Author's Note: Those who have read my other stories, please disregard the tale of Mary's birth and Victoria's ill health. This is The Happiest Timeline where nothing bad happens and all is fluff and rainbows and easy childbirth.
43
"Oh my, look who is awake," Victoria murmured to her newborn, who had just snuffled and blinked her eyes open. The baby was about three hours old now. Another girl. A tiny little thing, just as Anne had been. Enormous eyes in a wrinkled face. Wisps of brown hair on her head. Oh, it was true, one forgot how very small a new baby was.
Victoria pressed her nose to the baby's head and closed her eyes. She'd forgotten how nice they smelled, too.
She was sitting up in her freshly made bed. A healthy fire burned in the fireplace and she had hot water bottles near her feet. The baby was swaddled up tight and warm. It was late November and piercingly cold already. Afternoon was giving way to early evening. Victoria was tired, drained, but not exhausted. Once again she had been blessed with an easy and remarkably quick delivery. Tiny babies, she supposed, were easier than big ones. Lydia, the first, had taken almost a full day to arrive, and Victoria was thankful she'd forgotten most of it. Catherine had been faster but bigger and thus a different challenge. Anne, of course, early and really too small, had hardly waited for the doctor.
And this one...Victoria smiled and looked into those enormous eyes, much like hers. She traced a finger down the tiny nose that looked just like her own. Victor and the housekeeper had practically delivered this one. The doctor had arrived in the very nick of time. He'd barely had time to close the door behind him before he had to catch the baby.
Victoria sighed. The baby grunted and mewled, wriggling in her many blankets. Her tiny mouth started to work in a way that Victoria remembered very well. As she opened her nightdress to feed her baby for the second time, she realized she'd also forgotten how often babies ate. At least this one was a natural. Contentedly the baby suckled while Victoria watched. The tiny eyes blinked slowly. A small arm escaped its blankets and the hand found Victoria's fingertip. The baby squeezed. Victoria felt the odd desire to weep.
Just as the baby was finishing her meal there was a knock at the door. "Come in," Victoria said, and Victor entered the room, leaving the door ajar behind him. He bent to kiss her.
"How are you?" he asked.
"Quite well," she replied as she buttoned up her nightdress. With surprise she realized that she still could do it one-handed, even years out of practice. She lifted the baby to her shoulder and patted her tiny back through the blankets. The resulting burp sounded wet and Victoria winced when she felt a damp trickle down her shoulder. She'd forgotten all about that, too.
"Oh dear," Victor said, noticing. "Have we any cloths?"
"On the bureau, thank you," Victoria said. Taking the proffered cloth, she wiped at the baby's mouth and then let Victor attempt to sponge off her shoulder.
"I do hope you're not like your sister Catherine," he said to the baby. "She couldn't keep anything down. Every single meal came right back up when she was new."
"But she grew out of it," Victoria assured the baby. "You'll grow big and strong, won't you?"
Victor tossed the soiled cloth into the laundry basket with the same practiced gesture Victoria had used to button up her nightdress. He settled on the bed beside her and reached out a finger for the baby to hold. They sat there like that for a few moments, quiet and warm.
"May the girls come in?" Victor asked after a while, once the baby had loosened her grip. "If you're ready. They're anxious to see you."
Indeed, Victoria heard little shuffles outside the door, and three pairs of eyes trying to peek in. She smiled. "Come in, children, please."
Her older girls entered the room more quietly than she'd ever witnessed them move in a group. There was something almost reverential and awed about how quiet they were, the way all three of them looked into her face.
"You may climb up," she told them. "If you are careful and take off your shoes."
They did so, and again she was both surprised and delighted by how well they minded her. Well, it was an extraordinary circumstance, she supposed. Victoria had disappeared, clearly in distress, just before midday. Without any time to waste the children had been hastily ushered outside to play. Confusion had been writ large on all of their little faces, she recalled, as she'd gone up the stairs with the housekeeper and Victor had telephoned for the doctor.
Now Lydia, Catherine, and Anne huddled about her in bed. Lydia sat to one side, Catherine near her feet, and Anne sat on Victor's lap. For a while they stared at the baby, transfixed. Then Lydia said, "Did the extractor hurt?"
Victoria shot Victor a look, but he was suddenly studying the ceiling. "Not one bit," Victoria assured her. "He hardly needed it at all."
Lydia nodded, satisfied. "What's his name?" she asked.
"It's a girl," Victor told her. "You have another sister."
"Oh," she said, sounding disappointed. "Well, that's all right. A baby brother would have been nice, though. I've already got sisters, after all."
"She's so tiny!" said Catherine, leaning in closer. The baby blinked at her and Catherine beamed. "Oh, she's sweet."
Anne reached out a tentative hand and laid it on the bundle. "What is her name?" she asked.
Victoria adjusted her hold on the baby and shifted so that Lydia could sit more comfortably. "I thought Lavinia might be nice," she said. "For my aunt."
"That is pretty," Catherine said. "But I like Miranda. Or Portia. Ooh, Emilia or Perdita!"
Victoria smiled. Catherine had obviously discovered Lamb's Shakespeare on the nursery bookshelf.
"Rose," Anne suggested. "Or Daisy. Those would be nice."
"Jane, so that she fits in," said Lydia with finality. Everyone looked at her. "Our names are fancy in order by age. She should fit the pattern. Victoria, Lydia, Catherine, Anne, Jane. Or maybe Maud."
"My name isn't less fancy than yours," Catherine said, sounding hurt.
"The 'ia' ending makes a name fancy," Lydia told her patiently, as though it were obvious.
"That is very silly," Catherine huffed.
"No arguing in front of the baby, you'll teach her bad habits," Victor interrupted. Remarkably, again, that was enough to quiet them. The new baby was magic. "Your mother is right, Lavinia is a lovely name."
"Is she a Lavinia?" Anne asked. She was looking into the baby's face. The baby was still awake, but only just, squeezing her little fist open and closed and letting her eyes roam over all the new faces. "It is pretty. But I think she's Mary."
Now everybody looked at Anne, so soft-spoken and articulate for a five year old. "What makes you say that?" Victor asked.
Anne blushed and shrugged. "I was looking at her, and she looked at me, and I thought, 'That's Mary.'"
"Oh," said Victor. "It's a nice name. A classic."
"Lots of royalty are named Mary," Catherine offered. "For middle names. That's nice."
"It's not very fancy," Lydia said. "She'll fit in our pattern."
"Lavinia could be her middle name," Victoria mused. Now that Anne had said it, it was true. Mary. This was Mary. She reached over with her free hand and patted Anne's knee. "Mary is just right, dear one."
Anne blushed harder, clearly pleased. Victoria gently tucked the baby's arm back into her blankets. The entire family huddled about, rapt, and watched Mary fall asleep again.