But once there he could not kneel by Takver and ask her forgiveness, as he wanted desperately to do. Takver had no time for emotional scenes; she was busy. She had cleared the bed platform except for a clean sheet, and she was at work bearing a child. She did not howl or scream, as she was not in pain, but when each contraction came she managed it by muscle and breath control, and then let out a great houff of breath, like one who makes a terrific effort to lift a heavy weight. Shevek had never seen any work that so used all the strength of the body.

He could not look on such work without trying to help in it. He could serve as handhold and brace when she needed leverage. They found this arrangement very quickly by trial and error, and kept to it after the midwife had come in. Takver gave birth afoot, squatting, her face against Shevek’s thigh, her hands gripping his braced arms. “There you are,” the midwife said quietly under the hard, engine-like pounding of Takver’s breathing, and she took the slimy but recognizably human creature that had appeared. A gush of blood followed, and an amorphous mass of something not human, not alive. The terror he had forgotten came back into Shevek redoubled. It was death he saw. Takver had let go his arms and was huddled down quite limp at his feet. He bent over her, still with horror and grief.

“That’s it,” said the midwife, “help her move aside so I can clean this up.”

“I want to wash,” Takver said feebly.

“Here, help her wash up. Those are sterile clothes—there.”

“Waw waw waw,” said another voice.

The room seemed to be full of people.

“Now then,” the midwife said. “Here, get that baby back with her, at the breast, to help shut off the blood-flow. I want to get this placenta to the freezer in the clinic. I’ll be ten minutes.”

“Where is— Where is the—”

“In the crib!” said the midwife, leaving. Shevek located the very small bed, which had been standing ready in the corner for four decads, and the infant in it. Somehow in this extreme rush of events the midwife had found time to clean the infant and even put a gown on it, so that it was not so fishlike and slippery as when he had seen it first. The afternoon had got dark, with the same peculiar rapidity and lack of time lapse. The lamp was on. Shevek picked up the baby to take it to Takver. Its face was incredibly small, with large, fragile-looking, closed eyelids. “Give it here,” Takver was saying. “Oh, do hurry up, please give it to me.”

He brought it across the room and very cautiously lowered it onto Takver’s stomach. “Ah!” she said softly, a call of pure triumph.

“What is it?” she asked after a while, sleepily.

Shevek was sitting beside her on the edge of the bed platform. He carefully investigated, somewhat taken aback by the length of the gown as contrasted with the extreme shortness of limb. “Girl!”