George Viccars is Eyam’s apprentice tailor, Anna’s lodger, and eventually her suitor. Having lived in London, he seems experienced and cosmopolitan to the villagers, which makes him attractive to Anna. He’s also kind to her sons and could introduce them to the lucrative tailoring trade. Anna’s incipient sexual desire for George helps rouse her from the emotional lethargy into which she drifted after the death of her husband, Sam, but their courtship is cut short when the plague arrives (carried in bolts of cloth George ordered from London) and makes him its first casualty.