The Birth of Love

… Look through the Earth …

Throughout the night, Prisoner 730004 cannot sleep. She paces the floor of her solitary cell and she thinks of how it was on the island, when every night she was lulled to sleep by the waves and every morning she woke to the sound of birds. Simple sounds, which she thrilled to; something within her was stirred by these sounds. And Prisoner 730004 remembers the glowering mutable sky, and the salt sea, and the beautiful wreckage of nature.

*

Now, she is in a city; perhaps she is back in Darwin C, or somewhere else she has never been before. She can hear the whirrs and grinding of the transport system, and the air-processing units throbbing, expending precious energy in their mission to keep the city habitable, and she thinks she hears landing craft whining above. Beyond, the inhabitants are sleeping and at the allotted hour they will rise and begin the day. Through the covered tunnels they will move, from one sun-protection zone to another, and all the time their lungs will be filled with generated air. And their bodies will cry out at the madness of it all, but the cries will be lost, in the pulsing hum of the city.

*

Surely their bodies must cry out, thinks Prisoner 730004. And she is drugged, she knows, and her mind will not work properly, so although she cannot sleep she drifts in and out of lucidity, and sometimes she thinks she is on the island, listening to the sound of waves, the wind gusting through the grasses. Then the coldness of the cell recalls her again.

*

Michael Stone finds he cannot sleep, because his mouth is dry from all the wine he drank, and his head aches. So he rises from his bed, walks into the kitchen, pours himself a glass of water. And he thinks that it does not matter, the dawn will come, he only has to wait. He draws the blinds and sees the city beneath him, the lights shining from successive cars, and the street lights with their sallow glow, and all the diminished motion of the pre-dawn hours.

*

Michael sips the water and thinks of his heart beating. Below he traces ribbons of light and motion spanning from one stone building to the next. He hears the sirens and the hum of the night. He breathes deeply and thinks of the planet turning in space and time creeping onwards.

*

Time will creep, and then it will spring the dawn upon him.

*

Robert von Lucius wakes with a start, and finds he is thinking, ‘But what if it is really true?’ This theory of Semmelweis, he realises he means. He has considered it until now only as an element in the case of Semmelweis’s so-called madness, not as significant in itself. But now he is bolt upright in his bed, thinking, ‘What if he is right, and no one believes him?’ This thought grips him by the throat, so he feels he cannot breathe, and he rises from his bed and walks through the corridors of his house, his footsteps echoing around the panelled walls. To one side his grandfather gazes down at him, a bastion of propriety, a man who attracted neither censure nor praise. Further along, in another portrait, the judgemental stare of his father, a man with a straight back and a chest full of medals. A fine man, a military man, who once saved the life of a fellow officer. Admired by his troops; by thirty-five he had been decked in glory at the battle of — but Robert von Lucius stops himself from considering the battle honours of his father. His thoughts slide once again towards the asylum and the hunched figure of the doctor. The candle flickers as he hurries along. The corridor is draughty, and he draws his collar up. He does not know where to walk, and for a while he meanders, thinking of what he should do. What can he do for this man, he thinks? Then some time has passed; he finds he is in his study, and he takes a sheet of paper and begins to write …

*

Brigid is awake, though she was promised sleep; after the epidural she would be able to sleep, they told her. They took her in a lift to the sixteenth floor, and she lay on the stretcher, merely relieved that she was here. She was rattled on a trolley, along corridors, and she kept her eyes on the ceiling and breathed. The soft tones of the doctors were reassuring to her. She longed so much for release that she didn’t mind the needle at all; she turned her back to the anaesthetist and waited for him to save her. He told her she must be very still when he injected her, and he was about to insert the needle when she felt a contraction beginning. ‘Stop stop,’ she said, quickly, and he said, ‘Just in time, well done.’ They waited — the midwife and the anaesthetist, and Patrick with his hand on hers — while Brigid lay on the bed and groaned — a weary, horrible groan which perplexed her though she couldn’t stop it — and when the surge diminished she made herself very taut and still, and the needle went in. She remembered the sensation from last time — ice-cold liquid coursing down her spine; like last time it was as if she could feel it trickling along, and then she willed the minutes down — ten to fifteen minutes said the anaesthetist and, though that seemed limitless at first, she willed them down. The contractions faded furiously, she didn’t think they would ever submit to the epidural, until finally there was a contraction she only partly felt, and then she found she could breathe normally again. She emerged into an exquisite numbness, her body dulled. The midwife — a new midwife, not Gina, this one in hospital scrubs and with a short bob, less intimate than the other, but kindly all the same — said to her, ‘Now you can get some sleep. If you sleep, you’ll find you get through transition unconscious, which is a very nice way to do it, and then we’ll wake you when we think it might be time for an examination.’ She was eager; she lay on her back and waited, but the epidural sent her into spasms; she began trembling uncontrollably, and every time she thought she might sleep she was awoken again by the shuddering of her body. ‘Nothing we can do, just a side-effect,’ said the midwife, so Brigid stayed on her back, shuddering but not minding it so much. She was simply grateful they had taken away the pain.

*

For hours she has been lying there, still relishing this absence of pain, despite the violence of her trembling. The night has moved slowly along. Every couple of minutes she feels the distant rumbling of contractions through her body, palpable but not agonising and that is all she cares about. Patrick is asleep in the corner, on a mattress. Brigid can see his arm slung out to one side, and the rise and fall of his body. ‘Let him get his rest,’ said the midwife, as she covered him with a blanket, patted it down. ‘He’ll need his strength tomorrow.’

*

After watching her husband for a while, Brigid closes her eyes. Her body reaches urgently towards sleep but then the shivering begins again. She is shuddered awake by one more spasm, then another, to confirm her body’s self-thwarting, its confusion. The clock has moved, but only slightly. Brigid hears the sound of cars, tyres drumming across the bridge, and over the river she can see — if she turns her head she can just see the Houses of Parliament on the opposite bank, and boats moored for the night. Lights twinkling on the water. The city looks soft and tranquil; she has never seen the river before at this empty time of night.

*

She closes her eyes again, trying to sink into the stillness. The suspense is the worst part, being in the middle of something and knowing that it will end, somehow, but not knowing what the ending will be. The hours will flow along, but Brigid longs to escape them, to accelerate to the conclusion.

*

She only has to endure.

