A House Without Windows (5 page)

I lumber about the confines of my prison, my mood lowering with every passing day.  My daughter should not be subjected to the sight of a woman in labour at her age.  There is nowhere else for the baby to be born except on the bed, where Amy herself once entered this cruel world. 

For something to do I dredge up my midwifery training and teach Amy about the development of the foetus, and draw diagrams depicting how the baby changes in the womb with every passing month.  Amy is fascinated, and says she wants to be a midwife when she grows up.  I hate to crush her enthusiasm and youthful ambitions, but the only chance she may ever have to be a midwife is to help deliver her half-brother or sister.  The thought that she and the new baby may have to spend their entire life imprisoned in this room scares me beyond words. 

I spend some time informing Amy that when labour starts I am going to be in severe pain, but that she must not panic.  I tell her I am not ill, and that the pain will disappear when the baby is born.  She listens carefully.

The baby’s head hasn’t engaged and I must be near to full-term now.  I seem to spend hours now on all fours with my head on the floor, just willing the baby to turn.  Amy laughs as I rock and sway from side to side like a belly dancer, but I also know from my midwifery training all those years ago that the baby is in a transverse lie, the worst presentation of all. 

My last plan of action is to use our torch to shine a light on my pubic bone.  I tell Amy that she has to get used to seeing me without any knickers on, as this is what midwives have to do if she wants to learn how to help catch a baby when it’s born.  I lie like a beached whale on the bed and ask her to shine the torch and shout directly onto my pubis.  I know we’re wasting precious batteries in the faint hope that the baby will hear her voice and turn towards the light, but I’m gambling on anything now. 

Amy is asleep when I awake, needing to use the toilet.  My bladder is the size of a cherry these days. The show of bloodstained mucus confirms the beginning of labour.  I try not to panic as I feel the baby’s buttocks are still over to one side of my abdomen and its head is over on the other side.  There is no room left to try and turn the baby. A shoulder presentation is any mother’s worst nightmare.  I need a caesarean section.  The baby will not be born without one.

I dress in a bra, knickers, skirt and jumper, and lie back down on the bed and try to breathe deeply to slow down my pounding heart rate.  I don’t know what the time is or how long Amy will sleep for.  I need Edwin to bring breakfast to let him know I need an ambulance.

I suddenly feel full of hope: an ambulance will take me to hospital, and I will be able to speak to the anaesthetist before they put me under.  Better still I can write a note on Amy’s drawing paper with her felt tips.  I slide out of bed again as gently as I can, and as I feel the first contraction I write in big letters that I have been held against my will for about 8 or 9 years by the man that has brought me into hospital.  I do not remember his surname or know his address, but I know his name is Edwin, and he is also keeping my daughter there as a prisoner.  I write down my parents’ names and their last known address, and I fold up the paper and pop it into my bra for safekeeping.

Amy stirs eventually as the contractions are gripping me about every ten minutes.  I take off my knickers but keep my skirt on. There is a rush of blooded water onto the bedclothes, and I can feel the umbilical cord presenting in the birth canal.  I explain to her that she cannot help the baby to be born because I need to go to hospital, and that the baby will not be born unless I can have an operation.  She holds her reading book with one hand for comfort, and hammers on the door in panic with the other hand shouting for Edwin. 

Whether he heard her or whether it was time for him to bring us breakfast I do not know, but he arrived and nearly dropped the tray of food as he saw the bedclothes and my face.  I explain the transverse lie which needs a caesarean section, and that both myself and the baby are at risk.  I plead with him to call an ambulance.

Edwin tries to keep the panic from his voice, and says that as I’m a doctor and I delivered Amy, then I can deliver the baby myself.  I explain that this baby is presenting shoulder first and not head first like Amy did, and that if he wants both of us to live then he needs to get me to hospital as quickly as possible.

Edwin says no ambulances.  Amy hugs her book looking distraught, and pleads with him to take me to hospital in his car.  He appears stunned, and stands there not knowing what to do.  I am gripped by a fierce contraction as my body tries in vain to expel the baby.  The pain doubles me up on the bed and Amy screams in panic. 

Amy’s screaming seems to jolt Edwin out of his stupor.  He runs out and locks the door, but then comes back in with a carrier bag of food and says it’s for Amy.  Prince follows him. He tells her to be a good girl and look after Prince, and that he will be back after the baby has been born.  I cry and plead with him to take Amy with us, but he insists that she must stay.  He says to her that he was often left on his own from the age of about four in a cupboard and survived, and that she must be a brave girl.  He picks me up as though I was as light as a feather, and carries me through the door that has been closed to me for nine or so years.  He locks up after us, and my heart goes out to my daughter, sobbing alone on the other side of the door.  I can hear her little hands pounding on the woodwork as she calls out for me.

