you only knew – what he was really like, you'd wouldn't wish for one of Pug's puppies to be placed under his protection, let alone Fanny!

"I accept what's done to be done," said Edmund, in a slightly kinder voice. "I am sorry if I hurt you with that allusion. But I'm thinking of Fanny first and foremost. I see her as the injured party in this over you, Tom. Our father feels the same. We don't know how the curse affects any children of yours; Fanny might have been safe enough as your wife – the witch you insulted hasn't seemed to gain any power over her after your marriage – but as the mother of your children? And being she was an innocent, and you've known her since she was a child, must be perfectly aware she would do anything you asked, what need had you to urge her into–"

"Oh, quite right. Because," Tom interrupted, "that is the only way you imagine a woman like Fanny would be with someone like me? Naturally you could think nothing else. Even as a husband, I should have had to of urged her, or used guilt on her. Is that not your accusation, Edmund? You may as well come right out and say you don't believe me good enough for her."

"Tom, please try to see reason."

"Either way" – folding his arms – "when all is said and done, it can matter very little – Fanny is, by your own account, with child whether or not you approve."

"And our father?"

"Yes, I shall be very unlucky there," conceded Tom, rather bitterly. "But he surely cannot despise me much more than you do – I have the practice on my brother and might well survive a father's equally unjust scrutiny as a result."

"I never despised you," said Edmund, grieved he could hold such a belief. "Can you believe me capable of it? Well, perhaps the thought of your harming Fanny – intentionally or not – has brought me the closest to it I've ever imagined being, but I never–"

"I wouldn't," insisted Tom, firmer in this conviction than in any other subject Edmund had yet heard him speak upon. "Nothing could induce me to upset Fanny – let alone harm her. Don't imagine you're the only one of the two of us who cares what becomes of her one day to the next. The man who loves first does not always love longest – do not judge someone as unloving simply because they're new to the emotion. A husband can love as well as a brother or a cousin."

"Can this be true?" He was marvelling – could this really be his brother Tom speaking? "Can you really love her?"

Unlike Fanny, Tom was not especially prone to every emotion making him colour – to blushing at every provocation – despite their similarity in complexion, but his face darkened, vividly reddened, enough at the question – even with the mask to conceal much of it – enough to convince Edmund of genuine feelings being involved.

"If you are a sincere husband – if you truly love Fanny and can swear to me, with your hand on the Bible, you never hurt her – I'll vouch to our father for you."

Tom could and – albeit with some sarcasm and teasing he could not resist, as loving Fanny was a serious endeavour but professing this love to his overly severe brother more than once, until they were both uncomfortable, was not – did swear to Edmund's satisfaction, and the brothers were almost friends again as the end result of it, but it took rather longer than either expected to persuade their father no wrongdoing had been committed.

Even a – surprisingly passionate – outburst from Tom declaring his father might jolly well label him a fool if he would, but he must insist upon it being a very hard thing to ask a man – even if he be the most restrained of all gentleman – to lie in bed beside an extraordinarily pretty woman and listen to her breathe and sigh every single night for any extended duration and not grow to feel something for her by way of course, didn't do much to slow the baronet's tirade.

Probably, this – this which made him so unbending – was partly his own guilty conscience pricking at him, a feeling he himself had abandoned Fanny to Tom's sole judgement in casting her off, and his attempts to amend this in reaching out to her – when she by all appearances did not understand his meaning – had come in too late and at, it seemed, too great a cost.

But it mattered little whether or not Sir Thomas actually gave in and approved of Tom's physical affection for his wife – after all, the baby was to come in a manner of months, quite regardless of if the baronet believed his son to be prepared for fatherhood.

"And I daresay," Tom ventured, though he trod on thin ice to dare say it, "once there is a child toddling about the house" – and he gave a slight toss of his head – "clutching Nanny's hand and smiling at up you – a sweet child who will look a good deal like Fanny, no doubt – neither you nor Edmund will care any longer how or when it came to be among us. You both have a strong tendency to dote." To Edmund, aside, "And I imagine the child will readily prefer you to me – everybody else does."

"On that subject," said Sir Thomas severely, "there will be a stipulation, Tom – you need to understand your actions have consequences. Although, to be sure, if a witch's West Indian curse couldn't make you think, I certainly don't have conceit enough to hope to accomplish it myself."

"Stipulation, sir?"

