Miss Julia Rocks the Cradle (12 page)

By this time I was shaking all over, my hands trembling and my heart racing. Yet a swelling relief flooded my soul—we’d delivered a baby with no trouble at all. I sank down in a chair, unable to stand a minute longer. You’d think I’d had that baby myself.

Lillian and Etta Mae were sitting back on the floor, resting as Hazel Marie crooned to her new little girl.

“What’re we waiting for?” I asked. “Can’t we do something and get this over with? Or maybe,” I went on brightly, “it’ll wait till some help gets here.”

“No’m,” Lillian said with her hand on Hazel Marie, “’less they comin’ in the door right now, ’cause she crankin’ up again.”

And she was, her face getting that intense look on it and a low moan coming from her throat.

“Miss Julia,” Lillian said as she hunched over Hazel Marie’s nether parts, “take that baby an’ hold it while this one’s a-comin’.”

Never in my life had I held a newborn and I didn’t know how to hold it or what to do with it. But Hazel Marie was now concentrating on the next one, so I had to take up the little bundle whether I knew what I was doing or not.

Easing stiffly onto a chair, I cradled the baby in my arms, so fearful of doing some irreparable damage that would maim it for life. I could feel it move inside the blanket, although there was more blanket than baby, and I was afraid the baby would slide right out of my arms. Then it starting mewling, sounding like a kitten. “Is this one all right?” I asked, holding it away from me. “It’s about to cry.”

Lillian didn’t even look up from her ministrations. “Hold it close, Miss Julia, so it hear yo’ heart beatin’ an’ it be all right.”

Well, they Lord, I thought, is that all it takes? I cradled the baby a little closer, not wanting to crush it, and felt it nestle in.

Hazel Marie was panting by this time, her arms outstretched with fingers clutching at the plastic. Poor thing, she was going through it all again, and my stomach cramped up along with hers. It was almost more than I could take, but I didn’t dare stand up and try to walk with a baby in my arms. So I sat there and watched and listened as Hazel Marie labored and sweated and moaned and bit her lip and struggled to bring another infant into the world.

“You can scream if you want to, Hazel Marie,” Etta Mae said. “It’s all right.”

“No,” she gasped. “Lloyd might hear.”

And right then I realized again how much depth there was to Hazel Marie, in spite of her affinity for heavy makeup, short skirts, and sky-high heels. She had an inner strength that was seeing her through this ordeal as it had a few other trials and tribulations along the way. Of all the occasions in the world when a woman has license to scream and yell her head off, this was it. Yet she was concerned about disturbing her son.

I wondered if she was giving Mr. Pickens a thought, and if she was, if she still figured he was worth what she was going through. He was undoubtedly piled up in bed at a Motel 6, snoring away without a care in the world, while Hazel Marie was here paying the price. Although there’d been times in my life when I’d regretted having no children, what I was witnessing made me glad I was past my prime and in no danger of paying that particular price.

Suddenly with another gush and a muted cry from Hazel Marie, Lillian said, “I got it, I got it. Hold on now, we jus’ about done.”

I could see her wiping another little naked black-haired baby, patting its back, then beginning to wrap it in the throw that Etta Mae had warmed. “You better cry now,” Lillian said, quickly unwrapping it and dangling it upside down. “Lemme hear you cry,” she urged as she gave it a right smart slap on the back.

The baby gasped, then let out a quavering wail, its little arms waving in the air and its body trembling all over.

“Is it all right?” Hazel Marie cried, craning her head to see what was going on. “Is it breathing?”

“It breathin’, all right,” Lillian said, smiling, as the baby took a deep breath and let us know in no uncertain terms that it had emerged unscathed. “An’ this one got a real set of lungs on it. Jus’ listen to it. You got another fine girl, an’ Mr. Pickens gonna be struttin’ ’round here so bad that none of us be able to stand him.” She and Etta Mae went through the string and scissors procedure again, then Lillian wrapped the infant snugly and laid it in Hazel Marie’s arms.

I leaned back in my chair and closed my eyes, utterly overcome with what we’d accomplished. Two babies delivered alive and well in the midst of a ferocious storm. It was more than I could take in, but it was over and as far as I could tell, no harm done at all. This would be something to talk about at the next book club.

I sat up and asked, “Can we get her on the sofa now and wrap her up?”

“No’m, not yet,” Lillian said, her hand kneading Hazel Marie’s abdomen. “Miss Etta Mae, we gonna need a pan of some kind. Run get that Dutch oven outta the kitchen.”

I was stunned. “Don’t tell me there’s a third one in there!”

“No’m, we jus’ got to finish up here,” Lillian said.

Etta Mae returned with the Dutch oven, and she and Lillian bent over Hazel Marie again, delivering something else that I didn’t see and didn’t care to see. The baby stirred in my arms and one little arm flailed out of the blanket as it started kicking. I patted it and began rocking back and forth, hoping it would calm down.

Etta Mae took the other baby from Hazel Marie so Lillian could turn her and clean her up. That was another thing I couldn’t watch. I declare, you might as well hang up your modesty the minute you find yourself with child.

Lillian warmed another blanket and spread it on the sofa. Then she helped Hazel Marie into it and wrapped her up. After putting a pillow behind her head, Lillian said, “Le’s give them babies to her now an’ they all get some rest.”

Etta Mae and I laid a baby in each of Hazel Marie’s arms. Her face glowed as she held them close. “You’re sure they’re all right?” she asked, then laughed. “I need to count their fingers and toes, but I don’t have a free hand to do it.”

