The Doctor Who Saved Christmas (Preview)

Chapter One

Lawrence, Colorado, 1881

Mrs. Titmarsh glared at Esther, blocking the door with her stout frame, hands on her hips. 

“You’re late,” she announced. “You’re meant to be here half an hour before we open, not five minutes.”

Esther flushed. A few sharp retorts bubbled up, hovering hopefully on the tip of her tongue, but she swallowed them down. A clever reply wasn’t worth losing her job. 

“I’m sorry, ma’am,” she replied, as modestly as she could manage. “Vernon wasn’t well this morning. I ran all the way here.”

She probably looked as though she’d been running, too. Esther was uncomfortably aware that her hair was coming undone from the knot she’d skewered it into, she was out of breath, and her cheeks were likely red from the cold. There were even a few beads of sweat on her temples, although they were quickly chilling. She was starting to feel as if she’d been spritzed with ice water. 

Mrs. Titmarsh gave an unimpressed grunt and reluctantly stepped aside. 

Esther was relieved to come in out of the snow. It was already gathering ankle-deep in places, and there was much more to come. November was shaping up to be a month of bad weather, and of course December and January would be worse. In fact, the snow would probably stay until spring, now. 

She thought immediately of their big, drafty old ranch house, the way the wind whistled through it, rattling ice-laced windows in their frames, and she shivered. 

It was warm in the mercantile, if only because Mrs. Titmarsh didn’t want her customers to be cold. Cold customers shopped faster, she said, and were less likely to buy themselves little treats and things they didn’t need. 

“You coddle that brother of yours,” Mrs. Titmarsh continued, following Esther over to the mercantile counter. “He’s twenty-one and shouldn’t be so fragile. When my boys were his age, they were married and had a handful of children, to say nothing of working in the fields every day.”

This time, Esther nearly did round on the woman. Mrs. Titmarsh was saved from a ferocious tongue-lashing (and Esther from becoming unemployed) by a pair of hands grabbing Esther’s shoulders and steering her away. 

“Thank you, ma’am,” Amy said cheerfully. “I’ll take Esther to get ready for work. No time to waste!”

The tension drained from Esther’s body, and she allowed her friend to guide her into the small backroom behind the counter. 

“One day, I’m going to kill that woman,” Esther hissed. “She’s cruel, and selfish, and even…”

“Hush, hush, she’ll hear you,” Amy admonished. She was already wearing the plain gray calico aprons they wore as a sort of uniform, and she unhooked Esther’s from its peg. “You are later than you should be.”

“She doesn’t pay us to come in early. It’s not fair. Besides, the roads from here are terrible. She knows I don’t live in town.”

“Yes, but you need the money, and so do I. We might be good workers, but she can find someone else in town. This is a good job, Esther. You know that. Unless you fancy scrubbing floors or taking in laundry for a living?”

Esther put on her apron, tying it behind her waist. It seemed to pull tighter with every passing week as the weight fell steadily from her. Times were never good, and hadn’t been since Pa’s passing, but now was especially bad. She gave at least half of her food to Vernon, although he tended to bring it up again anyway. 

“Is it bad again?” Amy asked after a moment’s quiet. There was no need to ask what she meant. 

“Yes,” Esther answered, voice low. “He hasn’t been able to get out of bed for a week and a half. He was running a temperature this morning again and threw up his porridge. I don’t know what to do anymore.”

Amy bit her lip. “You should send for the doctor. Can you afford it? I can lend you something.”

Esther shot a wry smile at her friend. “You can’t afford it, either. And besides, the doctor’s not much use. It takes him a full day to get here, and he has to stay overnight. I can’t blame him for not visiting often or for charging such high prices. I’m not sure he could do much for Vernon, and I probably can’t afford the medication.”

That was an upsetting thought. Esther had an old book of herbal remedies which she reviewed frequently, and some of them did work, to an extent. They could ease Vernon’s labored breathing or help him keep down food and water. They’d been managing. 

But with winter upon them, the fields were reduced to thick blankets of snow, and most things were dead. Ferreting around for hours in the snowy herb garden, Esther had managed to get up the last of the mint, although she’d nearly frozen her hands and feet in the process. Drying out the leaves had meant that they had enough for the occasional cup of mint tea, which generally soothed Vernon’s stomach. 

It wasn’t enough, though. 

Mrs. Titmarsh poked her head through the door. 

“Enough gossiping. I’m opening up now, so you’d better both be ready.”

