Carriscant approached the Sieverance house on the Calle Lagarda in a state of some agitation and trepidation. Delphine Sieverance had returned to her home on 22 December: the new year was now three days old and he had yet to see her. Christmas chez Carriscant had been tense but endurable, largely because he had spent most of his time at the hospital, and Annaliese was preoccupied with her seasonal work with the bishop. Udo had come over for dinner on Christmas Eve, had grown drunk and maudlin as the evening progressed and ended up staying for three days. But at least his limping presence about the house dissipated the coolness that now existed between Carriscant and Annaliese. Nothing had been said openly, there had been no one moment, but somehow over that period a tacit understanding had been arrived at: there would be no more pretence, there was little affection between them any more, and that was that. It was an inescapable fact, Carriscant knew, but its acknowledgement depressed him all the same, and he had deliberately arranged that he saw in the new year by constructing a new rectum for a Jesuit priest, returning home exhausted after a long and arduous operation to a dark and silent house.

He put on a smile, now, as he climbed the stairs to the living room where Sieverance greeted him warmly, affably. He was out of uniform, wearing a seersucker suit with a thin blue stripe and a loose cerise bow tie which, for some reason, Carriscant found irritating and affected.

'How is Mrs Sieverance?' he asked, once he had reassured the man about his own well-being.

'Excellent, improving daily, my dear fellow, thanks to you.'

Carriscant accepted more compliments as he was led down the corridor to her bedroom. The American nurse, a plump young woman with a wide gap between her front teeth, opened the door to admit them. She had a busy over-efficient manner that verged on the insolent, Carriscant thought.

'You know Nurse Aslinger?' Sieverance asked.

'Indeed. Good morning, Miss Aslinger.'

'Morning, Doctor, everything is ready for you.'

He turned to the bed. She sat there patiently, smiling at him, a smile of such pleasure and such genuine warmth, he thought, that it made him want to weep.

'Ah, my favourite medical man. Dr Carriscant, a happy new year to you.'

He took her proffered hand and shook it briefly. 'And to you, Mrs Sieverance. A happy and healthy one.'

'Not forgetting "prosperous",' Sieverance added with a silly laugh.

'Health and happiness will do fine for oh-three,' Delphine said, and then continued, 'I'm feeling very well, Doctor. I walk a little further in the garden every day. I've even taken a short carriage ride.'

'You'll be on the Luneta next,' he said, 'listening to the band. The police band is playing all next week.' He approached the bed, avoiding her eye.

'Talking of the Luneta, you haven't seen anything of Miss Caspar recently, have you?' she asked. Her face was all smooth innocence.

He could not believe the temerity, the arrant mischief. 'What? Ah, no I don't think -'

'Who's that, my dear?' Sieverance asked.

'Miss Rudolfa Caspar,' she said, her face deadpan, her eyes never leaving Carriscant. 'A mutual acquaintance. She's an old friend of Dr Carriscant, isn't that so, Doctor? A special friend.'

'I think I should be – ' Carriscant gestured vaguely towards the bed.

'Excuse me, I'll make myself scarce.' Sieverance left.

Nurse Aslinger drew back the sheet over Delphine's lap. Carriscant saw that, although her nightgown had been folded up to her waist, towels had been laid across her thighs and belly so that only the area of the dressing was exposed. Nurse Aslinger stood close by his elbow as he gently removed it. The six-inch scar was pink and vivid but it had knitted well. His mouth drying rapidly, he could just make out, beneath the towel's hem, the shadowed new growth of her pubic hair. Gently, with his fingertips, he touched the wound: a shininess, a hard smoothness, but no puckering or ridging.

'Beautiful scar,' he said automatically, without thinking.

'Not the word I would choose,' she said.

'It'll fade with time. In a year or two you'll hardly notice it.'

Nurse Aslinger replaced the dressing while he routinely prohibited over-exertion, sudden movements, horseback riding.

'Oh, I have something for you,' she said and reached into the drawer of the bedside table and held out a book for him. He took it: East Angels by Constance Fenimore Woolson. He opened the cover and saw her name written boldly in violet ink on the flyleaf: 'For Delphine Blythe with affection, Fenimore'. Another hand had added 'Sieverance' after 'Blythe'.

'Delphine Blythe Sieverance,' he said. 'That has a fine ring to it. Thank you.'

'You must tell me what you think.'

There was a knock on the door and Sieverance re-entered, his face alight, unusually full of invigoration.

'Mrs Sieverance is making excellent progress,' Carriscant said, with jovial formality like a doctor in a bad play, slipping the book into his coat pocket. 'We are very pleased with her.'

'Then this is the perfect occasion to express our gratitude.'

'Really, there's no further need – ' Carriscant began but then stopped when he saw that Sieverance had closed his eyes and had raised his beaming face heavenwards. He took his wife's hand and then, to Carriscant's profound alarm, his.

'Please join hands before the Lord,' he said to Carriscant and Nurse Aslinger, who promptly slipped her hand into Carriscant's. 'And please kneel with me.'

Carriscant found himself being drawn down into a kneeling position at the foot of Delphine's bed. Sieverance's face was frowningly beatific, at once stern and devout, while Nurse Aslinger's head was piously bowed, revealing a nasty heat rash on her nape.

'O Lord above,' Sieverance intoned in a low, intense voice, 'grant us this day thy blessing and receive our thanks for thy blessed powers of healing visited upon our beloved Delphine.'

'Amen,' said Nurse Aslinger.

'And we thank thee, O Lord of hosts most high, for the dedication and skill thou hast bestowed on thy servant Salvador Carriscant. We thank thee, O Lord our God, for leading us into this man's care-'

Carriscant's ears closed as more gratitude was delivered up to the Almighty. He felt his cheeks and ears glow with a form of pure embarrassment he had not endured since he was a child. Nurse Aslinger's hand was hot and moist, Sieverance's was bony, its grip unnecessarily firm. He gazed at the needlepoint rug (puce roses on an oatmeal background) on which he knelt and concentrated on the dull ache that was beginning to spread through his left knee joint. But something made him slowly raise his eyes: Delphine was looking directly at him and her lips moved as she mouthed one word at him – 'Sorry.' They were conspirators again, anew, and he felt himself begin the sudden headlong slide once more.

The prayer of thanks lasted almost five minutes and after it was over Sieverance's exhilaration was almost insupportable. Carriscant made a brief farewell to Delphine and went through with Sieverance to the sitting room where his host insisted he stay and have a glass of lemonade.

Carriscant took small rapid sips, keeping the glass to his mouth.

'As a military man, you know,' Sieverance said, dabbing at his poor fair moustache with a knuckle, 'we don't often give much thought to divine providence.'

'I suppose not,' Carriscant said, aimlessly, not understanding where the conversation was headed. Not caring. This lemonade is really not too bad.

'It takes an occasion like this to make one realise just how fortunate one has been.'

'I suppose so.'

'I mean what if, what if Delphine had fallen ill next week instead of before Christmas? Lord knows what would have happened.' He shuddered, upset by this vision of a hypothetical future. 'It doesn't bear thinking about.'