Timepiece Page 5

  At the dictate of English custom, the wedding was scheduled for twelve noon. Ten minutes before the hour, David, with Gibbs by his side, entered the chapel and proceeded directly to the altar.

  As the last noon strike of the steeple’s clock resonated in a metallic echo, the church organ erupted in brilliant sforzando. MaryAnne appeared at the top of the circular staircase, and the entire congregation rose to their feet as much in collective awe as ceremony. She was radiant in a hand-embroidered ivory dress that laced down the front, corseting her narrow, though expanding, hourglass figure. Delicate lace gloves rose past her elbows and a cathedral-length veil cascaded down her back, held in place by a simple orchid wreath.

  David could not take his eyes off his bride as she descended the stair, flanked by Catherine and preceded by Catherine’s five-year-old niece, who dropped white rose petals before them as they passed beneath the great floral arches of white peonies and apple blossoms.

  For the first time in his life, David truly felt fortunate. When MaryAnne reached the altar, he leaned close.

  “You look stunning, my bride.”

  MaryAnne blushed as they knelt together before the clergyman on a silk pillow facing an altar of white-and-gold-leafed alderwood.

  The organ ceased and MaryAnne handed the robed priest a prayer book. He thanked her, opened the book, and cleared his throat.

  “Who giveth this woman to be married to this man?”

  There was a sudden and uncomfortable silence. It had been discussed previously that there was no one to give MaryAnne away. It was an error, born of habit, on the clergyman’s part, and he instantly recognized his blunder.

  MaryAnne looked up. “God does, Your Reverence.”

  The priest smiled as much at her cleverness as her sincerity.

  “So he does, my dear.”

  He looked out over the congregation. “Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today to unite this couple in holy matrimony according to God’s holy ordinance. Are there any who object to the union of this couple?”

  There was no response, though Victoria Piper took the opportunity to cough. The priest turned to the bride. “My dear, if you will repeat after me.”

  MaryAnne looked at David affectionately as she repeated the words of the vow until the priest said “till death do us part.”

  David looked into her face as a tear rolled down her cheek. “MaryAnne?” he asked gently. At her name, MaryAnne looked up at David. “Not until death, my love, but forever.”

  David smiled and his eyes moistened. “Forever,” he repeated.

  Catherine wiped a tear from her cheek.

  The priest smiled and continued. “And thereto I give thee my troth.”

  MaryAnne took a deep breath. “And thereto I give thee my troth.”

  The priest then turned to David, who followed him in the oath with the proper and extemporaneous alterations. When they had completed their vows, the priest nodded to Gibbs, who handed David the ring. MaryAnne removed the glove from her left hand and handed it to Catherine, who took it, and delicately folded it in half, then took MaryAnne’s engagement ring and bouquet. MaryAnne offered David her hand.

  David held out the ring. It was an exquisite diamond marquise of extraordinary cut and color, framed with sapphires, and set in a woven, white-gold band.

  MaryAnne was breathless. “David!”

  He smiled at her joy as he slid the ring onto her finger.

  The priest bestowed a final blessing on the couple and the organ roared to life. David stood first, and offering his bride his right hand, helped her to her feet. She took his arm and, after Catherine had turned MaryAnne’s train, they departed down the aisle. David shook a river of hands as they hurried out of the church to a flower-strewn carriage where a formally attired coachman sat waiting. At the couple’s approach, the driver laid a step down and helped MaryAnne and then David into the carriage. He encouraged the horses with a flick of his whip and the carriage lurched forward.

  When they were a distance from the church, David kissed his bride, then leaned back contentedly. “I would like to give you one of your wedding gifts now.”

  MaryAnne smiled. “One of?”

  “Remember, my love, now that you are mine, it is my prerogative to spoil you.” He handed her a small box wrapped in elegant white tissue. She tore back the paper, then lifted the lid. Inside lay the teardrop diamond pendant. It shone with exquisite brilliance, reflecting the afternoon sun.

  “Oh, David,” MaryAnne said softly. “You have made me a queen.”