*

I must only endure, thinks Prisoner 730004, sitting on her thin bed, and rubbing her eyes. They have drugged her again, and everything is hazy and disturbing; her thoughts have been chemically addled, impaired by their drugs. She despises them, for invading her brain in this way, for pretending this is a cure. And she sits on her thin bed, not really caring to consider the time, because she has so little to gain from the dawn.

*

Not many more hours, thinks Michael, sitting on his sofa, having glanced too recently at the clock to permit himself to glance again. Today I will see her, after many years, and she will be much changed. She will be lying in her bed. The bed she lay in with my father, who is now dead. And when I have crouched beside her, I will be free to return to this solitary life, to do anything, to live or die, however I please. Only — and now he cannot stop himself, he looks at the clock — a few more hours, and it will be over.

*

Only a few more hours, says the midwife quietly, to Brigid — seeing that she is still awake — and I will examine you again.

*

In his study, Robert von Lucius is finishing a letter.

*

Dear Professor Wilson, it is early in the morning, and I find I cannot sleep. I have been so concerned about the case of Professor Semmelweis. You are a sage and certain man, and I hope you can tell me the answer to this question: what does it mean if Professor Semmelweis is right? I perceive that even if this question is answered it will not necessarily save him from his rages or determine how he should be treated — though that asylum is no place for him, of that I am sure. But what does it mean for the medical profession, for mothers who give birth in our modern hospitals, if Professor Semmelweis is correct, and if he is generally ignored? And what does it mean for our notion of sagacity, of the temperance and fairness of our sciences, if he is dismissed so roundly, and it transpires he was correct all along? Surely the case must be reopened? Surely someone must conduct a study?

*

For myself, I find that I must act. As soon as morning comes I will go to the asylum, and talk more to Professor Semmelweis. I feel I must champion this theory because if there is the slightest vestige of truth in it, if adhering to its precepts might save the life of a single woman, then we must — someone must — bring it to general notice again. I will go to the asylum and make sure I understand very precisely what Professor Semmelweis has proposed. If only my library were a little more extensive, it would house a copy of his book. But I will procure one as soon as I can. However, it is more important to talk to the originator himself, as I am fortunate enough to have personal access to him.

*

Professor Wilson, I will write to you again very soon but in the interim I beg you — so far as your studies and work allow you — to make enquiries about the reputation of this theory in your own country, and to advise me of your opinion on the matter.

Yours ever,

Robert von Lucius.

*

Now Brigid notices that through the window dawn has broken, and the sky has turned pale blue. Robert von Lucius thinks, at last the morning, and now he can act. Prisoner 730004 sees the light at the high window changing, and understands the day has come. And Michael thinks at least now he can rise — he has recently made one last attempt to sleep, curled up on his sofa, but hopelessly alert and stricken by nerves — and he throws off the blanket and moves towards the kitchen. There, he switches on the kettle and he cuts a slice of bread. He puts that in the toaster and waits for the kettle to boil. Then he pours water into a cup and when the toast is ready he spreads it with butter and jam. Normality, he thinks. All this calms him slightly, though his hands are shaking.

*

Now I must act, thinks Robert von Lucius, as he hurries into the breakfast room. He pours himself some coffee and takes a bite of a roll. The newspaper has been neatly arranged beside his plate and he glances through it. It is full of news he cannot digest entirely, something about the Emperor on his annual retreat. There has been a scandal at court. Robert von Lucius drinks his coffee down, and feels the warmth in his belly.

*

Brigid finds she is hungry, her stomach growling a reproach, and she asks the midwife if she can have some toast. But the midwife says they must wait until the doctors have assessed her. ‘There may be the need for surgical intervention,’ she says, and Brigid feels only disbelief. On the mattress in the corner Patrick is stirring. When he turns towards her, she sees his eyes are bloodshot. He looks tired and as if he hasn’t slept at all. But she must look far worse, she thinks, ravaged internally and still awaiting the final act.

*

Prisoner 730004 is given a bowl of nutri-meal, which she cannot eat. ‘Am I to be moved today?’ she says to the guard, but he doesn’t answer. She has been trying not to think of her fellow islanders, in order that they may stay free of her misfortune and thereby happy, but now she allows herself to think of Oscar, and she hopes he is free, and she hopes that Birgitta and her son are not caught. She hopes they have fled into the mountains on the mainland, or the remaining forests along the coast. There is still land which no one uses, vast tracts of unusable land, of no interest to the Protectors. She hopes they have found the guides there, and can live quietly. Or die quietly, together, mother and son. And now Prisoner 730004 succumbs to tears, and she sits there for a time with her head in her hands, weeping as she has not in years, perhaps she has never wept in this abandoned way, because she thinks there is no real hope, not for her and perhaps not for them either.

*

This will pass, she thinks, but that does not console her.

*

Michael holds the phone to his ear, but Sally will not answer. He wants to tell her he cannot come. He must go to the studio, find her there, explain that he cannot speak on the radio. He will make his excuses and then he will catch a train. So he drinks his tea and finishes his toast. Beyond his window, London is rising into life. The streets are filling with cars. The traffic moves, slowly in the morning sun. In his flat, high above it all, Michael washes his plate and leaves his cup in the sink. He looks around his spartan room and does not know what he should take with him. So he takes nothing, except his wallet. He dresses in his suit, which looks a little shabby this morning. He was too drunk to hang it up the previous night, and now it is lightly wrinkled, the collar crooked. It doesn’t matter, he thinks. His mother will scarcely notice him.

At the door he turns and surveys his flat, as if recording this ordinary scene: the coffee table strewn with newspapers, the sofa cushions flattened by his weight, the bed unmade in the adjoining room. At this moment Michael stands, in perfect ignorance of the future. He has no sense of foreboding. He puts the keys in his pocket and walks along the corridor to the lift. He presses the button and waits for the lift to ascend.

*

It is unfortunate, the midwife has told them, but they must wait a little longer. The doctors are on the ward, but they have a couple of other women to assess first. They are called women, not patients, Brigid notes, because of course they are not ill. Swollen and weary, mad with pain or shuddering as the epidural dulls their nerves, but they are not ill. This state is perfectly natural; its conclusion is the birth. Whatever happens, she thinks, it was meant to happen. She is wondering if this is true, as Patrick says to her, ‘Is there anything you need?’

