Sax was still thinking about this, sitting in a corner absorbed in his wristpad, reading a collection of abstracts from recent experimental work on the memory, when there came a thump from the kitchen and a cry from Nadia. Sax rushed in to find Nadia and Art crouched over Michel, who lay white-faced on the floor. Sax called the concierge, and faster than he would have imagined possible an emergency crew had barged in with their equipment and shouldered Art aside, big young natives who brusquely encased Michel into their compact web of machinery, leaving the old ones as spectators only of their friend’s— struggle.

Sax sat down among the medics, in their way, and put a hand to Michel’s neck and shoulder. Michel’s breathing had stopped, his pulse as well. White-faced. The resuscitation attempts were violent, the electrical shocks tried at a variety of strengths, the subsequent shift to heart-lung machine accomplished with a minimum of fuss; and the young medics worked in near silence, talking among themselves only when necessary, seemingly unaware of the old ones sitting against the wall. They did all they could; but Michel remained stubbornly, mysteriously dead.

Of course he had been upset by Maya’s memory failure. But this did not seem an adequate explanation. He had already been aware of Maya’s problem, none more so, and he had been worried; so any single display of her problem shouldn’t have mattered. A coincidence. A bad one. And of course eventually— quite late that evening, actually, after the doctors had finally given up, and taken Michel downstairs, and were clearing out their equipment— Maya returned, and they had to tell her what had happened.

She was distraught, naturally. Her shock and anguish were too much for one of the young medics, who tried to comfort her (that won’t work, Sax wanted to say, I’ve tried that myself) and got himself struck in the face for his pains, which made him angry; he went out in the hall, sat down heavily.

Sax went out and sat beside him. He was weeping.

“I can’t do this anymore,” the man said after a while. He shook his head, seemingly apologetic. “It’s pointless. We come and do all we can and it makes no difference. Nothing stops the quick decline.”

“Which is?” Sax said.

The young man shrugged his massive shoulders, sniffed. “That’s the problem. No one knows.”

“Surely there must be theories? Autopsies?”

“Heart arrhythmia,” said one of the other medics curtly as he passed by with some equipment.

“That’s just the symptom,” the sitting man snarled, and sniffed again. “Why does it go arrhythmic? And why doesn’t CPR restart it?”

No one answered.

Another mystery to be solved. Through the door Sax could see Maya crying on the couch, Nadia beside her like a statue of Nadia. Suddenly Sax realized that even if he found an explanation, Michel would still be dead.