"It's the end of the way things have been," Meg uttered with conviction more resigned than prophetic.

In the next room, Sister Bernadette listened, and agreed silently. Life as a religious was increasingly at odds with - something. Modern common sense, or too much schooling for proper holy obedience. She wouldn't call herself discontented, but the secular world kept finding little cracks to slip in - as it would - and she hadn't the will lately to push back with her usual vigor.

It was small things. Lingering with the nurses at table longer than she needed to finish eating, to listen to them chat a little more. Not even about worldly matters, but to enjoy their company and the balm to her self-worth of knowing they liked having her there. Letting her mind wander in Offices, so that only the vocal memory of long years kept her on the note and singing with her sisters for a minute or two at a stretch.

Or - not thinking of the goodness of God while she knelt and pulled winter cabbages in the kitchen garden, but the scratchiness of the thick black wool stockings they wore until the end of April, and how glad she was that nobody would have cause to compare the wrinkles sagging at her knees to the sleek nylon-clad calves of the nurses. How she'd caught herself then, all pride and misplaced ego, a pointless waste of mental energy, sinful in its own way. There could be no comparing her life to that of secular women her age, let alone younger and more vibrant girls. She had chosen and been chosen.

She hadn't realized how the little slips were adding up until Sister Monica Joan, of all people, rebuked her gently for counselling Jane to bend the truth to the Carter sisters to get a foot in the door. Sister was right, not only about her open mendacity, but about the pureness and simplicity of Jane's soul. She would envy it in Jane and try to emulate it, except that she knew something of Jane's own struggles. She wondered if Jane mightn't seek Holy Orders at some point herself, if she found herself at home here. She might become Jane's elder sister in the Order.

That was a steadying thought. Of course - that was the heart of it. She was thirty two years old, but still the youngest in the religious life, at Nonnatus. Subconsciously the others treated her as such. Spoiled her a little. What she needed was to be more responsible for someone else's spiritual life. Take her place as a more mature sister. That would keep her more scrupulous and attentive.

And speaking of attentive, it was Maeve who needed her now.

"Our mother was our age when she had us," the labouring woman gritted out. "I was the death of her."

"No," she whispered softly. She wanted to tell Maeve that for a long time, she thought she'd brought about the death of her mother, too, but she was wrong. That only God could take lives back, not little babies working hard to be born, or little girls who were too busy being little girls to notice their mothers growing sicker. But she couldn't say things like that as a midwife. Maybe as a minister, but she'd never be that.

She thought of asking Dr. Turner about it. Consult with him as a medical professional about the one, and ask him his thoughts about the other. Babies couldn't cause the death of their mothers, surely. Only God and the too-slow progress of medical knowledge. She wondered what he thought. She'd worked with him at countless births over the past ten years, and had rarely heard him mention God at a bedside, except to mutter a short plea for assistance or a thanksgiving now and then.

She could feel him sitting quietly in the shadow beyond the dim beam of the electric light, letting her and Trixie work and trusting them to manage the birth entirely. He was really only present at this birth for reassurance, and, she suspected, curiosity about the indoor lives of the Carter sisters. The look on his face when he'd seen Maeve's great belly draped with sheep's-cauls was a study in fascinated outrage.

She looked back over her shoulder, as she held the gas and air to Maeve's face, and breathed along with her. Dr. Turner was observing intently, but smiling, as though there was nowhere he'd rather be than watching this.

"I want Meg," moaned Maeve, grunting her way through the painful relief of passing the baby's head.

She had a moment of being acutely aware of Dr. Turner also seeing Maeve's utter vulnerability, her exposed self and her starkest fears. Men weren't allowed in birthing rooms, except doctors, when they were needed. What must it be like for him? Especially with so little to do but watch, and wonder, at this meaty, animalistic, female enclave? Men knew the other end of the child-making experience, not this one.

"Would you like to step forward, Doctor," she suggested hastily, "so you can hand Baby to mother when it's born?"

At least it was something for him to do, in his rightful role.

He stood at her word. She went past him and gathered up a clean towel to receive the baby, laying it out near Trixie on the clean edge of the bed. Dr. Turner kept a polite pace back, on the other side of the sheet draped over Maeve's legs and belly. Everything proceeded in an orderly fashion then, as it had all evening. An unremarkable, successful birth to record. Just another baby in Poplar - and for the mother and family, a change that would overwhelm their lives.

But Maeve didn't want the baby. She wanted her sister.

Imagine being needed like that, Sister Bernadette thought.

Trixie, nodding to the soiled bedclothes and disarray, pointed out she wasn't ready for visitors.

Dr. Turner turned to Sister Bernadette. "Why don't I," he suggested tactfully, "go through and announce the glad tidings first?" And he transferred the newborn carefully from his arms to hers.