‘I’m just so hungry,’ she says. Patrick looks down at his empty plate. He has — before Brigid’s eyes — consumed two pieces of toast, and drunk a cup of tea. Guiltily, he says, ‘Hopefully you’ll be able to eat something soon.’

‘We’ll have a better sense of what will happen when she’s been assessed by the doctors,’ says the midwife.

*

So Brigid waits. She waits, trembling on her regulation bed. Patrick washes his face in the sink. Cleans his teeth. He takes a book and tries to read. ‘Let me know if you want anything,’ he says to Brigid. He is sitting on a low chair, trying to read a thriller. Even now, thinks Brigid, as Patrick reads, and as the midwife tidies the room, and as she lies there, inert apart from the involuntary spasms, her labour is continuing, without her intervention or even awareness. Within her body, though she does not notice, everything is changing, the baby is preparing to leave.

*

She thinks of Calumn, waking in his little bed, wondering where she is. Crying, ‘Mamamam.’ She has only spent a few nights apart from him since his birth. She wonders if he woke in the night, and if he cried for her and found she had gone. Her mother would have been sleeping in the spare room — she imagines Calumn shuffling along the corridor, opening the door of the main bedroom, finding it empty, not knowing where else to look. Bemused and lonely in the corridor, in his little pyjamas. She should have told her mother to sleep in the main bedroom instead. She hadn’t been thinking, at the time.

She says to Patrick, ‘Can you call my mother?’

Patrick takes his phone and dials the house. There is a brief pause and then he is saying, ‘Hello, yes, it’s Patrick here. How was your night? Oh no, no news here. We’re just waiting for the doctors to come in and assess Brigid. But she’s fine. Well, she can tell you everything herself. Here she is.’

‘Darling,’ says her mother, as Brigid takes the phone. ‘What on earth is happening? You can’t still be in labour?’

‘I had an epidural. So everything slowed down further but wasn’t painful any more.’

‘Oh, I’m so glad. That was sensible of you. But what’s happening now?’

‘The doctors are coming in a moment. Then they’ll tell me what stage we’re at.’

‘How frustrating for you, dear. What bad luck.’

‘Never mind. Anyway, how is Calumn?’

‘Oh, he’s fine. A little bit up and down in the night; I think he just knew something was going on.’

‘Did he find you in your room?’

‘No, I heard him crying in the corridor.’

‘Was he upset we weren’t there?’

‘Oh, perhaps a little, at first, but then we had a fine old time of it. I took him back to bed and sang him a few lullabies, and he fell asleep soon enough. And then I slept on the sofa bed in his room. So I was there the next time he woke, and — oh Lord — the next. Reminded me of all the sleepless nights I had with you.’

‘What’s he doing now?’

‘He’s just having some milk. And we’re reading a story.’

‘So he’s not too upset?’

‘No no, he’s fine. He’s just here. He’s a resilient little fellow, aren’t you darling? We’ll be absolutely fine here until you get back.’

‘Can I speak to him?’

‘Of course.’

And Brigid imagines her mother holding the phone to Calumn’s ear, the phone touching his shining hair, and she says, ‘Hello sweetie. How are you? It’s Mummy here. I love you so much. And I’m coming back very soon, lovely little boy. I hope you’re having a nice breakfast. Daddy is with me and he loves you very much too. We will be back very soon and then we will all sit down together and eat some food and read some books. Won’t we sweetie? I love you very very much.’

‘Is that everything?’ says her mother.

‘Did he smile?’

‘Oh yes, he knows his mummy, don’t you Calumn?’

‘Patrick will call you and let you know what’s happening, if I can’t,’ says Brigid.

‘Of course, I understand. I’ve been through it myself. Don’t worry about us at all.’

‘Thanks Mum.’

‘You look after yourself.’

*

Brigid hands the phone back to Patrick. Her mother, always good in a crisis. A coper, self-determinedly. And Brigid yearns for her son, and wants to hold him and kiss him and hear him babbling lovingly at her, and she worries — once again, once more after all the times she has worried about it already — that he will never recover from the arrival of the other child. But this other child — and she turns to the midwife and says, ‘Will it be soon?’

‘Oh yes, very soon.’

*

Michael is on the platform, and the train is delayed. Sally had offered to order him a taxi, of course she had offered, and almost insisted, but he said he wanted to take the Tube. ‘Madness,’ she said to him, the night before. ‘You don’t want to be jostled around and probably end up late, do you, really? Arrive puffed out and sweaty, hardly in the right frame of mind? When you could come along in an air-conditioned cab?’

‘No no, it’s quite all right,’ he said to her. She was obliged to accept his whim. ‘Whatever you prefer,’ she said in the end. ‘You’re the one who’ll be in the studio.’

*

So he is waiting for the Northern Line, and then he will have to change at Tottenham Court Road. All around him, thousands of humans, passing through time. Moving at their own pace through the hours and days. Michael looks around at them — at the man with a bulging briefcase, and the woman with a grim fixed expression, as if she hoped for something better, and all those with grey hair and balding heads and potbellies and a few more of their infirmities revealed to the world. A few more hidden away. He knows nothing of their experience of time, though each one has woken to the sunshine and eaten breakfast and conducted their morning rituals, and each one, thinks Michael, lives — though perhaps they do not know it — governed by ancient impulses — a desire for human company, love, intimacy, family, a fear of darkness and the unknown, an aversion to pain, a curious sense of hope, despite everything. Perhaps some of them believe that this series of days — their series of days — will be infinite. Perhaps the repetition has deluded them, so they do not notice the years passing, or perhaps they look up from time to time and see that things have subtly changed, that something in their cycle of days has changed. But maybe they dismiss the thought. Ultimately, he thinks, we must all dismiss this thought, because otherwise how do we live? How do we live through our series of days?

*

The train is swinging towards the platform, and now it whirrs to a halt, and its doors open. In a swathe of people, a directed surge, Michael gains the entrance, and is deposited into a bright carriage. The train is crammed with bodies, and so he stands and holds onto a rail. All around him people are doing the same. The carriage is full of overheated humans, dressed in work clothes, shoulder to shoulder. But never, thinks Michael, face to face. Some of them are holding newspapers and struggling to read them. These people are hoping to differentiate themselves. But they are buffeted and jostled all the same.

