frisson of an unidentifiable emotion caught Laura unexpectedly. Jealousy, perhaps? No. It was more like a feeling of connection to that baby. A longing to touch it. To pick it up. When the little fist was suddenly flung free of the sucking mouth and a tiny face crumpled and reddened she had no hesitation in reaching into the box.
Nobody else was going to do it, she told herself. The men were backing off in alarm at the deterioration in the baby’s mood. At her touch, the screwed-up face relaxed and the tiny fist unfurled to encompass her finger. Laura smiled into a carbon copy of Jason Halliday’s eyes.
‘Hello, there,’ she whispered.
Only a few short minutes had passed since Mrs McKendry had dropped this bombshell in their midst but it was very unusual that the older woman had not yet said more than she had. Nobody was surprised to hear her begin to issue some firm instructions.
‘Sit down at this table—every last one of you. I don’t care if half of Wellington burns to the ground. You’re no’ going anywhere till we get to the bottom of this.’
Amazingly, the whole group of burly, dedicated firefighters complied. They were all out of their depth right now and it clearly came as a relief for their self-appointed surrogate mother to take charge.
‘We should call the police,’ Bruce suggested mildly. ‘It’s a criminal offence to leave a baby unattended.’
The look he received questioned his level of intelligence rather eloquently. ‘Whoever left this bairn had reason to think it would be attended to.’
A dainty foot tapped on linoleum in the silence that followed.
‘And there can be only one explanation for that. One of you is this baby’s father.’
‘You’re lucky.’ Jason’s comment was directed at Laura, who, along with Mrs McKendry, was the only person now standing. ‘It can’t be yours. I think we would have noticed.’
The chuckle of appreciation at the attempt to lift the atmosphere was short-lived and it hadn’t even raised a smile as far as Laura was concerned. Carrying a full-term baby may well have made her large enough for Jason to notice. In fact, it was probably the only way he’d really notice her as a woman.
As though her resentment was contagious, the baby emitted a fractious cry and Laura did what she’d been wanting to do ever since she’d first seen what was in the box. She scooped the baby up and cradled it in her arms.
It was crying in earnest now and there was no doubt it was well overdue for a nappy change but Laura didn’t mind. The slight weight of the infant in her arms triggered an instinctive and remarkably fierce desire to protect and comfort it. She rocked her noisy, smelly bundle and directed soothing words towards its ear. The words she spoke were unimportant. So was what was being said around her for the next few moments.
The first Red Watch arrivals to take over the day shift started to form a secondary tier of astonished spectators. As far as these men were concerned they were not involved. The baby had been left during the night, therefore it had to be someone on Green Watch who was implicated as the father. Some even found the situation highly amusing.
‘No wonder someone left it on the doorstep. Noisy little bugger, isn’t it?’
‘Don’t get too close. It doesn’t smell great either.’
‘Let’s put it back where Mrs Mack found it.’ The speaker suddenly thought of an urgent job that needed attending to as he felt the heat of Jean McKendry’s glare.
‘I still think we should call the police,’ Bruce said heavily. ‘Or Social Welfare. We can’t sit here all day, Mrs M. We’ve had a busy night shift and what we need is some sleep.’
‘What she needs is feeding,’ Laura informed them. How she knew it was a girl was not questioned.
‘Bacon and eggs?’ Jason suggested hopefully. They all looked at Mrs McKendry but any prospect of a cooked breakfast evaporated instantly on reading her face.
‘I’ll make some toast,’ someone on Red Watch offered. ‘Have you guys cleaned the truck?’
‘We’re not allowed to move,’ Stick responded gloomily. ‘Not until one of us owns up to fathering this kid.’
‘Don’t worry.’ Red Watch members were backing away now. ‘We’ll do it.’
The new crew for the ambulance day shift was equally co-operative. Helpful, even.
‘We could go out and find some formula or something at the supermarket.’
The pager messages signalling a priority-one callout to a chest pain put an end to that scheme. Within another few minutes the hooter sounded to alert the fire crew.
‘Alarm sounding at a warehouse on the corner of George and Matton streets,’ the loudspeaker announced. ‘Smoke seen to be coming from the rear of the building.’
Green Watch members could see the departing vehicles through the dining-room’s window. They listened to the fading sirens with almost defeated expressions.
‘This isn’t getting us anywhere,’ Bruce declared finally. ‘Look, Mrs M. If one of us had any idea that we were related to this baby we would have said so by now.’
Raised eyebrows and pursed lips suggested that this was not necessarily an accurate assumption.
‘Half of us are married. We’ve got families of our own.’
‘Precisely. A good reason not to confess, wouldn’t you say?’
Laura was jiggling an increasingly unhappy infant now. No one knew how long this baby had been outside in the box. It might have been hours since its last feed. Her reluctance to cast the first stone was wearing thinner by the minute. If this carried on any longer she was going to open her mouth and point out the obvious. Why hadn’t anyone else noticed yet? She shifted the baby’s weight slightly and became aware that the patch of blanket under her arm was distinctly damp.
‘Stick, could you get that other blanket out of the box?’ Laura asked. ‘She’s leaking a bit and getting cold won’t make her any happier.’
‘Hope you’ve got gloves on.’ Jason blinked at the look he received from Laura. ‘Hey! What have I done?’
He found out soon enough. As Stick pulled the folded fleece from the box his eyes widened.
‘There’s stuff in here,’ he exclaimed. ‘A bottle and a tin of baby food. There’s nappies and—What the hell is this?’
The piece of paper said it all. Officially stamped by the authority vested in the registrar of births, deaths and marriages, it gave all the information Mrs McKendry had been waiting for. She peered at the certificate and then transferred a steely gaze to one of the men staring anxiously back.
‘Jason Halliday. What have you got to say for yourself now?’
‘Huh?’
The piece of paper was passed along the table and everyone had scanned it by the time Bruce handed it to Jason.
‘Here you go…Dad.’
Jason’s colour had faded to give his bewilderment a decidedly pale background. He stared at the birth certificate, with his name handwritten on the empty line for ‘Father’s Name’, for a seemingly interminable length of time. It became too long for his audience.
‘Megan’s a nice name,’ Cliff said hesitantly.
‘It’s her one-month birthday today,’ Bruce added.
‘She was born in England,’ Stick said kindly. ‘You can’t really be blamed for having missed the big event, Jase.’
Laura said nothing. She reached into the box and extracted a disposable nappy, some wipes and a clean stretchsuit. She could still see Jason when she moved towards one of the couches to find room to put the baby down. She