‘Oh, please, please don’t.’ Evaline put the little boy’s body down in the crib, scooped up Helen and cradled the warm baby as they both sobbed. Everything was ruined. She would lose her job. She would not be able to pay the baby farmer. Edwin would have to go to an orphanage. Evaline rocked backwards and forwards, until the little girl settled. They would blame her for the baby’s death, of course. She cursed Naval Officer Wiggs, for his easy affection and empty promises. For leading her astray and landing her in this impossible situation.
*
Evaline pushed the perambulator down the narrow alley that rang along the back of the row of houses and banged on the door. She looked over her shoulder, this was not the sort of tenement row well-dressed nannies came with their charges. She could hear babies crying from inside but no one answered, so she balled up a fist and hammered on the door again.
‘Evaline! What are you doing here?’ The small, wiry woman had sounded furious at the interruption, though her tone had changed the minute she saw who it was at the door. Ada looked at the pram and then at Evaline. ‘I think you’d best come in.’ Evaline took one last look about but only saw a mangy cat and pushed the pram inside.
‘Wasn’t expecting to see you.’ Ada muttered as she hobbled back into the dank room she called the kitchen. There were four babies in crates lined up on the table against the wall, their naked feet wrestling with the air.
‘May I see my son?’ Eveline asked.
Ada coughed into her hands and wiped them on her skirts, ‘Course you can, let me get him.’ She disappeared into the back room and Evaline tried not to take in the surroundings. The house was alive with the noise of mewling babies. The kitchen was filthy. There were bottles of infant syrup left open, a dirty spoon, bottles of gin. The place was disgusting and Ada was one of the good ones.
‘Here he is, see? As you left him.’ She shuffled back in with Edwin, sucking on his own fist. On seeing his mother, he wriggled and kicked in Ada’s arms and held out his own for Evaline, who put him on her hip and swayed and jiggled to keep him calm.
‘Something has come up, Ada, and I’m going to take him,’ said Evaline.
‘What?’ said Ada, ‘Are you leaving the Lancasters?’
‘I’ve made other arrangements. I can take Edwin to be with a friend nearer the house. He’ll be closer and… I can pay you for the rest of the month…’
Evaline rummaged to find the money she had brought. Ada was an old bird, flown over from Austria. She seemed frail but was made of stern stuff and she had been in this business too long not to sense when a woman was hiding something. Ada stared at the pram with the hood pulled up. Evaline stood in front of it with baby Edwin on her hip as she pressed money into Ada’s hands.
‘Why have you brought the Lancaster babies here? Someone could have seen you? I ask you again, what is going on?’
‘Nothing,’ said Evaline, who half laughed and then let the smile slip from her lips too quickly. Her face was damp from nerves. The pristine pram with its painted wooden frame looked ridiculous in such surroundings, something had to be wrong. Ada edged closer to the pram.
‘Soon they will not fit in together, surely. Let me see them,’ she cooed.
‘No!’ Evaline almost put her hand upon Ada’s chest. ‘They’re sleeping.’
‘I won’t disturb them, it’s not like I’m not used to babies.’ Ada laughed.
‘I said no.’ But Ada pushed her aside and looked into the pram and gasped, and started muttering something unintelligible in her own language. Ada had seen enough death to know what she was looking at.
‘Get out! How dare you bring a dead child in to this house!’
‘Shhh! Keep your voice down.’ They spoke in furious whispers. Evaline gripped onto Ada’s sleeve. The walls were thin. The houses crowded. No one knew who might be listening.
‘Why do you bring a dead baby to me! A Lancaster. Are you mad?’
‘Please Ada, I have a plan. I wasn’t going to tell you but there’s only one of me. What was I to do with the children when I came here? I must be quick. I don’t have much time.’
‘Time for what?’
Ada looked at the dozing Helen and then at Edwin on his mother’s hip, still sucking his fingers. Then she shook her head. ‘No, Evaline, you can’t. You have lost your mind!’
‘It is best for everyone.’
‘What is the age difference between them?’
‘Four weeks, it’s really nothing.’
‘They’ll know. His mother…’
‘His mother wouldn’t notice if I swapped him with a cat. This is meant to be. This is God’s plan for Edwin and me, I know it is. I have prayed and prayed and now this. I have to do this. I must. And you will keep this secret.’
‘You’ve gone insane,’ Ada mumbled and turned her back, putting her hands to her temples. As she looked
