‘One moment, please,’ she said, as the pain finally let up and she turned to her scuffed canvas bag containing all her possessions in the world: a woollen scarf her mother had knitted her; a picture of her little boy, Alfie; a thin blanket she had taken from her bed at the merchant’s house where she worked as a servant; and a small box containing an emerald engagement ring that Eli Hilton had given her the night before he left for war, when she had no idea she was already carrying Alfie.

  And right at the bottom, her empty purse and the urgent telegram from her mother that the housekeeper had handed to her with a self-satisfied smirk on her face telling her to get home immediately to Alfie. She had then glanced, with horror, at the date, which told her that the housekeeper had taken a week to give her the telegram. Had Alfie been in hiding all that time? She still couldn’t bear to think about it as the train rattled at a painfully slow speed along the tracks, every second she took to get to him feeling like an hour.

  She had already been worried sick about Alfie before receiving the telegram, ever since she had seen the newspaper headlines staring up at her from the doorstep of the Victorian town house where she worked. A black and white photograph of her beloved mother, beneath the headline on the front page: Midwife facing life imprisonment for manslaughter.

  She had immediately asked her employer for a day’s leave, knowing that without her mother there, and with Eli away fighting on the front line, Alfie’s welfare would fall to his father’s family, who would relish the opportunity to have him sent away.

  But her request for leave and an advance on her wages had been refused by Mrs Blackwood, the housekeeper, and she had gone to bed that night terrified of what would become of her little boy. But without any money, or any means to get home, she had no choice but to wait another week for her wages. It had been a torturous seven days, thinking of Alfie being sent away somewhere she had no hope of finding – but nothing could have prepared her for the shock of realising that he had spent those seven days terrified, cold and alone in the priest-hole at The Vicarage.

  She continued searching for a train ticket that she knew wasn’t there, her hands shaking. The packed train carriage was stuffy and hot, and she felt dizzy and sick as she turned back to the conductor, who had flushed red with irritation as a small child sitting opposite tugged at his jacket.

  ‘I’m sorry, I can’t seem to find it,’ she said. ‘I definitely had it. I must have dropped it when I fell asleep.’ She looked at the floor beneath her feet.

  ‘It’s against the law to board a train without a ticket. Please gather your things and we will escort you from the train at the next stop,’ the conductor said matter-of-factly.

  Another stabbing pain suddenly hit her, sharper than the last, as tears stung Bella’s eyes. She had lain awake all night thinking of nothing but Alfie, her stomach starting to swell with the pregnancy that, judging from her last monthly bleed, was nearly three months along.

  She had woken at dawn, taken some bread from the larder while Cook’s back was turned then set out on the hour’s walk to the station. It was as she had been walking along the busy road that the pains had begun. Pains that she tried to ignore as she managed to sneak into a carriage, pains that slowly grew as the train crept along. She knew she was miscarrying the foetus inside her. All she could do was plough on and hope she made it to The Vicarage before she started bleeding. She tried to block out Alfie’s terror, the image of her beautiful boy alone in the dark, and focus on what she needed to do to get back home to him.

  ‘Please don’t throw me off the train, sir, please,’ she begged. ‘My mother’s house is in Kingston; please let me stay on until then. I’ll do anything.’ She felt tears sting her eyes, mortified that she was having to plead like this.

  ‘I don’t want a scene, miss. Just pick yourself up before I have a mind to call the police and have them waiting for you on the platform.’

  The woman opposite with her child on her knee frowned in concern as Bella gritted her teeth through another wave of pain then forced herself to stand and make her way to the doors, where two soldiers were sitting on the floor playing cards and smoking. ‘Where are we?’ she asked the men.

  ‘Just coming into Falmer,’ said a woman with two small children waiting to get off.

  ‘How long do you think it would take to walk from Falmer to Kingston?’ Bella asked nervously.

  ‘To walk?’ The woman frowned. It’s a good two miles over the Downs, so it’ll take you two hours I’d say.’

