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side.”
    “Off with you, then,” Robert said
affectionately. “I’ve got to get ready for a trip to
Brantford.”
    Fifteen minutes later, Marc sat at his desk
and prepared to begin his own day’s work. He had engineered a
successful meeting between Clement and Uncle Seamus, with the
latter offering something that might have been interpreted as an
apology, enough of one at any rate to effect a détente. Marc
himself was careful not to rush blindly into any drawers or
crevices, but he seemed to have been spared the pleasure of another
parlour trick. Perhaps Uncle Seamus would settle down. As far as
his family were concerned, this high-humoured impishness was
preferable to the depression he had suffered after his retirement
and brought with him to the New World. And indeed these high jinks
might prove to be a necessary precursor to a healthier, more
balanced outlook on life. Certainly he would be loved here by those
around him, and children obviously adored him.
    Marc heard the housemaid who had brought
towels and hot water to Robert five minutes ago now retreating down
the hall towards the vestibule.
    “Ow!” A squeal and then a giggle.
    And then a guffaw.
    My word, Marc thought, what have I gotten
myself into?
    ***
    When Cobb got home shortly after seven that evening,
Dora had a hot supper waiting for him. She and the children had
eaten theirs earlier. Delia was in the front room reading and
Fabian was outdoors playing in the last of the autumn light. Which
suited Cobb just fine. He was bubbling with excitement over the
possibilities held out to him this morning by the Chief Constable,
and although he took great pains to hide it, he was dying to report
the good news. He had just finished his baked apple and was
clearing his throat to speak when Dora said:
    “Hurry up and finish, Mister Cobb. I got
somethin’ important to tell you.”
    “It can wait, can’t it?”
    “If it could, I wouldna said otherwise, now
would I?”
    “I suppose not.”
    “Well, you suppose correct.”
    Cobb sighed, and gave up. “What is it, then?
I hope you ain’t gonna tell me no gory dee-tales about yer
baby business! You know the rules!”
    Cobb and Dora had agreed not to discuss each
other’s work unless it was absolutely necessary. Dora didn’t
appreciate his descriptions of barroom brawls he had broken up, and
he found any reference to the messier aspects of her midwifery
revolting. But there were exceptions, and Cobb suspected he was
about to hear one of them.
    “This could be police busy-ness ,” Dora
said cryptically. “So listen up.”
    “I’m all ears.”
    Dora glared at her husband as she invariably
did when her radar detected the slightest hint of irony. “It’s
about Mrs. Trigger,” she said.
    Cobb’s heavy brows shot up. “That old witch
still at it, is she?”
    “You know very well she is. There’s a lot of
folks north of Hospital Street who can’t afford anybody else. And
at one time, Elsie knew what she was doin’.”
    Elsie Trigger had acted as midwife for the
poorest families in the northwest section of the city where it had
begun to sprawl indiscriminately. Dora did much of the older east
end, while several newcomers had set up in the wealthier
south-western part of town.
    “Maybe so,” Cobb said, “but since she moved
her own carcase inta Irishtown she’s gone straight downhill,
eh?”
    “Taken to the drink, she has.”
    “So what’s so new about the old bat that you
gotta break our rules?”
    Dora sighed, a gesture that made her large
bosom undulate alarmingly under the bib of her apron. “Two dead
babes, that’s what.”
    Cobb tried to look sympathetic. “There’s dead
babes all over the city.”
    “These two shouldn’t’ve died. I got called
out this afternoon to a shack up on Brock Street. I told the fella
who come fer me that I didn’t service the northwest, but he was
desperate. He said Mrs. Trigger had been tendin’ his wife in her
confinement, but when the babe started comin’