They were. Amy was the one with the head for numbers, able to add up columns of figures in her head in the blink of an eye, so she took the money and managed the accounts. She kept track of everybody’s credit tabs and ensured they were paid up when they started to owe a little too much.

Esther and Amy had been friends for as long as she could remember. Esther didn’t even recall any other place beyond Lawrence, although she’d been four when they moved here. 

Physically, the two women could not be more different. At twenty-two, Esther was tall, strong—despite her rapidly dropping weight—and fair, with pale brown hair and large, vivid green eyes. She had year-round freckles that persisted even when it was snowing. 

Amy was much shorter, two years older, and had black hair, black eyes, and a remorseless sense of optimism. 

She also had a dead husband and a three-year-old baby, which was why Esther would never have accepted money from her friend—she couldn’t spare. Still, Amy was luckier than most widowed women with young children, as her parents were still living and adored their only granddaughter. They looked after little Mary while her mother worked. 

It was a safety net Esther did not have and was yet another reason why she couldn’t afford to be optimistic. In Esther’s experience, optimism was nothing more than wishful thinking. It was a good idea to expect the worst, because that was usually what was coming. 

Esther was the strong one. A lifetime of working on a ranch would do that for a person. When customers came with lists of goods, Esther collected them together. She kept an eye on the stock, organized it as efficiently as she could, and even took out the horse and cart to deliver to certain customers. 

She wasn’t entirely sure what it was Mrs. Titmarsh did, beyond owning the mercantile. She sat on a rocking chair on the boardwalk outside the store—or at least, she did when the weather was good—and chatted to passersby. 

In bad weather, she brought her chair inside, set it by the counter, and passed her days criticizing the girls. 

“Remember, it’s better than working in the fields in the snow,” Amy reminded Esther, and they stepped out into the store just as the first customer arrived. 

With winter just starting to dig in its nails, people were understandably keen to stock up on goods. Mrs. Titmarsh’s mercantile was a large one, the only one in the whole of Lawrence, and it sold just about everything. A large stove in the corner belched out heat and the strong scent of woodsmoke, and Mrs. Titmarsh set up her rocking chair beside it. 

“My sister and her family are meant to be coming down for Christmas,” one harried middle-aged woman confided, paying for her goods at the counter. “I hope they’ll make it before the snow comes down in earnest. I haven’t seen them since we moved here. I’d better stock up good, just in case we all get snowed in together! It would be cozy, though, don’t you think?”

Esther, who was carrying a third bag of flour to the counter for the woman, gave a tight smile. 

If she and Vernon were snowed in, it would be disastrous. If she didn’t get to work, she wouldn’t be paid, and no money meant no food. They were down to their last half-jar of dried mint, with no more medicines or herbal treatments for Vernon. She shivered. 

The middle-aged woman smiled wanly at the girls and wheeled her barrow full of goods out onto the boardwalk. A few flakes of snow were drifting down. It was barely past noon, but already the sun’s heat—such as it was—was starting to fade. 

“Why don’t you talk to Mrs. T about a raise?” Amy whispered. “Everyone knows how hard it’s been for you since Mr. Murphy died. And with Vernon…”

Esther swallowed hard, not wanting to think about Pa more than necessary. It had been three years since he died, and it still hurt every day. 

“Mrs. T won’t give me a raise. You know how cheap she is. And you know how people think of Vernon. It doesn’t matter how ill he is. He’s a young man, and they assume he must be healthy. I won’t get sympathy in this town.”

Amy placed a hand on her friend’s shoulder. “Well, you’ll get it from me.”

“Less chatting!” Mrs. Titmarsh called from the corner. “Look, there’s a customer.”

A man stepped in, snow falling from his shoulders and melting into his hair, and Amy went forward to serve him. 

***

The day passed quickly enough, but by the time work was over and the store was shutting, it was all but dark outside. Esther was grateful that Mrs. Titmarsh closed the shop a few hours earlier in the winter, but she was under no illusions that it was for her benefit. 

Mrs. Titmarsh didn’t like walking home in the dark, either. 

“For you, girls,” the woman said abruptly, while they were putting on their coats and bracing themselves for the long, snowy walk home. She shoved her fat hands into her apron pockets and came up with four neatly wrapped paper balls. 

Amy half-unwrapped hers and gave an exclamation. “Oh, marzipan fruit! Thank you so much, Mrs. T.”

The woman grunted. “Don’t think they’ll sell. Here, Esther. One for you, one for that lazy brother of yours.”

