By Anna Von Reitz
I met with Simon this morning and he shed more light.
He was enroute to Marseilles and stopped briefly overnight and for the morning. He took me to his Father's library after breakfast. I don't think the door has been opened since David died and we had to feel our way to the window and pull back the drapes because the electricity was out in that sector of the house.
Did you realize that David kept extensive and I do mean -- extensive -- records of what he called "The Realm of England Project"?
Over eighty big leather-bound photo albums he called "The Baby Books" of all the babies that received breast milk from his foundation. It was overwhelming. All these photos of sickly and premature babies, literally thousands of them, identified only by first and middle names: "Patrick John" and "Elizabeth Ann" and so on.
Simon told me 78,770 babies had received milk at last count, the day his Father died and the counting stopped. I think my brain stopped for a full five minutes.
"I know you hated my Father," Simon said suddenly, out of nowhere.
That isn't really true on a personal level. David was always very kind to me; my friendship with you was never discussed and apparently never held against me, Uriah. I am sure I looked a combination of dazed by the numbers of babies and startled by Simon's sudden assertion.
"I didn't hate your Father, Simon." I began hastily. "I was just looking at all this from the outside as an old friend. I thought he was a fetisher --- another kinky British Lord."
Which I did, and in part, still do suspect.
"And he may have been," Simon agreed with apparent equanimity, granting that some evidence was there. "but there is more to this by far."
I waited for his analysis, which wasn't long in coming.
"Britain has been in population decline since the War in the Crimea. We never really recovered from the First World War and then the Second World War hit.... among certain old families, this has been a concern for decades--- including ours."
Were we, I asked myself, on the verge of excusing madness and abuse? I sat up a little straighter.
"You are telling me this was an effort to save British lives?"
"Yes," Simon replied simply. "an effort to save the most vulnerable British lives. Sick babies. Premature babies. Anemic babies."
There was a long pause.
"You have to realize this took place against a backdrop of the Pirbright Institute and the insane eugenists pushing abortion as the answer to everything. Politically, my Father was pushing back and making gains in a way nobody could criticize --- except for what it has cost my Mother."
"He used her for his campaign."
"Yes, yes, he did."
We let that sit on the library desk between us for a good long while.
Simon finally broke the silence.
"You know my Mum as well as anyone. She'd walk over burning coals to save a baby --- anyone's baby."
The pure truth of that made me burst into tears --- old, battle-hardened Iron Pants herself, bawled like a good healthy baby and kept wiping the tears away and gasping and wiping some more.
He's absolutely right about that, Uriah, and you know it, too.
Simon's voice was unsteady and low when he broke the silence again.
"It hasn't been easy, this family campaign. It cost everybody almost everything, but we gave tens of thousands of babies the best shot we could give them."
I sat there in King David's library among the dusty books, shaking my head, seeing the method of his madness and how it dove-tailed so precisely with Bathsheba's love of babies and children.
There was no doubt in my mind or Simon's and there should be no doubt in yours, either, Uriah, that Bathsheba would sacrifice her own life to save a child, much less -- by now -- over 80,000 of them.
It's time for her to retire, I agree; it's time for you to have a sane life together. I understand, Uriah. I'm just saying that I am staggered to contemplate what one woman, basically acting as a Wet Nurse, has quietly, anonymously, accomplished.
How many others are out there, I wonder, embattled souls fighting for the Cause of Life in their own way? People we never know. Blood donors, organ donors, women silently donating their breast milk, all the unsung heroes.
I told Simon that I understand what his Mother chose and why she chose it. And I don't hate his Father in life or in death. I just intend that we will all have some sweet years left.
Granna
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