“I'm sorry. It must have been something I ate. Antoine picked all those blackberries for me yesterday. I already felt sick last night,” Beata said, sitting down in one of the kitchen chairs and obviously feeling awful. “I didn't want to hurt his feelings and tell him.”

“Are you sure it's the blackberries?” Maria asked kindly. She was not at all surprised to see Beata looking so ill. And in fact, it made her hopeful.

“I think so.” She asked Beata a few pertinent questions then, and laughed at the innocent young woman's answers.

“If memory serves, my dear, I think you're pregnant.”

“Do you?” Beata looked astonished, which made Maria smile broadly.

“Yes, I do. Why don't you wait until you're sure to tell your husband.” There was no point worrying him unduly or getting his hopes up. Men were odd about things like that, Maria knew. It was better to tell them once one was certain.

“And when will that be? When would I be sure enough to tell him?”

“In another week or two, if nothing happens, and you continue to feel poorly. You'll know soon enough.” Beata was smiling to herself as she went to milk the cows, and that afternoon she was so exhausted she came back to the house after her chores and slept for two hours before dinner.

“Is Beata all right?” Antoine asked Maria with a look of concern when he got home. His bride was usually so lively, and all she seemed to do was sleep now. He wondered if it was because he kept her up late, making love to her at night, but lying next to her, he found it impossible to keep his hands off her.

“She's fine. She's been out in the sun all day. I had her picking fruit for me,” Maria said discreetly. But in addition to covering for her recent nausea and sleepiness, Maria was finding her to be a hard worker, and the younger woman was truly helpful to her.

Beata was certain herself about her pregnancy within two weeks, when nothing had happened to convince her otherwise, and even at this early stage she could no longer button her waistband. And she was constantly nauseous. She was taking a walk with Antoine one Sunday afternoon, on the way home from church, when she smiled up at him mysteriously, and he beamed down at her, wondering what she was thinking. Life in close proximity to her was a constant, delicious mystery for him.

“You look like a woman with a secret,” he said, smiling down at her proudly. He loved being married to her, and thinking ahead to their future together.

“I'll share it with you,” she said softly, tucking a hand into his arm. They had decided to walk to church instead of driving. The weather was still beautiful, it was the end of August, and as closely as she and Maria could figure it, she was two months pregnant. She was sure she had gotten pregnant on their wedding night, and Antoine suspected nothing. “We're having a baby,” she said, looking up at him, her eyes full of wonder, as he stared at her and stopped walking.

“Are you serious? How did that happen?” he asked in amazement, and she laughed at him.

“Well, when we go home, I'll explain it to you, or maybe I should just show you how we did it, to remind you.” She was teasing him, and he laughed with her, feeling foolish.

“That's not what I meant, although I'd be happy for the reminder anytime, Madame de Vallerand.” He loved saying her name now, and so did she. It seemed to suit her. “I meant when, and how do you know, and are you sure, and when is it coming?” And then suddenly, he looked worried. “Should you be walking?”

“Would you like to carry me home?” she asked sweetly, and then giggled at him. “I'm fine, although I've felt a bit sick lately, but Maria says that's normal. I remember hearing about girls I know who were dreadfully ill for several months. They couldn't even leave their bedrooms.” But in the healthy atmosphere they lived in, leading a quiet life, Beata was sure that the nausea would pass quickly. It was already a little better. The first weeks had been truly awful. But now she was so excited at the thought of what was happening to her that she didn't mind it. “I think it happened on our wedding night, which means that we should have a lovely baby at the beginning of April. Perhaps in time for Easter.” Out of habit, she had almost said Passover, but instead said Easter. In the Catholic faith, it was a time for resurrection and rebirth, and seemed a perfect time to her, and it would be nice to be able to take the baby out in the summer. It seemed better than having to bundle it up and keep it inside in the winter. To her, the timing was perfect. And Antoine was beside himself with excitement. He made her slow down, and not walk with such determination. If she had let him, he would have carried her home on his shoulders. And she could see that he was a little worried. He wasn't sure if he should make love to her anymore, and didn't want to hurt her. She assured him that everything was fine, and they could go on as normal.