Edwin tells me to shut my eyes.  He carries me up some stairs and opens another door. I peep through my closed eyelids and find we are in the kitchen of his house.  I see a clock on the wall, which says 6.30.  I assume it must be early morning instead of night-time, as Amy had not long been awake and no daylight is coming through the drawn curtains.  He carries on up the hallway, opens the front door and goes through a sort of half porch, and I am outside for the first time in nearly a decade.

I feel cold, cold air.  I hear the crunch of his footsteps on snow.  He tells me to keep my eyes closed.  Another contraction takes my breath away.  He opens the car door with one hand and helps me into the front seat.  I try and slouch so as not to compress the umbilical cord, which is partly hanging out of the birth canal.  I ask him to lay the seat down, and he complies. The seat cover feels furry, and I pull at it until some of the fur comes off in my hands.  I hold on to the fur. He tells me that if I open my eyes he will kill Amy.

He starts the car and we move off.  I open my eyes just the tiniest amount and can see we are in a street with other houses.  Nobody is about.  I’m laid too far down and it’s too dark to see any sign that might give me the name of the street.  I feel him looking at me as he drives, and realise I must be very careful not to put Amy at any risk. 

I see road signs flashing by, and caught a glimpse of an arrow pointing straight ahead to Croydon.  I remember that Croydon is a large outer London suburb on the border with Surrey.

I get a flashback to the evening of 20
th
May 1987; the last time I was in his car.  I was 27, had just finished work in the Accident & Emergency department, and had started on the walk back to my accommodation.  I’d recognised his face as the drug user from out of area with pain and haematuria whom I had treated a few days before.  He’d told me I had beautiful hair as he lay on the triage trolley. I couldn’t remember his name, but thought it strange when he pulled up in his car a few days later and asked me for directions to A&E again.  I had to lean in through the open passenger window to speak to him, but that’s all I can remember.  I smelt some strong aftershave, but when I woke up I was in the room I’d get to know so well. I must have inhaled something like chloroform or ketamine, but I suppose I’ll never really know what happened that night. I was on cloud nine as I had just begun to suspect that Liam and I might be parents. I didn’t even get the chance to tell Liam I was pregnant, and to this day he has no idea he has a daughter.

We arrive at the hospital and he tells me not to say a word or Amy will die.  He says he will speak for me, and that he will not leave my side for even a minute.  In-between contractions I can still feel the piece of paper in my bra, and I hope and pray I can get it to one of the nurses without him noticing.

He parks the car and carries me into Accident & Emergency.  He’s sweating despite the cold morning, and drips of perspiration drop down his face. I’m in terrible pain but think of Amy locked in the room and I say nothing.  I hold on tightly to the piece of fur from the seat cover.  I notice a sign giving information in the waiting area.  It says that the date is Friday January 5
th
1996.  I realise I am nearly 36 years old and heading towards middle age.  The clerk on reception wants to take my name, address, and date of birth, but Edwin gives false details and gives an address in Scotland that he probably made up on the spot.  He reiterates to the clerk that we do not live in the area, but were visiting relatives when labour started.

I’m ushered straight in to a cubicle.  The doctor pulls the curtains around me and asks Edwin to wait on the other side while he examines me.  I can hear him breathing close by as I change into a gown, and I hold the precious piece of paper and the fur under my arm.  The fur is of a nondescript greyish colour.  The doctor examines me, takes some observations, and says that I need an emergency caesarean to save the baby.  I tell him I have not eaten or drunk anything for at least 6 hours, and he rings up to Theatre to inform them to prepare for me.  Another contraction makes me want to retch.  A porter arrives with a wheelchair to take me up to Theatre.  Edwin follows close behind, but is barred from entry at the doors to the operating suite.  

I thought there was going to be a scuffle, but at the last minute Edwin gives in and says he will be waiting for me to come out, and to remember his promise.  I shiver inside as I’m wheeled through the doors of the operating suite and into the anaesthetic room.

At last after nearly 10 years I am free of him.  I bring out the piece of paper and the fur from under my arm.  The paper is warm and folded up into a tiny square.  I give it to the anaesthetist as another contraction makes me temporarily lose my grip on reality.  I gasp and tell the anaesthetist that my name is Dr Elizabeth Nichols, and that I was kidnapped from the Rachelle hospital in Norfolk, on 20
th
May 1987 by the man waiting outside, whose name I only know as Edwin.  I tell him my 9-year-old daughter Amy is still being held prisoner in Edwin’s house, and that he has threatened to kill her if he finds out I have spoken to anybody.  I tell him I do not know Edwin’s address.  I also give him the piece of fur from the car seat.  The anaesthetist gives me a stunned sort of look and assures me that one of the team will contact the police, but in the interim time is of the essence and that he must anaesthetise me because the baby is in severe distress.