*

‘This is a Northern Line train for Mill Hill East. Stand clear of the closing doors.’ It is foolish, thinks Michael, as he is buffeted and jostled in turn, to be too concerned about your own destiny, about the way the Fates toy with you, if they are toying indeed and not concerned with something else entirely. It is foolish to be too concerned, because in the end it is impossible to change things. Small elements might be rearranged, but the grand sweep, well, that is impossible to change. How could I have foreseen anything that has happened, all the events that have accumulated? All the mistakes I have made, the destruction even I have wrought? I was blind, as everyone is who lives within time.

*

To blame yourself for lacking foresight is perhaps like blaming yourself for being mortal, thinks Michael. You know nothing of the future. The past is unfathomable, stretching into darkness. The present is where you live. And the future — the future is simply the locale of your hope, the place where you deposit your expectations. And your fears too. But for some reason, today Michael feels more hope than fear. He thinks he may be redeemed. If he can go to her and say — something — what it is, he is not sure. When he is there, perhaps he will know.

*

It must or might be, thinks Michael, that — but now the train is pulling into Charing Cross and the carriage empties and fills again, and Michael is knocked on the back and turns his head round, though he is not angry at all. He just wants to see the person who has collided with him, and it is a woman wearing red, looking urgent and troubled as she leaves the train. She is hurrying down the platform, and now the train moves out of the station, and he can no longer see her.

*

Robert von Lucius walks through the streets of Vienna, his head bowed. The streets are crowded with people, and he hears the clatter of horses’ hooves on the cobbles. Carriages pass him, in a continuous line. He steps aside to avoid a man, and the man nods his thanks. The shops are opening, and the market sellers are setting up their stalls in the square. Von Lucius is hurrying, and the crowds merely irritate him. They are an obstruction, so many people standing between him and the asylum on Lazarettgasse. Between anticipation and action. Though what he will do when he arrives, he is not sure. Much depends on the mood of Professor Semmelweis, on whether he is lucid or raging. Now the cathedral clock chimes above him — he checks his own clock against it — and it is 8.30 a.m.

*

‘Brigid, I am Dr Gupta,’ says one doctor, holding out his hand.

‘I am Dr Witoszeck,’ says the other, younger and less self-assured.

‘We are going to examine you, if that is all right?’ says Dr Gupta, though Brigid can hardly refuse. She says it is all right. They say, ‘We are now beginning the examination,’ and they push their hands inside her, one after the other, and then they jot down notes together.

They say things she cannot understand. They speak quickly, using medical terms. Then Dr Gupta addresses her. He sits down — on the chair Patrick has vacated for him — and says, ‘The labour has progressed quite some way. You have done very well. However, the baby’s head is stuck. It is the wrong way round and so this is making things very difficult for you. I think this is quite a large baby, larger than your first baby. This is why your contractions have been so unproductive, I suspect, because of the size and now the awkward position of the baby.’

‘What can I do?’ she says.

‘We will see if some pushing turns the head. If that doesn’t work then we will consider the other options. I’ll leave you with the midwife.’

*

So her baby is stubbornly fixed. They are sending stronger waves of chemicals into her body, making the contractions more forceful even than before. Brigid is positioned; her numbed legs are moved. Upturned, stranded on her back, Brigid sees that her legs have been opened wide, and she becomes aware that she is naked below the waist. She observes this fact, though she no longer cares. Deprived of feeling, her body does not seem to be her own. The midwife says, ‘An hour to push. Then the doctor will come back again.’

*

Outside, the hum of traffic. There are boats moving on the shining river. And the midwife says, ‘Now! Push!’

*

With deadened nerves, Brigid aims to push. Her muscles are asleep, she thinks. The epidural has numbed her body and somehow it also seems to have detached her altogether from her surroundings. From what is really happening to her. She is obeying the midwife, but automatically, as if it doesn’t matter any more. And the midwife says, ‘That’s it! Keep pushing!’ and Patrick is there too, saying, ‘Push! Brigid, keep going!’

*

She grits her teeth, only an hour she thinks, from some reserve she must produce a final burst of energy — and she thinks she is pushing though her body has been silenced and cannot tell her what it is doing at all. She hears a deep guttural growl, like an animal, and she knows, though it seems improbable enough, that this sound is coming from her. In her desperation, she is growling like a beast.

*

And Patrick says, ‘Go on Brigid — that’s great. Well done! Keep pushing!’

*

‘You should rest for a moment,’ says the midwife, and the growl stops. Brigid breathes, tries to understand her body; she listens but all the shrillness has been muffled. Patrick kisses her and says, ‘You’re doing really well.’

She is given a drink of water, tended to briskly, her brow is wiped, and then the midwife holds up the watch again and says, ‘Now! Push again!’

*

Within her, Brigid feels the suppressed force of a contraction, still tearing her apart, but surreptitiously, so what she registers is something like an aftershock, not the real force and fury at all. She has her eyes on the ceiling, a great lamp is shining down on her, she is the illuminated centre of the room, and so she grimaces and makes grunting noises, as if that will help. She grunts to compensate for the muteness of her body, these silenced muscles she has been dutifully honing throughout the months of her pregnancy, with special yoga exercises. She has been training for the marathon of the birth, and now she is lying on her back, with Patrick and the midwife peering doubtfully inside her. And because there is nothing else she can do, Brigid growls like a beast and bares her teeth, and she hears Patrick saying, ‘Come on Brigid, come on.’

*

She is pinioned by drugs. The midwife’s hand is upon her knee, though Brigid can hardly feel it. And in the other hand she holds a watch.

‘OK, now off we go again,’ says the midwife. Brightly, as if it is a race.

*

The true horror, the horror I am not prepared for though I have already seen it once, is still to come, thinks Patrick, looking over at his wife, her face contorted, her jaw wide open in a snarl. He thinks of all the effort she has gone to, the months of pregnancy and hauling her belly around, and now this. He wants to put his hands on her, to comfort her, but she is engrossed in her state, and he holds back. Later blood will flow and then there will be the ruined and deflated belly, wrinkled as if aged prematurely, a flap of baggy skin. Patrick remembers this melancholy voided belly, which he loved because it had housed his son, because each silvery stretch mark reminded him of the months of suspense, the eventual birth. And then the gradual recovery, the body slowly regaining shape and definition, though never quite the same as before. But before that, they must pass through the terrifying beauty of the birth — the gory sundering. And now he says, because it is all he can do, and he is otherwise ineffective, redundant otherwise, ‘Go on Brigid, push!’

