Anna awoke with a tense, slight gasp as her unpleasant dreams came to an end. She raised a hand to her head as panic turned to dread. It was Sunday and Mr. Bates had asked her to walk with him to church. Her head ached and she felt ill, but she had turned him down last week because of a headache and couldn't snub him twice. Better to get it over with. She lifted herself and scooted back against the headboard and a sudden bout of nausea gripped her. With no time to drape her dressing gown around her she sprinted from her room and down the hall and quickly emptied the contents of her stomach in the women's lavatory. As her body began to recover she lifted her head and stared into the reflection she saw in the looking glass. Her bloodshot, tired eyes swelled with tears at the force of her body retching and white fingers ghosted over her mouth as she wiped it clean. She rinsed her mouth and resettled her hair.

It dawned on her then. Her cycle had passed. In the stress of keeping the secret, of avoiding Mr. Bates and Mrs. Hughes's worried looks, she hadn't given a thought to the prospect of being pregnant. She hadn't thought it possible. Especially after trying so long with her husband and nothing to show for it. It couldn't be.

Her hand began to shake as she gripped the sink. It couldn't be. "No. It couldn't be happening to me." Slowly her countenance crumbled and she sank down against the closed bathroom door in a flood of emotion. This was the end. After all she had been through with John, his previous wife, his jail sentence and conviction, their struggle to have a child of their own. This was how it would end?

She let herself dissolve into the cold black and white tiles of the floor, the white paint of the walls that was peeling away at the corners with age. Her hair once again coming free from it's neat braid and sticking to her face and neck, wet with tears. She didn't know how long she had been there; perhaps it was hours or merely minutes. She got up slowly, her head pounding from her body's exertion. She straightened her nightgown, tucked her hair back into place and swept her tears away. Taking a deep breath she opened the door and returned to her room.

As she walked away the door at the far end of the hall creaked open. Daisy could just barely make out a figure walking down the hall in the early morning light. Shadows cast an eerie light against the white walls of the bathroom at the end of the hall. She had heard something. It sounded as if someone had been ill. The figure moved with a heavy step and hunched shoulders as if under a heavy blanket. The figure entered one of the servant's rooms and Daisy noted that it must be Anna, she had recently moved back to the Abbey due to both Lady Mary and Lady Grantham needing a lady's maid.

As the figure closed the door Daisy lingered with her head peaking out, wondering if there was more to the figure than early morning sleepiness.