Esther bit back her usual annoyance at Vernon being called lazy. He loved marzipan, after all. He especially loved marzipan fruits, which were delicately flavored lumps of marzipan cleverly shaped to resemble all kinds of fruit and vegetables. They were a popular Christmas treat, but of course Esther could never afford them. They barely had enough money for the basics, and certainly not marzipan. Sometimes they couldn’t even afford flour, let alone sugar.

“That’s kind, Mrs. T. Thank you.”

Esther took the paper balls and carefully slipped them into her pocket, hoping they would be intact by the time she got home. 

“Why don’t you come back to ours for a while?” Amy asked as they stepped outside. “Not for long, of course. I could ask Pa to take you back in the cart. We’re having roast chicken.”

Esther’s mouth watered. How long had it been since she’d had anything like that? She imagined her brother, lying awake in his bed—he slept terribly these days—hungry and ill and counting the hours until she came back. 

“I’m sorry, I have to get back to Vernon,” she heard herself say. “The snow is still coming down, and if I can’t get home tonight, I don’t know what I’ll do.”

Amy bit her lip. “Okay. Just… just know that I’m here, if you need anything.”

What can you do? It was an uncharitable thought, but Esther couldn’t help it. She forced a smile. 

“Thanks, Amy.”

“Esther?”

“Hm?”

Amy sighed. “Ask her. For the raise, I mean. With the Winter Fair coming up, she needs us more than ever. Now is a good time to ask.”

Esther gave a tight nod. “I’ll try.”

The two women parted ways. Amy headed off along the front street of the town, which had been mostly cleared of snow, although a new, powdery layer was already beginning to build up. Esther took a narrow path that led up toward the hills. It hadn’t been cleared that morning, and it wasn’t going to be cleared anytime soon. She had good, sturdy boots, her one luxury, and they weren’t leaking yet. Sighing and hauling up her skirts to her knees, she began to pick her way through the snow. 

***

By the time Esther spotted the house in the distance, it was dark. Moonlight glittered on the snow, and the falling flakes had stopped. For now. Her breath misted out in front of her in a silvery cloud, and a thin, crunchy layer of ice was forming on the top of the snow. It was about calf-deep here. 

The blocky, dark shape of their ranch house loomed on the horizon. It was completely dark, except for a buttery yellow light glimmering in one upstairs window. That was good. It meant Vernon had had the strength at some point to get up and light a candle in his room, instead of lying in the dark. The fire Esther had lit that morning would be out, for certain, and she prayed that some residual warmth remained. 

She passed dark fields, left untended for far too long, empty paddocks standing beside them. The front garden was unkempt and overgrown, sticks of dead trees and shrubs poking out from under the snow. 

Inside, the house was barely warmer than outside, and Esther’s breath still misted in front of her. 

“I’m home, Vernon,” she called. There was no reply. She could see the light creeping down the stairs in the corner and hoped she hadn’t accidentally left the door open when she left. Heat would come flooding out if she had, and Vernon rarely had the strength to get up and close it. 

She lit a candle in the kitchen—just one—and used its light to get the stove good and hot. There was leftover vegetable stew for tonight. No bread; she’d had no time to make it. 

And then there was nothing for it but to climb the stairs. It was a familiar ritual, but Esther’s heart pounded every time. 

Perhaps today is the day I open the door and find Vernon dead and cold. 

She drew in a short, panicky breath, pushing away the thought. She resolutely thought about nothing as she climbed the stairs. At least, she tried to think about nothing—it had never come easily to Esther. Instead, she found herself thinking about marzipan, turning the creak of the stairs under her feet in a sort of lopsided little song.

There were only two rooms in the top of the house, hers and Vernon’s. Vernon had shared with Pa, when he was alive, and Pa used to lie awake listening to his son’s breathing, half-expecting it to stop at any moment. 

Now it was Esther who lay awake, holding her own breath as she listened to her brother’s. 

She held her breath now as she pushed open the door. 

Vernon half-stirred toward her, and Esther let out her breath in a long, relieved gasp. Vernon was a tall man, taller than her by a hand at least, and painfully thin. It was easy to see how he could be handsome, if ill-health hadn’t stripped away his glow and the flesh from his bones. 

There was a grayish tinge to his skin that didn’t look good. He had hazel eyes, unlike Esther’s green, and his were sunken and too dark for his pale face. His hair was the same pale brown as hers, but overlong and greasy. He managed a smile, thin lips twitching at the corners. 

“You’re back,” he murmured, sounding sleepy. “It seems late.”

“It’s just winter.”

