"The babies, Miss Swift. The child in my house... the other babies born in the village recently... they are not the children I delivered. Someone has replaced them, you see. Taken the babies and in their place, left others."

She could not mask her disbelief and knew he would be insulted, but she could not help it.

"Why?" Tamara asked. "Why would anyone do that? And how could you tell, if someone is swapping newborn babies for other infants?"

The smile on Dr. Nichols' face turned her stomach, for there was hysteria in it, not humor. "It isn't difficult to tell the difference," the doctor said. "Sarah's baby, all of the others. Well, they're not human, Miss. Not human at all."

All the breath went out of her and Tamara stared at him, eyes wide.