“Come on,” said Carmen. “It’s a booking for the hospital in the middle of the night—what did you think it was going to be?”

He scratched his head. “Is she going to have it in the cab?”

“No,” said Carmen, then, quieter to her sister: “Are you?”

“No!” said Sofia.

“But if she does, we’ll pay for the cleaning and you’ll be in the papers.”

“Mummy, where are you going?” It was Phoebe’s voice.

“Just nipping out,” said Sofia.

“‘Just nipping out’?” Carmen said.

“The thing is,” said the cabbie, “I just got it cleaned and . . .”

“Can we come?”

“Mummy’s just going to hospital,” said Carmen.

“Hospital?” said Jack.

“Jack!” said Pippa crossly. “You never listen! It’s for the baby.”

“I forgot about the baby,” said Jack. “Oh. Bye then.”

“I want to come too,” said Phoebe.

“I won’t be long. And Carmen will stay.”

“Can we watch a grown-up film?”

“You can watch The Driller Killer,” said Carmen. “Let’s just get your mum to the . . .”

But the cab had already taken off down the icy road without them.

“IT WAS TWO hours ago,” said Carmen firmly. “And it was one glass of wine and I didn’t finish it.”

“Drinking and driving is very dangerous,” said Pippa disapprovingly.

“Surely this is why you bought that ridiculous Range Rover,” said Carmen. “A car so oversized and stupid-looking, the only possible reason to buy it would be to keep you safe if your sister ever had to drive you to hospital. It will destroy everything in its path.”

“Oh God. Okay. All right then,” panted Sofia.

“Come on, munchkins. Put your dressing gowns on.”

They looked, Carmen mused, like the children in Peter Pan in their old-fashioned nighties and long striped dressing gowns and, excited by the entire experience, were skidding their way to the car, not even fighting about who had to sit in the middle as they usually did.

She helped Sofia into the passenger seat—why, wondered Carmen, had she bought a car that necessitated an escalator to get you up into it?—and belted her in, then skidded around to her side of the car.

She’d driven only her little Fiat before, which was ten years old and had the heating stuck on full blast all the time. She’d never driven an automatic. She didn’t know where the hospital was. She suddenly wasn’t sure this was a good idea.

“Press—”

But another contraction came over Sofia and she couldn’t finish.

Jack leaned over from the back. “It’s ‘D,’” he said. “‘D’ for ‘drive,’ see?”

Carmen put her foot down on the clutch, then realized there wasn’t a clutch.

“No, that’s the brake,” said Pippa.

“You’re very useful, thank you,” said Carmen, trying to take deep breaths. She could feel herself getting a little panicky. She shut her eyes and thought of calm things.

“Okay,” she said. “Let’s go.”