But for the next several months, Antoine kept a constant eye on her. He came back to the house as often as possible to check on her, and he did most of her chores for her, although she insisted that there was no need to.

“Antoine, you don't have to do that, I'm fine. It's good for me to have exercise and stay busy.”

“Who said so?” He finally took her to a doctor in Lausanne, just to reassure himself that everything was normal. The doctor reassured them both that everything was proceeding just as it should. The only thing Beata regretted frequently was that she couldn't share the news with her mother. She had tried one more letter, which had come back to her this time even more quickly. She was entirely sealed off from her family. The only family she had now was Antoine and the Zubers and, in a few months, their baby.

By Christmas, at nearly six months, Beata was enormous. She was so tiny ordinarily that the addition of a growing baby to her small frame made her look far more pregnant than she was. By the end of January, she looked as though she was having the baby any minute, and Antoine hardly let her leave the house now. He was afraid she would slip and fall on the ice and snow and miscarry. And at night, he loved lying beside her and feeling the baby kick him. He thought it was a boy, and Beata hoped it was, but Antoine insisted it didn't really matter to him. It just seemed like a boy to him because it was so gigantic. Beata was healthy and in good spirits, but she could hardly move now. She had made some clothes that accommodated her growing form, and as always Maria was astonished by her sewing talent. She made some tops and skirts and dresses from old scraps of fabric she had lying around, and even a very stylish coat from a red plaid horse blanket Walther gave her. She looked young and beautiful and healthy. And when she went to church on Sundays, Father André was delighted to see her.

More than anything, Antoine was worried about who would deliver the baby. He thought about taking her to Geneva or Lausanne to have it in a hospital there, but the reality was he couldn't afford it. There was a doctor thirty miles away, but he had no telephone, and neither did the Zubers, and when the time came, there would be no way to reach him. Driving there and back would probably take longer than delivering the baby. Beata insisted she wasn't worried about it. Maria had given birth to her own children at home, and had gone to France to be with one of her daughters when she delivered. She had sat with friends over the years, and even without any official training, she was an experienced midwife. Both women felt assured that they could handle whatever happened. Or at least that was what Beata said. She didn't want to worry Antoine, but she admitted to Maria several times that she was frightened as well. She knew virtually nothing about having a baby, and the bigger it got, the more she worried.

“It won't happen till you're ready,” Maria said confidently. “Babies know just when to come. They don't come when you're tired or sick or upset. They wait until you're feeling ready to greet them.” It sounded overly optimistic to Beata, but in the face of Maria's calm, sensible ways, she was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt and believe her.

And much to her own surprise, in the last days of March, Beata found she had renewed energy. She even went to milk the cows one day, and when he found out that night, Antoine scolded her soundly.

“How can you be so foolish? What if one of them kicked you, and hurt the baby? I want you to stay home every day, and take it easy.” It worried him considerably that he could provide no comforts or safe facility for her. He could do nothing to make this easier for her, and even though she was always a good sport about it, Beata was no farm girl. She had been brought up in the lap of luxury and was a delicate city girl. From what he could gather, she had never caught a cold without seeing a doctor. And now he was expecting her to deliver a baby in a cottage in the Alps, without even the help of a nurse or a doctor.

He wrote to a friend in Geneva and asked him to send him a book on midwifery. He read it at night surreptitiously after Beata went to sleep, hoping that he could learn something that would help her. And as the final days of her pregnancy went by, he grew increasingly nervous. If nothing else, her tiny frame panicked him. What if the baby was too big to be born? There was a chapter in the book about cesarean sections, which could only be performed by a doctor. And even then both mother and infant's lives were in jeopardy, and the book admitted that often births of that nature ended in disaster. Antoine couldn't imagine anything more terrifying than losing Beata. And he didn't want to lose their baby either. It was impossible to believe that a baby of the size she was carrying could emerge successfully from such a tiny mother. Beata seemed to be growing smaller and the baby bigger by the hour.