“Oh.”

“It’s freezing in here. I’ll get the fire going. But first, I have a present.”

Esther took out the marzipan fruits with a flourish, handing them over. Vernon’s thin face split into a wider smile. 

“Oh, wow! Marzipan! Esther, how much did these cost?”

“They were from Mrs. T.”

“Mrs. T?” he repeated, looking askance.

“Maybe she’s getting into the Christmas spirit. They’re both for you.”

There was a pause. “No, they aren’t.”

“I mean it, Vernon. You have them both.”

Wincing with pain, Vernon levered himself into a sitting position. 

“I mean it. If you don’t eat yours, I won’t eat mine.”

She sighed, sitting back on her heels. The fire was warming up nicely, and they had enough wood ready that she wouldn’t have to go out tonight to chop more. It was as good as it was going to get for the Murphy siblings. 

“Fine. Hand it over.”

They sat together on the bed, cross-legged, delicately nibbling at the marzipan. For a moment, Esther could almost imagine that they weren’t deathly poor, that their father wasn’t dead, and that their house wasn’t crumbling around them. 

And then, of course, Vernon began to cough. 

Chapter Two

Snow, snow, and more snow. Michael wasn’t sure what he’d expected to find this far west, and this late in the winter, but what he had found so far was… well, snow. 

Wishing once again that he hadn’t sold his horse, Michael gritted his teeth and hauled his foot out of a calf-deep drift. He wasn’t sure who he hated more—himself, for letting Rosie go for the price he did, or the stagecoach driver, who’d told him the roads were impassable and he’d have to walk to Lawrence from there.

It was dark, and if it wasn’t for the distant lights of the town luring Michael onwards, there would have been a real possibility of him wandering into the wilderness and just freezing to death somewhere. 

Perhaps that wouldn’t be so bad. 

Abruptly, the snow thinned out, revealing a road with a path cleared in the middle, although snow piled thickly up along the corners, and no doubt there was more to follow. 

He took a moment to catch his breath, shaking melting snow from his clothes and out of his hair. His boots were leaking and his socks were wet, but there wasn’t much to be done about that. 

The front street was mostly deserted, which was to be expected with the bad weather and dark nights. The temperature, as they all well knew, would drop steeply and dangerously once the sun was gone.

There was a large mercantile on the corner (closed, of course), what looked like a restaurant (also closed), and a few other stores. He saw what he was looking for in the middle of the line of shops, set back from the rest, and his face brightened. 

Boarding House: Beds and Meals Provided. 

Perfect. 

Limping over to the building—three stories, lopsided, in great need of repairs and a good lick of paint—Michael began to feel the cold and his various pains much more now that there was the prospect of rest ahead of him. 

He elbowed open the door and stumbled inside. A wave of heat washed over him and he stood there for a moment, eyes closed, soaking in the delicious warmth. 

“Oi, you! In or out! You’ll let in the cold!” a voice snapped, and Michael obediently slammed the door shut with his heel. 

He opened his eyes and took in his surroundings. 

The front door opened up onto a foyer with a muddy, wet floor. A door on the left opened up into what he could only assume was a dining room, or perhaps a parlor, in which a fire was blazing. A door on the right was signposted “Kitchen, Private,” and behind the long counter opposite the door was a narrow set of winding stairs. 

A young man, presumably the one who’d demanded he go in or out, sat behind the counter, grinning, with his feet propped up in front of him. 

“Evening,” he remarked. “Lovely weather we’re having.”

“Not exactly,” Michael mumbled, limping forward. He left wet footprints behind him. “I heard there was only one boarding house in town. Is that true?”

“It sure is. You can get rooms at the saloon, but you generally have to share, and it’s not respectable, you know?” The man dropped his feet down from counter and leaned forward, long fingers splaying over a huge, worn ledger book. “You’re not a local. We don’t get a lot of newcomers here in Lawrence.”

“Well, it’s a good distance to travel. My name is Michael, Michael Parker. I’m here looking for work.”

The man lifted his eyebrows. “In the middle of winter? Optimistic. My name’s Benjamin, but you can call me Benji, if you like.”

“Um, Benjamin will be fine. Can I have…”

“Traveling alone, are you?” Benjamin leaned back again, lacing his hands behind his head and narrowing his eyes. He had a sort of tense, jerky energy, as if he could never sit still. He looked to be around twenty-four or five, about two years younger than Michael, and he was lanky and thin, with a mop of blond hair and green eyes. 

