***chapter 37**
****Plans***
"And you intend to…um…bring her up yourselves?" Jimmy tactfully rephrased the question.
Arthur looked shocked. "But of course, my dear fellow! Can you imagine the scandal if we didn't? The damage it would do to our political reputations?"
Jimmy swallowed the lump that rose in his throat. It was the answer, but not the reason, he wanted to hear.
"We shall, over the next day or so, through our press secretary Finlay Patterson, grant an exclusive interview with the BBC and arrange for official photo shoots. We certainly need to have the child better dressed for the occasion." Arthur frowned, recollecting the hasty purchase of baby clothes that had led to them accumulating, among other things, the lilac sleep suit.
The infant began to stir and whimper anew and Prudence, hitherto relaxing with another glass of chilled white wine, stiffened in alarm.
"Oh! Oh! Is it waking up? Don't pass it back, please, I couldn't possibly bear any more of that dreadful kicking!" She waved a hand as though to fend her off.
And perhaps it was hormonal, Prudence being so new a mother, but she fell into her husband's arms and sobbed like a child herself.
"Could you sort it please, Jimmy, there's a good fellow?" Arthur asked, patting his wife's back. "Is the creature being sick? I believe that's quite common with babies, as well as their constantly wetting or soiling nappies, and then there's being too hot or too cold."
"Nowt to fret about, sir. She's grand. Probably just hungry." Jimmy smiled at Lord Maddocks' assumption he knew all about fatherhood after being a father for less than twenty-four hours. "Have you a name for the bairn yet? Only I was wondering…" Nothing ventured, nothing gained. He took the bull by the horns and plunged headlong into a subject dear to his heart. "I know she'll have several names, important people always do, but if you could maybe see your way to including Dora as one? Rose and me, we'd planned to have another babby, though it never was to be, and if it was a girl we said we'd call her Dora. It means gift and I thought the bairn being a gift from God and all…"
He paused, hoping he hadn't spoken out of turn and overstepped the mark. The Maddocks might regard him as a good friend nowadays, but they were still his employers.
"But, Heavens, Dora is PERFECT as a FIRST name!" Prudence, now that it was established she needn't take the baby back, seemed to recover rapidly from her recent trauma. Her cheeks were pink from alcohol, and, having quickly drained her second glass of wine, she downed a third and enthusiastically began on the fourth that Arthur had just poured. "Dora was my grandmother's name and the name of Arthur's mother too. It's long been a traditional name in both our families."
"The name Dora has a long, illustrious history," Arthur agreed.
"Quite. A long, ill-lush-ill-lush, ill-lush…" Prudence giggled, unable to finish the sentence. "Arthur, I do…hic…declare, this unassuming wine has…hic…gone to my head."
"Vintage wine, my love, vintage. Only the very best is good enough for my darling wife. We are, after all, the proud parents." The several glasses of whiskey he had enjoyed since they brought their child home took its toll on Arthur now, for he slurred his words and, like Prudence, seemed incapable of sitting upright.
As a new bottle of wine was being uncorked and the top of a new bottle of whiskey unscrewed, they readily agreed to Jimmy's suggestion that he take Dora to Mrs Geraghty for a feed. And, animated by drink, freed from their responsibilities, the proud parents fell into discussion (which, to judge by their frequent gales of laughter, must have been highly amusing) about the unseasonal snow, the clock on the mantelshelf, the prime minister, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, what colour Prudence should have for a new coat, of "ships and shoes and sealing wax", of everything except their baby daughter…