“Randi,” he said kindly, “you look beat. Why don't you go lie down for a while? Out of the heat… Rest…”
“I'm all right,” she said huskily. “I–I'll just sit here for a minute. I'm — fine.” Her appearance and her lackluster tone of voice belied her words.
Trafford sat down on a squat stump beside her. He watched her searchingly. “Are you?” he asked softly.
The strain, the fatigue, the heat had all taken their toll, and Randi was desperately vulnerable. Suddenly she broke down. She put her face in her hands and cried softly, her slender shoulders trembling.
Trafford watched her, his face solemn with compassion. But he made no move to interfere. Presently Randi stopped crying. She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. She had long since forgotten about the niceties of cosmetics. Contritely she glanced at Trafford.
“I'm sorry,” she said, her voice catching slightly. “I hate women who cry at the least little thing.”
Trafford gave her a little smile. “A good cry never hurt anybody,” he said. “Sometimes I wish I could write a prescription for one.” He looked into her tear-stained face. “But you mustn't give up. They'll find him.”
“It isn't that. It's—”
She stopped. She looked away.
Trafford gave her a quick look. “What is it, Randi?” he asked gently.
Suddenly the last of Randi's barriers came tumbling down. She fixed her troubled eyes on the older man. “It's my fault,” she said miserably. “It's my fault Tom crashed. It's all my fault — if he dies!”
Recognizing the importance of the turn the conversation was taking, Trafford was careful not to press too hard. He said quietly: “That's quite a responsibility you're taking on, isn't it?” He paused. He looked into her eyes. “Why do you feel that way?” His voice was calm, reassuring. Despite it, he felt Randi's rising anguish.
“Because he was worried. Because perhaps he didn't—couldn't—concentrate enough. He may have done something wrong — and crashed — because of me…” A little sob escaped her. Her guilt crowded in on her.
“Why, Randi? Trafford probed gently. “Why do you say that?”
Randi was on the verge of losing control. “Because I–I—” With a conscious effort she got hold of herself. She took a deep breath, and in a flat, monotone voice she went on. “Because for months our marriage hasn't been — a marriage. Because I haven't been a wife.”
Trafford watched her with growing comprehension. Deliberately he remained silent, letting her talk.
“I–I don't know what to do,” she said hopelessly. “We — we do love each other. We — we used to be so very close…” She dug her knuckles into her eyes, but she did not cry. “I'm so — confused. I don't know what happened to me. I…”
She stopped abruptly. She looked almost defiantly into Trafford's face. Now that the dam had been broken, she let her innermost thoughts, her feelings and fears, pour out.
“Yes — I do know,” she said. “I lost the baby. We wanted a child so very, very much — and I lost it. After carrying it for more than eight months, I lost it.” She squeezed her eyes shut. “And Tom… Tom…”
Her voice broke. She lowered her head and sobbed in stark anguish.
Trafford did not want to lose her. Softly, gently he prompted: “Tom…?”
Randi shivered almost imperceptibly. She looked up, staring at the man — past him — not seeing him, staring into a nightmare remembered by a tormented mind.
“I was lying there,” she said tonelessly. “Alone. For hours. Waiting. But he wasn't there… I knew I would lose the baby. I knew. I knew… And we had made such wonderful plans… such wonderful plans…”
And once again the inexorable nightmare that had been born as cruel reality flooded her mind in all its horror and anguish. A memory — harrowing, tortured — unreal…
Once again she stood in the sunlit nursery, seeing all the wonderful things placed there in anticipated celebration of their love. Hers and Tom's. The gaily painted dresser for baby's things; the colorful cut-outs on the walls; the white lace curtains; the funny-looking bassinette; the cuddly stuffed toys. And the crib. Once again she smiled down at her stomach, big with love, and once again she touched it, feeling the lusty little kicks within…
And she reached for the little child's wind-up phonograph Tom had bought. And she turned it on, listening to the cheerful, tinny voices of children singing the familiar nursery rhyme:
and she watched the little running figure mounted on the spindle slowly turning with the music…
And once again she picked up the multicolored mobile from the dresser — the one to be hung above the crib from the ceiling hook which had once held a lighting fixture…
The nightmare quality of her remembrance slowly heightened, as she knew it would. As it always did. As she dreaded it…
And she relived its horrors in somnambulistic detail… The stool next to the crib… Stretching to reach to hook high above — and the heart-stopping moment when she knew she was going to fall…
The mobile flying from her hands, and everything — the dresser, the bassinette, the pictures, the toys — spinning wildly, crazily and forever as she fell…
The searing pain when the sharp corner of the wooden crib gouged into her swollen stomach and the life inside…
The agony of struggling to her feet, holding on to the dresser, drawing herself up and coming face to face with the running figure on the spindle top, suddenly menacing and foreboding…
Her trembling hands clasped over her pain-racked womb — and her silent scream of deep, deep anguish when the red spot appeared between her feet on the bright yellow carpet… growing larger and larger until it engulfed the world…
Once again she knew the despair of lying helpless, pain-ridden and alone on the floor in the nursery so suddenly turned into a nightmare… Watching the door, Forbidding. Unreachable. Silent. And closed. Closed… Offering no help — as the new life within her, the life she had wanted so very much, dissipated itself on a yellow rug, its moisture anointing her loins…
Swimming, struggling in and out of consciousness, sinking into an abyss of oblivion — and clawing herself back up… Waiting. Waiting for Tom to come and make everything right…
And watching. Watching the door. Closed.
Closed.
And then — after an eternity of waiting and suffering…
Tom.
Silhouetted in the open door, the setting sunlight glinting from the silver wings on his uniform jacket… Tom — hurrying to her side, staring down at her, his face a mask of horror…
And the scream. She had not known it was hers… Arching back; straining in desperation; seeing the staves in the crib — her eyes racing along them to oblivion…
And once again fighting her way back and watching the formless, immobile shape become Tom. Tom, standing before her, his bloody, bundled-up uniform jacket cradled in his arms…
She stared at Trafford, not seeing him — still reliving her nightmare. She knew she was telling him. Everything. But she was not aware of words. Only remembered horror and pain — and grief…
“She was dead,” she whispered bleakly. “The baby was dead…”
She took a deep breath, returning to now once again. “And after that,” she said tonelessly, “everything fell apart… I–I couldn't stand Tom touching me. I'd see him standing there — holding…”