The familiar flickers of candlelight bouncing off the walls seemed jolly, homey, comforting. It was the same nighttime routine as always. Candles being caught up, lit, taken up stairs to guide the way to rooms. The same laughter that showed in its breathy quietness the relief of a day over. The eyes lightheartedly rolled when they were always a candle or two short.
Mrs. Hughes smiled distractedly. She was trying to decide whether to wait up for Mr. Carson or make her own way up the now dark stairs. She had just settled on the way to her pantry when Lord Grantham made a near silent entrance to the servants' kitchen. The time for her surprise was so brief it could not be measured by any clock; it was rapidly replaced by alarm at the Lord's face.
"Mrs. Hughes, I just received a telegram. There's been a train accident."
Dread suffused with a near-hysterical hopefulness warmed her unnaturally. She waited, her eyes shouting the question that her throat could not.
"It was Carson's train."
