Demmet sat on the high stool, the stethoscope hanging from his neck, his ears blissfully free of any foreign objects, and watched the surgeon complete the operation down to the last suture. If no one left a sponge inside, and the nurse would see to that, then the operation was safely over, and no subsequent autopsy was ever going to reveal that the surgeon was at fault. When the surgeon left, sullenly and silently, Demmet rose from the stool, stretched his muscles and went out to break the tragic news to the next of kin. He had a reputation at the Robler Clinic of being the best at breaking this sort of news.

It is a fact of hospital life that doctors instinctively avoid dying patients and spend more time with those who are going to get well. Even now, across the nation, doctors are just beginning to study their own attitudes toward the dying, something that they have instinctively avoided for centuries, though the rest of the populace believes that they are not uncomfortable with death. Doctors are supposed to be men of great compassion, courage, and knowledge. But it is only now being admitted that a doctor often avoids telling a patient his illness is terminal, not for the patient's benefit but for his own.

Demmet, unlike his colleagues, had no such troubles. He whisked off his mask, examined his cool aquiline face for any resurgence of pimples, touched up his just-graying sandy-blond hair with his fingertips, removed his surgical gown, and went to the administrative offices to make the usual report for this special sort of operation.

"What was it this time? Heart failure?" asked a graceful young woman with dark red hair and cool brown eyes. She was Kathy Hahl, assistant administrator of the hospital and director of hospital development, another term for chief fund raiser.

"Yeah. Heart failure will do," said Demmet. "You know, the sand wedge, the damned sand wedge, is a disaster off the fairway."

"Not if you use it right. If you use it right, it's like a scalpel. Puts the ball just where you want it if you use it right," said Ms. Hahl.