A small and unwanted protest at her fate made her decide to lie down on the couch in the living room rather than on her bed. Clay had warned her that overwhelming fatigue was to be expected, “Until one day, you just don’t feel able to get up.”

But not yet, Olivia thought, as she reached for the afghan that was always on the ottoman at the foot of the club chair. She sat on the couch, placed one of the decorative pillows where it would be directly under her head, lay down, and pulled the afghan over her. She then sighed a relieved sigh.

Two weeks, she thought. Two weeks. Fourteen days. How many hours is that? It doesn’t matter, she thought as she drifted off to sleep.

When she awoke, the shadows in the room told her that it was late afternoon. I had only a cup of tea this morning before I saw Clay, she thought. I’m not hungry, but I’ve got to eat something. As she pushed aside the afghan and slowly got to her feet, the need to review the proof about Catherine again suddenly became overwhelming. In fact, she had the frightening sense that it might somehow have disappeared from the safe in the den.

But it was there, in the manila file her mother had given her only hours before her death. Catherine’s letters to Mother, Olivia thought, her lips quivering; the Mother Superior’s letter to Catherine; a copy of Edward’s birth certificate; the passionate note he had given my mother to pass on to Catherine.

“Olivia.”

Someone was in the apartment and was coming down the hallway toward her. Clay. Olivia’s fingers trembled as, without putting them back in the file, she thrust the letters and birth certificate into the safe, closed the door, and pushed the button that automatically locked it.

She stepped out of the closet. “I’m here, Clay.” She did not attempt to conceal the icy disapproval in her voice.

“Olivia, I was concerned about you. You promised to call this afternoon.”