Late in pregnancy, Beth reflects on the life she has built at Frank’s farmhouse. When she first arrived, the house and its three male inhabitants were neglected, and Beth found unexpected satisfaction in transforming both the home and the family around her. Beth also looks back on giving up Oxford because she could not bear to stay in the same town as Gabriel and Louisa, and on choosing Frank, whose kindness and steadiness restored her confidence after Gabriel.

Beth has carefully prepared a birth plan: she will call her mother when labor begins, wait at home through the early stages, and then go to hospital with Frank. Instead, her waters break suddenly in the afternoon during a violent storm, and the first contractions are immediately intense and close together. When Beth tries to telephone her mother, the line is dead.

The storm has brought down a telegraph pole, cutting the phone lines and blocking the lane, so Beth is trapped at the farmhouse with no way to reach help. Her labor accelerates so fast that she has no time to think or plan, and the pain quickly becomes overwhelming. By the time Jimmy gets home from school, Beth is on the kitchen floor, already fighting the urge to push.

Because Beth cannot wait for Frank to be found, she begs Jimmy to help her. Jimmy reacts with surprising calm, fetches towels and scissors, and uses his experience delivering lambs to guide Beth through the final moments of labor. He helps deliver the baby, gets him breathing, manages the umbilical cord and afterbirth, and places the newborn boy in Beth’s arms, where Beth is flooded with love and relief.

Jimmy encourages Beth to feed the baby, and Bobby latches on at once. Frank then arrives, sees what has happened, and drops to Beth’s side in shock and joy. When Frank meets his son, Beth and Frank share an instant of pure happiness and gratitude, united by the certainty that Bobby is theirs and that they are now a family of three.