"Should the physician of my choice declare it beneficial – at any point while she is carrying this child – to have Fanny removed into another room, I do not wish to hear any complaints from you about how it will mean an extension of your curse to wait out so many nights without her – you ought to have thought of that before."

Tom couldn't help wincing – his very flat mouth giving him away – but he restrained himself otherwise and said, coolly, all composure, as if it really mattered very little to him either way, "Certainly, sir. If the doctor advises it."

"As long as you profess to understand me" – Sir Thomas looked away, walking to the window dismissively – "let us end an interview which has been nothing but displeasure to us both from start to finish. Edmund, you may leave me as well – I wish to have some time on my own to reflect."

Taking Edmund's arm, Tom spun on his heel and began for the door, saying, clearly enough for his father to overhear, "Come, Edmund, we are dismissed and must leave dear Grandpapa to his nightly musings."

Glaring daggers, Sir Thomas turned around so quickly a lit candle set upon the edge of his desk nearly went out.

"Tom..." Edmund groaned and let his arm go slack, hoping Tom would take the hint and loosen his grasp; he was beginning to go quite numb from all the squeezing and clutching.

Tom – not loosening his grasp, probably not thinking of Edmund's comfort at all – halted sheepishly and, turning his head, peered over his shoulder into his father's general direction. "Too soon, was it?"

At least in private, between just themselves, there was some unrestrained jubilation regarding the coming child.

Tom did ask, a little wounded, why she hadn't told him sooner, why he should have had to learn it from Edmund and his father, but Fanny could only blush and say she hadn't known, hadn't even suspected.

"It was silly of me, I suppose," she admitted, her cheeks a long way off yet from beginning to cool, "not to think of it, even once – for, of course, I knew I was bigger, and I haven't had my courses a while – moreover, I saw my mother when she–" Breaking off in mortification, Fanny shook her head. "But, well, yes, I suppose I have been very stupid not to guess."

"I daresay you were," laughed Tom. "But if you are stupid, my poor mouse, then I must be doubly so – I see you undress for bed every night; I ought to have noticed."

"I have always understood men usually don't," was Fanny's – rather shy, downwardly directed – reply to this. "That is, I've never heard of a gentleman noticing before his wife does. They have to be told by the lady first."

"But to be less perceptive than my own mother, for pity's sake – how unlucky!"

"Oh, yes, I see what you mean, but–"

Fanny never finished her sentence, as Tom scooped her up and spun her around very merrily, planting a kiss on her cheek, before setting her back down again.

She was rather dizzy – her face went very white, and she had to close her eyes for several minutes and breathe slowly, exhaling in and out.

"Damn. Are you all right?" He pulled his mouth into a crooked grimace. "Ought I not have done that?"

"I'm well – I'm very well," she assured him, when she could speak again. "But" – and she sounded worried – "you aren't displeased? This doesn't make you unhappy?"

"Not nearly as unhappy as it apparently makes my brother and father," he teased, then – seeing her face fall – realised he had better be straightforward for once. "No, my dear Fanny, I am not unhappy. If you must know, if I have to say it, I confess I couldn't be gladder or prouder."

The following months were not easy ones for Fanny.

She had never been very strong, although her recent increase of weight had given her a glowing appearance of improved health compared to what she had been before, which was promising, and the physician – the same one, it turned out, who Sir Thomas had called to the house for Tom when he'd been wounded by the poachers – had his doubts about her ability to carry the child for the full required duration.

Of course, she was told, she must absolutely, as any woman in her state would be required to do, keep away from horses and the stables entirely, and while the physician didn't rule out short walks on pleasant days – aware the air might do her and the child good – he warned her very strongly against venturing out into poor weather; if it were hot or rainy, she was urged to remain indoors without exception.

During one of his regular visits, after some time had passed and Fanny had gotten quite far along, the physician recommended putting her to bed, despite it being a good deal earlier than he would have suggested confining a more robust or hardy woman in her state.

As Sir Thomas had predicted, the physician's advice also included the suggestion Fanny be moved from Tom's room into a guest room downstairs – the same guest room Fanny had stayed in when she had fallen ill during William's visit and Mary had played the harp for her.

This was a thoroughly miserable time for Fanny, despite all the intended goodness towards her from everybody involved. She did not mean to be ungrateful, but it was very hard for her to feel contented or even in tolerable spirits shut up in one room with the curtains all kept closed, when she saw nobody she was fond of.

