There was a picture of Tully, mugging for the camera, tilting up an empty champagne glass. She looked gorgeous in a black Chanel dress and glittery, beaded shrug. Below the photograph, it read: Tallulah Hart at a gala charity event at the Chateau Marmont, with her date, media tycoon Thomas Morgan.

The door opened. Dr. Marcia Silver stepped into the room. “Hey, there, Kate. It’s good to see you again.” Sitting down on her wheeled stool, she glided forward, reading Kate’s chart. “So, is there anything you want to tell me?”

“My husband thinks I’m depressed.”

“Are you?”

Kate shrugged. “A little blue maybe.”

Marcia made a note in the chart. “It’s been almost exactly twelve months since your last appointment. Way to go.”

“You know us Catholic girls. Rule-followers.”

Marcia smiled and closed the chart, reaching for her gloves. “Okay, Kate, we’ll start with the pap smear. Slide on down to the end here . . .”

For the next few minutes Kate gave herself over to the little indignities that came with female health care: the speculum, the probing, the sampling. All the while she and Dr. Silver made stilted, impersonal conversation. They talked about the weather, the latest show at the 5th Avenue Theater, and the approaching holidays.

It wasn’t until nearly thirty minutes later, when the exam had moved to her breasts, that Marcia actually stopped making chitchat. “How long have you had this discoloration on your breast?”

Kate glanced down at the quarter-sized red patch beneath her right nipple. The skin was slightly puckered like an orange peel. “Nine months or so. Maybe a year, come to think of it. It started as a bug bite. My family doctor thought it was an infection and put me on antibiotics. It went away for a while and then came back. Sometimes it feels hot—that’s how I know it’s an infection.”

Marcia stared down at Kate’s breast, frowning. Kate added: “I had my mammogram on time. Everything was clean.”

“I see that.” Marcia went to the wall phone, punched in a number, and said, “I want to get Kate in for a breast ultrasound. Now. Tell them to fit her in. Thanks.” She hung up and turned around.

Kate sat up. “You’re scaring me, Marcia.”

“I hope it’s nothing, Kate, but I want to be sure, okay?”

“But what—”

“Let’s talk when we know what’s going on. Janis will take you down to radiology. Okay? Is your husband here?”

“Should he be?”

“No. I’m sure it’s fine. Oh, here’s Janis.”

Kate’s mind was a whirl. Before she knew it, she was dressed again and being shepherded up three floors and down the hall. There, after an interminable wait, she endured another breast exam, more clucking and frowning, and an ultrasound.

“I always do my self-exams,” she said. “I haven’t felt a lump.”