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made a face. ‘I was afraid you’d say that.’

      ‘I can easily check it in your file.’

      ‘No, I know perfectly well I’m due for one.’

      ‘The mammography screening unit at Southshore Health Centre would be the easiest place to go.’

      ‘Will I have to wait? I’d really like to have it over with before the wedding.’

      ‘That shouldn’t be a problem. But do you really hate it so much? It doesn’t hurt very badly, does it?’

      ‘Spoken like a man,’ she teased. ‘Yes, it does hurt a fair bit, especially if you have largish breasts, on top of which it’s not remotely dignified. Oh, I’ll be glad I’ve done it, but it’s not exactly something to look forward to.’

      ‘I suppose not,’ he agreed on a laugh. ‘Rest assured, though, we males of the species have our own unique and painful medical indignities to endure!’

      ‘True,’ she conceded.

      The rest of the afternoon’s patients were routine, with some more interesting than others. After over twenty years in general practice, Marshall was used to the rhythm and flow of the work. If he’d been a composer, he could have written a piece of music to express it.

      Intertwining pastoral melodies for all those rather benign things like children’s ear infections, annual flu shots, blood-pressure measurements. The interest lay in the way he got to know his patients year by year as he watched the wheels of their lives slowly turn. Patients he’d known as children were now grown up and married with families of their own. Patients he’d first seen in their fifties were now making decisions about retirement homes.

      Then there would be plodding underbeat for the cases that few doctors could find interesting. Patients who came once to have a cut stitched or an ear syringed and were never seen again. People who needed a medical examination for work or insurance purposes and had phoned this practice purely because it was on a list of approved ones in the area.

      There would be a burst of joyful song for wanted pregnancies, good test results, serious illnesses cured. And, finally, there’d be the keening of violins for the patients that broke your heart.

      Like Hilde Deutschkron. He’d spoken to her surgeon on Tuesday morning. Today was Thursday, and she’d been discharged from the hospital this morning as planned.

      After his last office appointment for the day, Marshall drove to her small house several streets back from the beach at Bondi and knocked at the front door.

      Mrs Deutschkron’s daughter, Marianne, answered. She was an attractive dark-haired woman of about thirty-eight, and Marshall had seen her a few times years ago for minor illnesses when she’d still been living at home. Since then, she’d led an interesting life as a journalist, with several stints of living and working overseas. She wasn’t married, and he was pleased to find that she’d taken time off work to help her mother convalesce. Mrs Deutschkron’s two sons lived in Melbourne and he knew she got lonely at times.

      ‘How are you, Marianne?’ he said. ‘I don’t suppose you remember me…’

      ‘Of course I do, Dr Irwin!’ she said with a confident smile. ‘How could I forget the man who came at me with a cauterising thingy that time I had that strange lump on my little finger that kept bleeding if I bumped it?’

      ‘That’s right,’ he said. ‘I’d forgotten all about that. We never really decided what it was, did we? The cauterising didn’t work, I remember, and it came back. You had to have it cut out under local anaesthetic at Southshore Hospital.’

      ‘I’m amazed you remember!’

      ‘Only because it stumped me, and the doctors at Southshore, too. Did it ever come back after the surgery?’

      ‘No, but I still have the scar.’ She stuck her little finger up in the air, then lowered her voice and said, ‘Come through. Mum’s on the couch, though I think she should really be in bed. She’s not feeling very good, and she’s anxious to hear your report. Do you have all the results or whatever everyone was waiting for?’

      ‘Yes, I do,’ he said, following her down the rather dark corridor. ‘Uh, would it be too much trouble to ask for some tea?’

      ‘Of course not. Straight away?’

      ‘If you don’t mind.’

      Marianne nodded, and he saw that she understood. There was a brief flare of well-schooled alarm in her eyes. Marshall didn’t really need tea, but he wanted to break the news to Mrs Deutschkron alone. He had no doubt she’d need her daughter later, but for those first few moments…

      ‘Hello, Mrs Deutschkron!’ he said, coming into the thickly decorated sitting-room. There was a floral lounge suite, photos and knick-knacks everywhere, two shelves of books, vases of silk flowers, and all of it immaculately dust-free. ‘Marianne says you’re not feeling too good?’

      ‘Would you be?’ she retorted weakly. She’d lost weight since he’d last seen her, just before the surgery, and it was starting to show in the loose fit of her clothing, though there had been a time, long before he’d known her, when she had been far, far thinner than this.

      ‘You have some news for me, don’t you?’ It came out abruptly, coloured by the accent she hadn’t lost even after more than fifty years away from her native Germany.

      ‘Yes, I do.’ He sat down in the armchair at right angles to the couch where she lay, her legs and torso covered in a mohair blanket. ‘And not good news, I’m afraid.’

      He knew she wouldn’t appreciate prevarication. Even his tiny pause now was pounced on.

      ‘Don’t keep me in suspense, then!’

      ‘There was cancer throughout your liver, and the surgeon was unable to locate the primary tumour. That means the cancer didn’t originate in the liver. It has metastasised from a primary tumour elsewhere. Chemotherapy is an option for you, but it won’t be a cure. It’ll give you several more months, that’s all. I’m sorry, Hilde, there’s no easy way to say this.’

      She’d taken a sharp in-breath as she’d understood the truth, and now she was nodding slowly. ‘I’m dying, then.’

      ‘Yes. It was a surprise. Had you been feeling more discomfort and pain than you told me about?’

      ‘Ach! Pain!’ she said dismissively. ‘It’s relative, isn’t it? Where’s Marianne? You sent her off to the kitchen, didn’t you?’

      ‘Yes, I did.’

      ‘Thank you…’

      They could both hear the rattle of bone china teacups on their matching saucers, and the sound of cupboard doors opening and shutting. ‘Shall I call her in?’ Marshall asked.

      ‘No, let her wait for the kettle. I’ll just…digest this.’

      She sat in silence, thinking, and he waited, wondering whether to reach out and touch her hand. He decided after a moment that she wouldn’t appreciate it, and stayed where he was.

      Then she looked up. ‘So, may I articulate this situation more precisely?’

      ‘Of course, Hilde. Any questions, anything at all…’

      ‘I’m seventy-two years old. I am dying from a cancer that has spread throughout my body. I can choose to let death come soon…How soon?’

      ‘A few months,’ he offered. ‘Three or four, perhaps. It’s very hard to say.’

      ‘Or, by having a course of chemotherapy, I can live longer. Again, how much longer?’

      ‘Three or four months more. I’m sorry, it’s so hard to be specific. Everyone is different.’

      ‘The chemotherapy will make me sick.’

      ‘Probably.’

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