Anna From Away by D. R. Macdonald Page A

or hanging, just as he’d left it the day she died.
    The liquor at least he had cooked himself, the last bottle of his last batch. Sweet as good water, hot in the gut. He’d get back to working with wood, soon. Wouldn’t he? Livingstone Campbell had pestered him again on the phone, only God knew what he needed with a big desk like that.
    This was what Anna Starling needed, a warm swig of this, she’d sleep. Maybe she was sleeping anyway, dreaming of dogs, the stun of water under ice.

IX.
    “A NNA?” B REAGH WAS BENDING over her, smiling, eyebrows high. “Red Murdock asked me to look in on you. So here I am, looking.”
    Her bright green eyes tempered Anna’s irritation, she didn’t like this kind of surprise, still shaking off cobwebs, her own face battered by a feverish sleep she’d like to return to. The glaring kitchen windows said full morning, and an unpleasant guilt crept into her, as though she’d been caught out at something or had overslept for work. She pushed her head deeper into the pillow. “I’m not much to look at,” she mumbled into the down, funky with her own sweat.
    “Well, you’re awake anyway. That’s a step, Anna. I’ve got tea going.”
    “Where’s your little girl?”
    “With Molly MacKay. They love each other.”
    At least the child wouldn’t see her blowsy and half awake. “Did I leave the door unlocked?”
    “The back was open. I got worried when you didn’t answer the front.” Breagh clapped mugs on the table. “Nobody here used to lock up, but now you don’t know who might detour down this road. I’ll cook you some breakfast. You’re on the pale side.”
    “Tea’s fine. Black. Murdock sent you over?”
    “He told me what happened. What a night you had, girl. You feel all right?”
    “I’m just tired. I need to clean up.”
    “What a blow to the body, eh? Still, you’re lucky. If Murdock hadn’t heard the dog …”
    “If
I
hadn’t heard it, I’d be up long ago and working.”
    “You and dogs. Can’t ignore them though, can we? In distress.”
    She pulled a chair close to the daybed and Anna sat up on her elbows. “Breagh, there’s a brush in the bathroom there … please?”
    “Sure, dear.”
    Anna brushed out her tangled hair, then wrapped the quilts around her and sat up. She sipped the tea, wishing for the taste of rum in it. Crows were squabbling outside for the bread and stale cookies she had tossed out yesterday.
    “This won’t send you back home, will it?” Breagh said, seated with her tea.
    That had tracked last night through Anna’s wakings, a great excuse to pack up, give it up and go, she was half-sick, wasn’t she, who knew what she’d be like in the morning? Yet here she was, sitting on the edge of the daybed, groggy but talking with this young woman from up the road. Did Breagh guess? The woman had a driving energy, you could tell, she’d move ahead regardless, she didn’t spend time sifting her past, Anna was sure of that. “When I’m just getting used to things … like swimming in March?”
    Breagh laughed. “You know what you need in that tea, dear? Some rum.”
    “Oh, do I. But how?”
    “No spirits?”
    “Brandy. A little bottle.”
    “We’ll go for that then.”
    “I should get dressed. I feel worthless.”
    “Stay there, I’ll fetch it.”
    The Courvoisier Melissa had slipped into her suitcase (you’ll need it, honey, take it, it’s winter there) Breagh poured generously into their tea and Anna had to admit after two swallows it was worth the lift. Their conversation warmed along with the kitchen. Anna asked about her family.
    “I’m adopted,” Breagh said quickly, as if to get it out of the way. “I grew up in North Sydney. We used to come out here now and again, summers like. Winter sometimes, if the road was broken. Visit Uncle Murdock. He was good to us, my stepsister and me. I don’t know my dad, my mom gave me up and went west somewhere. Must be in the blood or something. Lorna’s dad? Don’t