"How many weeks is she?" the Sister asked as Jenny found her and Chummy talking over a set of records in the treatment room, thankfully easily located so Jenny could share her suspicions.

"32, 3 maybe. Something. I think", Chummy replied, not being able to quite calculate through the panic that was coursing through her veins at the sudden news.

"Then we must find her husband" Sister Julienne. "Do you know the telephone number for the flat?"

Chummy's mind went blank.

"I know it's on Wilton Crescent but one really cannot recall the number". Suddenly a thought struck her. "Peter may know it though. He and Bob have been telephoning each other. I wrote it down at home but I think I threw it away" she concluded, drifting off trying to recall if she did pick it up and dispose of it.

"Nurse Lee, perhaps you could telephone the Station?" Sister Julienne suggested, seeing that if Chummy telephoned it might only alarm her husband unnecessarily. Jenny was about to depart into the hallway.

"He won't be there Jen old girl" Chummy said absently interrupting her friend's journey. It was nearly 4 o'clock.

If he was on days, 4 o'clock was his usual time when he would nip into Nonnatus for a cup of tea. Chummy knew he always came up to Lodore Street from Newby Place where he would always carry out a circuit of the Church at the request of Father Williams.

"Of course" Sister Julienne continued realising as had Jenny who began to do up her cardigan, ready to take flight again to find him.

"He will be near All Saints" Chummy offered as Jenny ran out of the door, desperate that he be found and equally as desperate to go upstairs to her sister in law.

"Come along, Nurse" Sister Julienne said, "bring up your medical bag. We must telephone for an Ambulance too". Chummy was not entirely sure her legs could carry her but she followed the Sister to her old room, becoming 'Midwife Noakes' in each step as she came closer to where her sister in law lay.

Peter heard his name shouted loudly; the woman's voice not taking care of any usual convention with regard the fact he was in uniform strolling down Newby Place towards the Church gates.

"Peter! Peter!" Jenny shouted seeing his back walking away from her as she sped along. He recognised her voice immediately; panic suddenly flowing through his veins.

"What's happened to Camilla?" he said, turning seeing the nurse's flushed face as she braked speedily. Jenny could hear the fear in his voice, skin suddenly turning a dreaded shade of porcelain.

"Nothing" Jenny breathed, trying to suck in as much air as she could; skin pink with the speed she had cycled towards him. "Chummy's fine. Do you know the telephone number for the flat on Wilton Crescent?"

"It's Knightsbridge 171. Why?" he asked, concerned still etched across his face although relieved that it was not news of his wife.

"Veronica isn't well and we need to find Bob".

Chummy knelt at the side of her old bed, taking her sister in law's hand as she sat up, propped on pillows.

"Ronnie you do realise you need to go to Hospital?" Her voice might have been calm on the surface, and her hands were not shaking quite yet, but her heart was beating a thousand to the minute. Over her shoulder Sister Julienne stood as Chummy felt her presence strengthening her words.

Ronnie shook her head earnestly, looking to Chummy and then Sister Julienne. "No".

"Please Ronnie".

"No" she repeated. "I know this is labour Sister" she continued, looking upwards. "It feels the same as my girls and I know nobody can stop it unless nature stops herself". To Chummy she sounded resigned and matter of fact, but that could well have been the shock and realisation of what was possibly to come.

"How far apart are the pains Veronica?" the Sister asked, sitting carefully on the edge of the bed.

"5 or so minutes" Ronnie replied before pausing. "I know I'm losing it. There is no need to beat about the old bush. I trust you Chummy. I would like you to help me, no-one else. I want you to deliver me, so no hospitals".

The Nurse did not know what to think; except that knew she needed help. If it was not practical support in the delivery it was emotional guidance from a more experienced hand.

"Should I telephone Doctor Turner?" Sister Julienne asked, resting a palm on her nurse's shoulder. There were times that she too needed a helping hand and guidance of the local practitioner and she could see their patient thinking it over in her mind. Ronnie had met the doctor in a fleeting moment that afternoon and liked him.

"Yes", Ronnie replied.

The three parties, Dr Turner, Chummy and Sister Julienne stood outside the room, Veronica having fallen into a brief slumber before the three slipped out quietly.

"Do you really think you should deliver her Nurse Noakes? This is your niece or nephew and he or she…." Dr Turner was about to say 'has an extremely stormy prognosis if Mrs Browne will not go to Hospital'. He had his own misgivings about such a premature delivery outside a Hospital but he knew full well that he could not force his patient to receive medical care beyond Nonnatus.

"She needs me" Chummy interrupted, knowing full well what was likely to happen. Technically, whilst babies this premature could live it was a rarity.

"I would be more than happy for you to deliver your own niece or nephew in normal circumstances but not such a premature birth", Sister Julienne said. "It is not good for your own health, Nurse". On her mind was her own nurse's pregnancy and the prospect of the strain of a traumatic delivery.

