Robbie commits to Polly and her unborn baby

Robbie Dexter commits to Polly Drayton and her unborn baby after learning that Polly is nearly five months pregnant. His decision transforms a fragile reunion into an apparent family commitment: he expects the child to be his, welcomes the prospect of fatherhood, and accepts the role Polly assumes he will take. The scene’s tenderness, however, rests on a secret. Polly knows that Felipe, not Robbie, fathered the baby, while Robbie’s belief that Rachel Elliot has been unfaithful helps him relinquish their relationship and embrace Polly’s version of their future.

The choices surrounding the pregnancy

Robbie’s commitment takes place against the novel’s parallel accounts of Rachel’s desire to become a mother. Rachel has decided to have a child and, after asking Nathan to provide the means, later conceals from Robbie that she has stopped using contraception. In the privacy of a bathroom, she seals her contraceptive cap into its compact and hides it beneath cotton wool in her vanity case. She reasons that, at almost forty, each cycle matters and that she could cope alone if a future with Robbie failed. Her secret attempt to conceive makes the pregnancy in Robbie’s household part of a wider conflict over who controls the conditions of parenthood—and what each person believes a relationship has promised.

Polly’s pregnancy began in a very different circumstance. A week after Robbie dumped her, she let Felipe, a visiting uncle of someone she barely knew, chat her up, hoping for consolatory revenge. Their encounter took place on a moonlit late-October night against the back wall of a pub, near a vent sending kitchen steam into the dark. Polly recalls it as crude and unwanted in its emotional aftermath: she had been seeking an answer to her heartbreak, yet continued to long for Robbie’s hands and kisses. By the time she serves him supper, she is almost five months pregnant.

Polly’s concealed knowledge

Polly knows that the baby cannot be Robbie’s. Her period came after her last sexual encounter with him, and she remembers the night with Felipe. She also considers whether the child’s appearance might expose her: Felipe has dark hair and brown eyes and is fairly fair-skinned, traits that, Polly thinks, make the deception possible. The baby’s parentage is therefore not an uncertainty she shares with Robbie but a fact she deliberately withholds from him.

Her deception extends beyond paternity. Polly has told Robbie that Rachel and Will Raphael were sleeping together, turning Rachel’s friendship with Will into what Robbie understands as an affair. Polly later congratulates herself for making the story persuasive, reasoning that the framed portrait of Rachel in Will’s flat helped the pieces seem to fit. She regards the lie as the way to make sure she gets Robbie. Robbie, by contrast, treats Rachel’s supposed betrayal as real: he has already confronted her by phone and believes their relationship has been destroyed. His commitment to Polly is thus formed not only by her pregnancy but by a false account of the woman he has lost.

The decision at supper

The immediate scene is domestic and unceremonious. Polly serves fish fingers—eight for Robbie and five for herself—with mashed potato and frozen sweetcorn from a battered bag. She has arranged ketchup and cutlery on the kitchen table, a small recreation of their old life together. As she feels what may be a kick, she invites Robbie to touch her belly. He detects nothing, but smiles as if he has felt it.

Robbie is surprised by his own relief that Polly has not had an abortion. He is also surprised by the support she has received from her parents, especially Mrs Drayton, whose approval he had feared. From the beginning, Polly’s family has assumed he will stand by her, and Robbie discovers that he expects this of himself as well. He calls the child theirs and grins at Polly. In his understanding, he is accepting a baby conceived by the two of them; the reader knows that this confidence is misplaced.

A family promise built on unequal knowledge

Robbie’s decision gives Polly the reassurance she has been seeking. She tells him that she and the baby will always be there for him and presents the child as his long-awaited little lamb. Then she kisses the top of his head, clears the plates, and starts washing up. The ordinary gestures of supper and care make the promise feel settled, even though its foundation is concealed. Robbie has agreed to a future with Polly without knowing the child’s paternity or the extent of her manipulation.

The commitment also reflects how differently Robbie experiences the two relationships. He believes Rachel’s supposed affair has shattered any love he had for her, and he admits that her intelligence and capability had made him painfully conscious of his own failings. With Polly, he feels capable and deferred to; he no longer faces the expectations he thought he could not meet with Rachel. That contrast helps explain why he welcomes the easier domestic intimacy at the table, but it does not make his choice fully informed. The scene closes with the appearance of a family beginning, while the reader is left aware that Polly’s knowledge and Robbie’s belief are sharply divided.