The children huddle together as if watching for a sign, a wave, one last look out of the window as the police van draws away.

‘She didn’t even say goodbye,’ Sorrel says, sounding disappointed.

19. May

Melissa

‘Do you want to know whether it’s a girl or a boy?’ the radiographer asks.

Melly holds her breath. Lina says that she knows it’s a girl anyway and the radiologist smiles. Little girl or boy, it doesn’t matter. A life that was conceived in fear is becoming itself, will be welcomed, cherished. Loved. The monitor glides over Lina’s swollen abdomen. The radiographer is checking the position, the reason for this late scan. The baby is overdue but not breach; despite the obstetrician’s concern, everything’s fine.

Melissa’s eyes fill. Her baby is in custody now, for at least fourteen years.

‘Look,’ Lina whispers. ‘The hands.’

She’d had to let go of Izzy’s hands. The staff at the secure unit in Bristol had been kind but precise, very firm. The gates had shut behind her; the high fence barred her view.

‘See the face, she’s so beautiful.’ Lina’s English is much better than it was. She can speak fluently; six months in the refuge has worked wonders. Lina retreats to her cubicle to dress, Melissa waits in the corridor outside.

Izzy’s face had been shuttered when it was time to part; she could have stared at those lovely features for hours and still not understood. In the end there wasn’t much time to say goodbye. She’d put her arms around her daughter and Izzy had hugged her back. Melissa didn’t cry until she was outside the unit and then she couldn’t stop. Grace rescued her; she organized the overnight hotel in Bristol and met her there; they went back to the unit together the next day. Grace was with her in the youth court and later in the Crown court where Izzy was referred for sentencing. She came to the first meeting with the psychiatrist and counsellors when Izzy’s programme was explained. She held Melissa’s hand when the diagnosis of psychopathy was first discussed.

A couple walk down the corridor towards Melissa as she waits for Lina. Their heads are bent over a photograph; she can’t see their faces but the man has his arm around the woman and they are chatting softly, absorbed in the magic of the image. They don’t notice her sitting there, watching them; they will be thinking of nothing else except the birth of their tiny baby. They won’t be thinking of the child at three or thirteen; they have no idea at all of the complex life that will unfurl.