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his own benefit. The books show he’s been altering the figures over the last year.’ He thought for a moment and then said, ‘I’m going to tell Peter Maynard.’
    Millie started to protest but he held his hand up. ‘You aren’t well enough to work and he’ll have to know why.’
    ‘I’m all right,’ she insisted and made to go back to the sink where she’d been working, but suddenly she felt dizzy, the shelves with their many bottles were swirling round her. She would have fallen if he hadn’t caught her and backed her into the chair.
    ‘When will your baby be born?’
    ‘I don’t know,’ she had to admit. ‘I haven’t told the doctor, he’d have said something to Mum, you see.’
    ‘Oh my goodness!’
    At that moment Peter Maynard walked in. ‘Is something the matter, Millie?’
    She could feel her cheeks burning but Mr Knowles said, ‘Millie’s in a bit of bother,’ and went on to explain while her toes curled up with embarrassment.
    ‘Why haven’t you been to see a doctor?’ her boss asked. ‘You must know you need to.’
    She felt petulant. ‘It costs three shillings and sixpence to see him in his surgery, and he’d have told my mum. I didn’t want her to know.’
    ‘Oh dear, dear, dear,’ he sighed. Then he said gently, ‘I’m afraid you’ll have to tell her. You can’t go on hiding this for ever.’
    ‘She knows,’ Millie said. ‘Ryan’s mother came round to see us last night, and it all came out.’
    Peter Maynard picked up the phone on Mr Knowles’s desk and asked the operator for Dr Fellows. ‘Right, young lady,’ he told her, ‘you can see the company doctor right away. You know Dr Fellows, he gave you a medical before you started work with us. His surgery is on the corner of the street just down there.’
    ‘Yes, I know,’ she said. ‘Thank you.’ Millie really needed to know how much longer she had before the baby would be born. She’d have to get things ready.
    ‘You’re all right to go that far?’ Mr Knowles asked.
    ‘Yes, I’m fine now.’
    ‘Come back here afterwards and tell us what he says. When you can’t work we’ll have to find someone else to take your place.’
    ‘Poor kid,’ she heard him say as she closed the door behind her. So they felt sorry for her. Millie wanted to die with humiliation. Telling them had been awful, but it was a relief that they knew and were offering to help.
    The doctor gave Millie a date for the birth that was only eight weeks off and confirmed that her baby was developing normally. He prescribed iron tablets and vitamins and told her she must eat more if the baby was to continue to grow, recommending milk, eggs and cheese. ‘You’ll need to book a hospital bed for the delivery.’ He explained how to go about that but not how she’d be able to pay for it.
    She returned to the laboratory feeling reassured in one sense but overawed at the short time that was left before she had to take care of a baby as well.
    She told Mr Knowles and was reaching for her white coat to return to work when he said, ‘Go along to the boss’s office, he wants a word. Go on, he told me to send you.’
    Millie was swamped with the fear that he’d sack her. If he did she’d be without money for food or medicines for her mum. Since she’d given up work at Bunnies, she knew her mother had worried about having nowhere to turn but the workhouse. Millie had heard fearsome tales about the place from her neighbours, and she knew it would finish Mum if she had to apply. She tapped nervously on the boss’s door, dreading what might be coming.
    ‘Come in,’ he called and looked up as she did so. ‘Come and sit down, Millie. Did you get a date for when you can expect this baby?’
    ‘Yes, the doctor says November the tenth.’
    He frowned. ‘That’s not long.’
    She was suffused with panic. ‘Eight weeks but I feel fine. I can carry on working for another month or six weeks.’ She had to struggle to get her breath.
    ‘Millie, you