A Woman of Courage by Tania Blanchard

Author:Tania Blanchard
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2023-09-26T00:00:00+00:00

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Sarah had gone back home, and with Clementine, Esther and Laura still away, I continued to bury myself in my work, hoping I wasn’t pregnant. But I darted back and forth between thoughts of marriage, which seemed unthinkable without my teaching, and the idea of being a single mother and even of having my child in London and finding a way to live there.

In my darkest moments I thought about getting rid of the pregnancy, but immediately dismissed that option with a feeling of loathing and disgust. It was inconceivable. I felt trapped. Instead, I waited.

Mama said very little, just kept an eagle eye on me, making sure I was eating properly and finding any excuse to give me a reason to rest. I realised I was all Mama had left. She lavished on me all the care and love she would have given Papa, or my sisters had they been close by. Every morning, I woke knowing that my fate was becoming more certain. Any escape from this nightmare was disappearing fast and I’d soon have to face it. I was terrified of telling Roger. I already knew I loved him deeply and passionately. But how could I reconcile following my heart with the logic of the life I needed to fulfil my purpose? Could I somehow do both? I couldn’t imagine not teaching. It was my very life’s blood. How could I let go of my dream of living and working in London, when it had felt within reach only weeks ago? And if I did choose a life with Roger, what if he turned away from me after my rejection of him? My thoughts and fears went round and round in my head.

‘I’m going to have to tell Roger,’ I said to Mama one evening a few weeks later. We were in the parlour waiting for Jenny to come in from The Ox and Plough. ‘I think this baby’s here to stay,’ I said as I smoothed the fabric over my belly. Now that I’d said it and accepted what was ahead of me, I felt strangely content, and remembered the yearning I’d felt when Sarah and Jane had had their last children. Soon I was going to have a baby of my own. Soon I was going to be a mother.

She put down her embroidery. ‘Then you’ll have to do it soon,’ she said. ‘And you’ll want to be married before you begin to show.’

I nodded. ‘First I have to tell him and let him get used to the idea.’

‘Are you going to marry him?’ she asked, tentatively.

My heart clenched at her words. I opened my mouth to tell her that I hadn’t decided, because there were sacrifices whatever I chose, but found I couldn’t. Roger was everything I’d ever want in a man: love, trust and he shared my ideas about the way of the world. Fate had delivered to me what I truly desired, buried so deep beneath my ambitions to make the lives of women and children better.

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