Behind him, on the wall next to the stairs, hung a tarnished mirror, and Michael got a good look at himself. 

He sighed. His auburn hair was plastered to his head with melted snow and sweat, and he was red with the cold. His eyes, which were large and brown and were generally the subject of compliments, were puffy and heavy with tiredness. He was a tall man, usually, with broad shoulders and a strong frame, but tonight he looked shrunken and weak. He felt weak. 

In short, he did not look good. He looked like a drifter. 

“Yeah, I’m alone,” he managed at last. “I just need…”

“I’ve been here for about six months. Got family back home, you know?” Benjamin gave an elaborate sigh, rolling his eyes. He didn’t seem to notice the way Michael stiffened. “Got to send money back to them. Heaven knows what they do with it. I always say—”

“Look,” Michael interrupted at last, realizing that the man was just going to talk and talk, “I just want a room. I’m tired, and I don’t want a conversation. Just… can I have a room?”

Benjamin pursed his lips. “Right. I can’t give you one, sorry.”

“What? Why not? Don’t say you’re full up.”

“Honestly, I have no idea,” Benjamin said, leaning back and propping his feet up on the counter again. “I don’t actually work here.”

Before Michael could say something—or, more likely, slap the infuriating young man—a short, portly woman in her middle years came bustling out. 

“Benjamin Haversham, get your feet down off my counter before I polish it with your face!”

Benjamin grimaced, obeying with respectful speed. He hopped down from the stool he was sitting on. The woman sat in it, glaring balefully at him, and flashed a smile at Michael. She had a heavy Scottish accent and spoke so rapidly that he had to concentrate to make out what she was saying.

“Sorry about that. This one has been staying with me for a while now, and he loves to interfere. My name is Mrs. Marrighan, but you can call me Merry. This is me boarding house. Will ye be wanting a room?”

“Yes, please,” Michael said, almost deflating with relief. “Am I too late for food?”

“Not at all. I’ll whip something up for ye. Now, I require payment upfront. Just the one night?”

“Probably more, but for now, I’ll just pay for tonight.”

“Right ye are. Write your name here, and sign, and then ye can get settled. Seeing as ye want to help out so badly,” Merry added, aiming the last sentence at Benjamin, “ye can show him to his room.”

In the blink of an eye, she had given Michael the key, his money had disappeared into her hand, and he found himself being escorted up the winding stairs. 

The glorious heat faded a little as they climbed, but he was too tired to care much. 

“She’s a good sort, Merry,” Benjamin said over his shoulder. “I was terrible homesick when I first came here, and she made me feel right at home. She’ll do you a good deal if you stay for a month at a time. She says it’s because she doesn’t have to change the sheets as often. Oh, by the way, you’ve got to do your own chamber pot. That’s a rule.”

“I’m sure I can manage,” Michael responded drily. He wondered briefly whether Benjamin was this vibrant about everybody, or if Michael was just special. 

“So, you don’t have any work lined up?”

“Nope. I’m just going to see what I can get.”

Benjamin sucked air in through his teeth. “Well, okay. There’s a good number of people who pass through Lawrence that way, coming to do work and then moving on, but not in winter. You know there’s a good chance you’ll get stuck in town?”

Michael shrugged. “I’ll be fine. Might as well get stuck here as anywhere.”

Benjamin paused at the top of the stairs, glancing down at him. It was gloomy on the upper floors, with only Benjamin’s candle throwing a buttery, wobbly glow over their surroundings. 

“Don’t you have any family to worry about you?”

Michael returned his gaze steadily. “No. I don’t.”

For a moment, it seemed that Benjamin couldn’t think of anything to say, which Michael guessed might be a rare occasion. In the end, he shut his mouth and continued on without another word. 

The stairs led to a narrow hallway with rooms branching off either side, but Benjamin didn’t stop there. He crossed to another set of stairs, even narrower and steeper than the first, and began to climb. There was a triangular landing at the top of those stairs, with two doors set side by side. 

“This is you,” Benjamin said, tapping on the green-painted door. “The red one next to it is mine. Merry fitted out the attic to make more rooms, but they’re shaped oddly. Still, it’s quiet up here. In you go.”

Shouldering his pack, Michael twisted the key in the lock and let himself into what would hopefully be his home for the next few weeks or months. 

Maybe longer, if the weather was as bad as people said. 