Hearing a rumbling, grinding noise outside and seeing the flash of lights and the sound of motors, I hurried to a front window. “Well, would you look at that. They’re finally here.”

The snowplow went on past and was soon lost to sight in the falling snow, but two oversized pickups had stopped in the middle of the street. Four dark, bundled-up figures disembarked from the trucks, leaving headlights on and motors running, as they struggled through the snow toward our door, the strong beams of their flashlights lighting up the yard. I could see huge oak branches stretching across the driveway and covering our cars.

Opening the door, I barely recognized Sergeant Coleman Bates in a heavy coat and a knit cap that covered his face. He and the others stomped their feet, then came in. I quickly closed the door to keep what heat we had inside.

“Hey, Miss Julia,” Coleman said. “Hear you need some help.”

“I should say we do, or at least we did. Just look what’s happened.” I motioned toward Hazel Marie and her armful with some pride at what we’d accomplished.

Hazel Marie beamed at Coleman. “Look, Coleman. Two little girls.”

“Beautiful,” he said, but he wasn’t really looking. “We’re going to get you to the hospital now. Miss Lillian, we’ll need a few more blankets, please, ma’am.”

“But, the ambulance . . .?” I started, knowing there was no ambulance out there.

“All we have are four-wheel-drive double-cab vehicles, Miss Julia,” Coleman explained. “Only way we can get around. Douglas, you take one baby and, Len, you take the other one. Wrap ’em up good and don’t fall. Hazel Marie, I’m gonna carry you to the truck.” He leaned down and picked her up as if she were as light as a feather, which she probably was after such a sudden loss of weight. Lillian wrapped another blanket around her as Coleman nodded to the fourth man. “Chris, beat a path for us and get the back doors open.”

“Oh, Lord,” I said, “don’t anybody drop anybody.”

Etta Mae suddenly appeared beside me, pulling on her coat and stepping into her boots. “I’m going with them.”

“Oh good. Call us on Hazel Marie’s cell phone and let us know when you get settled. We’ll be over as soon as we can get out.”

“I’ll come get you when I get off,” Coleman said. “Around eight, unless we’re still shorthanded.”

As Coleman turned sideways to get Hazel Marie through the door, I saw the lines of fatigue on her face and wanted to comfort her. “You were wonderful, Hazel Marie,” I said. “I’m so proud of you.”

She managed a tired smile. “Call J.D. for me,” she said, as Lillian reached out and pulled the blanket over her head.

Lillian and I watched as the laden troop slogged through the drifts to the trucks. The two men with the babies got into the backseat of one truck, and Coleman lifted Hazel Marie into the backseat of the other one, with Etta Mae following her. Then Coleman and the fourth man got behind the wheels, put the powerful engines into gear, and slowly edged away down the street.

“Well, Lillian,” I said, as we closed the door, “we’ve done a night’s work, haven’t we?” Then, as we both went to stand in front of the fire, I reconsidered. “No,
you
’ve done a night’s work. Oh, Lillian,” I said, leaning my head against her shoulder, “what would we have done without you?”

Lillian patted my back. “Ever’body do a good job tonight,” she said. Then with a shuddering breath which made me realize the strain she’d been under, she looked around. “We better get this room cleaned up. Them chil’ren be up ’fore long.”

“What time is it, anyway?”

“No tellin’. All the clocks is stopped down here, but it late. Or maybe real early. An’ you know what, Miss Julia? We didn’t see what time them babies come.”

“I didn’t even think of it,” I said, wondering at my lapse. “I’ll run upstairs and get my watch.” Then, feeling the cold even more, I said, “and get some warm clothes on too. My feet are about frozen with this wet gown clinging to them.”

“You go on then,” Lillian said as she swept up an armful of newspapers from the floor. “I got to get this pan outta sight ’fore Lloyd and Latisha get up.”

I took a flashlight and headed out of the room, thinking that the second thing I was going to do as soon as I could get the car out was to buy another Dutch oven for the kitchen.

It was too cold to dress in my bedroom, so I got the warmest clothes I could find, plus a heavy coat and shoes, and went downstairs to put them on by the fire. I declare, I didn’t think my feet would ever be warm again.

When Lillian and I had the furniture back in place, you could hardly tell that my living room had doubled as a delivery room except for the pile of blankets and stack of unused towels that we hadn’t bothered to put away.

“Oh, Lillian,” I said, a sudden thought coming to me. “Were we supposed to boil water?”

“What for?”

“I don’t know. Maybe to wash our hands, but we didn’t do that either.”

“We do the best we can, ’cause that’s all we could do. No time for nothin’ else. What time you got, anyway?”

Looking at my watch, I said, “Almost five-thirty. You want to take a guess at when those babies were born? The birth certificates may ask for it.”

“I say ’bout a hour ago, don’t you?” Lillian stopped and gave the matter some thought. “Le’s us say the first one come ’bout four-thirty, an’ the other one, ’bout four-forty. That sound right to you?”

“I think it was a little before that. What about the first one at four-twelve and the next one at four-twenty-two? That sounds more precise.”

“That’s fine with me, but you better be callin’ Mr. Pickens’fore it get too much later.”

“Oh my, yes, but that means I’ve got to go into Hazel Marie’s cold room and look for her cell phone. And you need to get some clothes on too.”

Each taking a flashlight and braving the cold again, we went our separate ways. Going into Hazel Marie’s room, I swept the area with the flashlight beam and couldn’t see the cell phone anywhere. I knew I’d talked to the emergency dispatcher on it, but I couldn’t remember what I’d done with it after that. I might’ve still been searching if it hadn’t started ringing.