  Bella gasped as another wave of pain took her breath away.

  The woman looked at Bella, then at the child clinging to her leg. She was poorly dressed, her clothes slightly tattered, her boots worn. Slowly she reached into her coat and pulled out a shilling.

  ‘Here,’ she said. ‘For the bus. I know you, you’re Tessa James’s girl, aren’t you, from The Vicarage?’

  Bella nodded. ‘I can’t take your money.’

  ‘She saved my little boy’s life,’ said the woman quietly. ‘It’s dreadful what’s happened to her; she would never have hurt that woman, Tessa’s an angel.’ The train was pulling into the station. ‘You need the number sixteen bus, right by the entrance. Good luck.’

  ‘Go on, git!’ shouted the conductor as though Bella were a stray dog. As the train juddered to a halt, she stepped down on shaking legs onto the freezing, dark platform. ‘And don’t let me see you again, or I’ll call the coppers on you,’ he yelled from the window before slamming the door behind her.

  As the number sixteen bus made its way along the country lanes towards Kingston, Bella managed to doze again slightly as the pain subsided for a while. Her mind wandered to the events of the past year, since she’d last seen her mother and Alfie. Money had been impossibly tight at home, the women Tessa helped during childbirth were invariably poor and she rarely got paid. In desperation Bella had answered an advert for a scullery maid in Portsmouth so she could help support them both while her mother cared for Alfie. It was just until Eli came home from the war, she’d told herself, then they could marry and be a family.

  She had cried for the entire train journey to Portsmouth, but had managed to pick herself up and work hard, settling into her role and even letting herself believe the rumours circulating in the past week that the war might soon be over. Eli would be home and they could finally be a family. Then the morning came when she’d seen the newspaper article describing her mother’s arrest, laying on the doorstep she’d been sent to sweep. She’d picked it up with shaking hands and read in disbelief.

  A Lewes-based midwife has been charged with manslaughter tonight after a birth she was attending ended in the tragic death of mother and baby.

  Evelyn Hilton, forty-two, of Kingston-near-Lewes, was giving birth to her third baby, a much-longed-for girl, when tragedy struck. Midwife Tessa James missed the warning signs of a breech birth until it was too late. As time ran out for mother and child, she failed to call Mrs Hilton’s physician, Doctor Jenkins, and instead attempted to cut the baby out herself, resulting in fatal blood loss and the death of the infant.

  Chief Constable Payne of Lewes Police said tonight, ‘We have arrested a forty-six-year-old woman in connection with the death of Evelyn Hilton. The hearing will take place tomorrow afternoon at Lewes Crown Court. Our thoughts and deepest sympathies go out to Evelyn Hilton’s husband and young son, Richard, who is being comforted by relatives this evening.’

  The Sussex Argus tracked down Doctor Jenkins to his practice in Lewes. ‘I cannot comment on Tessa James’s case, but I will say that the issues it shines a light on are immensely troubling, and sadly nothing new. It is my view that midwives need to be regulated much more stringently. The 1902 Midwives Act specifies, very clearly, that midwives are limited to attending normal births. They are required to transfer care of a labouring woman to a physician in complicated cases, and are restricted from using instruments such as forceps, which they are not medically trained to use. What has happened to Mrs Evelyn Hilton is beyond tragic, but perhaps the good, if any, that can come of this is that more stringent measures are put in place going forward.’

  When the housekeeper had handed her the telegram, Bella had immediately made up her mind; she had no choice but to go over Mrs Blackwood’s head and go straight to the master. She walked through the house and knocked on the master’s door, checking her appearance in the mirror before she entered. Her face was drawn from crying, with dark circles under her blue eyes. Her long black hair, which was scraped back into a bun, highlighted her pale skin and, as she looked at herself in the mirror, she pictured Alfie’s piercing blue eyes staring back at her in the dark of the priest-hole, and tried to draw strength from them.

