I can’t sleep at night. I listen to hours of coughing and muttering and Mary’s airborne chatter and women relieving themselves in the privy in the corner. I stretch my eyes open wide to see if there is any hint of light in the sky between the bars of the windows even though there is no reason to hope for tomorrow. I talk to myself as there is no one else. I summon Mozart and Brahms in my head but they refuse to be roused. I call on my Daddy dream.

On first arriving here I am energetic with fright. I charge to the walls and hammer myself against them while high sounds come out of my mouth. ‘Up the stick,’ they say. ‘Side room for her – that’ll teach her.’

I am in a room with thick Rexine walls and a curved floor so my mess slides to the gutters at the edges. I am covered by a hard canvas jacket, my arms strapped round me so that I can only buffet my sides and shoulders and head against the yielding wall until I fall. I find myself in here several times, hardly knowing how I got here. When they come to retrieve me I hear spring-loaded bolts snap back. The first time, they bring nurses from the men’s wing to help. They charge in clumsily together like fat beetles and there are blue sleeves with white chevroned cuffs round me and a stench of male sweat.

‘You could’ve managed this one, surely?’ they bellow. ‘She’s only a little tiddler!’

After several afternoons in there and the stunning doses of peraldehyde, I sit quiet.

Nurse Tucker knows why I’m here. I haven’t told her, but she knows.

* * *

Chapter 22

‘Darling, whatever’s the matter?’

Douglas followed me, hovering anxiously at the bathroom door as I rushed from our bedroom, still holding the empty cup from my morning tea.

‘Are you ill?’ He stood at a loss, toes on the edge of the lino in his pale blue pyjamas, as I retched. The tea had brought on instant rebellion from my stomach. I felt better immediately and drank a glass of water, doing fast calculations in my head once more to make sure. I’d missed my last period, I must have conceived during the first half of August, which made me about five weeks pregnant now.

‘D’you think you’ve caught a chill?’ Douglas asked, still standing back from me as if I might explode. He rubbed his hand through his unbrushed hair. ‘What? What’re you laughing at?’

I felt a strong sense of relief. Something I could do for him, and do right. I went and put my arms round him. ‘Definitely not a chill,’ I said happily, looking up into his perturbed face. ‘Darling – we’re going to have a baby.’

‘A what?’ He was so flabbergasted that I laughed even more.

‘You do know the facts of life don’t you? This has happened the past couple of mornings except you didn’t notice. And my period’s very late.’