“Back to bed, sweet girl.” It was Sarah. She was still there, her freckles in full colour, her eyes holding me, still unwavering.

“I should nurse it.”

“Her,” she said.

Her, I thought.

“I should nurse Her.”

NURSE

Of a woman: to suckle, and otherwise attend to, or simply to take care, or charge of an infant.

They were all there: Ditte and Beth, Sarah and the midwife. They watched as I nursed. They heard Her suckling as I heard Her suckling, but they couldn’t feel the strength of Her suck or the weight of Her against my belly. They were oblivious to Her smell. For half an hour, Her little noises were the only sound in the room. No one gave voice to their hopes or their fears.

“Tears are quite normal,” said the midwife.

How long had I been weeping?

How many times did I nurse Her? I couldn’t count, though I’d meant to. Time became an elastic thing, and the boundary between dreams and waking was blurred. They took it in turns to sit with us, never leaving us alone. I wanted to bury my face in that sweet place below the shell of Her ear, breathe in the warm biscuity smell of Her. “I could eat you up,” I wanted to say. I wanted to undress Her and trace every chubby crease, kiss Her from head to toe and whisper my love into the pores of her skin.

Several weeks passed. I did none of these things.

Sarah sat on the bed, her large, freckled hand stroking the golden down on our baby’s head. “You can change your mind.”

I’d tried to imagine it a hundred different ways.

“It’s not just my mind that would need to change,” I said.

She knew this. As she looked at me, I saw relief wrestle with a shadow of regret. She was glad, I think, that I’d said it out loud. She turned from me, took longer than usual to fold a new napkin.

“Shall I take her?” Sarah asked.

I could think of no way to answer. I looked down and noticed milk had pooled at the edge of Her sleeping mouth. I moved a little and watched it dribble down Her chin. I felt the weight of Her, so much heavier than when I’d first held Her. I tried to think of a word that could match Her beauty.

There was none. There are none. There never would be a word to match Her.

I gave Her to Sarah. A few months later, Sarah and Philip emigrated to South Australia.

PART 4 | 1907–1913

September 1907