He'd handed her dozens of babies, and there was no reason this one should have been memorable. Except that her gaze was somehow drawn to the way the dim light fell on his strong arms as he held the babe, and he was so near that his quiet voice seemed to touch her forehead. His whole presence had a way of surrounding her, she thought, but not crowding. It was entirely too pleasant. She found it difficult to move away from him. It had crept up slowly, in the year and a half since Marianne, dear friend of them all, had passed away. So slowly she had not noticed for a while.

He was through the door in another second. She didn't put the baby down on the nest of blankets by the radiator after all, but gathered her close, rocking and cooing, wanting to hold her a little longer. And why not?

"Sister," Trixie brought back her attention a few minutes later. "While we're waiting for the placenta, I wonder if you could just have a quick listen?"

Sister Bernadette knew that tone.

"Oh, aye," she replied, meeting the nurse's eye, and set the little one down quickly. She reached for Trixie's pinard, as the nurse stood and gave her her place beside the bed. "Just a moment, Mavis, let's see if we need to hasten things along. You'll feel more yourself once you've shifted the afterbirth."

Her voice was light, but Maeve barely registered the activity beside her. And no wonder. As Sister Bernadette leaned over the instrument, the sound of another heartbeat came to her ear, steady and blessedly strong.

Oh. Oh, Lord. Twins. If we'd only known.

She moved the pinard about.

Not seated well. Transverse?

She set down the pinard and quickly palpated Maeve's belly. Yes, transverse presentation. Maeve wasn't birthing this one without the doctor.

"Yes, Nurse," she said quietly, "You're quite correct. Will you fetch Doctor now, please?"

The dance began before Dr. Turner even came back into the room. He stepped in beside her as she moved, knowing where not to stand in her way.

"Twins," she told him. He nodded.

"It explains the small first baby."

"And the slow third stage."

He stood back as she and Trixie worked over the labouring mother to turn the baby. It was hard, sweaty work - muscle to move pounds of unwilling tissue, as much as mental, visualizing the infant and its cords and membranes so as not to risk injury.

She didn't need to look; she could feel him breathing along with her.

And then the dance turned into a battle, with poor Maeve's body the battleground, and the three of them manhandling her, practically sprawled over her to get the last twin out before it was too late to save either one. There was no time to wait for labour to restart, as the twins' placenta emerged. Dr. Turner brought out his forceps and tried to explain, in his clear, calming manner, what he intended to do, but it was doubtful Maeve took much in.

"Fundal pressure, please."

He hardly needed to say so. She arranged her hands and pressed the baby hard in the right alignment to be received by the blades. The baby was beginning to move; it was working. If the cervix was still soft and dilated and the second twin small too, even without the aid of contractions they might still -

As Maeve shrieked in pain, Meg rushed back into the room, out of her mind and frantic with terror. All was confusion as she shoved Patrick away from her sister, and sent him down to the floor. He would not fight back - a doctor needed to save his hands, and he would never hit a woman besides.

So she, Sister Bernadette, with more of the adrenaline of scrapping with a schoolyard bully than holy fire running through her, hauled off and pulled the much larger Meg off of Patrick without a second thought.

Meg slapped out at her, connecting hard with her cheek.

The shock of it and the sound seemed to jar them all back into reality. Sister Bernadette didn't feel the blow, not then. She flew back to Maeve's side. Patrick placed himself between her and Meg, and found the presence of mind to talk the disturbed woman down quickly and efficiently, giving her no time to talk back, now that she was done fighting back.

The battle reformed, the three of them working to bring the babe into the world, and Meg trying to lend her sister some of her own immense strength.

It was almost as physical as being the birthing mother. Her body reacted of its own accord, too, propelled by natural forces beyond her, knowing how to move, where to attend. The smells, the sounds, the sensations - even her voice changed, became commanding and calm, deeper in timbre as she ceased thinking of herself and became part of the experience. This was where she was meant to be. How could she have thought anything else? This was where God was.

And then as in so many battles, there was a moment of too-quiet, before the fight took hold on two fronts:

"The placenta's coming away."

"Haemorrhage."

And the second baby had yet to draw breath.

While Trixie and Patrick worked on Maeve, Sister Bernadette took the tiny girl in her arms. Not satisfied with the mechanical mucus extractor, she cleared Baby's nose and mouth with her own breath. She rocked her little body up and down, and breathed for her and rocked her again. There was an electric current down her limbs, her body responding to the urgency of the infant as if she was her own.

It wasn't working.

He watched her every move, fighting silently alongside them.

Breath. Rock.

Sometimes, babies just -

Breath. Rock.

Not this one.

And the baby squalled.

"Praise the Lord," she whispered.

She drew a deep breath of her own, and took a moment to send up a quick: "Thank You, for You know how much this child means to so many around her - " and turned to bring the baby to her mother.

