Melanie had come through for her on that count as well. Bessie felt the paddles lathering up her chest with lubricant, then “Pow!” A huge white light ripped up the inside of her skull. Yes! Despite the sensation of being kicked by a horse, the jolt of direct current, she knew, would stun the atria, render their conduction pathways refractory to the fast impulses, and allow her own natural pacemaker time to reassert itself. Within minutes she began to feel better, opened her eyes, and saw Melanie smiling at her.

“Quite a feat for a fourth-year student,” Bessie said. “You know, up until that point, I got the impression nobody on staff appreciated your skills.”

Melanie chuckled. “Hey, that’s the job of teachers with medical students. Keep ‘em tired and feeling stupid. Makes it easier to stuff them with knowledge. But to what do I owe this trip down memory lane?”

Bessie reached for the paper with her good arm. “This got me going,” she said, tapping the article about Kelly McShane. “It all happened that same year. I remember her. She was so pretty and pleasant around patients. I thought then she’d make a great doctor. And if you recall, Chaz Braden had been my cardiologist. Come to think of it, he kept ignoring my complaints of being nauseated. That should have tipped him off my digoxin level was rising.”

“You’ve got a pretty good memory for something so long ago.”

“What do you expect? I nearly died. As for the time when Kelly McShane disappeared, I figure just about everyone remembers that, at least where they were.”

“How do you mean?”

“Thursday, August 8, 1974. That was the night Nixon resigned. He gave a TV speech at nine P.M, announcing he’d be gone by noon the next day. I was glued to my TV at home. And in my office, Friday, the patients and I watched his departure from the White House. I’ll bet you can tell me where you were, too.”

Melanie frowned a few seconds, as if trying to recall her whereabouts, then shrugged. “Not really. I remember it happening, but not where I was. Must have been busy days on the floors. Say, the nurses told me you’re going to your son’s home to live.” She got up and walked over to the family photos on the bureau, leaning over to get a better look at them.

Bessie immediately felt excited. The mere mention of what lay ahead brought her to life again. “That’s right. Me on the Big Sur. Fred Junior and his wife have built their dream house, including a cottage for me, plus arranged for private nurses, all thanks to the dot-coms. The kid had the smarts to sell before they went bust, and I’m going out in style.”

“Hey, I think you should take a doctor along with you.” She delicately fingered the frames as she looked at the pictures one by one.

“Come along. That would be the dream team, having you in charge. You’ve always been there for me, when you’ve been there at all.”

Melanie laughed and moved to inspect the figurines near the head of the bed. “Will you listen to yourself? You can’t blame gibberish like that on the stroke.”

“You know what I mean. You saved my life twice. Why not a third time? I’ll bet there are lots of opportunities for someone like you in California.”

“Be careful. I might take you up on it.” She carefully picked up the piece depicting Bessie examining an old man. “This is beautiful. Is that you?”

“A long time ago-” She stopped short at the sight of Tanya standing at the door. How long the young nurse had been there she couldn’t say. “Yes, Tanya?”

“I’m sorry to interrupt, Bessie, but it’s time for your shot.”

“Oh!” Melanie said, peeking at her watch, “Well, guess I better be off, then.” She quickly replaced the porcelain figure.

Bessie flashed an annoyed look at Tanya for interrupting them. She’d been enjoying the company. “Oh, Melanie, please don’t go.”

“I really have to. Sorry it took me so long to stop by, yet better late than never, eh? Have a good sleep, and I’ll try to see you before you leave.”

Obviously their visit was over. Contemplating the striking woman Melanie had become in middle age, Bessie reached for her hand and took it in hers. “All the best.”

“To you as well,” Melanie said, returning the gesture with a warm squeeze.

Out of nowhere an insolent little question popped into Bessie’s mind. How come such a good-looking woman had never married?

Once she’d left, Tanya walked over to a stand where a small, multidose bottle of heparin and packets of needles were kept.

Low molecular weight heparin was another anticoagulant, this one used in small injected doses to prevent blood clots from forming in the limbs of patients who were bedridden. She wouldn’t normally have needed it, being on warfarin and the baby aspirin already, but having thrown two emboli from her heart so far, the doctors were taking no chances.

Which was fine with Bessie. No way did she intend to be waylaid again and miss the Big Sur, she thought, watching Tanya, who stood with her back turned as she drew up the injection. Her annoyance with the girl vanished. After all, she’d just been doing her job. “Don’t worry, Tanya,” she said with a chuckle, wanting to make amends for her nasty glance of a moment ago. “I won’t faint if I catch sight of the needle.”

The nurse laughed, but continued to shield the syringe from Bessie’s view as any thoughtful nurse or doctor does when preparing a hypodermic for a patient. “I know, Bessie. It’s force of habit. You’d probably do the same with me if the situation were reversed.” She dropped the bottle in a plastic container for medical waste, pivoted around, and walked to the bedside. “Where do you want it?”

“Actually, in the mornings I’ve started giving them to myself.”

“Oh?”

“Yep. In case they want to keep me on the stuff when I go to my son’s. I don’t want to be totally dependent. Just leave the syringe on my nightstand.”

Tanya frowned. “You’re sure?”

“Yep.”

Tanya hesitated, the capped syringe in her hand, then shrugged. “Okay. You’re the doctor,” she said with a grin, and placed it on Bessie’s side table along with an alcohol swab. “But I can’t stay to talk. We’re short-staffed again.”

Time to sleep, Bessie decided.

She rolled over and reached for the syringe and swab. “Might as well be at the good old belly button,” she muttered, whipping up her nightdress and exposing what looked like a horseshoe of pinpricks around her umbilicus. She wiped the skin with an alcohol swab, then managed to bunch up a roll of flesh using the limited movements of her right forearm. With a quick thrust, she sank the needle in to its hilt, and slowly pushed in the plunger.

That same evening, Tuesday, November 6, 9:30 P.M.

Hampton Junction

Mark brushed aside a cobweb and sent a nest of spiders scurrying for cover. From a wall of cardboard cartons, he pulled out the third box he’d been through that evening. He was in the basement of his house, the home where he grew up and now lived and worked, rummaging in the inactive files that his father, Dr. Cam Roper, had stored here for as long as he could recall. The voice of his mother complaining about it ran as clear as a recording through his head.

“Honestly, dear, you’ve got lots of space in that office of yours in the village. Why clutter us up with this junk? We could make a workshop down here.”

“That’s why I’m filling it up with this stuff,” his dad had whispered to him, then winked. “To make sure I don’t have to spend our Saturdays down here building stupid shelves.”

Our Saturdays. Mark smiled at the resonance those words could still evoke.

That was before he’d lost them both.

First his mother. Pricked her finger on a needle, he’d been told. Then she fell sick and died in a matter of days. To a five-year-old boy it sounded like something out of a fairy tale, an evil spell cast by a wicked dwarf involving a spinning wheel. But no magic kiss brought her back. Later he’d learned the needle had been a syringe, and the evil had been meningococcus bacteria from a patient with meningitis. She’d infected herself while helping out at his father’s office drawing blood samples.