There were no doctors on the premises. No medicines or other supplies. Not even enough linens for bedding and cloths. All Hazel could do was hold the baby, so she did. Every now and then, Ruby whimpered. Hazel knew she was hungry, but no wet nurse was available. She would have to wait.

After about an hour, an exhausted-looking woman appeared in front of Hazel and took Ruby from her. Without a word, she swung her expertly under her arm and latched her on.

“Ye know what you’re doing,” Hazel said.

“I’ve had practice.”

“How many babies do you feed?”

“Four, at the moment. Used to be five, but . . .” An expression flitted across her face. “They don’t all make it.”

Hazel nodded, her breath catching in her throat. “It must be . . . hard, sometimes.”

The woman shrugged. “Ye get used to it. When my own wee bairn died, they gave me a choice. I could go to the crime yard for six months and wring laundry. Or I could do this.”

After a few minutes, she pulled away and started buttoning her dress. Ruby twisted her head from side to side, opening and closing her mouth.

“She’s still hungry,” Hazel said.

“Sorry. This cow is dry.”

At the end of the day, Hazel loitered by Ruby’s crib, her throat closing up, her eyes brimming with tears.

“Please—let me stay with her. And help the others too,” she begged the guard.

“You’ll be reported missing and add years to your sentence, is that what ye want?”

All night, on her hammock, Hazel tossed and turned. The next morning, she was the first one up the hill, the first in the door at the nursery. Ruby was all right, but another infant in her crib, a boy, had died in the night.

“Where’s his mother?” Hazel asked the guard when the body was taken away.

“A lot of ’em never show up,” he said. “They prefer to serve their time in the crime yard and move on. Can’t say I blame ’em.”

Even many of the ones who did show up, Hazel noticed, were listless, blank-eyed and gray-faced, turned in on themselves. Some barely looked at their babies.

The boy who died would be buried in a children’s cemetery at the corner of Harrington and Davey Streets, the guard told Hazel, in a gumwood crate. They’d wait until the end of the day, in case there were more.

That evening Hazel found Olive in the main courtyard with Liza, the crooked accountant, and some newfound friends. “Can we talk?”

“What d’ye need?”

Hazel got straight to the point. “Ye have to feed her, Olive.”

“I told ye, I don’t want to nurse six piglets.”

“Ye can tell the doctor ye only have enough milk for one.”

She shook her head. “I heard it’s disgusting over there.”

“Ruby’ll die if ye don’t.”

“You’re a regular Chicken Little, aren’t ye, Hazel?” Olive shook her arms in the air in mock panic.