"How long?" I asked, when Tom hung up.
His pale eyes peered affectionately from behind his spectacles. I felt
sorry for him. "Let's get that biopsy, first."
"No fooling, Tom. You're nine-tenths convinced. The learned goons in
your profession have told me my number was up, several times, before
this. Sooner or later, one of you is bound to be right. And I don't
feel lucky today. How long?"
He picked up a letter he had dictated, read it, and put it in a tray.
He straightened his prescription pad so it was square with the tooled
leather corner of his desk blotter. He glanced at the photograph of
Aileen, his wife, Joy and Lee, his daughters. "If it's malignant--it's
where you can't operate."
"How long will I be--able to write?"
"Month. Two. Three. Maybe more. No way to tell."
"Radiation--won't slow it down?"
"Can't use strong doses that near your brain, Phil." He grasped his
telephone again. He told his nurse to arrange the biopsy. Immediately.
He wrote an address.
"I'm busy tonight," he told me. "Can't get out of it. What about
tomorrow--for dinner?"