"Doctor, Ronnie needs me" Chummy pleaded, knowing she needed to carry out her sister in law's wishes.

She could see him working over the connotations in his mind, stealing glances to Sister Julienne. Dr Turner took a deep breath.

"I will let you this once" he said, pointing a determined finger in the air. "But the second I think you are uncomfortable, distressed or however which way I decide to call it, you come out of there".

"Yes Doctor".

"Very well", Sister Julienne replied, intending on keeping an extremely close eye on proceedings. "If you do need me, I will be downstairs".

The next three hours drifted slowly by as Chummy coaxed her sister in law through each contraction. She had been at births where mothers screamed and where mothers were silent but this time, there was eeriness in the peace that seemed to surround Veronica.

As the baby's body was gently eased from its mother, Chummy glanced quickly at the doctor. They both knew. She had been sure for a moment that baby was breach, not feeling the hard plates of the head as she examined her, but they had both seen the moment the head had been delivered. There was no cry, no flailing of arms and legs, just a gentle murmur.

She knew she had to ask before the Doctor prevented her and spirited the child away from her mother's arms.

"Ronnie? Do you want to see her?" Chummy asked quietly as she wrapped her niece in a warmed towel.

"Is she normal?" Ronnie asked, eyes heavy and hazy as adrenalin waned. She could not hear the child cry and even through the physical pain she had been feeling she could see the discreet glances between doctor and midwife.

Chummy hesitated. "She is very tiny", she replied, gently taking up the child in her arms.

"Is she normal?" Veronica repeated, pulling herself up on the pillows.

"Ronnie," Chummy started, swallowing back tears as two small eyes opened vaguely. It was not her place to be crying here. "She has something called Anencephaly. It means that her brain and skull has not formed properly".

"Is she alive?" she asked.

"Yes" Chummy replied, mouth suddenly drying at the words she needed to utter. "I'm sorry Ronnie, I really am, but nature needs to take its course".

She could see her sister in law digesting the news, focusing away at the doctor standing over them both. The child was placed in her mother's arms, both the doctor and midwife in silence, letting Veronica take the lead. She would let Veronica choose whether she looked under the towels.

"Would she have lived if she hadn't been born so early?"

"No" the doctor interrupted. He could see his nurse was struggling, shaking backs tears as she rearranging the blanket around her niece's head, to almost disguise it. The baby was murmuring, almost grunting, as she tried to breathe, her aunt knowing immediately there was noting that could be done other than to help her passing as gently as possible.

"Anencephaly is fatal" he concluded quietly.

"But she's breathing", Ronnie pleaded, seeing the baby nostrils flare; seeing though it was different from her other girls.

"Ronnie, breathing is a reflex and this condition means she can breath". Chummy did not want to use the phrase 'born dying' but she had heard it in training when talked of babies with such a condition.

They watched as Veronica ran her fingertip over the babies cheek. "Can she see me, hear me?"

"No, but treat her normally. Talk to her", Chummy suggested.

Dr Turner took a step back seeing perhaps that leaving the situation in his midwife's hands would be the most advisable; confident in her abilities having not had to carry out this threat of removing her from the room.

"Can you bring Bob up?" Veronica's voice was wilting and Chummy nodded before she got up, feeling the doctor's hand on her elbow. "Is the father here?"

"Yes", Chummy replied. "I saw Sister Bernadette on the stairs before and she said the Police had found him".

"Send the father up" he whispered sufficiently quietly to hope that their patient did not hear. "I will explain to him and perhaps Sister Bernadette or Sister Julienne? And ask someone to bring up an oxygen bottle. To make her more comfortable. It may be minutes, hours or days".

There were times like these that the gentle aura of the Sisters would truly help him too in these times of struggle.

Heavy footed, Chummy descended the stairs. Her brother was in the sitting room with Sister Julienne, a cup of tea in his hands that was long cold.

"Bobs?" Chummy asked, voice croaking as she arrived at the door. It felt entirely wrong to walk towards him, throw her arms around him. "Ronnie wants to see you".

"The baby?" he asked quietly, knowing the answer from his sister's face.

"She's alive, but you need to go upstairs. Sister Julienne, could you too?"

"Ronnie's alright?…"

"She's fine" Chummy said, finally feeling as though she could walk to her brother. "She just needs you".

"Has she seen the baby?"

"Yes".

"Madeleine", Bob mused, running a hand gently down his sisters arm, in need of the familiarity. "One would have liked to have called her Madeleine".

"Bob she is Madeleine".

Chummy was somewhat relieved that her brother did not ask why as she did not have the words to explain, feeling her arms start to shake at their sudden redundancy. Hearing his footsteps up the wooden staircase, she would go to the charity box and find that little pink knitted dress, hat and cardigan that had been donated just last week.

It would be far too big, but somehow that did not matter.