Edmund was at Thornton Lacey; Sir Thomas had business to attend to (some of which, perhaps of a parliamentary nature, actually took him out of Mansfield and to town for many days at a time); Tom was a bear all day, roaming Mansfield Wood; Lady Bertram was usually asleep if she was not otherwise occupied sighing her unhappiness at having to do without Fanny's company in the drawing-room yet rarely thinking of getting up and going to visit Fanny in her part of the house; and so, at least until the evening, when Tom, returned from the woods, was allowed in to sit beside her for a little while, it was always either Mrs. Norris or Sally Robins who tended to her.

Fanny didn't mind Sally, even if the maid-servant wasn't the best company. She was competent and she never said anything sharp to hurt her feelings or make her feel she was a burden.

Indeed, she developed something of an impression Sally felt far sorrier for her than she let on.

But Mrs. Norris was dreadful.

Everybody – especially Sir Thomas – had told her she was not required to wait upon Fanny – the whole family rather advised against it, truth be told, knowing how she was – but she'd pointed out the folly of anyone else in the household – except Sally, when she might reasonably be spared – being put out of their usual working routine and upsetting the household all for the sake of Fanny's indolence. She called it indolence, because she was of the mind any woman who wanted to, could be with child without putting the burden of her care upon others; after all, even poor women with no servants, and women who were servants themselves bore children all the time without fuss. And if Fanny would insist upon lying abed all day, she must stick her own head in the noose and tend to her, bring up trays and things and check in on her, because you couldn't expect the housekeeper to be up and down the stairs at all hours, and having Baddeley or Roger Smith wait on her while she lounged about in a nightdress, quite indecently, wouldn't be at all seemly.

While Fanny tried to be grateful – told herself again and again she ought to be – for her aunt Norris and her unflagging attentions, it was disheartening when every smile and "Thank you, Aunt Norris," was responded to with an indignant, derisive snort or curt look.

Mrs. Norris never missed an opportunity to remind her niece what an inconvenience she and her unborn baby were to the staff as well as to herself.

Twice, she brought Fanny to tears with a harsh gibe.

The second time happened to coincide with Tom's evening arrival, and he was very distressed to find her weeping and to discover she couldn't be made to talk about what had brought it on.

"Oi, Sarah," he hissed, grabbing the maid-servant's arm in the doorway as he was making to leave. "What the devil goes on here when I'm away? She cries and faces the wall and will not speak – and here you are sauntering in with her supper, as if nothing was the matter, except she hasn't touched the tray brought up for luncheon. Am I never to be told anything?"

Sally glanced over her shoulder, as if to be certain they were not overheard. Looking back to Tom, she mouthed, "Mrs. Norris." Then, in a clearer but still lowered voice, "And it's my understanding she eats more off Mrs. Bertram's plate than she leaves behind. I know it's hardly m'place to say, sir, but I shouldn't like to eat a meal with all the nicest parts already gone ages before it was brought to me. Or thrown together from whatever was in the pantry waiting instead of what Cook's making fresh. That there child she's got growing in her belly needs mor'n bread and cheese, or the occasional cold meats, if you'll pardon my saying so."

"So that's how it is." Tom sucked his teeth. "Well, that does sound just like my aunt – once she has got a fancy in her head, there's no bringing the old bird back around to reason. One has to outmanoeuvre her or suffer through the fancy gloomily as it takes its course."

And Tom's subsequent plan to outmanoeuvre her was a simple one.

He penned a letter to Edmund, asking if he wouldn't send Mary to them for a few weeks – surely the congregation at Thornton Lacey wouldn't degrade into sinful anarchy if they didn't see their beloved parson's wife in her usual pew for a few measly Sundays while she was needed elsewhere – and have her, if she was willing, wait upon Fanny.

And would she be able to say, if pressed by their aunt Norris, it was all her own scheme and never mention him at all?

Edmund was only too glad – hearing their aunt was at her old trick of being unpleasant to Fanny again raised his spleen just as it did Tom's – and would have sent his own housekeeper and the friendly old grandmotherly woman who swept the churchyard in addition to Mary – indeed, he should have sent a miniature army of competent, kindly disposed women of his acquaintance to look after his favourite sister – if he were not prevented, reminded – by Mary herself, who proved a great deal better able to keep her head about the whole situation than he was – it might be more of a hindrance than a help to have too many persons brought into the house at once.

So Mary came on her own.

