Free Fire Watch by Connie Willis Page A

and more pale every day There was still no word from her brother. On the third day she wrote asking Anne to tea.
    Anne had shown the note to Elliott. “How can you do this to her?” she said.
    “To you, you mean. You accepted, of course. It should be rather a lark.”
    “I refused. You must think about what you are putting her through, Elliott.”
    “And what about what I’ve been through? In an open boat in the middle of the night in the middle of a storm. I don’t even remember getting ashore. I had to walk halfway to Haddam before I was able to borrow a horse at an inn. Think what you’ve put me through, Anne, all because you didn’t choose to meet me. Now I don’t choose to meet them.” He fumbled with the comforter, trying to cover his knees.
    Anne had felt too tired to fight him anymore. She had put the packet of food down on the pew and turned away.
    “Leave the door open,” Elliott had said. “I don’t like being shut in this coffin of a room. And tell me when Victoria’s father comes in again with all my debts honored.”
    He will never come out, Anne had thought despairingly, but now, standing on the landing watching her father, she thought, He has come out after all, and hurried down the steps. When she reached the foot of the stairs, her father turned to her and said accusingly, “It is Miss Thatcher. She has come to call.” He walked past her up the stairs without another word.
    “It was improper of me to come,” Victoria said. “Now your father is angry with me.”
    “He is angry with me. You have done nothing improper, unless showing kindness is improper.” They were still standing in the wind at the door. “Won’t you come in?” Anne said. “I’ll make some tea.”
    Victoria put her hand on Anne’s arm. “I did not come to call. I—now I must ask a kindness of you.” She had not worn gloves, and her hand was icy even through the wool of Anne’s sleeve.
    “Come in and tell me,” she said, and once more shethought, It’s Elliott. Victoria stepped into the hall, but she would not let Anne take her black cloak or bonnet, and when Anne went to shut the door, she said, “I cannot stay I must go to Dr. Sawyers. He—a body has been found in the river. Near Haddam. I must go to see if it is Elliott.”
    A tremendous wave of anger swept over Anne at Elliott. She almost said, “He is not dead. He’s in the robing room,” but Victoria, once she had started, could not seem to stop. “My father has gone to Hartford,” she said. “There was some trouble about gambling debts of Elliott’s. My brother is still at sea. We have had no news of his ship. Elliott’s father is too ill to go. My father went in his place to Hartford, and now there is no one to see to this. I cannot ask Elliott’s father. It would kill him to see. I came to ask your father, but now I fear I have angered him and there is no one else to—”
    “I will go with you,” Anne said, throwing on her gray pelisse. It was far too light for the cold day, but she was afraid to take the time to go back upstairs for something heavier for fear Victoria would be too distraught to wait. I cannot let Elliott do this, she thought. I will tell her what he has done.
    But there was no chance. Victoria walked so fast that Anne nearly ran to keep up with her, and the words flowed out of her in great painful spurts, as if an artery had been cut somewhere. “My brother should be here by now. There’s been no word from New London, where they are to dock. He cannot have been delayed in port. But the storms have been so fierce I fear for his ship. I wrote him on the day that Elliott was first missed. I knew that he was dead, that first day. My father said not to worry, that he was only delayed, that we must not give up hope, and now my brother Roger is delayed, and there is no one to tell me not to worry.”
    They were on Dr. Sawyer’s doorstep. Victoria knocked, her bare hands red from the cold, and the doctor let them in