‘I cannot leave you,’ said Danuta, giving up on trying to wash her. She turned to Mr Wilson who’d gone quite green and looked about to faint. ‘There will be things in the cupboard,’ she said, firmly pushing him out of the room. ‘Fish fingers, beans on toast, bread and jam, perhaps?’

‘I dunno,’ he mumbled.

‘Then you must find out, Mr Wilson. Your children are hungry.’ She shut the door on him and went back to check on Mrs Wilson who was now straining hard to push the baby out.

‘Don’t push, but pant,’ she ordered. ‘That’s it. Like a dog. If you push too hard too soon, you will tear and I will have to stitch you, and that will be most uncomfortable.’

She quickly checked on the baby’s progress down the birth canal. ‘The baby has crowned. Gently now, gently does it. Now you may push – but not too hard.’

Mrs Wilson didn’t need telling twice and she strained and groaned and panted, and with a mighty roar she delivered the baby’s head which was swiftly supported in Danuta’s hands.

Danuta checked that the cord was free and not around the baby’s neck, and then encouraged Mrs Wilson to push again as hard as she liked when the urge came.

Mrs Wilson gripped the sides of the bed and bore down with great determination, and Danuta caught the slippery little body, quickly cleaned the mucus from its nose and mouth and was rewarded with a lusty cry.

‘You have beautiful very big boy,’ she said, clamping the cord and tying it off before cutting it free.

‘Oh, bloody hell,’ Mrs Wilson sighed. ‘I might have known after all that. I was hoping for a girl this time.’

Danuta wrapped the bawling baby in the clean sheet. ‘He is very beautiful,’ she said, hoping this would encourage the mother to take interest in him.

Mrs Wilson grinned. ‘He’s certainly got a good pair of lungs on him. Give him here, Sister, and let me see who he takes after.’

Danuta carefully transferred the squalling infant into his mother’s arms, then went to wash her hands in the rapidly cooling water.

‘Gawd help me, he’s the image of Fred’s dad,’ chuckled Mrs Wilson. ‘Poor little soul; what a way to start out in life, eh? No wonder he’s making such a racket.’ Despite her complaining, she crooned over him and soothed his cries by letting him suckle.

As Mrs Wilson seemed to have got over her initial disappointment, and was now happily feeding her baby, Danuta went to the door. ‘I will ask your husband for more hot water,’ she said.

She opened the door to find him and the small boys on the landing. ‘It is another boy,’ she said delightedly. ‘Please get me more water – lots of it this time.’

‘Can we come in?’ asked Mr Wilson.

‘Not yet. I will tell you when she is ready for visitors,’ Danuta replied, closing the door firmly.