The Wedding Journey

“All babies this young look puny,” she told her sister. “She’s average from what I can tell. She seems perfectly healthy and quite obviously hungry, the poor dear.”

Once the baby’s skin was clean and dry, Maeve made a diaper from the cotton bandages Flynn kept stacked nearby. Flynn opened a drawer on the other side of the room and offered a folded shirt.

Nora accepted the garment. She studied the intricate embroidery and monogram and asked a question with her expressive blue eyes.

“It’s just a shirt,” he said. “Cut it up to make her gowns. I have plenty more.”

Nora used his bandage scissors to cut off the collar, sleeves and buttons and crudely fashion a garment.

“She appears fine,” Maeve told her. “But we need to feed her.”

“Rice water?” Nora asked.

“No, milk is best.”

“It will have to be goat’s milk.” Flynn took a small tin container from inside a cabinet and headed for the door. “The sailors have a nanny aboard. I’ll be back with milk.”

Nora glanced about. “How will we feed it to her?”

Maeve handed her the now-squalling baby and searched in earnest for a feeding method. “We could soak towels…or gauze.”

She opened a cabinet and picked up a length of rubber tubing. “Better yet. We’ll use this.”

“That?” Nora asked, cuddling the infant.

“Aye. It’s pliable, see. We’ll puncture a couple of needle holes in it for the milk to come through and bend it like so. The baby will suck on it.”

“Are you sure?”

“Stick your finger in her mouth and see if she doesn’t latch onto anything.”

“I’ve just washed all the sailor’s breakfast dishes, so I expect my finger’s clean enough.” Nora offered the baby the tip of her index finger, and the crying stopped immediately. Nora got tears in her eyes. “The poor grah mo chee is so hungry.”

“We’ll have her fed in no time.” Maeve placed the tubing in a kettle of water. “I’m going on deck to boil this.”

Nora’s eyes widened. “And leave me here alone with her?”

“You’ll be fine,” Maeve assured her. “Just cuddle her, as you’re doing. She likes your warmth and the beat of your heart. If you’d like conversation, Sean McCorkle is lying in the next room.”

“Who would leave their newborn baby on sacks of meal, Maeve?” Nora looked into her sister’s eyes with a look of concern and disbelief. “She’s only just been born, wouldn’t you think? Aboard the ship…maybe right there in that storage apartment?”

“Seems likely, it does. But why her mother abandoned her is a mystery. If she’d died, someone would have found her body—or at the very least we’d have heard of a death.”

“Maybe her mother couldn’t care for her,” Nora suggested.

“Her mother was the one with milk to nourish her,” Maeve reminded her. “She could have cared for her better than we.”

“Perhaps something happened to her and she was unable to return. If she was a stowaway, like those boys, she may have been hiding in that storage depot.”

“We’ll do everything we can. Have a seat. I’ll be right back.”

The situation did puzzle Maeve. Perhaps the woman would show up. Perhaps the infant had been left there by accident. Maybe she’d been taken from the mother. There were too many questions to think about, without any facts, so she set about doing what she could to help.

* * *

Flynn explained the situation to a couple of the sailors seated near their pens of chickens and only several feet from the goat’s enclosure. The men generously gave him a cup of milk and told him to come back any time he needed more.

The newborn’s presence knocked him a little off-kilter. Returning to the dispensary, he regarded the situation. He’d cared for children aboard ship, of course, but he hadn’t been in close proximity to a baby only hours old since his own son had been born. The thought caused him more pain than he could deal with now.

Two years ago he’d lost his young wife and tiny son to the deadly cholera that had spread through Galway and so much of Ireland. His countrymen referred to potato blight and epidemics as an Drochshaol, the bad times, which were still prevalent and still a threat to lives and livelihoods. He’d read that after thousands had died, nearly a quarter of the remaining people had fled to other countries.

An Drochshaol was personal to Flynn. Unbearable. He’d studied to learn how to treat people and heal them. He’d devoted his life to medicine and research…but when the shadow of death had come to his own door, he’d been unable to do anything to save his wife and child.

He’d cared for them feverishly, night and day for weeks. Jonathon had gone first. Sturdy and strapping though the boy had been, his eventual dehydration caused by vomiting and diarrhea had been more than Flynn could stave off.

Grief-stricken, he’d buried his son and turned his attention to his wife, only to lose the same battle. Once they were gone, he had avoided people—even his family. He hadn’t wanted to practice medicine, turning instead to research in an all-consuming drive to understand and eliminate the contamination that caused so many deaths.

He rarely let himself think about Jonathon or his failure to save him, but the memories of all he’d lost stalked him in the night, haunting his dreams and stealing any peace he hoped to find.

The risks to a newborn on this ship terrified him. And the dilemma of caring for a baby posed a problem, as well. Perhaps, if no mother was found, they could find a family to take in the infant for the duration of the journey.

He approached Maeve and Nora. “Boil everything that touches this baby,” he told them. “Boil the cups in which we carry the milk.” He glanced at the tubing. “You’re using that to feed her? Did you boil it? Good. Wash your hands thoroughly.” He handed Maeve the half-full cup. “Throw out any she doesn’t take and get fresh each feeding. I’ll notify the captain that she’s been found. A search to turn up her mother will come next, I have no doubt. Shall we find someone to care for her?”

Nora appeared stricken at the idea. “I can take care of her!”

“Nora, what about your kitchen duties?” Maeve asked.

“You and Bridget can help. We’ll share her care and feeding.” She gave her younger sister a pleading glance. “Please. She’s so tiny and alone. We know she’ll be safe with us—and under the doctor’s supervision. With someone else we can’t be sure they’ll care for her properly or give her the attention she needs.”

Maeve looked at the fragile little human being in Nora’s arms, now frantically sucking at the pinpricks they’d made in the tubing and swallowing in noisy gulps. “I have helped care for a good many newborns. ’Tis not such a hardship.”

She glanced at Flynn, and her compassionate blue gaze shot him through, touching a tiny crevice in his hardened heart. Thoroughly impractical though it may be to have an infant strapped to his assistant or a kitchen worker, the warm burst of admiration he felt at their earnest concern and willingness to take on this task couldn’t be denied.

He didn’t let himself look at the baby, but the sound of her sucking speared his heart. He gave Nora a stern look. “Clear your intent with Mr. Mathers. Assure me you have his approval and promise you’ll take no safety risks in the galley. If you’re to be near fire or water, you will give your turn over to one of your sisters.”

“Yes, of course,” Nora acknowledged quickly. “Thank you, Dr. Gallagher. God bless you.”

“I’m going to assign one of the McCorkle boys to run errands for you part of the day. Emmett is the youngest and most agile, so he will run for milk and carry messages between the three of you.” He looked at Maeve. “Thoroughly instruct him on sanitation.”

She nodded her understanding. “Certainly, doctor. I’m relatively sure he already comprehends hand washing. Sean filled me in on their lesson. It made quite an impression.”

Flynn asked Nora to place the baby on the examining table once she’d burped. “Let’s have a listen now.” He glanced up and then away. “The two of you may call me Flynn when there are no patients or other passengers present.”

Maeve gave him one of her stunning smiles. “Thank you, Flynn.”

A soot-faced cabin boy appeared then, extending a piece of paper. Flynn took it and read the hastily scrawled note. Seemed the captain had invited him to dinner in his cabin that evening. “Tell Captain Conley I’d be happy to join him and his wife.”

The lad nodded and hurried off.