“I’m sorry, my darling, but it is the Lord’s will…”
The woman screamed as he plunged the razor-sharp scalpel into her abdomen, just below her navel and sliced downward towards her blood-matted pubis. She passed out at the sight of her taut, ripe belly opening up, a stream of blood running down her flanks into the mattress as a yellow layer of fat burst out of the gaping wound. Samuel pulled the fatty layer to one side as he carefully cut through the thin, shiny membrane beneath, revealing her abdominal muscles.
He slashed in short, shallow bursts, over and over, tearing through the blocks of muscle while remaining conscious of not cutting so deep as to harm the child. Despite his care, the blade nicked his wife’s bowel, the stench making him retch as the liquid faeces within spilled out. Along with the excrement, deep red blood was quickly flooding the abdominal cavity, clearly, he had also opened an artery or another major vessel.
Undeterred, he continued his slicing until, the womb, bloated with its precious cargo, was plainly visible, Samuel delicately slit open the uterine wall. Amniotic fluid gurgled out as the baby, in breach position, was revealed, and he gently pulled the child from its warm, watery bed.
With the new-born wrapped, snug and warm, in a clean, white blanket, Samuel slapped his unconscious wife in the face until he roused her.
“Look, my darling!”
He held the swaddled child out towards her, “It’s a girl!”
The woman began to weep, but her sobs were suddenly stifled as her tired lungs struggled for breath. She gasped desperately for air, her lips turning blue as her life-force continued to pour from the ruptured blood vessel in her butchered abdomen.
Samuel observed without emotion as his wife’s eyes filled with fear, both of them knowing her death was imminent. He leant forward and placed a gentle kiss on her hot cheek before snatching the gold crucifix that hung around her throat.
As he sat back on his stool, Samuel felt the child’s lungs fill with her first breaths and he held her close as they watched the mother she would never know, take her last.