*

Brigid thinks how impossible this is, how she fails to understand it, how her body is — even the second time, when they lied and told her things would be easy — refusing to release the child. She had never really considered that this birth might be worse than the first. In the midst of it, even as she strains and snarls, Brigid sees what is happening to her and knows it is worse than last time.

*

And though she can hardly imagine it, her thoughts turn to the child within her, contained in some bony unyielding place, its head trapped, and so she growls and wills her deadened muscles to work.

‘Go on Brigid!’ says Patrick. Like a nervous cheerleader. ‘Go on, you can do it!’

*

She screams in her effort, a thin shrill scream, and Patrick says, ‘Good girl, you’re doing so well,’ trying to make his voice sound warm and calm, and then the midwife says, ‘OK, and relax now.’ Brigid lets her head fall back, and she stares at the ceiling.

*

It hasn’t worked. The midwife examines her and makes the pronouncement. None of it — the grunting and straining and even the final cry — has moved the baby.

*

‘Unfortunately, we could be doing this for hours,’ the midwife is saying. The allotted hour has elapsed. It is 9.30 a.m.and the baby has not arrived.

‘No sign even of the head,’ says Patrick.

‘No sign at all?’ says Brigid.

*

Dr Gupta returns again, and he feels inside her and says little has changed.

‘For the sake of the baby, we cannot extend this any further,’ he says.

‘The head really hasn’t turned?’ says Brigid. Incredulously, because she hoped so much it would.

‘No, I’m afraid it hasn’t. At this point, the only real option you have is a Caesarean,’ he says. Already she can see people moving around the room, making preparations. ‘Anything else carries a greater risk for your baby.’

‘You are certain?’

‘Personally, I am certain that the risks of any other procedure are significant,’ says Dr Gupta. ‘A Caesarean is the safest course of action for your baby, and for you.’

*

Another doctor appears, with a form for her to sign. Consequences of a Caesarean may include … she doesn’t read the list. She signs her name, hands the paper back to the doctor. Patrick is beside her, winding his fingers around hers. They have no choice. There is simply nothing else she can do, and now she must abandon her efforts, submit entirely. She is close to tears once more, but she is exhausted beyond measure, flushed with chemicals, hardly in her right mind. There is a distant voice saying, ‘Why me?’ and she manages to conjure the image of Stephanie, just yesterday, and how sorry she had felt for her, and how certain she had been that this wouldn’t happen to her. But it is remote now, she can hardly remember yesterday. Patrick says, ‘I’m so sorry, darling,’ but he doesn’t understand. He assumes she is devastated, he doesn’t realise how far she has fallen. Because under it all, the confused pulsing of her thoughts and the insistent rhythmic beep of the monitor beside her, and the doctors murmuring at the door, she has tumbled into a dark secret sense of relief, that it is no longer her responsibility, that someone else will prise the baby out.

‘It’s over,’ she says, and Patrick doesn’t know what she means.

*

Prisoner 730004 is dragged roughly from her cell. ‘We must move quickly for your protection,’ says a guard. There is another guard beside him, both of them sinewy like trees, their faces wiped of everything except conviction. She sees them plainly before her, and then they open a door and the corridor is filled with light. Dazzled by the glare, she blinks and turns away. Now they are grappling with her, tying her hands.

‘For your protection and that of the species,’ one of them says.

She is walked along corridors, the doors tightly shut. Door after door, and she thinks that behind each door is another prisoner, and she wonders what they have all done, how they fell under the censure of the Protectors, and how they will be punished. She wonders if any of them will be freed — but that question seems absurd, when freedom is Darwin C. She feels sick and wants to pause, but the men lead her along. They will not look directly at her, they just march on, their boots hammering on the floor, a rhythmic thud, and she is dragged along beside them.

‘Where are we going?’ she says, after the hammering has gone on for a long time.

‘You are not entitled to ask such questions.’

‘Will I see my friends?’

‘You are not entitled to ask such questions.’

*

The hammering begins again and the doors are all tightly shut and Prisoner 730004 falls silent, they will not answer her. She struggles on, her grey-faced captors flanking her, their arms rubbing against hers, and she remembers her parents and how they were sent to the mass-scale farms, and how she believed at the time this was a good place for them to go, a pleasant retirement, a gift from the Protectors, and it was only gradually that she pieced the rumours together. Then she was stricken and horrified for many years, because she had been so eager to believe a lie. Because she had waved them off, in her willing ignorance.

*

Her parents had believed it too; they had gone to the train as if they were embarking on an adventure, and she wonders when they realised — whether they began to suspect something on the train itself, as they were shunted into a carriage with dozens of others, all of them old and frail and clearly expendable — or whether they suppressed their fears until they saw the farm itself. She wonders when they knew they were being discarded, and how long it took them to die.

*

Prisoner 730004 understands more than her parents did about this world, the world of the Protectors. If they send her to the mass-scale farms, she knows what that will mean. She will be given a bunk in a vast barn, full of others like her, she will be dragged into the domes at daybreak, there to collect the harvest, she will work until the sun drops beneath the horizon, she will receive her allotted ration of food. She will not be murdered, not precisely; she will be neglected and beaten when she fails to work, and her deprived body will protest, it will struggle for survival but it will decline nonetheless. She wonders what happens then — there are many rumours about what happens then — but now she does not want to think any more about the mass-scale farms. She is afraid, though she tries to tell herself that she must not show her fear. The drugs are making her afraid; they are conjuring these memories of her parents. The Protectors want her weak so she will beg for mercy. So she will tell them what they want to know.

*

But they will send her away whatever she says. Prisoner 730004 strives to remember that, despite the drugs they have fed her. Though the drugs are designed to make her cowardly and penitent, she tries to resist their effects. She must remember, she thinks, that she will not be saved.

*

The guards slam their feet on the cold floor. They slam their feet and she is dragged along beside them. The smell of the guards is thick and vile; she is repulsed by their bodies close beside her. They have walked for so long, it is a surprise to her when they stop. They come to a sudden halt outside a door. High and broad, and barred against her.

*

‘Wait here,’ say the guards.

