The changeling

Mrs. Pencarron looked sad for a moment. Then she said: “Mrs. Polhenny will look after the child. You need to get away ... just for a little spell.” My grandmother was finally persuaded and we left.

The Pencarrons did all they could to help us. It was no good though. My grandmother was very restive. She and I went for long walks together. She talked to me about my mother.

“I feel she is still with us, Rebecca. Don’t let’s try to shut her out. Let’s talk as though she is still with us.”

I told her how she had talked to me only a few weeks before.

“She asked me to care for the baby. ‘Always look after the child,’ she said. It would be my little brother or sister. It was strange the way she talked to me down by the pool.”

“That place meant something special to her.”

“Yes, I know. And now I look back I remember so well what she said. It was as though she knew she might not be here.”

My grandmother slipped her arm through mine. “We have the child, Rebecca.”

“At first none of us seemed to want her.”

“It was because ...”

“Because her coming caused my mother’s death.”

“Poor little thing. What did she know about that? We must love the child, Rebecca. We shall, of course. She is your sister ... my grandchild. It is what your mother would want ... it is what she would expect.”

“And we have left her ... already.”

“Yes. But we shall go back and it will be different. We shall find our consolation in the child. We’ll tell them at Pencarron that we’ll go back tomorrow. They’re darlings, they’ll understand.”

They did and the very next day we returned to Cador.

We were greeted by a satisfied Mrs. Polhenny.

“The child is getting on well now,” she said. “She’s turned the corner. I’ve been with her night and day. I could see it was special care she wanted ... though I didn’t think at one time I was going to pull her through. You’ll see the change in her. Screaming her head off now she is ... that’s if something don’t please her ladyship.” We were proudly taken to the nursery.

She was right. The baby had changed. She looked plumper ... much more healthy ... like a different child.

“She’ll get on like a house afire now,” said Mrs. Polhenny. “I can tell you it was touch and go with that one.”

I think from that moment we felt better. We had the baby to think of, to plan for.

We had been wise to take those few days at Pencarron.

They put a divide between us and the terrible shock of my mother’s death.

On our return it was as though we were brought face to face with the fact that we had our lives to lead. We realized that at the back of our minds had been the thought that the child was not going to survive, that there would be no living reminder of the beloved one’s death. Both Dr. Wilmingham and Mrs. Polhenny clearly thought the child would follow her mother, but by a miracle she was not only alive but a healthy baby. And she was here for us to love and cherish as my mother would have wished and expected us to do.

Now the child was all important to us and we began to move, in a small measure it was true, away from our grief.

There must be a christening. She was to be called Belinda Mary. My grandmother chose the name. “It just came to me,” she said; and from then on Belinda became a very definite person. We immediately noticed that there was something special about her; she was brighter than other children; we fancied-absurdly-that she knew us. Mrs. Polhenny, fortunately, was free from other duties and she took on the role of nurse for a time. I was sure the child owed a great deal to her skill. We needed a nurse, said my grandmother, and Mrs. Polhenny agreed. It was about a week after we had returned from Pencarron that she came up with the suggestion.

“There’s my Leah,” she said. “I don’t know, but ever since she went up to High Tor to do that there needlework, she’s been unsettled like. I thought that a spell down at St Ives with my sister would have made her want to stay at home for a bit ...”

My grandmother and I exchanged meaningful glances. We could not imagine Leah’s wanting to return to that cottage where cleanliness ranked almost as high as godliness. “Leah gets on well with little ones,” went on Mrs. Polhenny. “I’ve taught her a few things ... and I’d be on hand. What I think might be an answer is for Leah to take on this job of nurse to the little “un.”

“Leah!” cried my grandmother. “But Leah is a skilled needlewoman.”

“That means she’ll be able to make for the baby. She’d like that.”

“Have you talked to her about it?”

“Oh yes, I have that. And, believe me, she wants to do it. She’s tired of sitting over a piece of needlework. It’s bad for the eyes, too. She’s already feeling the need to rest them a bit. She’s been getting headaches. She wants to come here as the baby’s nurse. What she wouldn’t know, I’d tell her ... and she’d have a real fondness for the little one.”

“Well,” said my grandmother, “if Leah would really like that, I think it would be an excellent idea.”

“I’ll send her along. She can have a talk with you.”