Re: The Lieutenant/The Daughter
"No." Frances scoffed, the sound a glimmer of impatience that played with her amusement. "It's not mine. I found it here." That she could go get drinks in a proper fashion up in the bar car or the piano car wasn't lost on her. But, that came with a lot of expectation. And, someone might tell Mother. "I'm neither. It's just not particularly ladylike to drink from the bottle, and I prefer it that way." She did. The burn of it was something she enjoyed, probably only because she wasn't supposed to, but she didn't care about that. Not right now. In any case, the soldier was looking at her skirt and that was about as warming as a swig of any long-lost sherry.
The air seemed to cool at the sight of the... whatever it was, however. He did. The nameless man. It was something that mesmerized him, that he handled as if it might suddenly combust. But, if it was that dangerous, she wouldn't be here, right? Frances dropped the bulb of light back down. It bobbed to the cylinder and followed it until the soldier closed the bag. It wasn't blood. It was, he told her, nothing. But, it wasn't nothing. It was something.
It felt like there was a hook in her belly and no air in her lungs. She drew up to the man, a new line of worry between her brows. The expression was outsized on her face. "You can put it back." No one needed to be a hero here. In a skim of skirts, she turned again. She probably smacked him in the face with her hair a second time, but she was pushing toward the back of the car. An awareness was trying to break through. Like a persistent, but gestating idea, it kept tugged at Frances. But, it was still blurry. She didn't know what it was. At the end of the carriage, she turned again, this time to shine the light back on the solider. "We can go." It was wildness and insanity and none of it made much sense, but she held her hand out to him anyway. The empty one. "Put it back and we can go."