  ‘Ah, Bella,’ Mr Collins said as she entered. He walked over to her, unsteady on his feet, his breath smelling of whisky as he strayed too close, and locked the door behind her. ‘What can I do for you? I hope Mrs Blackwood is not expecting me to deal with any staff issues, I’m not really in the mood.’

  She had smiled politely, a feeling of intense nausea creeping in as his smile lingered a bit too long. There was a piece of spinach stuck in his teeth and despite his yellow grin repulsing her, she found it impossible to look away.

  ‘I’m sorry to bother you, sir, but my son, you see, he lives at home, in Kingston, with my mother. She has been arrested, so I need to go home for a short time to make alternative arrangements for him.’

  She hung her head, knowing what would come next as a tear escaped and splashed onto her shoe. She looked down at her curved stomach. Did he know what he had already done to her? Did he know she was already carrying his child? When it became obvious, would he kick her out onto the street like others before her?

  ‘I see. Well, are you expecting us to hold your position here open for you? Because that is quite a lot to ask. I suppose there may be some kind of arrangement we can come to . . .’

  Bella’s body flushed with a familiar panic as he tugged at his zip, then grabbed her hand and pressed it down inside his underpants, his fish breath making her heave. She closed her eyes, pleading with him to stop, which only seemed to excite him more, and he moaned loudly in her ear. She cried silently, trying to pull away, but he slapped her, pressing her hard into the corner of the desk as she watched the fire burn until he let out a deep satisfied groan. Before long he collapsed in a heap in his armchair, pouring himself another whisky and gazing silently at her as he slurped at it.

  ‘Can I leave in the morning, sir?’ she asked as she fought back the nausea and straightened her uniform.

  He paused for a long time before replying. ‘You can have two days, but we will need you back by midnight on Wednesday, or don’t bother coming back at all.’ He had glared at her, as if she were a bad taste in his mouth. ‘Aren’t you going to thank me? There aren’t many employers as lenient as I.’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Collins,’ she had said obediently, before walking back along the cold corridor and climbing the stairs to her bedroom, where she collapsed onto her bed, muffling her tears with her pillow. It was there she had felt the first cramp and, running her fingers down her leg, discovered a small trail of blood.

  ‘Kingston, final stop, Kingston,’ the bus driver said, turning off the engine and looking down the bus to where Bella was sitting. She stood up and glanced out of the window. Down the lane, not twenty yards away, was the gate to the path that led to her beloved Vicarage. She thanked the driver, then stepped onto the snow-covered lane and walked on shaking legs to the gate. Lifting the latch, she opened it and shuffled along the snow-dappled path to the front door of the dim, cold cottage.

  Bella slid her key into the lock and turned it, the memory so vivid of her mother standing in the doorway, her arms filled with wild flowers, that she felt like she was passing her as she crossed the threshold. Slowly she stepped in before closing the door behind her.

  ‘Alfie!’ she called out, breathlessly, her heart hammering with fear.

  There was no reply, and in that moment, another wave of pain took her breath away and she felt her heart break as no reply came. She had failed her little boy; she had taken too long and he had given up hope that she was coming. He had come out of his hiding place and been taken away by Wilfred Hilton, and now she would never be able to find him.

  ‘Alfie!’ she called again, tears streaming down her face now. The deafening silence in their family home, usually buzzing with happiness and warmth, was overwhelming her with sadness as she looked around the room for any signs of life.

  As the pains came relentlessly again, she wrapped herself in a blanket that her mother had left by the fire and curled herself into a ball, digging her fingernails into her arm and gritting her teeth. As she lay on the cold stone floor, the pains got so bad that she couldn’t stand. She was barely three months gone, yet the contractions felt almost as bad as when Alfie was born; in this very room, with her mother holding her hand, the fire burning, flowers on the window-sills and cushions under her head. Bella lay alone, crying, as the pains intensified, so she could barely stand it, until she had felt a gush of blood pour out of her onto the blanket between her legs.