  “No, MaryAnne. I have merely provided the proper accoutrements.”

  He raised the pendant, reached around her neck, and clasped its golden rope. It encircled her neck beautifully, falling just above her cleavage. She laid her head against his shoulder and looked down at her wedding ring. “I promise you that I will be a good wife.”

  “And, my love, I promise to be a good husband and friend. Your other present is back at our home.”

  “Our home,” she repeated softly.

  The wedding-brunch arrangements had been made for the garden, and it had never seen such splendor. No expense was spared. Long-shafted oil lamps with ribbons and orange blossoms tied around their supports decorated the grounds. Peacocks strutted about the yard in full plume between the white-laced tables that dotted the estate. The wedding cake itself was an elegant feat of architecture, six-tiered and bedecked with freshly cut white and peach roses.

  The food was served from the high-pitched, flower-laced gazebo. The menu had been especially selected and was abundant with cakes and bonbons, raw and fricasseed oysters, bouillon, cobblers, ices and coffee and entrées of crab, lobster, quail, and Cornish hens.

  When the brunch had concluded, the caterers began the task of boxing and wrapping the wedding cake for the guests, and the couple moved inside to the elaborate drawing room, where white roses covered and concealed the room’s chandeliers. Lilies and pink roses adorned the fireplace mantel and flowered vines encircled the mahogany pillars. David and MaryAnne stood before a backdrop of palms to meet their guests.

  When the room’s clocks struck five, David turned to his bride. “I would like to give you your wedding present now.” Taking leave of their guests, he took her hand and led her upstairs to the parlor, where he removed a thin key from his vest and unlocked the door.

  At his request, she closed her eyes, and taking his hand, followed him into the room.

  “You may open your eyes.”

  MaryAnne opened her eyes. Before her stood a majestic grandfather’s clock, larger and more magnificent than anything David had previously collected. It stood nearly eight feet in height, and the casing was ornately carved in floral renderings. Detailed pillars flanked the clock’s hood, which rose in two swan-necked pieces of carved mahogany facing inward toward a central finial spire. The white-faced dial was hand-painted and bordered by ornately patterned brass spandrels, preserved beneath a lead-crystal door that locked with a skeleton key.

  “David, it is the most beautiful clock.”

  David studied her face anxiously. “Do you like it?”

  She stepped forward to her gift and ran her fingers across its exquisite carvings. “It is so ornate. Yes. Very much.”

  David joined her. “I wanted the exterior to be as intricate as the interior clockwork. The chime is exquisite and unlike anything I have ever heard. It is angelic.”

  MaryAnne was enthralled. “I have never owned anything of such worth.”

  “May I tell you why I wanted to give you a clock?”

  She turned to her groom. “There is greater significance than its beauty?”

  David stared into the clock’s face. “You once asked me why I collected clocks.”

  MaryAnne nodded.

  “I have given this question a great deal of thought since then. A clock is a strange invention. A collection of cogs and gears that are always in motion, yet accomplish nothing. Not like a pump that provides water or a cotton gin that leaves
something useful. A clock just moves without thought or meaning—worthless without interpretation.” His eyes focused on the clock in condemnation. “It is just motion.” He turned and looked into his new wife’s eyes. “And so has been my life. I have moved, not with feeling, but because it is all that I could see to do. You have given my motion meaning.”

  MaryAnne looked into David’s face. “I have given you my life, David.”

  “And in so doing, you have given me mine.”

  They embraced again, kissing at length. David smiled as they parted. “Let us be on our way!”

  “Yes, my love.”

  Gibbs was already outside with the hackney, loading the travel cases into the carriage. On the front step, MaryAnne hugged Catherine.

  “Thank you, Catherine. You have made this day beautiful.”

  “I am so happy for you both. Take good care of him, MaryAnne. I love him dearly.”

  MaryAnne embraced her tighter. “How could you not, my sister.”

  After counting the cases, David took his bride by the hand and helped her up into the carriage.

  Gibbs stood by the side of the carriage. “Good luck, David.”

