'Here we go again!' The Doctor thumped the side of the TARDIS affectionately and flounced out into the room lit by a beam of sunlight. Lucie followed more cautiously. She took in the crowded furnishings, revolting carpet, and scattered papers on the desk, and groaned. 'Not Victorian again!'

'Why, don't you like it?'

'We've done this before!' Lucie stepped out, and the door creaked closed behind her. 'Last time we nearly died!' The TARDIS had parked itself neatly in what was apparently the study, attached to a small bedroom and living room. A chemical bench took up most of the wall beneath the window, and the decor was quietly opulent.

The Doctor waltzed into the next room, the larger door of which presumably led to the corridor. 'We'd better find out whose house this is before they - oh, hello!'

He pulled up short as the door handle jerked, but at the sound of his voice the person on the other side stopped still. Meeting Lucie's eyes mischievously, the Doctor also waited, signalling for her to be quiet. Lucie sighed and leaned against the connecting door frame.

Presently a thin, upper-class accent drifted through the wood. 'Is... Is someone there?'

The Doctor winced, all teasing gone. 'I'm afraid so. Don't worry,' he added quickly, injecting lightness into his tone. 'We're here by accident. Me and my friend.'

There was a pause, then tentatively, the handle turned again. Curious despite herself, Lucie stepped forward to stand a little behind the Doctor as the door opened slowly, and a young man inserted himself in the gap. Lucie sized him up: he was in his twenties, wearing a pale grey suit, very thin and fragile-looking, and the paleness of his skin made his lips and eyes stand out. His gaze darted between the two of them and then back to the incongruous blue box nestled between a filing cabinet and the bookcase, and he staggered back into the doorframe.

The Doctor leapt forwards as Lucie did. 'Steady!' She caught the young man's left arm as the Doctor took hold of his right, but to her amazement he came to and tried to shake them off. 'No!'

The Doctor let go, raising his palms peacefully, but Lucie persisted. The young man was clearly astounded by their appearance - as well he should be! - and didn't look at all well. As she pulled on his arm, the thin hand of which was holding onto a cane as though his life depended on it, he stumbled forwards, and abruptly she was holding all his weight. She cried out, alarmed; the Doctor came to her aid, and between them they managed to stabilise him. The door had swung shut in the scuffle.

He shook them off with more purpose, tossing his head to clear his fair hair from his face. 'I'd be obliged if you could give me at least one reason why I shouldn't call for the police,' he said tightly.

The Doctor tilted his head. 'Easily, but I doubt you would believe me. I'm the Doctor, and this is my friend Lucie. As I said, our presence here is purely accidental. We travel, you see, and sometimes our form of transport is a little... erratic.'

'That's putting it mildly,' added Lucie.

The initial anger of the young man had disappeared now that the intruders in his room were not demanding money or papers, and he was shaking. He took refuge in formula and gestured with his free hand to the suite near the fireplace. 'Please...'

The Doctor quirked a brow, discreetly shooed Lucie onto the sofa, and watched as their accidental host limped heavily to a chair and sank down. He shoved the cane beneath it and flashed a wan smile. Lucie felt herself warming to him. 'I... You gave me quite a turn. People don't just materialise in one's room every day of the week, and...' A thread of bitterness came into his voice. 'And I've not been so strong recently.'

'I am a doctor,' said the Doctor gently, sitting down himself and leaning forwards.

The young man shook his head a little too quickly. 'No, thank you. I'll be fine.' He put his head in his hands briefly, as if to reassure himself he was still there, and emerged again with calm eyes. 'I'm sorry, I was forgetting myself. My name is Elliot Delamir.'

'Delamir...' The Doctor's eyes had gone vacant. 'Why is that familiar...?'

'My father is the younger brother of the present Earl Delamir,' offered Elliot, who was trying not to stare curiously at Lucie's trousers and sweatshirt.

'Bear with me.' The Doctor sprang up and crossed the room again, disappearing into the TARDIS.

Elliot looked back at Lucie in surprise. She shrugged. 'I don't know. I can't read his mind.'

He seemed amused. 'Forgive me, but you intrigue me. You speak with a northern accent but I have never seen a woman dressed as you are, not even in Yorkshire.'

Lucie laughed. 'They're all savages out that side of the Pennines anyway. I'm from... a long way away. It's like your Lancashire there, but very different.' A brief spurt of homesickness caught her off guard. Elliot was watching her with very blue eyes, and she smiled self-consciously. 'Huh, it's not really anything special, but it's home.'

'Do you miss it?'

'Sometimes. But with him around it's hard to think about.' She jerked a finger in the direction of the TARDIS. Elliot nodded, apparently struck by shyness, and sat back. Lucie sought for a change of topic. 'What happened to your leg?'

He coloured instantly and glared at her. She blushed. 'I'm sorry. Forget I asked; it doesn't matter.'

His gaze softened with a slight shrug. 'It's not an unreasonable question.' He was silent for a moment, then spoke with his bright eyes fixed firmly on the rug. 'When I said I've not been strong recently, I didn't mean recently. I meant ever. My leg w... was paralysed when I had polio, when I was fourteen.'

'I'm sorry,' murmured Lucie, her mind flashing in another direction. That Teabing bloke had had polio, in Da Vinci Code, but he was wearing leg braces. Elliot wasn't – surely he'd have an easier time if he did. Then again, she wasn't sure if they'd been invented yet. The running game called polio she'd played as a child seemed cruel now.

Elliot tipped his head back against the chair and seemed to be struggling with some emotion. 'I... When I was born they said I wouldn't last the night. Then they gave me a month. Then a year.'

'You've had a hard time of it,' said Lucie, honestly impressed. If he was really as sickly as he seemed, it was a miracle he hadn't died of flu or something by now.

