Farewell To The East End

The doctor was ever so kind with them, but explained that a PM was unavoidable under the circumstances.’
    We continued plodding along, circling around a group of little girls playing hop-scotch.
    ‘Two policemen arrived. They took notes and spoke with the doctor. Then they questioned me. It was awful. They weren’t nasty or bullying or anything like that … it was just being questioned about a death, and seeing them write down everything I said that was so awful. I must have looked as white as a sheet, because the doctor was very kind and assured me that I was in no way at fault. I had been asked to tell them everything I knew, you see. They asked to see my records, and took my notes away with them. I think I had filled in everything correctly. I don’t know. It’s like a bad dream.’
    She looked ill.
    ‘You need a good hot cup of tea,’ I said, ‘We’re nearly at the convent – good thing too. You look just about finished.’
    ‘It’s the shock, I suppose.’
    ‘I’ll say it is!’
    ‘I’m cold, too.’
    ‘Not surprising. You had no sleep last night?’
    ‘A couple of hours, then I had to go out.’
    By now we had reached Nonnatus House. I took both the bikes to put them away. Cynthia said she had to report to Sister Julienne as soon as she got in.

    In the bicycle shed Sister Bernadette was putting her bike away.
    ‘Ah, Nurse Lee. Just the person I wanted to speak to. Did I see you cycling with no hands down the East India Dock Road?’
    Sister Bernadette was a midwife whom I both respected and admired, but she could be very sharp.
    ‘Me? Oh, er, well perhaps …’
    ‘I am sure it was you. I can’t think of any other midwife who would cycle in that nonchalant fashion down the main road. And were you whistling by any chance?’
    ‘Whistling? Well, I’m not sure. I can’t quite remember, but I suppose I might have been.’
    ‘You certainly were. Now look here, Nurse Lee, you are not one of the local lads. You are a professional woman. They can do that sort of thing, but you can’t. It’s too casual, too lackadaisical. It gives the wrong impression. It simply won’t do.’
    ‘I’m sorry, Sister.’
    ‘Don’t do it again, Nurse.’
    ‘No, Sister. I won’t, Sister.’
    But I did, and I’m sure she knew that I did!

    Cynthia did not come in for lunch. She had been sent to bed with a couple of aspirins and some hot chocolate. Sister Julienne said grace and when we were seated told everyone what had happened.
    ‘Humph,’ grunted Sister Evangelina, ‘alive and healthy at six o’clock. Dead at ten. Sounds like smothering to me.’
    ‘Oh no, Sister. I am sure you are wrong. They are a nice family. They wanted the baby. They wouldn’t do a thing like that.’ Sister Julienne was shocked.
    ‘Can’t be sure. No one can. These secrets are well kept. There have been more unwanted babies smothered than I’ve had hot dinners. Desperation drives people to do it.’
    ‘But these people are not desperate,’ Sister Julienne replied. ‘I agree with you that desperation might lead a starving family to smother a newborn baby, but those days are past.’
    Chummy, Trixie and I were wide-eyed with interest. We had heard nothing like this before, coming as we did from middle-class backgrounds. But Sister Evangelina had been born into the slums of Reading in the 1890s and had experienced more poverty and deprivation than we could ever dream of.
    ‘But wouldn’t they be caught?’ asked Chummy.
    ‘Probably not.’ Sister Evangelina glared at Chummy, and then at Trixie and me. ‘You young girls! Ignorant! Don’t know anything of the past! So many babies were born, and so many died, that the authorities would never have noticed a few smothered here or there – especially if a relative had assisted at the birth, and no one else. The family could just say the baby was still-born.’
    ‘But why?’ asked Trixie.
    ‘I’ve told you: desperation. Poverty, starvation, homelessness, that’s what drove people to do it. Read your history books!’
    Sister Evangelina was a formidable lady. Her temper was irascible, and the fuse short. We dared not press her.
    Aristocratic Sister Monica Joan, who was in her nineties and whose mind was not entirely reliable, had eaten very little. She picked at the mashed potato and onion gravy which Mrs B had lovingly prepared for her, pushed her plate aside and sat fingering her spoon, turning it this way and that as she held it between thumb and forefinger, with