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

bowl for you to scrape, if you wants to.”
     
    Sister Monica Joan pounced on the bowl as though she had not eaten for a fortnight, scraping with the big wooden spoon, and licking both sides with murmurs of delight.
     
    Mrs B. went over to the sink and took a wet cloth. “Nah ven, Sister, you got it all over your habit, an’ a bit on your veil, an’ all. Wipe your fingers, there’s a good girl. You can’t go to Tierce like that, can you? And the bell will go any minute.”
     
    The bell sounded. Sister Monica Joan looked round quickly, and winked.
     
    “I must go. You can wash the bowl now. Oh the delight in Heaven as the spheres move, and the tiny grains of sand touch the stars. The Phoenix rises from the living flame, and Ceres cries … don’t forget to keep the crispy ones for me.”
     
    She tripped out of the kitchen as Mrs B. fondly opened the door for her.
     
    “She’s a caution, she is. You wouldn’t fink she’d been in the Docks all through two world wars, and the Depression, would you? She’s delivered thousands of our children. In the Blitz she wouldn’t leave. She delivered babies in air-raid shelters and church crypts, an’ once in what was left of a bombed house. Bless ’er. If she wants the crispy ones, she can ’ave ’em.”
     
    I had heard stories like that so often, from so many people - her years of selfless work, her dedication, her commitment. Sister Monica Joan was known and loved throughout Poplar. I had heard that she was the daughter of a very aristocratic English family who were scandalised when she announced in the 1890s that she was going to be a nurse. Wasn’t her sister a Countess, and her mother a Lady in her own right? How could she disgrace them so? Ten years later, when she qualified as one of the first midwives in the country, they remained silent in their displeasure. But they cut her off altogether when she joined a religious order and went to work in the East End of London.
     
    Lunch was the one occasion during the day when we all met together. Most monastic orders take their meals in silence, but talking was permitted at Nonnatus House. We stood until Sister Julienne came in and said grace, after which we all sat. Mrs B. would bring in the trolley and usually Sister Julienne would serve, with one other person carrying the plates around. Conversation that day was general: Sister Bernadette’s mother’s health; the two guests due to arrive at teatime.
     
    Sister Monica Joan was peevish. She couldn’t eat a chop, due to her teeth, and she didn’t like the mince. Cabbage she could never abide. She would wait for the pudding.
     
    “Do have a little mashed potato, dear, with some onion gravy. You know how you like Mrs B.’s onion gravy. You need the protein, you know.”
     
    Sister Monica Joan sighed, as though all the injustice of the world had been heaped upon her,
     
    “‘Stop and consider! Life is but a day - A fragile dew-drop on its perilous way.’”
     
    “Yes dear, I know, but a little mashed potato wouldn’t go amiss.” Sister Evangelina paused, fork in hand, and snorted, “What’s that about a dew drop?”
     
    Sister Monica Joan lost her peevishness, and said, sharply, “Keats, my dear, John Keats. Our greatest poet, though perhaps you don’t know. Uh-oh, I shouldn’t have said anything about dew-drops. It was a slip of the tongue.”
     
    She took out a fine lawn handkerchief, and held it delicately to her nose. Sister Evangelina was beginning to turn red around the neck.
     
    “Your tongue slips a great deal too often, if you ask me, dear.”
     
    “No one was asking you, dear,” Sister Monica Joan addressed the wall, very, very quietly.
     
    Sister Julienne intervened. “I’ve put a few fresh carrots on your plate also. I know you like carrots. Did you know that the Rector has seventy-two young people from the youth club in his confirmation class this year? Just imagine! That, on top of all their other work, will keep the curates busy.”
     
    Everyone murmured interest and approval of the size of the confirmation class, and I watched Sister Monica Joan push the carrots around her plate with her forefinger. Such compelling hands, all bones and veins covered with transparent skin. Her nails were usually long, because she couldn’t be bothered to cut them, and resisted anyone else doing so. The forefingers on both hands were astonishing. She could bend the first joint, keeping the rest of the finger quite straight. I sat