*

In Lazarettgasse, Robert von Lucius hammers on the door of the asylum, and for a long time no one comes to meet him. He hears bells tolling in the distance. He hammers again, more loudly. There is another lengthy pause, and then, finally, the face of Herr Meyer appears, but he will only open the door a crack. He seems different today, all his oily charm is gone. It has seeped from him, and he is pale-faced and reluctant. He peers around the door with a sour pinched expression, and says, ‘Herr von Lucius. You have returned again?’

‘Yes, I wanted to see Professor Semmelweis.’

‘I am afraid you cannot enter,’ says Herr Meyer, holding up a hand.

‘Why not?’ Robert von Lucius is prepared to argue, to fight the man; he has come full of resolution and even excitement. He says, ‘Come now Herr Meyer, I demand an appointment.’

Herr Meyer says, perhaps less sour now and merely frightened, though prepared to deny everything, ‘Herr S is dead. He died in the night.’

And though his mind is suddenly blank, his thoughts erased by shock, Robert von Lucius hears himself saying, ‘But how? How did he die?’ He sees Herr Meyer working his mouth, forming a lie, he thinks. Even as Herr Meyer forms his lie, Robert von Lucius feels a great surge of rage as if he would like to strike him down.

‘He clearly had a degenerate condition. It festered internally and finally killed him,’ says Herr Meyer.

‘I do not believe you,’ says Robert von Lucius. His body is tensed with rage, and with the effort of suppressing it. Yet he tries to speak slowly and clearly. He says, ‘Professor Semmelweis told me he had been beaten. He said he believed he had internal injuries. He was a doctor, an esteemed doctor. He diagnosed himself …’

‘Herr S was insane. This means anything he said cannot be considered,’ says Herr Meyer, abruptly.

‘You are wrong. He died because he was savagely beaten. I am convinced of it. His death was avoidable. If you had treated him as a suffering human and not as an animal, he would have lived …’

Robert von Lucius stops talking. He understands that it is pointless to say anything to this man, this torturer, who thrives on pain and despair. And he is aware of something else, a horrified recognition that this is what he feared. He might have averted it, he thinks, if he had acted sooner, if he had allowed himself to act on his fears. So his rage is mingled with self-reproach, and he clenches his fists.

‘He was a violent madman,’ Herr Meyer is saying. He is puffed up with indignation. Robert von Lucius wonders if the man truly believes, if he believes and does not doubt himself, that he has done nothing wrong. ‘We restrained him in the only way possible. Otherwise he would have been a danger to himself.’

‘You are a murderer,’ says Robert von Lucius. ‘You have killed this innocent man, and thousands of women will die because of your actions.’

‘You should leave now,’ says Herr Meyer. ‘Before I call the guards.’ And now he slams the door, and will not open it again, though Robert von Lucius breaks his knuckles hammering on it.

*

When he finally realises that this door will not open, Robert von Lucius turns away, head bent, stricken with a terrible dark guilt, that he saw the suffering of Semmelweis and did nothing. The man is dead, he thinks, and I planned to speak to him today, to understand him further. I planned to help him, but I have arrived too late, and my plans do not matter now. The man is dead and we shall never speak again.

He thinks — though he tries not to, but he cannot repel the thought — of Semmelweis dying alone in his cell, the fetid dungeon they cast him into, dying in darkness, deprived even of the light of the moon.

*

Robert von Lucius turns with his head bent, and walks back down the hill.

*

Heads bent, the prisoners are pushed into the room. Prisoners 730004, 730005, 730006, 730007 are pushed into the room, and they nod their recognition quickly, not wanting to incriminate each other.

*

Prisoner 730004 lifts her head and sees before her the servants of the Protectors, called Protection Scientists. Half a dozen men, hard and vital, the beneficiaries of intensive courses of gene therapy. They are the elite guardians of this civilisation; they act to protect the species — their actions justified by this aim. Their lofty phrases, all those phrases they threaded around her, as they are threaded about Darwin C, woven across a thousand walls — they believe them all, coldly, rigidly. To Prisoner 730004, they look alike, as she glances at their faces one by one — her glance rushed and nervous, because she knows they have come to condemn her. Perhaps she thinks they are alike because their faces phrase the same attitude of mind, this absolute conviction. Nothing will shatter this conviction, she thinks, as she scans them with her weary eyes. They do not look at her. The Head Scientist — taller and sterner still — appears among them, wearing a grey robe. He is old, but he has been repeatedly rejuvenated, his cells replaced; he is a hybrid, an ageing body filled with borrowed life. Now one of the Scientists says, ‘Line them up.’ And the guards obey them. Prisoner 730004 can barely stand, fear has softened her limbs, but a guard grabs her and she is lined up anyway.

*

Another Protection Scientist says, ‘We regret to inform you, Prisoners, that you have been found guilty of conspiring against the survival of the species, and therefore you will be processed and conveyed elsewhere.’

*

Involuntarily they gasp. Elsewhere means the mass-scale farms, or an Institution for the Improvement of the Reason. They will be dispersed; there are innumerable such places. Prisoner 730004 looks at Oscar, sees he has been numbered 730005, and she wants to fling her arms around him, weep with him — but her hands are tied. His eyes are on the floor; he looks too shocked and broken to raise his head.

*

‘You should be grateful for the compassion and clemency of the Protectors,’ a Protection Scientist is saying. ‘In other, less advanced civilisations your crimes would be punishable by death.’

‘There is something else,’ says another of the Protection Scientists. Very slowly, enunciating his words clearly, so there can be no mistake, he says, ‘Your co-conspirator, the egg donor you called Birgitta, has been found. The Protection Agents tried to protect her, but she died in the struggle.’

‘She has been killed?’ says Prisoner 730004, too horrified now to stay silent. She sees Oscar slump forward as if a weight has fallen on his back, and for a moment she closes her eyes. It is too much to imagine. The death of Birgitta and the destruction of everything they loved. It is too much and she no longer cares what comes, her fears have been drowned by a limitless wave of grief.

*

With her eyes shut she hears Prisoner 730006 saying, in a voice barely above a whisper, but somehow she is phrasing the words, ‘You have done an abject and evil thing. You have committed a terrible crime.’

‘Birgitta was the criminal,’ says one of the Protection Scientists.

‘You are all the criminals,’ says another.

‘You have killed an innocent woman, whose only crime was to birth a child,’ says Prisoner 730006, in her frightened whisper.

