‘But you see,’ she says, ‘if people learned that you’d fudged your data to get noticed … that your experimental procedures were so inaccurate …’

Oh my God.

‘An unexplained risk of death, during the birth of mice after artificial gestation. That was something you should have shared.’

I know.

‘And right at the start of your career,’ she said. ‘Imagine everything that you’ve done since. All your work …’

The thought is awful. ‘You mean the pouch?’ I say. ‘Is there a risk …?’

‘Don’t be absurd,’ she says. ‘We have made the pouch perfectly safe. Our research practices are far more robust and accurate than yours were.’

‘It was just—’

‘If people found out, you would be discredited.’

I know.

‘Nobody wants that, Freida. Nobody. But you’ve given over the rights to the pouch now, and so you have no power here, do you see?’

It is true. I wanted no part of the selling. No part of the PR. None of the money. I am a scientist, not a politician. The mice were an aberration, that’s all.

‘And you’re embarrassing us now. You’re embarrassing yourself. There is no evidence whatsoever to suggest that the pouch increases incidents of domestic abuse. Quite the opposite.’

I have lost my fight.

‘We have a job to do, and you’re getting in the way. So I suggest you just leave, OK? Go away, and take what’s left of your reputation with you.’

Knock, knock, knock. I need to talk to you; I need to talk to my daughter. It has been too long. It has been years. Let me in! Please, sweetheart, please. But her eyes are cold as ice and red raw as she tells me what she’s seen. ‘Hundreds of children,’ she says. ‘Unwanted children, hundreds of them, living in homes outside the city. Hidden away. No one visits them. No one talks … Hundreds of them, already! Do you see what you’ve done? Women persuaded not to abort, to transfer to the pouch but then what? Then what? Have you any idea what you’ve done?’

And I haven’t any more, I have no idea. I try to speak but the words won’t come. I can’t explain. Not to you, not when you’re looking at me like you hate me.

‘It’s your fault! All those children …’

‘But I want to help.’

‘You want to help me, is that it?’

The bitterness in your voice breaks my heart.

‘I know about pouch abuse,’ I try. ‘I’ve got a case file, a husband and wife that I visited last year …’

She looks at the paperwork.

‘I know them already.’

‘What?’

‘He’s in jail for domestic abuse, and she’s working with me.’

‘With you?’