  She lay still for a moment, relieved that the worst was finally over, her panicked breathing beginning to subside.

  After what felt like hours of laying on the floor in a pool of blood, until she could no longer feel her body from the cold, she forced herself up. Weak and dizzy from her ordeal, she slowly piled up the bloodied blankets in the bucket by the back door.

  ‘Mama?’ The voice was faint, but it was definitely Alfie. Bella spun round, and looked up at the wooden steps in front of her. Feeling as if she might faint at any moment, she forced herself to climb the stairs until she reached the landing, where she bent down and pulled at the lid. It was locked.

  Bella held her breath and bit down hard on her lip to stop herself from fainting. Her little boy was still in there, in what state she couldn’t imagine. She began tapping on the roof of the priest-hole with her closed fist. ‘Alfie, Alfie darling, are you in there?’ she said, biting down on her lip, trying not to let panic engulf her.

  ‘Alfie darling, it’s Mama, please open the door, you’re scaring me. I’m alone, there’s no one else here. Please, if you can, open the door.’

  Bella turned away, looking for something to prise it open with, her eyes falling on the fire iron, but as she pushed her broken body up to walk back down the stairs and retrieve it, there was a loud click through the silent Vicarage. Slowly, the lid of the priest-hole began to creak open.

  Bella turned back, and from the pitch-black room, a little pair of bright, smiling blue eyes began to emerge.

  Chapter Five

  Vanessa

  New Year’s Eve 1969

  Vanessa Hilton stood at her bedroom window in Yew Tree Manor watching her husband weaving lights into the bay trees lining the driveway, their glow flickering on and off in the dark as his shouts of frustration at his son, who was trying to help him, echoed through the grounds.

  She glanced down at her watch. One hour until the guests arrived, yet she already felt exhausted to the core of her being. Her head had been spinning for weeks with every detail of this New Year’s Eve party, which felt to her like an event they had been building up to for a decade. Yet even with nothing left to chance, the day thus far had been a disaster, from the moment they had dragged themselves from their broken sleep until now.

  A snowstorm pounding at the house all night had kept the dogs awake and barking until the early hours, and when morning finally came, they had woken to find themselves without any power. Added to which, the lane outside the house was completely blocked with snow, making their driveway almost impassable until Richard had asked Peter, the gardener, to organise the delivery of a ton of bark to absorb the sludge. After that, he had turned his attention to the lights, which had been placed in the trees the night before and had now blown down or smashed. Several times that day Vanessa had been tempted to cancel. It seemed that Mother Nature was doing everything she could to tell her to stop this event that had been their entire focus and obsession for months.

  Bang.

  The gunfire had been consistent throughout the day, and each shot had made her bones shake. Alfie and Bobby had begun slaughtering their herd at lunchtime, some of them diagnosed with TB, the others needing to be destroyed as a precaution. It couldn’t have been worse timing, in the week that the sale of the land surrounding The Vicarage was going through for development and Richard had served them their eviction notice from their home.

  Bang bang.

  Vanessa flinched as a faint knock landed on the bedroom door. ‘Mrs Hilton?’ She turned to see a waitress in a white pinafore. ‘I’m sorry to bother you, but we were wondering when the champagne is due to be delivered.’

  ‘What do you mean? It was delivered hours ago. I saw the driver myself. It’s meant to be on ice in the cellar.’ Vanessa walked across the bedroom towards the girl, her nervous eyes wide.

  ‘I’m sorry, madam, but when we went down to start bringing it up, it wasn’t there. We’ve been looking for Mr Hilton to ask him.’

  Vanessa glanced at the floor-length red gown hanging from her wardrobe and tied her dressing gown tighter around her waist. ‘Well, we’re all going to be drinking warm champagne if it’s still sitting in boxes somewhere. Why didn’t anyone notify me about this before now?’

  The waitress scuttled after her as she made her way towards the top of the stairs, where her children’s nanny was walking towards her carrying Alice’s red shoes.