‘There was no progeny of the species,’ says the Head Scientist, who has been silent until now.

‘What do you mean?’ says Prisoner 730007.

‘Birgitta was found alone. There was no progeny of the species with her, nor anywhere in the vicinity.’

‘There was a child. A beautiful boy child,’ says Prisoner 730006. And now she is raising her voice, she is looking directly at them, these Protection Scientists who have discarded compassion. ‘You are lying and you have killed Birgitta’s son.’

‘So both Birgitta and her son are dead,’ says Prisoner 730005, and now he falls to his knees, and the guards raise him again roughly and force him to stand.

‘We found no progeny of the species,’ says the Head Scientist again. ‘We found no progeny, because there was no progeny.’

‘You are evil men, you have killed a mother and her son,’ says Prisoner 730006.

‘For the final time, we tell you there was no progeny.’ The Head Scientist is emphatic. He is stating what he believes to be the empirical truth. There is no emotion in his voice; he does not need to persuade them.

His words hang in the silence, and then Prisoner 730004 says, slowly, ‘You are right, there was no child.’

The other Prisoners turn to her, stunned by her words.

‘What do you mean?’ they all say to her. ‘There was a child. You know there was.’

‘No,’ says Prisoner 730004, and now she looks at them urgently, willing them to understand. ‘We were wrong. We were deluded. I see it now, now the true light of reason has shone upon my clouded thoughts. There was never a son.’

‘What are you saying? Why are you denying everything that is true?’ says Prisoner 730007.

‘There was no son,’ says Prisoner 730004, flatly, as if she has finally apprehended the truth. The facts, she thinks.

And Prisoner 730005, who understands, though the others do not, says, ‘Perhaps you are right. Perhaps — now the fog is lifting — perhaps you are right. There was no son.’

‘There was a son,’ says Prisoner 730006, ravaged by despair and now believing they have betrayed her. She shakes her head towards them. ‘You are both lying, and it is too late even to save yourselves. What is the purpose of your lie?’

*

Prisoner 730004 says again, ‘There was no son.’

She bows her head. Within her bitterness and all her fear, there is something else, something like hope, fragile and perilous, but fluttering within her.

*

Brigid is being wheeled along a corridor, confused and prostrate. Lights pass above her, and she closes her eyes. Patrick has disappeared, she doesn’t know where. They said he would come back soon. When she turned her head wildly, and asked where he was, they said she mustn’t worry. ‘You just lie back and everything will be taken care of,’ someone said, though she couldn’t see them. Now they are turning a corner, the doctor is hurrying past her. A nurse is at her side, saying, ‘It’s fine, dear, we’re almost there,’ and they are moving down another corridor — all these closed doors, thinks Brigid, and each door represents a mother in pain, birthing a new life — and then they are at the entrance.

*

‘Here is the theatre,’ says the nurse. ‘We’ll get you in and get you ready. There’s nothing to worry about.’ The doors swing open, and all Brigid can see is a new glare, a still more intense and burning light. It is going to happen here, in this over-lit white room — she can hardly see what is in there; she is screwing up her eyes against the light.

*

When Michael arrives, Sally Blanchefleur is standing outside the studio. He sees her before she notices him, and though she is angular and beautiful, tapping a long finger on her phone, he feels sorry for her, that she will have to make excuses for him once again.

‘I was so worried, Michael, I thought you’d never arrive,’ she says, quite sternly, and he knows he must be plain.

‘I am so sorry,’ he says. ‘It is my mother. My mother is unwell. I have to go to her now. I cannot speak on the radio.’

She is staring at him in disbelief, now, her hand to her cheek. He sees her eyes, thinks there is pity in them, but anger too. ‘Sally, I am sorry to have caused you so much trouble.’

‘Michael, it is not that. Your mother, you say. I thought you never …’

‘I will write to the producer myself. Say how very sorry I am, about it all. I know that doesn’t really help …’

‘They will understand. If only you’d told me — how long have you known?’

‘Not long.’

*

He knows he has wasted her time. And she had come out to support him. ‘Sally …’ he says. But she puts her hand on his arm, strokes his sweaty shirt. She says, ‘Michael, it really doesn’t matter.’ Though he has been a fool, he thinks, perhaps she has understood him anyway. He nods to acknowledge it, flushed and almost elated. ‘Call me when you can,’ whispers Sally, and turns away.

*

He sees that the sun is shining, that the day is fine and bright. The sky is a perfect brilliant blue.

*

Robert von Lucius stands in the sunshine thinking that it is a fine day — the richness of the light, a gentle breeze unfurling along the street — and he wonders what he should do with this fine day, marred so entirely by the news he bears. The guilt he must endure. He stands in the square with the cathedral clock chiming above his head. The noise of people all around him, and the ordinary clattering of horses’ hooves on the cobbles. Something terrible has occurred, he thinks. And no one will acknowledge it.

*

Under the clock, Robert von Lucius thinks it is necessary to do something to repair the reputation of this man, as he failed so abjectly to help him when he lived. He was too hesitant, and now he has missed the chance to save a life. Yet something remains. The work is not lost. It is perfectly necessary, thinks von Lucius, with the breeze on his face, that I prove the theory of Professor Semmelweis, if I can. That I disseminate it more widely. For someone must believe it, he thinks. There will be someone who understands.

*

Patrick has come back, dressed in a surgical gown, and Brigid cannot look at him, because she is so afraid. He is like a figure seen in a nightmare; at one level familiar but troubling in his strange clothes. He holds her hand, standing beside her. He says, ‘Are you OK? Brigid are you OK?’ But she cannot speak to him. The doctor says, ‘There will be an incision and then you may feel a tugging sensation. Everything will happen very quickly. The baby will be taken out and then he or she will be checked and warmed up a bit. Then you will be able to see your child.’

‘Can Patrick hold the baby, until I can?’ says Brigid. With the doctor she is trying to sound businesslike. She suppresses her fear and it is only when she feels Patrick’s hand upon hers that she wants to beg them to change everything, to do something else.

‘Of course he can. We’ll just have a quick check, and then the baby will be handed over to its father,’ says the doctor.

‘Don’t tell me what is happening as you go along,’ says Brigid. ‘I don’t want to think about it.’

