“Simple.” He cut off the nurse with a curt word, and I suddenly had some idea of the nature of their disagreements. “It’s a simple favor we can do for one in our care.”

“With all due respect, Dr. Turner, we cannot leave her here all night. It isn’t safe.” Nurse Branson, the one who’d shown me in, moved past him and gripped the woman’s arm. “Come along, now.”

Panicked, Mary Jo twisted away. The doctor moved to intervene, but the patient fought them both and landed in a tangle of nightclothes and limbs on the ground. They struggled to help her rise and held firm to her on each side.

I moved closer, gathering courage. “Here.” I pretended to scoop papers off the floor, holding them out to Mary Jo, who was now locked between nurse and doctor. “What if I hold the music for you?” She stared, and no one moved. “It’s all right, I’m a musician too.”

She watched, her one eye focused on me while the other wandered off to the side, and she smiled, spreading the tight triangle of her nose. She straightened and attempted to lift her imaginary bow, and when they released her arms, she began to play.

Dr. Turner watched her, then he turned his gaze on me with warm, steady approval. At close range, I noticed a trace of whiskers spread over his pale cheeks, a slight bump in the bridge of his nose. Everything about him breathed welcome and authenticity. We stood facing one another, several feet apart as the woman played on. Yet it felt for all the world as if we were waltzing together, his Bach cello solo paired with my Chopin piece, right there in the ward—which was suddenly not so dark.

When the odd music faded, Mary Jo stroked the imaginary instrument lovingly, and then, to the shock of us all, she thrust it toward Dr. Turner. “You play, Doctor.”

“Very well.” He turned his shirt cuffs up as if he took this quite seriously, and lifted the violin and bow, positioning them in a manner not entirely awkward for a novice. Then he moved his hand back and forth across the invisible strings, drawing out a song one could almost hear.

The room fell quiet, watchful faces turned toward the man in the center, drinking in the music he exuded without a sound. He had an otherworldly bearing, this man—someone who had one foot planted on earth and one in heaven, with an equal number of beloved people in each. I didn’t know what to make of him.

Mary Jo had sunk into calm, eyes closed, body swaying along with the doctor’s music.

At last, the silent concert was interrupted. “Dr. Turner,” whispered Nurse Branson, with a look of deep significance. “I think it’s time for a move.”