"You usually don't get so hyper about money. What's the matter with you?"

Good question.

"Sorry. Just don't feel like going to a party tonight, I guess. I told you I didn't want to come."

"Just loosen up and try to enjoy yourself. Vic is covering for you, so why don't you have a few drinks and relax."

Alan smiled and sighed. "Okay." He would have a few drinks but he doubted he would relax or enjoy himself. There was too much on his mind tonight. Especially after the phone call he had received this afternoon.

Murray Raskin, the hospital neurologist, had been catching up on reading the hospital EEGs today and had come across little Sonja Andersen's. He had immediately called Alan at home, stuttering with excitement. Sonja's routine EEG last year had been grossly abnormal with a typical epileptic pattern in the left parietal lobe—the same as it had been for the past half-dozen years. The one Alan had ordered yesterday was completely normal.

All traces of her epilepsy were gone.

Alan had been stewing ever since. He knew now there would be no peace for him until he had unraveled the Andersen and Westin incidents and made sense out of them.

But that wasn't all that was eating at him tonight. He didn't want to be here. He didn't want to be in a social situation with Sylvia Nash where he couldn't play "Dr. Bulmer." He'd have to drop the professional mask and be "Alan." And he was afraid then that Sylvia and anyone else within half a dozen blocks would know exactly how he felt about her.

"Isn't that the Nash lady's car?" Ginny said, pointing to the bright red car under the lights of the front door.

"Sure is."

He parked the Toronado and they walked past Sylvia's car on their way to the front door.

"With all her money, you'd think she'd get something nice and new instead of this ugly old thing."

"Are you kidding?" Alan said, lightly running his fingers over the glossy red finish of the long hood to where it ended at the chromed, forward-leaning grille. He loved that huge grille with its vertical chromed rods gleaming like teeth. "This is a 1938 shark-nosed Graham, fully restored." He peered through the tinted windows. "More than restored. It was considered an economy car in its day. Look inside—she's even put in a bar."

"But why this awful red color? It would look better on a fire engine."

"Red was Mr. Toad's favorite color."

"I don't get it, Alan."

"The Wind in the Willows—this is Toad Hall, and you remember Mr. Toad, always stealing motorcars, don't you? Well, red was his favorite color. And the author's name was Kenneth Grahame… get it?"

Ginny stared at him, a frown forming. "Since when have you had such an interest in children's books?"

He reined in his enthusiasm. "Always been one of my favorite stories, Ginny. Let's go in."

He didn't mention that he had bought a copy of The Wind in the Willows only after learning that Sylvia's place was called Toad Hall.

No, Alan thought as they approached the front door, he could not see how it was going to be a pleasant evening.

"Ah! Here comes a special guest!" Sylvia said.

Charles Axford glanced at her, then into the foyer, then back at Sylvia's face. She had suddenly become animated. That annoyed him.

A chap with average good looks with a slim, athletic-looking blonde on his arm—Charles guessed them both to be slightly younger than he—was approaching. The woman was beaming, the man looked ill.

"Which one's so bloody special?"

"Him. He's one of the doctors I told you about."

"I'm a doctor, too, you know."

"He's Jeffy's doctor."

"I was Jeffy's doctor for a while."

The corner of Sylvia's mouth pulled to the right. "You only did some tests on him. Alan's a real doctor."

"Two points for that one, Love."

Sylvia smiled. "That was worth five and you know it."

"Three, tops—because I'm precisely the kind of doctor I want to be. But let's go meet this 'special guest.' It's been so long since I've spoken to a real doctor."

"Come along, then, but try to limit the 'bloodys' to ten per minute."

Sylvia introduced them. Alan Bulmer was the fellow's name. Decent-looking chap. The woman was a pert, beaming blonde with the most captivating green eyes; she gushed over Sylvia and burbled on about the house and grounds.

Charles studied the doctor while he and the wife made nice-nice with their hostess. He looked acutely uncomfortable, like he was going to crawl out of his skin. His eyes kept moving to Sylvia and then richocheting off in all directions like misspent bullets.

What's the bloody matter with him?

Just then some other overdressed bird toddled over and tapped Bulmer's wife on the shoulder. They squealed and hugged and did everything but call each other "Darling!"

Charles turned away. Bloody doctor's wife. How well he knew the type. He had been married to one for eight very long years, and free of her for half again as long. This one reminded him of his ex: Probably a decent girl once, but now she was a Doctor's Wife and on the status trip.

Ba came by, resplendent in a white jacket and shirt, with a black bow tie and pants, carrying a tray full of tall, slim glasses of champagne. Some guests seemed afraid to take anything from him. Charles signaled to him.

While passing out the glasses to all those around him, he appreciated the awed expressions on Bulmer's wife and her friend as they looked up at Ba. Most hostesses would keep someone like Ba out of sight for a party. Not Sylvia. Good old Sylvia liked the stir he caused in the uninitiated.

Charles decided to start some friendly—for the moment— chatter with Bulmer and maybe find out what this real doctor was made of. He nudged him and nodded toward Ba's retreating form.

"Big fellow, what?"

Bulmer nodded. "Reminds me of Lurch from The Addams Family."

"Lurch? Oh, you mean that show on the telly… the butler. Yes, does remind one of him a bit, although I do believe Lurch's face was more expressive."

"Possibly," Buhner said with a smile. "I imagine Ba's height gave him some rough times as a kid. I mean, the average Vietnamese male is five-three, and Ba's got to be at least a foot over that."

"Pituitary giant, wouldn't you say?"

Bulmer's reply was immediate. "Uh-huh. Arrested in his mid-teens, I'd guess. Certainly doesn't show any acromegalic stigmata."

Five points to you, Doc, Charles thought with a rueful mental grin. The bloke already had a diagnosis filed away and waiting. Sharp for a G.P.

"Is that English you two are speaking?" Sylvia was saying.

"Doctor talk, Love," Charles said. "We use it to befuddle the masses."

"But it was about Ba. What were you saying?" She seemed genuinely concerned.

"We were saying that he probably had an overactive pituitary as a kid, maybe even a pituitary tumor. Made him a good foot taller than the average Vietnamese."

Bulmer chimed in. "But his pituitary must have slowed down to normal when he reached adulthood because he doesn't have any of the facial and hand deformities you see with adult hyperpituitism."

"Lucky for him it stopped on its own. It's eventually fatal if untreated."

"But doesn't he ever smile?" Bulmer asked. "I've known him all these years but never once seen him smile."

Sylvia was silent a moment. "I have a picture of him smiling."

"I've seen that picture," Charles said. "It answers the old Pepsodent question about where the yellow went."

Sylvia was studiously ignoring him. Her eyes were on Bulmer, and they glowed in a way he had never seen.

"Want to see the picture?"

Bulmer shrugged. "Sure."

"Good," Sylvia said with a smile and a lascivious wink. "It's upstairs in my bedroom… with my erotic Japanese etchings."