She doesn’t want to see the knife. Her skin, torn apart. She doesn’t want to see them ripping through her flesh.

But Patrick, standing with a clear view of the naked body of his wife, sees it all. He sees the doctor holding the blade. With a practised movement of his hands, he presses it to the skin. The great belly is to be punctured, thinks Patrick. The knife sinks in, and blood begins to flow.

*

Michael has the money ready before the cab stops; as soon as he is out he starts to run. He thumps his feet upon the paving slabs, hears bells tolling in the distance. He feels free, now, as if he has been released from diffidence. He has not run this fast for years. At the station he rushes to buy a ticket, slaps money into the hand of a person he doesn’t see. Everything is blurred around him, until he focuses on the train he must catch — it is not far from him, though the clock says it is about to leave. So he runs again, stalled by metal barriers, scuffling from side to side, and then he hurries up the steps to the door and turns the handle.

*

The door does not open. He twists the handle again, hammers on the glass. ‘Let me in,’ he says. ‘Please can you open the door?’

He hammers still — he does not understand why the door will not open. Then he hears a whistle, and someone is saying, ‘The train is about to leave, step down sir.’ He turns towards the voice, says, ‘Can you not open it?’ Hammering still on the glass. ‘Please. You must open the door …’

There is a pause, then Michael hears a sigh of frustration, and the guard hurriedly twists a key in the lock, pushes him onto the train.

‘It’s your lucky day, sir,’ he grunts, and slams the door behind him.

*

A few people look up as Michael walks through the carriage. Perhaps they heard the commotion at the door. They look him up and down briefly, then turn back to their phones and papers. Staring out of the window at the receding girders of the station, Michael tries to catch his breath. He feels glad, simply because he made the train. Though he is breathing heavily, though his heart is pounding in his breast, he smiles to himself. He looks down at the moulded plastic of his tray table, thinks that he should get a coffee, something to eat. He has a couple of hours to kill, and then he will see her. James will be surprised that he has come so soon. His mother will be in her room, frail and wild-eyed, unkempt, half-mad with age.

*

He wonders what happened on the radio, how they explained his absence. It was fairly certain his book was going to dive anyway. It was falling like a wounded bird; the descent was making him ill. He thinks of how he spent his launch hiding in that conservatory, because the swiftness of the descent was giving him vertigo. Perhaps it was nothing more than that: a sort of dizziness, caused by the gulf between his dreams and the reality around him. His expectations, popping like balloons as he descended. Still they had been kind, they’d tried to cushion his crash landing. Sally especially — he must do something to make it up to Sally. He’s feeling sick and slightly faint, but it must be the effects of that spiralling sense of vertigo. He has fled from the scene of his embarrassment, he’s getting further away with each minute.

*

His imagination has failed him, and he can think of nothing he must say to his mother. No fine words, nothing to soften the anticlimax of his arrival. He will be obliged to repeat back to her what she said to him. Good luck. She needs it more than he does. ‘Good luck,’ he says, under his breath, so no one hears.

*

Torrents of blood, thinks Patrick. So much blood. It seems impossible that anyone could bleed this much, and not be dead.

‘Is it OK?’ says Brigid, so he swallows and says, ‘Yes, all going fine.’

The doctor is grappling inside his wife. His hands are delving deep inside her. As if he is searching for something. And the blood is thick and red on his hands, viscous and strange. Extraordinary, thinks Patrick. He thinks he might faint, but then he is mesmerised by the sight of the doctor’s grappling, and now he sees a foot. There is a tiny purple foot, in the doctor’s hand. Then a leg follows. The baby is appearing, part by part. It looks crazy, to Patrick, as if Brigid has been filmed engulfing her young, and now the tape is being played backwards. It is grotesque, and yet Patrick cannot avert his gaze. His child is almost here, though it looks dead, as the doctor drags it roughly from Brigid’s body. It must be dead, thinks Patrick with a sudden sense of panic, it is so listless in the doctor’s hands. And he wants to cry out that the baby has died, the blood has drowned the baby, but Brigid says, ‘Is it OK?’ again and the doctor says, ‘Yes the baby is almost out.’

*

Headless, like a mutilated doll, the baby is half inside and half outside, the cold air on its body, and Patrick feels a sense of pity for this tiny thing, ripped from the womb, the only place it has known. The doctor is delving for the head, and with a last tug, the baby is whole.

Purple and motionless in the doctor’s hands.

*

‘It’s out,’ says Patrick.

The nurse has taken it away, and he hears the first screams, shrill in the sterile room. ‘Is it OK?’ he says to Dr Gupta. The doctor nods. ‘All is fine. You’ll have her back in a minute.’

‘It’s a girl?’ says Brigid.

‘Yes, a fine girl,’ says the doctor.

*

And suddenly the baby is pushed into Patrick’s arms, and he is stunned by how vital she seems, though she looked so fragile before. Now she is like a wild slippery monster, screaming with her mouth wide open and her eyes closed.

‘Darling,’ says Brigid, looking up at the baby. ‘My beautiful darling.’

Patrick cradles the child, says, ‘There there, sweetie. There there, it’s all OK. Everything will be fine.’ He has the child in his arms and now he sees his wife craning her neck upwards. He lowers the baby towards her. ‘Can you see?’ he says to her.

‘Oh, yes, she’s wonderful. You’re so wonderful, aren’t you? Don’t cry darling, Mummy and Daddy are here,’ says Brigid. And she holds her daughter’s hand. The tiny wet hand, covered in blood and vernix. The baby is being wrapped in a towel, but Brigid holds her hand and won’t release it.

Worth it and over, what it cost, thinks Brigid. Worth everything. The tugging sensation is over, there is no pain and she hardly remembers the night. She thinks of Calumn and how it was when he was born. She remembers it so vividly now; scenes she had forgotten come pouring into her mind. Her son, she thinks, who she loves beyond measure. And now this girl, this beautiful little girl — Brigid is crying as she holds her daughter’s hand, and Patrick sees her crying and thinks, my extraordinary wife, and the children she has created. He is overwhelmed with joy, and relief, that it is all over, that their children are in the world. Safe and with them in the world.

The baby’s cries are fading, as Patrick strokes her and kisses her and says, ‘There there, everything is OK. I love you and everything is OK.’

*

‘I will always love you,’ Brigid whispers to her daughter. ‘I will always love you, for ever and ever.’