On the drive home, Marissa’s excitement rose. Four cases of isolated TB salpingitis took her case out of the realm of anomaly and suggested a possible trend of public health importance.

Marissa pulled directly into the garage, then exited through the garage door to meet Wendy, who’d parked in the driveway. They entered the house through the front door.

“Nice house,” Wendy said as she followed Marissa down a corridor into her study.

“Think so?” Marissa said without enthusiasm. “It had been Robert’s house before we were married. To tell you the truth, I’ve never liked it.”

Marissa went straight to her Rolodex for Cyrill Dubchek’s home telephone number. “I’m calling one of the CDC department heads,” Marissa explained. “We were involved for a little while during my last year at the CDC. He’s quite an attractive man.”

Marissa found the number and propped the file open with a letter opener.

“Didn’t work out?” Wendy asked.

Marissa shook her head. “It was a stormy relationship from the start. The ironic part is that our major disagreement was over children. He’d had several before his wife died. He wasn’t interested in any more. Obviously that was before I knew about my fallopian tubes.”

Marissa punched the number on her telephone, then waited for the connection to go through. “It’s quite a story,” she said. “We were at loggerheads during my first couple of months at the center. Then there was romance. At the end we’d evolved into being good friends. Life is unpredictable.”

Wendy started to say something, but Marissa hushed her with a raised hand, indicating Cyrill had answered.

The first part of the call was friendly chitchat. Finally Marissa got around to the reason for her call. “Cyrill,” she said, “I have a doctor friend sitting with me and I’m going to put you on the speakerphone.” Marissa pushed the appropriate button. “Can you hear me?”

Cyrill’s voice filled the room as he responded in the affirmative.

Marissa got to the point. “Have you heard any talk around the center of TB salpingitis, like a relatively recent upswing in cases?”

“Not that I can recall offhand,” Cyrill said. “Why do you ask?”

“I have reason to believe that there are four such cases up here in Boston. All in relatively young women, and all without any apparent nidus of infection elsewhere, particularly nothing in the lungs.”

“What do you mean by ‘relatively young women’?” Cyrill asked.

“Late twenties, early to mid-thirties,” Marissa answered.

“That’s a little old for a pediatrician to be treating,” Cyrill said. “How have these cases come to your attention?”

Marissa smiled. “I should have known I couldn’t be cagey with you, Cyrill,” she said. “The fact of the matter is that I’m one of the infected. I’ve been involved with in-vitro fertilization for almost a year. Tonight I discovered three other women with the same unusual diagnosis.”