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enough o' the other damned sort in the world already." She expertly cut the cord, tucking everything away neatly, then lifting the baby on to a length of clean linen, bound it up tightly and placed it in the hesitant arms of its mother. "A little beauty an' all. Look at them red curls, just like her Ma's an' wi' nowt of . . ." She stopped speaking, cutting off the words with a sharp, irritated click of her tongue for the less said about him, the child's father, the better. Scoundrel that he was. 'Handsome is as handsome does' was one of the maxims which fell regularly from Polly Pearsall's lips and though he'd been full of charm and a fine-looking chap, what he'd done to this poor child was far from fine. If Polly had had her way he'd have been brought back and put before the magistrate. Made to pay something towards the upkeep of the child just born but he'd be in the next county by now, no doubt of it, and that troupe of strolling players he travelled about with .
    She watched as Annie looked into the face of her daughter, waiting for that glow of maternal pride, that bond which is formed between mother and child in the first moment of their meeting. For that soft-eyed look of wonder and the awed need to touch the baby's cheek, to put a tentative finger in the curled shell of the child's hand which would instinctively grasp it. But it did not happen. Annie Abbott held her new-born baby in the awkward crook of her arm, her eyes wary, her expression somewhat alarmed. "What am I supposed to do next?" it seemed to say. She glanced up apprehensively at Polly looking exactly like a caller who has had some other woman's child put unexpectedly into her arms and, politely, is holding it for the shortest possible time before returning it thankfully to its rightful owner. Of course the babe had not been cleaned up yet. Perhaps that was it though usually, in Polly's experience, a mother will give even the muckiest of new-borns a cuddle.
    “ 'Ere, give 'er ter me an' I'll bath 'er then you can put 'er to t' breast. ”
    That ought to do it, she told herself. She could remember when her first had folded its pursed lips about her nipple and even now, twenty years later, the unique joy she had experienced then was something she would always remember.
    “ See, give yerself a wipe round," slapping a bowl of soapy water and a cloth on to the table by the bed, "an' I'll send Hesper up ter change bed an' fetch you a cup of tea. An' there's some soup I made fer the noon trade. That'll put the heart back in yer, then I'll 'ave ter be gettin' back downstairs. Seth's bin shoutin' for me, the great lummox, so I'd best get off. Yer'll be right as rain now, me duck. Yer've done well an' as far as I can see everything's fine down there," pointing in the general direction of Annie's belly. "Yer'll be up an' about in a day or two. Yer young an' strong. An' when yer up to it, later, I'll fetch them little duds our Maggie wore. Well, they all did, all my childer and Maggie was last. ”
    All the while she talked Polly was sloshing the quiet baby about in another bowl of warm water which she had poured from the big earthenware jug on the dresser. She doused it vigorously, careful of the top of its head and the neatly tied up cord on its belly. Again she wrapped it firmly in the length of cloth, then put it once more in its mother's arms.
    “ Give it suck now, child," she said kindly to the equally quiet girl on the bed. "She'll need feedin', yer know, an' there's only you can do it. ”
    Annie held the tiny, fiercely wrapped bundle in her arms. Hesper had been changing the soiled sheets on the bed, holding the baby, clucking and fond, exclaiming on her lovely red curls whilst Annie wriggled into an immaculate nightgown, one which belonged to Polly and which Annie herself had washed and ironed only yesterday. She had drunk the tea and obediently spooned the thick vegetable soup into her surprisingly ravenous mouth before being handed the child again.