He places an oxygen mask over my face and I breathe in deeply to help the baby.  I thank the life inside me for giving me the means to escape, and vow to make a good home for the baby and for Amy. 

I awake in Recovery from a dreamless sleep.  I need a drink of water, but my eyes feel too heavy to open and I’m too sleepy to talk.  I hear the doctor tell me that I have a son and that the police are on their way.  I fall asleep again and when I wake up I am in a room on my own with my baby asleep in a cot next to me.  The walls are pale blue instead of grey, and the floor has light green and white tiles.  Daylight filters through blinds that are the colour of pale custard.  My baby is wrapped in a blue blanket, and I blink in wonder at all the colours.  There is somebody in a dark blue uniform standing by the door, but thankfully there is still no sign of Edwin.

I try to sit up, but the morphine is wearing off and I feel pain from the stitches in my abdomen.  The person in the uniform comes in closer and smiles at me.  She’s a policewoman and says her name is Faye Carter, and she asks if I’m up to talking.  I manage to mouth at her that I need some water, and as I sip the cold refreshing nectar I look at my baby again.  He definitely looks like a Jocelyn now, but I think I’ll call him Joss for short.  Amy will be tickled pink.

Amy.  Where is my darling?  Is she hungry?  Is she still crying for me?  I come

back to reality with a bump.

Faye sits down by my bed and says she wants to talk about the piece of paper I gave to the anaesthetist
, and also about Edwin.  She says my parents’ address and my statement that I had been kidnapped checked out, and that the Missing Persons Team had contacted my parents, who are ecstatic and are on their way to see me. 

My eyes fill up with tears that spill down my cheeks.  So many nights I cried for my mother when Amy was sleeping and I didn’t have to be strong for her.  My greatest fear had been that they accepted I was dead and had given up searching. 

I ask about Edwin, and Faye says he had been arrested as he waited outside the operating suite.  He will eventually be charged with kidnap, kidnapping of a minor, and rape.  However, he had no ID on him and had decided to remain silent and not give them his name or address, therefore as yet they have been unable to find Amy.  My heart sinks, because I know Amy is his princess and he doesn’t want her found.  There is also the unspoken worry that the police won’t believe me until they find Amy.

Faye asks how I travelled to the hospital.  I reply that Edwin took me in his car, but made me keep my eyes closed.  I tell her I managed to pull some fur from the car seat and gave it to the anaesthetist.  She nods and asks me where I thought he might have parked his car, but all I can tell her is that when we arrived at the hospital I opened my eyes but it was dark and I didn’t really take much notice of his car or where he parked it, as I was in too much pain and distress.  She nods again and says the police now have the piece of fur and are searching the hospital car parks. 

I tell her that he didn’t need to carry me too far before we were at the doors of Accident & Emergency, and she assures me they will find the car very soon.  I tell her the passenger seat will be laid down almost flat, and she speaks into her radio and passes the information on to the search team outside.

I can’t believe what is happening to me.  The two people I love most in the world apart from Liam and Amy come into the room. They have aged in the years we have been apart, and I break down completely at the sight of them. None of us can speak for the first few minutes.  We hug together on the bed and they take a first look at their new grandson, completely oblivious to all the drama going on around him.  They tell me he is beautiful, and that I am very pale but still beautiful.  I smile at them through my tears and tell them they also have a 9-year-old granddaughter. Mum is lost for words again. 

I want to ask if they know anything about Liam but can see Faye reappearing at the door, having kindly given us a few moments of privacy.  She says a car with a passenger seat that is lying flat and covered with a greyish fur cover cannot be found in any of the hospital car parks.

He is one step ahead.  He must have moved the car whilst I was in the operating theatre.

My joy is tarnished somewhat by the thought of my poor Amy still left alone in her prison, but at least Edwin is in custody and under lock and key himself.  I ask what the next stage is, and Faye tells me Edwin’s face is soon going to be on national TV to see if anybody recognises him.

Mum and Dad say we have a home with them as soon as I am recovered and out of hospital.  I tell them the stay will only be temporary until I am able to stand on my own two feet again.  Money in my bank account has remained untouched since 1987, and I can see my parents are getting older.  I have no wish to interrupt their peaceful life with a child and a newborn baby if I can work and find my own place.  Mum says it will all come with time.

I ask Mum about Liam, but she says they lost touch several years ago.  She says she has no idea where he is, but tells me she will phone the Rachelle hospital and find out if he still works there. She tells me she is going to stay in the room with me all night.

When the nurse comes in to check my wound and bring milk for Joss I ask if there is a hairdresser in the hospital.  She looks surprised, but says there is.  I ask her to book an appointment for me.