Page 79 of When the Sky Breaks

“I am so sorry,” Sorcha said immediately, shoving her handkerchief toward the startled young man like it would somehow actually help. I sighed, raking a hand over my face and taking her arm. I was ready to be done traveling. I handed the porter a dollar coin, and the young man’s face went from horrified to placated in an instant. A quick “thank you” and the boy was back to his work.

I looked around for Ansel, wondering if we could just get back on the train and pretend this had simply never happened. But, per his usual, Ansel had disappeared into the crowd and was nowhere to be seen.

A cluster of friendly, older women gathered around and started offering Sorcha every conceivable anti-nausea remedy. One shoved a lavender sachet in her direction. Another suggested candied ginger, digging through a carpetbag that could have easily concealed a full-grown longhorn. A third suggested smelling salts. Sorcha accepted the lavender and politely but firmly declined the other suggestions.

“That helping?” I asked. Sorcha nodded, pressing the bag of flowers close up against her face.

“The smell,” she mumbled, gesturing vaguely at the coal-fired steam engine, then at the rows of food stalls reeking of grease.

“I know,” I said gently. “I’m sorry. I wish I could fix it.”

Sorcha just shrugged, taking deep breaths of the lavender. Then I heard whispering behind me.

“Is she . . .” a young woman’s voice trailed off.

“Expecting?” An older woman’s voice this time, laced with a mixture of judgment and utter shock. “I do believe she is.”

“And she’s traveling?” the younger woman nearly shrieked.

“Can I help you?” I asked, figuring a direct approach was best and turning around to face our commentators.

A young woman in a pale blue traveling suit stood beside a middle-aged woman in a much-less-expensive set of tweeds. A socialite and her chaperone, I surmised.

“Has she any family?” the older woman asked.

“I’m her husband,” I assured them.

“And are you two expecting?” The young woman whispered the last word like it was a curse.

“We’re going to visit my father,” I said.

The women looked skeptical.

“The baby was an unexpected surprise,” I lied.

The two women looked ready to faint.

“Married and pregnant, what is the world coming to?” I mumbled, attention going back to Sorcha. I brushed a strand of sweaty hair back from her forehead, noted that her color looked far better now that she had the lavender, and made to take her hand and get back onto the train. But then I was profoundly distracted by a middle-aged man in a topcoat sprinting in our direction, brandishing a bottle and a rag like weapons.

“She’s ill!” the man exclaimed. “And I’m a doctor.”

“You are?” I tried to keep my tone civil, but my patience was wearing thin. I missed the mountains, the desert, the solitude.

“Chloroform.” The man shoved the proffered bottle farther toward us. “She’ll sleep right through until your next stop. No more fuss.”

Sorcha looked justifiably horrified. And with that my patience wore clean through to nothing. I bent to glare at the doctor on eye level and snapped, “If you say one more word about giving chloroform to my pregnant wife you will be drinking that entire bottle right now just to see how you like the suggestion. Am I understood?”

The doctor blinked, swallowed hard, and retreated.

Sorcha tugged on my sleeve. “Come on. Ansel will find us. Let’s wash up then get back on the train. Before we make even more of a spectacle than we have already.”

Thirty-Three

Sorcha

It was late into the night and we were another half day’s travel south of the District of Columbia. It was raining hard but not storming—no wind, no lightning, a dark, still, sopping-wet sky. The train carriage was quiet—a hushed voice here, a toddler fussing there, but no real sound disturbing the night. Until suddenly something was rattling. And then someone started choking.

Screams split the night air—some wordless howls, a few curses, and one older woman’s voice just repeating, “Somebody do something!”