All were much happier with the new arrangement; even Mrs. Norris displayed signs of outward contentment.

If Mary was so eager to take her place, to go about the house laden down with heavy trays all day, she was perfectly willing to resume sitting by Lady Bertram's side in the drawing-room and never bother any more about Fanny.

"I was quite willing to do it, sister," she said to Lady Bertram, on first rejoining her. "But with my weak chest and poor old knees it was a great burden. I should never have said so, not a word of it, but I did suffer dreadfully. I'm sure it shan't tax Mary going back and forth half so much as it did me. Why, I daresay, she wants desperately for occupation – by all reports of how things get on at Thornton Lacey, it seems Edmund never makes her do anything.

"And her new bonnet! I do not say it is over-trimmed – that ugly tendency towards ostentatiousness is not one of Mary's faults, I grant you – but one cannot deny it is much too fine. I know what a bonnet such as the one she had on when she arrived costs, you see, for a friend of mine once had one very like, and she showed me the bill, and – between ourselves – I don't see how Edmund can afford it."

Tom was not present when the child – a squalling boy with a piercing set of lungs to rival his father's and Fanny's own light eyes exactly – was born.

The joyful event occurred, a few weeks sooner than it ought to have occurred, at half past nine in the morning; and so, of course, Tom was a bear in Mansfield Wood.

The maddening irony was that, given Fanny could not be with him at night, he might have chosen to be a man during the day and would have, then, been at the house at the hour of his son's birth.

But, as it was early, and there seemed a fifty-fifty chance of the child's being born during either the daytime or at night – a tossup, regardless of which he might choose – he decided to, as he already been doing, most days, simply keep up the usual routine of being a bear during the day and a man at night.

Gentlemen not being allowed, typically, into the birthing room – it has never been considered a place for men, even the physician, if the situation does not prove especially dire, if all goes well, is often looked upon as an intruder by the women assisting the mother – no one supposed it would have been any different if Tom had been in the house; still, he came back from the woods more than a little sorry to have missed it.

It had been Mary who'd discovered Fanny.

Bringing up a tray to her, she was momentarily dismayed to find nobody in the bed and, glancing about quickly, realised Fanny had gotten up – perhaps in some muddled attempt to stoke a fire which had gone dormant, though such an action seemed a strange fancy to take when the morning was relatively warm, or to look for something on the other side of the room – and, finding herself to be seized up with pain, grasped the back of a chair and clung to it, breathing slowly and waiting for it to pass.

At first, Mary was a bit puzzled – Fanny was, although in obvious pain, so very quiet, scarcely making a peep, and who ever heard of a woman being quiet while giving birth?

But then she glanced downward and saw the wetness seeping into the carpet (it was a good thing Mrs. Norris was no longer Fanny's attendant, as she no doubt would have made much of the carpet's being ruined and quite overlooked the more pressing matter at hand) and very quickly understood.

Her initial thought was to help Fanny back to the bed, but – even if she said nothing and did not scream or wail – she had channelled her pain into gripping the chair-back so hard Mary was afraid of breaking her sister's fingers if she attempted to pry them off by herself.

"I shall be right back," she'd promised, squeezing the unresponsive Fanny's shoulder and running to the door to call out.

Fanny managed a belated little moan of acknowledgement.

The next thing she was aware, somehow, she'd been put back into the bed and a lot of blurred female faces, and a little later on – she thought – the physician and some assistant of his, were standing over her, saying something.

The birth was a difficult one, exhausting for the befuddled mother struggling to bring her baby into the world and scarcely aware of what was going on around her as she did so, everything seeming to be so muffled and far away.

She screamed only once, right before the baby was out, and then promptly lost consciousness.

Her sudden swoon accompanied by a very still, white face gave those present a moment of severe fright – two maid-servants who were helping, neither of them Sally Robins, both imagined she'd died right in front of them and were on the verge of hysterics until assured otherwise, and Mary bit her lip so hard she tasted blood – but the physician checked for her pulse and assured everyone she lived and was merely suffering from exhaustion.

The baby did not follow his mother's quiet example but screamed himself raw and the women became preoccupied with taking him off to clean him up and asking one another – a little testily, since everyone present and involved seemed to think it was somebody else's duty rather than their own – if anyone had sent for the wet nurse yet.

