Ben watched the doctor wash her hand very extensively, wondering why she took so long rather than looking after his daughter. He looked back at Alice and put a hand on her forehead and the girl looked up at him frightened, as if begging for help. "It will be alright," he whispered to her, cursing his own helplessness.

Then he let go with a final caress of her cheek. "I'll be close by," he told his daughter, and he moved behind the screen as requested. He sat down slowly, catching his breath and he coughed a few times.

When he had recovered, he began to think of what Alice's health had been like before. "Her health was normal... good... when she was younger. She caught measles when she was small, but it was mild. And scarlet fever, the same. But when that very bad flu came to town a few years ago, she got really sick. So sick we thought she was going to die. Her mother and baby sister did. It was bad. Doctor said there was nowt he could do for her. But she recovered. She was weak for several months after, though... Not as strong, physically, and out of breath easily, trouble learnin' in school, and she had always been t' brightest before. But she got better in the end."