And the battle was over.

The sisters lay reconciled, each with her own infant to care for. They and the medical staff were no longer at odds.

Their patient was stable and ready to travel to hospital.

Both babies were safe and healthy.

And she knew exactly where she was supposed to be. At her work, in her element, working alongside Doctor and the skilled nurses.

Doing the work of God, she reminded herself.

They stayed a little longer, to see Maeve off with the flying squad, and the twins settled with their aunt. The whole family would have gone to the hospital together, but for the two infants. Sister Bernadette thought it was the best thing to happen, that Big Meg and Big Maeve should have their attention split from each other, for once, not by strife but for love of their children. Maybe each one could focus on what she needed, for a time, apart from her sister. Meg's terror of being left alone would be filled by the twin's need of her.

It was quite light by the time she and Dr. Turner stood outside the rickety board house. Trixie had cycled on ahead, in search of a hot bath before everyone woke and took up all the water in the boiler.

"Can I offer you a lift?" he asked, as they carried their medical bags down the stairs. Her bag did seem heavier than usual, she admitted, but she had her bicycle, and she was used to napping off a night spent at a labour.

"Oh, no," she demurred, "It's not far, and good exercise."

"I should think you've had plenty of that. What an ordeal." He dropped his medical bag into the car boot and closed the lid with a decisive bang. "How's the cheek? Let's have a look."

Automatically she turned her face into his hand, just as his fingers touched under her chin and his thumb stroked with incredible gentleness over the injury. She looked anywhere but at him, realizing that everyone in the gathering morning marketplace would also see.

She pulled away. So did he, patting his pockets for his cigarette case. "It was just a slap," she assured him. "She was upset."

"I'm afraid it was more than that. It'll bruise up nicely before it's done."

"Well, sometimes fighting the good fight is meant literally."

"It shouldn't do. I'm sorry."

"Dinna fash, truly, it's never happened before, and I doubt it will again."

She was aware that her dismissive words belied the fact that she wanted to hold his hand against the slap, that it was starting to ache and felt better for his touch.

"Mind if I smoke?"

He always asked, gentleman that he was. She always shook her head, with a smile. She loved the smell of his cigarettes. It should have made for a terrible combination, cigarette smoke, Mercurochrome, carbolic soap and Brylcreem. Occasionally unwashed shirts, after too many days running between cases with no time for laundry. But it was him, and it was comforting, and it made her long to take care of him all the more.

She should have said good morning and walked away. Her job was done. But she felt unfinished. As if tonight deserved more than a nod of farewell.

"We're like an officer and a sergeant, the morning after the Somme," he said, as if in agreement with her thoughts. He gestured to her with his cigarette, "And that is not to say that I see myself as the officer."

Such a compliment should have been waved away, she knew. But he wasn't wrong. They'd passed control of the field back and forth between them all night, taking their cues from each other. She felt wrung out, rinsed clean somehow, but aching with the effort of it all, almost as if she'd been labouring herself. She was familiar with it by now. She knew that it sometimes happened during intense births, and that it would pass. It was just a physical reaction, like muscle memory.

Aye, for a thing that's never happened to you, and never will.

She wondered what he felt, after a delivery. She could never ask.

He leaned back against the car and inhaled with pleasure. The knot of his tie was crooked. What with one thing and another, she suddenly wanted a smoke so badly it was no wonder he noticed her glance.

"I feel as though I should offer you one," he remarked.

"Just a puff," she replied, conspiratorially. He wasn't expecting her to answer, and she was delighted by the look on his face when she did.

"Of this?" he held up his own cigarette.

"Quickly. Just a wee one," she urged. She took it from his hand, and he watched her curiously, as well he might. What was she doing? That kind of intimacy was far beyond anything acceptable for her.

But just at this moment, they had come through a gruelling night, and he wouldn't judge her in the least for a small indulgence.

The smell and the taste hit hard, and then the small rush, even though she couldn't bring herself to inhale deeply.

"Oh, what are these?" she asked him. Could her memory hold true, after so long?

"Henleys."

She was right. "Henleys! I loved Henleys," she told him. "They were the kind my father used to smoke." She went on, in an undertone: "I used to sneak one out of his desk sometimes, when I was about fourteen."

He seemed speechless. She didn't blame him. She took another quick puff and handed back his cigarette. "Thank you," she said, primly.

He smiled back. "You've earned it."

He wanted to say more. Perhaps he'd thought of something to say about her younger self. She nodded abruptly and moved off to collect her bicycle before he could.

Henleys. Of course. That's all it was, when she was near him. Just the smell memory taking her back to a sense of comfort and safety, and her old self.

But why should she want that?