When Fanny woke, returning to herself disoriented and not properly aware of the time which had passed, it was evening and she was alone – Mary and Sally Robins had been taking turns sitting with her, and Roger Smith had been in to tend the fire once, but unluckily, by pure chance, she happened to be without anyone at all when she finally regained consciousness – in the dark guest room.

(Tom would have been with her, but Sir Thomas had warned him off troubling her and – of course – he'd wanted to have a look at his son, settled very snugly in the nursery, and conceded, albeit grudgingly, to leave her to rest at his father's urging.)

Confusion turned to a kind of panic when Fanny realised she was totally alone – the baby was not with her, either – and, only vaguely recollecting the events of the day, was mortally afraid this meant the infant – she did not know, having been unconscious, if it were a son or a daughter – had died or something else had gone terribly wrong.

Ignoring her swimming head and weak legs, she dragged herself out of the bed, not even thinking to search for a dressing-gown to cover her thin nightdress, and made her way to the door and out beyond the rotunda and into the main hallway.

All seemed deadly still and quiet out here, too, and her chest clenched, her chin trembling with fear, walking along with her hand upon the wall for steadiness, as she made her way.

She began to hear, though she couldn't be certain she wasn't imagining it, a keening little cry which she followed as best she could, finding herself at the open nursery door in the end, where she was spied by Tom sitting beside a handsomely carved wooden cradle (probably the same one which had rocked himself and Edmund and later Maria and Julia to sleep in their infancy so many years before).

The sound – most assuredly real now – was coming from the cradle and Fanny nearly fell over in relief, her tired legs finally giving way.

Tom, up in a flash, caught her and guided her to a chair before ringing for the servants to bring her something to drink so insistently he just about broke the bell in the process.

"I hadn't the slightest idea of your being awake or I would have come to you," Tom said a trifle defensively, lips pursing. "My father made out you were sleeping like anything, and it would be detrimental to disturb you. But look, mousy, now you're here" – and he motioned to the cradle, his mask winking in the firelight – "isn't he splendid?"

"He," echoed Fanny, dreamy. "A boy."

Tom couldn't help grinning. His eyes were bright behind the mask's slits. "A son."

This aforementioned son let out a fresh wail – the increased rocking of the cradle suggested he'd begun thrashing unhappily into the bargain as well.

"Poor little lad," said Tom, and brought his hand down, letting it hover uncertainly; it was as if he wanted very badly to comfort his child but wasn't at all sure what he ought to do to achieve this end.

Leaning forward – wishing her chair were closer – Fanny strained her eyes to peer down into the cradle at her crying baby.

The first name which came to her mind was Tom – but she was actually not thinking particularly of her husband or his father, rather she was put in mind of a colicky brother of hers – little Tom Price – she'd helped care for before being coming to live at Mansfield.

She'd cried almost as many tears over being parted from 'Baby Tommy' upon being told she must go away as she had for her favourite sister and for William.

Still, regardless of who she referred to, Tom was the name she pronounced – or murmured, to be more exact – over the cradle, and probably the name the baby was destined to have as the future heir to Mansfield Park anyway.

"He is ill?" whispered Fanny, after saying what would become his name, looking with shining eyes from the baby to his father. "He cries so."

"Everyone seems to suppose he's perfectly healthy," Tom told her, shrugging. "He might be hungry – the nurse fed him before, but she was supposed to come back and feed him again, only she's been a long time in coming." He turned his head to look at the nursery's mantle clock. "I daresay the foolish woman is gadding about the park without a care to the hour."

"Oh!" cried Fanny, and immediately began to pull her nightdress off her shoulder, wriggling her arm and one breast free. "Oh, how stupid of me. Of course."

Tom tilted his head. "Erm, Fanny, what are you doing?"

"Feeding him," she laughed, slowly getting up and going over to the cradle to lift the baby to her breast. "I do know that much about babies, Mr. Bertram."

Tom still seemed confused. "The nurse is to be along later."

Another giggle escaped her. "He doesn't need the nurse later," she said as the baby stopped crying and began to suckle. "He needs his mother now."

This clearly was the case; Tom could see for himself it was what needed to be done, that it made the infant stop bawling his whole head off if nothing else.

Still, when Dick Baddeley (nobody else had been available) came in with the long-awaited water or wine Tom had so vehemently rung for, he was positively astonished to find Fanny just settling her baby – gurgling, golden and contented – back into the cradle, the room gone peaceful, the child obviously fed, even though the wet nurse hadn't come.

A/N: Reviews are welcome, replies could be delayed.