The cynical smile reappeared. 'I didn't mean to tell you that, I'm sorry.'

'Well you shouldn't just bottle it all up, if it really affects you that much.'

His eyes narrowed again. 'It doesn't affect me.'

'Oh yeah?' Lucie was seized by frustration. 'So why were you wriggling like that if it doesn't? Why did you look daggers at me when I mentioned your leg? There, you just did it again! There's no shame in being weaker than everyone else if you can't help it! You'll get an inferiority thingymajig if you carry on like this. Isn't there someone you can talk to?'

'I'd just be a burden to them,' he retorted sulkily.

'You wouldn't if they really cared,' she shot back.

Breathing shallowly and heavily, he turned away, resting his head on his fists with his elbows on his knees. Lucie sat back, wondering vaguely what gave her the right to lecture at him like this, and coming up with the reason that he was bloody well asking for it, being such a bundle of exposed nerves and self-consciousness. An awkward mood settled, and lasted for some minutes.

Elliot stirred, and was about to speak when the Doctor re-emerged from the TARDIS, a bundle of papers in his hand. There was an odd mixture of delight and sadness in his features. 'Mr Delamir, I— Have you two been arguing?'

Lucie blinked. 'How can you tell?'

'It leaves a taste in the air,' he answered, grinning cheekily. 'Well I hope you agreed to differ on whatever it was. No? Well, we can't part like that, now can we? Come on, all's well that ends well!'

Lucie met Elliot's gaze again as he looked up. 'I'm sorry, Elliot, I shouldn't have laid into you like that.'

His eyes went wide. 'Oh, no, if anything I should be thanking you for speaking the truth to me. So few people do.' He smiled wryly. 'Even if your delivery was a little forceful.'

Lucie smiled back at him, and the Doctor beamed. 'Excellent! Now, speaking of deliveries Mr Delamir, I think you should have these. I promised to give them to you a long time ago, and I must apologise for the delay.'

Elliot's brow creased in confusion as he accepted the bundle, which consisted of about ten envelopes held together with a navy blue ribbon. 'Thank you, Doctor, but how...?'

The Doctor caught Lucie's eye and rubbed his hands together. 'I think we've taken up enough of your time, my dear sir, so we'd better be off.'

'If you insist,' said Elliot, sounding disappointed. He stretched to put the letters on the low table and stood up, leaning on the arm of the chair for support whilst he scrabbled around for his stick. 'Won't you take some refreshment before you go?' he asked, managing to infuse the polite request with a note of longing.

' 'Fraid not.' The Doctor shook Elliot's hand cordially in both of his own. 'Thank you for your hospitality, especially at such ridiculously late notice.'

'It was a pleasure.' Elliot seemed to be coming up on the upswing of his earlier plunge of mood, and when Lucie offered her hand to shake, he hesitated. His thin fingers were still shaking slightly as he twisted his hand to take hers in a different grip, and gently kissed her fingers. The Doctor raised his eyebrows and nudged her, and Lucie blushed furiously. 'Thank you,' she managed.

Elliot smiled warmly and took a lop-sided step towards the door. He stopped and turned when they didn't follow. 'You are staying?'

The Doctor grinned. 'Ah, no, but we'll be leaving in a more ah... unorthodox way. As a scientist you may find this a little hard to believe, Mr Delamir.'

Intrigued, Elliot limped after them as they went into the study, and stood at the door, watching. The Doctor waved cheekily as he followed Lucie into the TARDIS, and closed the door.

'What were those letters?' asked Lucie, unable to restrain her curiosity any longer. 'Who gave them to you?'

The Doctor sobered, crossing to the controls. 'Normally Lucie, I dislike being a go-between, but if there's one thing guaranteed to get my sympathies, it's a life destined to be cut short.' He turned on the screen, and they watched Elliot Delamir as he watched the TARDIS. 'I knew his name from two things. One was the sender of the letters. And the other was a graveyard, not too far in the future.'

'He dies?' blurted Lucie, staring.

'You all die, Lucie,' the Doctor said gently. 'He will have that wonderful Victorian epitaph for the weak and sickly. "Affliction sore long time I bore, Physicians were in vain, Till God did please to give me ease, And release me from my pain." '

Despite all her anger with his weakness, she felt nothing but pure, helpless pity. 'Isn't there something we can do? Take him to the twentieth century or something where they could cure him?' Even as she spoke she knew it was impossible.

The Doctor shook his head. 'That's the way it has to be. The letters were written to him by a women he loved, and who had to leave London. It would have made a wonderful novel – she was a widow, you see, and her husband was presumed dead, but one day he just turned up, out of the blue, and swept her off. She loved Elliot, but their courtship never really got off the ground, due to timidity on both parts.'

'Oh my God that's so sad... And he's so lovely once you get past his stupid shyness. '

The Doctor twirled a few switches solemnly, and Lucie had a fleeting glimpse of Elliot's upturned face, eyes wide with disbelief, as the TARDIS vanished. She smiled despite herself. 'Well, that'll give him something to think about, anyway.'

Elliot limped unsteadily back into the small living room with a pounding heart. Normally he would have dismissed his impossible visitors as the product of a sleep-deprivation, or stress, but the proof of it was sitting on the table, as real as the polished wood. He dropped into the chair again, resting his cane on the edge this time, and reached for the bundle with quivering hands. The envelopes were addressed in rather plain block capitals, but when he opened the first and drew out the letter within, a familiar, looping hand and gentle scent struck him simultaneously, and he gasped for breath. How on earth had the Doctor...? Did he know?

His hands were shaking too violently to hold the paper still, so he pinned it to the chair arm instead with his fingers.

'My dearest Elliot...'