Sure enough, the room was a strange shape, like a diamond. The roof sloped steeply, and he had to bend his head when walking around at least half of the room. A narrow, iron-framed bed stood at an angle along one wall under a sloped window, and another round window was set in a brick wall at the end of the room. It let in plenty of light, the moonlight and white snow lighting up the room bright as day. Too much light, really, as there were no curtains. There was a patchwork rug on the floor, a washbasin, a trunk for clothes, a stool, and a desk table. 

“No fireplace,” Michael commented. 

“People kept trying to set the place on fire, apparently,” Benjamin said, leaning against the doorway. “My room is just like yours. Want to see?”

“Um, no thanks.”

“Fair. It’s probably a mess, anyway. So, what sort of work are you hoping to get?”

“Farm work, I guess,” Michael said, letting his pack fall heavily to the bare floorboards. There wasn’t much in it—just spare clothes, what little money he had left, a couple of books, and a few knick-knacks. “Maybe ranch work. I’m good with animals.”

Benjamin nodded. “I see. Were you always a farm worker, then? Did you never do anything else?”

Michael hesitated. No matter how much he hated it, images, smells, and sensations always flashed through his mind at the worst times. 

He could see his own hand, fingers flexed around a silvery, razor-sharp scalp, unflinching and confident. Clean white gauze, rolls of bandages, rows of tightly-made hospital beds, sheets so taut he could bounce a quarter off them. 

He swallowed hard. 

“Nope. Just farm work, ever since I was a boy.”

The lie was coming easier now, and that was something. 

Benjamin, however, narrowed his eyes. “Do you have a special talent, Michael?”

“What are you talking about?” He was too tired for this. Too tired for Benjamin. 

“Oh, you know, a thing you can do that not everybody can. Mine,” Benjamin added confidentially, “is that I can always tell when a person is lying.”

Despite himself, Michael felt color flooding his cheeks. He swallowed hard, sitting down on the edge of the bed with a thump. The mattress springs bounced and creaked. 

“I, uh…”

“It’s okay, okay.” Benjamin laughed, holding up his hands in surrender. “I shouldn’t be so nosy. It’s your business, not mine. Merry is always telling me to get my nose out of other folks’ business. If you want to tell me where you’re running from, you can do that. If not, that’s just fine.”

Some of the tension began to bleed out of Michael’s frame. He felt his shoulders begin to relax, and the feeling was starting to return to his hands and feet. 

“Thank you, Benjamin. I’m sorry I’m so… so prickly today. I’ve had a long journey, and I’m not feeling sociable.”

“That’s okay. Look, I’ll be honest with you. Lawrence is… well, it’s a lonesome sort of town. The people aren’t worse than anywhere else, but we’re kind of spread out. Neighbors aren’t as neighborly as perhaps they should be. People are worried about surviving, taking care of their own, and they forget about other people. That’s why I like Merry so much—she’s someone you can rely on. I try to be as friendly as I can, because this is the sort of town where a person can disappear.”

Michael swallowed. A town where a person could disappear. Wasn’t that what he’d looked for? And yet, now he was here, he felt… lonely. 

“Thank you again, Benjamin. Really, I am grateful. You’re a good man.”

Benjamin gave a ducking nod and a sort of half-smile. “Just trying to be neighborly, you know? Maybe, if you’re feeling up to it, I could show you around the town tomorrow? Unless you want to start looking for work right away.”

“I could go for a tour. I saw a mercantile back there, and there’s a few things I want.”

“Mrs. Titmarsh’s? Sure, I’ll show you around.” Benjamin dropped a wink and a lazy smile, straightening up from the doorframe. “I’ll come up and give you a knock when your food’s ready, give you time to settle in.”

He left without another word, leaving the door swinging open. Michael didn’t have the energy to get up and close it. 

The trip had been a rough one, and he’d made it by the skin of his teeth. It was snowing again now, coming down heavily enough to make a drifter forget his way. 

A person can disappear in a town like this. 

The thought gave him the shivers. 

Where are you going, Michael? 

To shut them out, he got up and wandered over to the round window. The sloped window was already blocked up with snow, but the other one afforded him a view over the town. As Benjamin had said, it was spread out. Michael could see shapes on distant hills that were probably houses, but only a few had lights glimmering in the windows. 

In a place like Lawrence, people probably went to bed when it got dark. Candles were expensive, and firewood was difficult to find as the winter went on. What else would they do? 

He stood there for a few minutes, watching the snow fall, until the babbling in his mind smoothed out and he’d warmed up enough to risk the long walk downstairs, where there was a fire and people, and he wouldn’t have to be quite so alone. 

He’d had plenty of loneliness lately, and the way things were going, there’d be more to come.