Still moving forward, she consulted her phone again. This time, she noticed all the messages crammed together in overlapping oblong shapes on the home screen. Mildred must be worried about her. Of course Mildred was worried about her! She’d expected Compton to be home half a day ago, and it had never occurred to Compton, in the midst of all the carnage, to stop and call her sitter.

Hurriedly, she opened up the phone app and punched the button for Mildred. It rang and rang and rang, and just as Compton was about to hang up, Mildred answered.

“Hello? Compton? Is that you?”

“Yes,” Compton shouted, although there was no longer a need to shout. She made a conscious effort to modulate her voice back to normal levels. “Mildred, I am so sorry. I’ll be home as soon as I can.”

“Compton.” Mildred sounded strange. Maybe she was mad? For the love of all that’s holy, don’t let her be angry enough to quit. With Ellis gone, Mildred, who was single and lived in their building, had agreed to stay on in her job, and if she left, Compton had no one else to watch the children. “Have you seen the news?”

“No, I haven’t seen anything. I’m leaving work now, I . . .” Compton trailed off. “What happened?”

“They called in the National Guard. They’re closing the subways soon. No one is allowed to leave.”

“What?” Compton stared around, wild-eyed. “How will people eat?”

“They’re going to allow food banks in every borough. Multiple locations, one every couple blocks, I think. You can go out to one of those. And people in certain jobs can go out. Your job is one of them. There’s a list. But that’s it.”

“Oh my God.” Compton stopped walking, standing still in the middle of Broadway. It didn’t matter; there was only one visible vehicle for two blocks in either direction, a gray sedan. “So many people are going to die.”

“They’re saying the hospitals can’t take anyone else. Is that true?”

Compton’s weary mind flashed backward a few hours. “Yes,” she said simply.

She could hardly hear Mildred’s next question. “Is this the end of New York?”