Yes, I gaze with envy on them because my blood tests have revealed that my own erythrocytes are not flourishing as they should under my drug regime. My condition is refractory, that is to say, it is not responding to treatment. The word sounds like a mixture of recalcitrant and fractious. As if the disease is folding its arms and stamping away to sulk in a corner. The best thing you can do with a small boy in this mood is to put on the wireless and carry on with your tasks, humming along to the melodies and pausing occasionally to give the boy a kiss (growlingly shaken off) or a stroke of the hair (angry little head ducks away). But I do not know what blandishments I can offer my leukemia. This being the case, I will, for the time being, ignore it.

The kind woman’s husband had been right. He’d said that it would be “a change of scene for you,” and so it was. It was soothing to be in a house I’d never been pregnant in. To look at a garden where I’d never imagined Catherine playing.

I started to visit about once every month or so. I never saw the husband on any of these occasions. I sat at ease with his wife, sobbed, and spoke and it might be sobbing or speech that was preponderant but you could hardly tell, they were so intermingled. It didn’t matter. Gradually the speech outwon the sobs and in the end I stumbled onto the subject of James. I had to talk to someone, and I didn’t dare confide in anyone at Alver Shore, not even the nicest of women. I couldn’t start unburdening myself to these friendly souls about the vicar of their parish.

I began with the Camp Coffee incident that had originally brought me to her door.

“It was when he promised to do better,” I said. “Do better in talking about Catherine. You see, the old James would never have needed to promise to talk about Catherine. The idea would have been absurd, that she would be a special chore he had to remember.”

“He must be protecting himself.” Her tone was speculative.

“Yes. Like a crab. I know he’s somewhere inside,” I concluded, heaving a great sigh. “Too sad to come out. Or maybe too angry. How was your husband, Bridie, after it happened to you?”

We had been on first-name terms for a while.