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telling off.'
    'Was she now?' Mike eyed Yona askance. 'If she were mine, I wouldn't put up with it. How many have we got today?'
    'Five,' said Ted. At the same moment Yona said, 'Six.'
    'Sorry, five,' she corrected herself. She'd become confused at the idea of belonging to Mike Preston in any capacity. 'I never could count,' she excused herself.
    'It's a good thing that you're not Mike's registrar, then.'
    Ted chuckled. 'Ortho requires a certain degree of numeracy—with so many toes and fingers to choose from.' He picked up the first folder. 'This is a sad case really, Mike, but it's got its happy side, too. A girl of twenty-five with a twelve-year history of juvenile rheumatoid arthritis who's just got herself engaged and is desperate to walk up the aisle without crutches. But, to do that, she'll need a total hip replacement.'
    Yona expected Mike to refuse there and then as hip replacements had a limited lifespan, but he said, 'I did a replacement for a thirty-year-old man only last week, although it was really Hobson's choice. His hip had been shattered in a car crash. Of course, he was hale and hearty before the accident... Still, there's no harm in me taking a look at her. Let's have her in.'
    She was very pretty, with soft blonde hair and wide, trusting blue eyes. It was cruel to see her shuffling, old woman's gait and distorted feet in boat-like orthopaedic shoes. And her twisted little hands could only just grasp the upright posts of the forearm crutches she required.
    As always, Ted said exactly the right thing. 'You're looking very pretty as usual, Karen. Is that a new necklace?'
    She beamed at him with real affection, which was not to be wondered at when he'd been her friend and doctor since she was twelve years old. 'Fancy you noticing,' she said, delighted. 'Roy gave it to me instead of an engagement ring. I mean, who'd want to wear rings on hands like mine?' she asked of Yona.
    'Who'd ever notice anything else on somebody with hair like yours?' asked Yona. 'Such a gorgeous colour and beautifully styled. You must give me the name of your hairdresser.'
    'No problem.' Karen smiled. 'She's my mum. Her shop's on the Central Parade.' That was Salchester's foremost shopping mall. 'You'd suit the new executive cut. Doctor.'
    'When you girls have finished admiring each other, we should get down to business,' reproved Mike, but with a smile in his voice.
    He's quite good at saying the right thing, too, thought Yona. Well, sometimes. To anybody but me...
    When Mike had finished examining Karen, he sat down beside her and explained simply and clearly the pros and cons of a hip replacement at such an early age. Relief of pain and increased movement now, to be set against probable reversion to her present state in about fifteen years' time—and with no promises about a second successful operation if her disease didn't go into remission.
    But Karen had already made up her mind. 'Thanks for spelling it out, Doctor, but I'll be forty by then so what will it matter?'
    'That's me definitely on the scrap heap, then,' said Ted wryly when Karen had gone and they were waiting for the next patient.
    'And I've barely got five years to go,' Mike added with a rueful grin. 'Should we book into Sunset House now, d'you think?'
    'It used to be said that life begins at forty,' Yona said bracingly. 'Personally, I can't wait.'
    Mike eyed her clear-skinned prettiness for a long second and without any apparent admiration, before saying, 'That's too bad—it looks to me as though you've got a long wait.' He'd sounded so daunting that it took her quite a while to realise that he'd actually paid her a compliment.
    She hardly had time to feel pleased before a nurse brought in the next patient and said, 'Dr Price has been trying to bleep you, Doctor. One of the new inpatients has just collapsed.'
    Yona thanked her, leapt up and darted out. She took the stairs two at a time to reach the bridge that connected Outpatients with the main ward block.
    'Most