  “Thank you, Gibbs. We will return in a fortnight. The company is in your hands.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Andrea

  “I had never supposed the cost women bear in the perpetuation of the species. Nor that such courage could be had in such a petite frame.”

  David Parkin’s Diary. January 17, 1909

  MaryAnne’s pains were still light when the hurry-up call went out to the midwife, one Eliza Huish. The woman was known as one of the most revered midwives in the city, and had given birth herself on eleven occasions.

  Eliza arrived on horseback shortly before dusk. She was older than MaryAnne had expected; a stern, aged countenance worn into the matriarch’s hard face. She was wide-hipped and buxom, her hair was streaked with gray and drawn back tightly in a bun with a few prodigal strands falling across her cheek. Her attire matched her manner. She was dressed austerely in a drab muslin dress partially concealed beneath a faded ivory apron, which carried the stains of previous deliveries. At her side was a worn carpetbag filled with the implements of her profession: herbs, ointments, tonics, and tattered rags.

  “Waters not yet broke, Catherine?” she asked.

  “No, ma’am.”

  The woman stopped at the room’s threshold and surveyed the elaborate Victorian parlor, her eyes raised to the ornate frescoed ceiling. She was not likely to have seen such wealth before. The parlor was one of David’s favorite rooms, and though he spent little time there, he endowed the room with his favorite collectibles, including MaryAnne’s grandfather’s clock. MaryAnne, at Catherine’s suggestion, had chosen to birth in the parlor, as it was more convenient to the water closet and kept better temperature than the other upstairs rooms.

  The woman sized up the room’s occupants, then went to work with priggish fervor. Her first official act was to expel David from the room. In reluctant retreat, he left the parlor with his hands raised above his head and told Mark outside, “It is a time of female despotism.”

  “Why can’t David be with me?” MaryAnne asked.

  The question stunned the woman, who found the very wish unnatural and could see no reason why a woman should desire a man’s presence at such an occasion.

  “It is not a man’s place when a woman is in travail,” she said. “Only a woman can know what a woman is suffering.”

  MaryAnne was in no condition to argue and relinquished herself to the woman’s government. The midwife placed a hand on MaryAnne’s forehead, then walked to the foot of the bed and lifted MaryAnne’s gown up to the waist, singing hymns beneath her breath as she worked. She poured virgin olive oil into her hands and began rubbing it into MaryAnne’s hips and abdominal muscles.

  “This’ll stretch you out, darlin’. Make it a whole lot easier. Also brought along some Lydia Pinkham’s vegetable compound. Fetch that from my satchel, Catherine. And the spoon.”

  Catherine lifted a brown glass bottle filled with the tonic. She leveled a spoonful and offered it to MaryAnne, who made a face at the bitter substance.

  “Two spoonfuls, Catherine. Works miracles with all female ailments,” the midwife said confidently, as she kneaded MaryAnne’s thighs. After administering the dosage, Catherine pressed a cup of coffee to MaryAnne’s lips, which she gratefully received. The woman wiped the oil from her hands onto a rag.

  “How long since labor started?”

  “She had the first strong pain shortly after noon. She started regular several hours ago,” Catherine said. Her voice rose hopefully, then fell in disappointment. “. . . But they stopped just before you arrived.”

  MaryAnne sighed.

  The women sat and looked at each other quietly.

  “Would you care for something to eat, Eliza?” Catherine offered.

  The woman nodded. “Thank you.” She looked over at MaryAnne. “Haven’t had a bite since breakfast.”

  Catherine excused herself, returning fifteen minutes later with a silver tray stacked with cut cucumbers, honey candy, pine nuts, and cream cheese and walnut sandwiches. The woman snacked on the fare, eventually joined by Catherine, who ate only to pass time. A half hour later, MaryAnne suddenly began breathing heavily. The midwife set down a sandwich and placed both hands on MaryAnne’s stomach, concentrating on the contractions with professional intensity. Three minutes later, MaryAnne started into another. “There, that’s a good start. Long pains, close together.”

