The man picked Dottie up in his arms with little effort and followed Gladys and Margaret down the stairs of the bus. They garnered a good number of curious looks and people instinctively parted on the sidewalk like the Red Sea. With so many of the young men of Brooklyn off at war, the neighborhood was full of old women and elderly men, children and their weary mothers, none of whom would have been of much help, and Margaret was grateful again for the man’s assistance.

For the first time, Margaret was glad that Gladys lived in the basement unit of a brownstone. The man didn’t have to take too many steps to carry Dottie inside.

Gladys ran ahead, opened the door, and cleared her sofa of all the books and magazines that were always lying around in various stages of being read and annotated.

Virginia Woolf, Isak Dinesen, Pearl Buck. Gladys read only female authors.

There was also a blue sock, half-knit, that Gladys had begun working on during their most recent Saturday night get-together. They’d knit twenty pairs over the past few weeks and would ask John in their next box to share them with more men in his company. At this rate, they might have the entire battalion covered by Christmas.

They hoped it did as much good for the boys as it did for them.

“Set her there. I’m going to call for a doctor. And, Margaret, go down two doors to the right. Apartment 3B. A friend of mine lives there. A midwife. She might know what to do in the meantime and I know she’ll come quickly if she’s home.”

Margaret hurried as Gladys had directed and her racing heart rejoiced when Gladys’s friend opened the door. She explained their emergency, and the woman readily agreed to help.

“I’m Catherine, by the way,” she said as she grabbed a black leather bag and put a sweater around her shoulders.

“And I’m Margaret.”

“Margaret. Yes—Gladys has told me about you. And your friend Dorothy. I’m sorry—I didn’t know that Dorothy was with child. Gladys hadn’t mentioned that.”

“We’ve only just told her. And it’s not exactly news that Dottie is shouting from the rooftop.”

Catherine nodded. “I understand. We’ve seen many such cases since the boys have gone off to war. The results of an overly romantic goodbye?”

Margaret hung her head as if she were the one in the troubling situation. “Yes. Exactly.”

Catherine shrugged. “Not that I wish I was over there fighting, but we women have our own battles as well, don’t we?”