She wasn't sure why she wanted him to remember that nuns aren't born as nuns, in that moment. Especially not that she'd had a naughty streak in her as a girl, just as everyone did. Didn't everyone used to nick ciggies from their parents? She couldn't imagine he hadn't.

But nuns weren't supposed to seek common childhood experiences with seculars. They were supposed to represent the light of God in the world and help people curb harmful habits with the assistance of prayer.

On the face of it, she reasoned, cycling her way down the market streets just setting up for the morning trade, it was innocent enough. If she'd been Trixie instead, there would have been nothing untoward about that brief exchange. Would there? Just a doctor sharing a quick smoke and checking up on his long-time nurse after a difficult case, before both parted ways.

But that was the point. She was not supposed to behave like a secular, on the face of it.

By the time she was home again, she was sore and tired enough to want to fall into bed.

"Sister, you must go take some refreshment and then sleep for a while," Sister Julienne told her, proud and pleased with her. "Nurse Franklin has already gone up. When you've rested, you can pray the offices you missed this morning, and then join us for recreation in the afternoon."

If Sister Julienne noticed the cigarette smoke, she didn't mention it. Perhaps it wasn't such an outlandish thing for a nun to do once in a while. There was a bottle of brandy kept for medicinal purposes, after births that went wrong, after all. So a quick puff was probably nothing to trouble herself about.

But not the sharing of a cigarette with a man who made her heart beat faster than it ought.

Or having to stop herself from fixing his tie, as if it was only natural for her to do so.

And not stitching on his coat button in secret, imagining his quick seeking fingers finding the button and wondering, for a moment, how it came to be mended.

She recognized, as she undressed, that she'd slipped farther from the spirit of her vows than anyone seemed to know but her and God.

I love him.

Dr. Turner. Patrick.

The awareness rose up, unbidden, uncomfortable, undeniable. It was a physical shock, arriving just as she was too tired to deflect it. Her heart gave a painful lurch within her ribs that made her draw in a breath.

Of course I love him, she told herself. I'm called to love all, to serve all. It was natural she would feel warmly towards him. He was a good man and a friend. She adored his small son. Her heart bled for the two of them. She'd grieved for her dear friend Marianne, too, and she knew the depth of her care that they were missing.

But the world was full of people who deserved more care in their lives. That's where her vows came in to support her, to help her transmute base feelings into action, into love that served God in the world.

Proximity, that was the problem. She spent more time with him than any other man. That was all. She could take steps to prevent that.

She tossed in bed for an hour before drifting into a fitful sleep.

Trixie must have quietly alerted Sister Julienne to the slap on her cheek, but Sister agreed it was best to drop the matter. Sid Carter had left a generous crate of produce for the nun's table with a note of gratitude, and a brief mention of "our Meg's temper". It was far more important not to alienate the strange family, now that they showed signs of drawing nearer.

After joining her sisters for recreation, and telling the story over her sewing - minus the undignified scrap - she went back alone into the chapel. She'd slept, she'd eaten, and there was just time to straighten herself out before Vespers.

She stood in her usual spot for singing the offices, and fixed her mind on her purpose.

She'd attended a particularly difficult birth, and gone through it with both Trixie and Dr. Turner.

She admired and liked him, and they worked well together.

He seemed to admire her work, too.

And that had to be the end of it. They'd become too familiar, and she was becoming distracted by a natural sense of care for him.

She thought of lingering near him, not wanting to part. And her reckless lapse in being so friendly with him.

How could she face him again? What must he think of her?

How could she do her work, if she could not work alongside him?

What had she left, without her work?

That was the thought that finally brought tears prickling to her eyes.

She'd been joyfully, gladly led here by a surge of longing, great words of wisdom, and the conviction that she was called by God, whatever work she was called to do. Lately her work was the central focus of her days, not prayer. Remembering God in all the small things was not even part of her daily routine anymore.

No wonder she was reacting to the stresses of the world like a secular these days, instead of seeking a peaceful mind. Feeling annoyed with her sisters, instead of charitably amused or forbearing. Wanting a chat with close girlfriends. Wanting a smoke after a difficult night. Letting fond feelings slip in where respect and gratitude ought to live, taking on a greater importance than they deserved.

The Silences of God happened to every nun, at some point. Clearly, she was filling in the silence with remembered things that once served to please her mind and satiate the senses.

She looked up at the stained glass window of St. Luke and St. John. St Luke was her particular favourite Evangelist; he with the medical knowledge and the exhortation to serve that spoke to her soul. He was also a great believer in women as healers, and as leaders, something that the nuns enjoyed arguing about between generations.

Tonight she could not hear his wisdom. Only the thick pressure of the quiet of the chapel around her.

She desperately wanted to pray, but the words would not come.

No, that wasn't quite true: she wanted to know what to do.

She didn't feel as though she loved God any less. But as overly sensitized as she felt, she was numb to His presence.