  MaryAnne grimaced. “It’s taking so long.”

  “It is natural, the first birth always takes longer. We’ll likely be here all night.” As if to emphasize her words, she glanced over her shoulder at the grandfather’s clock. “There’s a fine clock . . . help us time these pains.”

  A minute later, MaryAnne tensed again, then groaned with another contraction.

  “Just breathe easy, darlin’. No sense making it any harder than it need be. First always takes longer,” she repeated. “Seen a first labor once go up on two days . . . but once the water broke.”

  MaryAnne was oblivious to the chatter, concentrating on the strange forces that had seized her body.

  In the next ten minutes, MaryAnne had gone through five more cycles.

  “How do you feel now, darlin’?”

  “I want to push,” MaryAnne panted.

  “Good, good. It’s moving along right quickly now. You go right ahead and push with the next pain.”

  The woman wiped her forehead with her wide sleeves. Two minutes later, MaryAnne started into another contraction. As she began to push, her water broke. MaryAnne felt the sheet beneath her wet.

  The midwife gasped. “Oh, dear.” She stood looking at the bright red discharge. MaryAnne was bleeding heavily. The woman became suddenly grave. “Catherine, hurry now, get me some rags.”

  “What’s wrong?” Catherine whispered.

  “There may be separation of the afterbirth.”

  “What is wrong?” MaryAnne asked, her voice strained.

  “A little bleeding, darlin’.”

  Catherine said nothing. MaryAnne was bleeding profusely.

  MaryAnne looked up at the ceiling. “Is my baby all right?” She clenched for another contraction. Her voice pitched. “Catherine, where is David?”

  “I don’t know, MaryAnne.”

  “I want David,” MaryAnne said between heavy breaths.

  “It is not proper,” the midwife returned, studying the continued flow of blood. MaryAnne sensed from the change in the woman’s countenance that the crisis was greater than she confessed. Fifteen minutes passed beneath the clock’s serpentine hands. The midwife’s anxiety increased. MaryAnne began to feel light-headed.

  “Is my baby still alive?” she asked again.

  The woman did not answer. The blood continued to flow.

  “Will I die?”

  The midwife shook her head unconvincingly. “You will b
e well enough.”

  MaryAnne’s breathing quickened with the onset of a new contraction. She did not believe the woman’s reply. “Is there a chance that I will die?”

  This time, the woman did not respond. MaryAnne exhaled, then clenched down with the pain. “If we are to die in travail it will be with David by my side.”

  The midwife looked up at Catherine. “Call the man.”

  At Catherine’s summons, David quickly entered the dim room, his face bent in concern. He walked to the side of the bed and took MaryAnne’s hand. It was impossibly cold. He glanced up at the midwife, who silenced him with a sharp shake of her head. His heart froze. She did not want to concern MaryAnne with the seriousness of her condition. How bad was it? He looked down at the foot of the bed and saw the pile of blood-soaked rags. He felt his stomach knot. MaryAnne was wet with perspiration. David held her hand as he blotted her forehead.

  Oh, God, do not take her from me, he silently prayed. I will give anything. He rubbed her hand to warm it. “You can do this, Mary. It will be all right. Everything will be all right.”

  “I am so cold.”

  David bit back his fear. “It will be all right, my love.”

  Just then, the midwife walked to the side of the bed and bent over MaryAnne. Her forehead was beaded in perspiration and her face bore a solemn, dark expression. There was no more time to shield MaryAnne from the truth of the crisis. “MaryAnne, the baby needs to come now.” Her words came slowly, each weighted with emphasis. “You need to give birth now.”

  “I don’t know how to!” she cried.

  “You can do it, MaryAnne,” she replied firmly. “Go ahead and push. The baby must come.”

  “Is my baby alive?”

  The midwife said nothing. Catherine began to cry and turned away.

  “Is my baby alive?!” she screamed.

  “I don’t know. It is the baby’s sack which is bleeding, so the baby is in the gravest danger. But it is still your blood, and if it does not stop soon . . .”