Kelsie felt a glow of relief, and pride, and confidence. This was Connor, her Connor, and he’d matured into a caring and skilled man. Maybe he had even recovered from some of his control issues, she thought with a smile, and couldn’t help wondering what the future held for them. For the first time she wondered if some time in the future they might even meet again. She hoped so.
He spoke gently to Anna. ‘If you can stand the change, it would help if you were to sit on the edge of the seat, Anna. Right near the edge so baby’s toes can dangle. We won’t lift your skirt until we need to.’
Kelsie slid one of Wolfgang’s raincoats onto the floor and Connor knelt beside Anna. The girl’s eyes were closed and she was muttering prayers under her breath in an unending litany.
Kelsie decided that was as good as anything to do in the circumstances but everything seemed to be progressing normally—or normal for a breech baby wanting to be born on the Orient Express between countries.
With Anna’s change in position her baby’s little legs descended further until his hips were suddenly exposed and Connor folded back the nightgown so they could see the progress of the baby. Things would happen faster now.
Anna was having a son. Neither Kelsie nor Connor mentioned it, with the mother concentrating so deeply.
‘If the hips fit, the head fits,’ Connor said quietly, and Kelsie smiled at him.
‘I hadn’t heard that before. Very nice.’
Anna’s eyes were closed and Max was standing outside the door, available but not observing.
Kelsie leaned out the door and spoke in an undertone. ‘Can I get another couple of towels, please, Max?’
He nodded and disappeared up the corridor, returning in less than a minute with warmed towels.
‘Impressive.’ Kelsie smiled at him before laying one across Connor’s knees for him to use if he wanted to wrap baby before it was born.
The descent of the baby continued smoothly, with the help of gravity and his mother bearing down, and Connor’s knowledge to keep his hands off a breech baby in case he startled it or pulled, in which case a baby would throw up its head into an alert position, instead of being curled for birth.
Frightened babies ran into problems. It seemed Connor knew that. Kelsie knew that. Some less up-to-date accouchiers didn’t know that.
Connor also knew that breech babies could be a little more dazed and reluctant to breathe than babies who came head first. His main concern in this scenario.
So he was much happier to be the catcher to hand the baby on to Kelsie for assessment because he was more used to having a paediatric registrar do all his baby resuscitation while he cared for the woman.
In Kelsie’s working world, caseload midwives who caught babies in homes were often in pairs and the second person was always responsible for encouraging reluctant babies to breathe.
Anna’s baby had turned a pale shade of blue by the time the head finally arrived and Connor handed the floppy little boy across to Kelsie while he waited for the next stage with the mother.
Kelsie took the limp little body, wiped him quite firmly with a towel, dried him all over so that his little arms wobbled, but after another few seconds a mewling cry was heard, much to Connor’s relief.
He watched the mother seem to wake from her stupor at the sound, shake her head and focus on her infant. Then with a gasp she reached for her son, and with the cord still attached he was gently eased into the open front of her gown against her skin.
Anna’s son lay with his head on the gentle swell of his mother’s breasts, facing Kelsie, so they could see the colour of his face and as he cried with gradually increasing indignation, suddenly pink-cheeked and vigorous.
These were the moments Connor savoured. And judging by the soft look on Kelsie’s face, she did too.
He wondered if she regretted not having had babies and then pushed the thought away. Pushed away the concept of a fifteen-year-old child they could have shared because the thought tore at somewhere deep within him.
He returned to the job at hand as the final stage of birth was completed with no damage.
He could hear Anna murmur in Italian, saw out of the corner of his vision the mother stroke the dark fuzz on the baby’s head, and then Kelsie tucked another warm towel over them both.
She caught his eye. She’d always caught his eye. This time she held it and for a moment they connected with the satisfaction of a wonderful outcome.
A special moment. Then she sent him a long relieved look and he was surprised because he hadn’t realised the depth of her anxiety, but she allowed it to escape now the crisis had passed. Suddenly he wanted to hold her in his arms and reassure her that everything was fine. That she was amazing. But he didn’t.