The Red Door

He helped lift three more passengers down from damaged windows or doorways, then with another man’s aid, pulled a fourth from the rubble. It was a woman, too frightened to cry, her eyes huge in her pale face. She looked around, dazed, uncertain, and then saw her husband standing to one side earnestly telling the man who was clumsily bandaging his arm that his wife was still in the carriage. With a small sound, like that of a frightened animal, she stumbled toward him, and he buried his face in her shoulder, gripping her with his good arm.

Rutledge walked on, still searching. More people were arriving to help as word spread. Among them was a doctor, who began to organize a makeshift infirmary.

Listening to Hamish, scanning faces, trying to keep his own fear at bay, Rutledge did what he could.

A woman crouched in the opening where a carriage door had once stood—the splintered remains still clinging to torn hinges—called to him. He clambered over wreckage to lift her down and then hand her over the worst of the debris. She was mumbling disjointed prayers interspersed with Hail Marys. He could see the blood in her fair hair, another cut bleeding through a tear in the sleeve of her shirtwaist. He turned to look for the doctor, urging her to come with him when she pulled free.

“No. Don’t leave. There’s someone still in there—I think she’s dead.”

“Can you walk as far as that line of trees?” he asked her gently. “Where the women are helping others like you. Do you see? I’ll do what I can here.”

She nodded, holding on to his arm until she had regained her balance, and then walked on. A woman in an apron came to collect her and guide her the rest of the way, offering words of encouragement and comfort.

Rutledge turned back to the task at hand. Testing his footing, he pulled himself into the compartment she’d just left.

A red-faced man, sweating from exertion, came up just then and said, “There’s a doctor coming down the line, looking for the worst cases. Were you a passenger?”

“I’ve come to help—”

“Then follow me.”

“The woman just there—the one walking to the trees—needs medical attention. And she told me someone is still trapped in here.”

“Have a look, then, I’ll be back as soon as I’ve passed the word.”

The compartment he was in was a shambles, seats at an angle, door hanging ajar. He almost put his foot through a hole in the flooring, and then felt the car shift very slightly. Rutledge paused, then gingerly swung himself around the splintered door into the passage beyond. But there was no access that way. He came back again and tried to shift the splintered door. At first it wouldn’t budge, then it gave way with a groan, nearly pitching him forward onto feet and a pale rose skirt. He caught himself in time, waited a moment for the carriage to settle again, and then crept through the opening he’d made.

From the far side, he was able to slide the door out of the way, then turn to the injured passenger.

It was a young woman, her trim ankles almost touching the toe of his left boot.

She lay on her side, her face hidden by a valise that had fallen next to her, and all he could see was a shoulder and dark hair. A crumpled hat lay beyond the crown of her head.

There was just room to kneel beside her. Rutledge said, “Miss? Can you hear me?”

He wasn’t sure what it was that warned him. But just as she moved her head, crying out a little with the effort, he recognized her.

It was Meredith Channing.

She was dazed, her eyes not focusing right away, but then she saw him, and there was an intake of breath as her gaze sharpened.

“Ian? Were you on the train as well? Are you all right?”

“I came as soon as I heard—I was in London.”

“But how did you know I was on board?” “I didn’t. I came to look for my godfather.”

She tried to smile. “Is he all right?”

“I haven’t found him yet,” he said, making an effort to keep the worry out of his voice. “How badly are you hurt?” He was afraid to touch her. But she had trained as a nurse and he waited for her assessment.

“I don’t know. My shoulder—I think it must be broken. Or dislocated.”

He could see blood on her stockings, and one shoe was missing. And there was a smear of blood across her cheek.

The carriage swayed again.

“I must get you out of here. It’s not safe.”

“No, please, it hurts too much to move.”

Glancing beyond her, he could just see a man’s legs. He got to his feet and leaned forward for a better look.

The man was dead, there was no doubt of it, and suddenly he wondered if the two of them had been traveling together.

He knelt again by her side. “You’re one of the lucky ones,” he said, trying to divert her. “There’s a man in one of the other carriages pinned where no one can get to him. And he’s bleeding. Can you move your feet?”

She wiggled her toes. “They seem to be all right,” she said. “A little bruised from the tossing about. It’s my shoulder—my chest—that hurts.”

“Your fingers now,” he told her. “Move them if you can.” But only her free hand could obey.

“Are you dizzy? Did you hit your head on anything?”