The doctors had removed it six weeks before, after discovering a gray, roundish mass on the right anterior lobe. The mass, about the size of an old farthing, proved to be cancerous; the lab report classified it as medulary thyroid carcinoma, a relatively rare form of cancer that was often hereditary and more often caused by radiation. The origin in her case was not known; she hadn’t bothered taking the genetic test because she had no siblings or offspring to warn and decided, quite sensibly, that the cause made little difference to her. There was no treatment or cure beyond surgery. Her prognosis could be estimated from the two different survival charts included with the material she received while preparing for surgery. Depending on which graph one preferred to consult, either 78 or 91 percent of patients in similar circumstances lived five years after the discovery of their disease; ten-year survival was either 61 or 75 percent. Given her young age, Cardha was more likely to fall in the positive end of either curve; there was much reason for optimism. But numbers and percentages told you nothing about your future, and much less about yourself. They told you nothing about fear, and failed miserably to track the daily ironies of “getting on with things,” as the pamphlets implored.

Such as the daily irony of the small blue pill. Without it, she became depressed and couldn’t concentrate. Taking it made her head buzz, but forget to take it and she felt as if her skin were made of tissue paper. She slid a pill out from the bottle and pressed it onto her tongue, washing it down with two sips of grapefruit juice.

Cardha had barely swallowed when she sneezed. It was a scratchy sort of sneeze, the kind that presaged a cold.

Not what she needed this week. She had a job interview tomorrow at the Playhouse. It was a small position as assistant house manager, but she wanted it badly, part of her campaign for a new start, a fresh go, propelled by her cancer and the realization that she might very well die soon.

The phone rang. As Cardha reached for it she had a premonition that it was about Ed and his wife, the ghastly murderess. So she wasn’t surprised when the inspector introduced himself.

“Of course, Inspector Gorrie, I’ll tell you everything I know,” she said. “I have a doctor’s appointment in a half hour. Could you stop by after that?”

The inspector consulted his appointment book. He had a few other matters to attend to. First thing tomorrow morning?

Before the operation, she would have agreed, risking the job interview or even rearranging her plans to meet the inspector. But now she felt stubborn—nothing, not even Ed Mackay, God rest his soul but damn him at the same time, would take her off course.

“The next day perhaps?” she asked.

The inspector agreed and rang off after receiving directions.