Call the Midwife: A True Story of the East End in the 1950S

never seen or heard of again.”
     
    Mike speculated that being sent off to Canada was probably the best thing that could have happened to him. Sister Monica Joan looked very thoughtful before replying, “I would like to think that. But it is just as likely that poor Barney died of hunger or disease in the Canadian winter.”
     
    It was a sobering thought. I asked for more stories. She smiled at me indulgently.
     
    “I am not here for your entertainment, my dear. I am here by the grace of God. Four score years and ten, it has been. A score too long … too long.”
     
    She fell silent for a minute, and no one dared speak. She had seen so much, done so much in life - fighting for independence in her youth; entering a religious order in middle age, wartime nursing and midwifery in the London Docks when she was nearly eighty years old. Who could match such experience?
     
    With a slightly amused, slightly quizzical expression in her fine eyes, she looked around at us, so young, so frivolous, so superficial. Her elbow was resting on the table, her slender fingers supporting her chin. We were spellbound by her presence.
     
    “You are all so young,” she mused reflectively. “Youth is the first fair flower of spring.”
     
    Lifting her head, she spread out her eloquent hands towards us. Her face was radiant, her eyes shining, her voice joyful and triumphant.
     
    “Therefore … ‘Sing, my darlings, sing, Before your petals fade, To feed the flowers of another spring.’”
     

SMOG
     
     
     
    Conchita Warren was expecting her twenty-fifth baby. I had seen quite a lot of the family during the past year because Liz Warren was the dressmaker of my dreams. She was the oldest daughter, twenty-two years old, and had been making clothes since she first had a doll. It was all she had ever wanted to do, she told me. On leaving school at fourteen, she went straight into an apprenticeship with a firm of high-class dressmakers, with whom she still worked. She did not usually take private clients at home because she said the mess was such that she couldn’t ask ladies to come to the house for fittings. However, as I was accustomed to the house, it did not bother either of us. She was an expert in her trade, and enjoyed making garments for me over many years.
     
    I had always loved clothes, and took a good deal of time and trouble over them. My clothes were specially made for me, and I turned my nose up at ready-to-wear stuff. Today this would be unusual and terribly expensive, but it was not the case in the 1950s. In fact it was cheaper. Really good quality clothes could be made for a fraction of what they cost in the best shops. Beautiful materials could be found in the street markets, going for a song. I usually designed my own things, or adapted styles. When I lived in Paris, I would attend the catwalk shows of the great French couturiers - Dior, Chanel, Schiaparelli. The opening of the season was, of course, reserved for the press and the very rich, but after about two or three weeks, when the excitement had settled down, the fashion shows continued, perhaps twice weekly, and anyone could attend. I loved them, and made careful notes and sketches of what I knew would suit me, in order to have them made for me later.
     
    The only trouble was finding a dressmaker skilled enough to make her own paper patterns. Liz was perfection. She not only made up her own patterns, but she had a real stylish flair, and often suggested or adapted things to suit the cloth or the cut. We were about the same age, and it was a happy collaboration.
     
    During one of these visits Liz told me, with a wry smile, that her mother was expecting again. Together we speculated on how many more Conchita was likely to have. Her precise age was not known, but she was probably about forty-two, so she could have another six to eight babies. Going on past form, we put our money on a total of thirty babies.
     
    Conchita booked again with the Sisters for another home confinement, and requested antenatal visits at home. For continuity’s sake, I was asked to take the case. She was in perfect condition again. She looked radiant, and did not really look pregnant until about twenty-four weeks, although once again her dates were uncertain. The youngest little girl was one year old. Len was all excitement and anticipation, as though this were only his second or third baby.
     
    It was winter, and very cold and icy. Heavy snow clouds hung over the city,