44.

A Life That Would Not Sell

Aetherion, Year 198 AGH

The extra visit was on the other side of the paper.

Ressa had turned the sheet twice already. On the front were the charges she understood: two hours of help, travel, an additional charge if the visit overran. On the back, beneath a pale printed border, the credit paid most of a second visit. She flattened it with the heel of her hand.

“And they would do the washing?”

“The household work you agreed when the visits were arranged,” Petra Senn said. “Washing could certainly be part of that.”

“The washing, or arranging for someone else to do the washing?”

“The work itself.”

Ressa turned the paper back. The front was still too expensive.

Petra waited. Through the window of the consultation room, Aetherion's afternoon light fell across the edge of her sleeve. She had moved her chair so that Ressa could see the figures without having to look at them upside down. It was a small consideration, and useful. Ressa disliked conducting business over the tops of people's heads.

She paid Nemi for two hours a week. They could change the bed and deal with the washing, or go through appointments and collect things, or prepare enough food to make several evenings easy. They could not do all of it. She knew the time each task took. She also knew that adding another task did not make the first ones disappear.

A second visit would put some space between them.

“How much of my time does this coordination take?” she asked.

“We do most of it. Once we have the information.”

“That is usually where my time goes.”

Petra smiled. “That is one of the things we are trying to improve.”

Ressa was ninety-five. The body into which she had transferred in 140 had been about twenty then, and was old now too. She could make her own supper. She could also prefer to spend an afternoon on something other than lifting wet bedding. She had come with a list of what she wanted done, written large enough to leave room beside each item for a price.

Petra drew the paper closer.

“The credit is available where a client gives us access to a fuller profile. It reduces the work involved in matching services. We can anticipate some of your preferences instead of asking you to supply everything from the beginning.”

“And if you anticipate them wrong?”

“Then we amend them.”

Ressa looked at the authorization beneath the figures. It extended to associated services, future offers, information obtained from other providers. The spaces for her signature and the date were empty.

“I would like to know who the other providers are.”

“They vary according to what you need.”

“Before I sign.”

“We can give you the current list.”

Petra took another sheet from the folder beside her. She was a pleasant woman, with short dark hair that stayed lifted where she had pushed it back. Her speech did not become slower when Ressa asked her to explain something. Ressa had appreciated that from the beginning.

“Meals, for example,” Petra said. “We would know to arrange something you actually enjoy. There's a pear dish here. A particular favorite, apparently.”

For a moment Ressa saw sugar shining along the cut edge of a pear, and a spoon approaching her plate for the second time.

She put her hand over her mouth.

“Have I said something funny?”

“No. Yes, but you couldn't know why.”

“We needn't include meals.”

“I don't like that pear dish.”

Petra picked up her pen. “That is easily changed.”

“I never liked it.”

There had been a cake with a weight it could not support, and Mara laughing at its remains. Ivo had gone to so much trouble over the pears. Ressa had finally told him the truth with a mouthful of sweetness still there.

She lowered her hand.

“Where did you get that?”

“It's in the supplied material.”

“Supplied by whom?”

“Personalization information comes through our profiling service. The clinical arrangements are separate.”

Petra turned the sheet around. It was headed Client preference extract. Halfway down the page, the pear entry sat between two other short lines. Beneath it was a reference.

Source preference record: R140/6.

Ressa stopped looking at the pear.

“May I see the page that goes with this number?”

“This is the extract we receive.”

“Then who has the page?”

“I can ask for the source query to be raised.”

“Is that a person?”

“A request to the supplier.”

Ressa drew the sheet nearer. The paper was thin, and the border from the page beneath showed faintly through it. She had often complained about people putting too much on glass. A window could be filled until there was nothing left for the eye to land on. Here the things that mattered occupied three small lines.

Petra tapped the offer.

“The information can be corrected before any visit takes place. You would approve the care arrangement.”

“I'm not asking you to send the pears back.”

“No, of course.”

“I want to know where this came from.”

“I understand. As I say, I can raise that.”

Ressa looked again at the reference. It was not an answer. It was something to write down.

“May I take these?”

“The quotation is yours.”

“And the extract.”

Petra hesitated over the second sheet, then placed it on top of the first.

“Certainly. It may help you see what can be changed. I can include a fresh authorization so you don't have to come back for another.”

“I haven't used this one.”

“You can take your time.”

Ressa put both pages into her bag without folding them. She left the signature spaces empty.

Outside, she paused where the corridor widened to let another visitor pass. She took out her own list and looked at the washing. There was still no price beside it that she liked.

*   *   *

Nemi, thirty-four and long-legged, had the far corners of the sheet. Ressa brought her two together, pinched the edges and waited while Nemi came around the table.

“Yours is longer,” Ressa said.

“Mine is the same sheet.”

“Then it is longer on my side.”

Nemi drew the fold through her hands until the corners met. A white ridge rose between them and fell flat.

“There.”

“I could have done that.”

“I know. Let go of your end.”

Ressa let go. Nemi folded the sheet again, pressed it once with her palm and added it to the pile. She gathered the linen against her chest and turned sideways to pass the chair. Ressa drew it back.

“Thank you,” Nemi said, and put the linen away.

The offer had been lying beneath a bowl of small wooden pegs. Ressa lifted the bowl.

“I need some of today's time for this.”

Nemi read the first page, then the extract. She looked up at the pear entry.

“Is that wrong?”

“Yes.”

“Shall I put a line through it?”

“Not on that copy.”

Nemi set down the pencil she had reached for.

Ressa brought over the folder in which she kept the receiving clinic's old letters. She had not preserved them because she expected another argument. They concerned things she might need to find again. Some had been opened and refolded so often that the edges had become soft.

“I want the permission I gave them in 140. The original preference sheet, if they have it.”

Nemi looked at the clock.

“I can help with the request today. We won't get to the shops as well.”

“I have bread.”

“You have bread for tonight.”

“And tomorrow.”

Nemi waited.

“The shops next time, then,” Ressa said.

“I can book a longer visit next week.”

“At your usual rate?”

“Yes.”

Ressa looked at the quotation again. “Not yet.”

They made the request to the receiving clinic together. Ressa named the record and signed for her own copy. Nemi checked the return address, then put the request where it would go out with the other letters.

The room was easier to move through with the washing put away. Ressa sat down at the clear end of the table. She had intended to use it for a small painted border on a plain box, a way of making the lid distinguishable from two others in the cupboard. The brush lay beside a tile with dried blue on it.

Nemi looked at the box.

“Is that one of the things for tomorrow?”

“No. That's for when I feel like doing it.”

“Will I move it?”

“Leave it there.”

Nemi left it there.

The clinic's copy arrived the following week. The paper was new; the marks reproduced on it were not. Ressa recognized her name at the bottom before she read the purpose above it.

Preference information for planning receiving care associated with the transfer. No further use without additional authorization.

At the top was R140/6.

The pear dish appeared in a small box devoted to food. She had apparently been willing to say that she loved it on paper as well as across a dinner table.

She read the entry twice.

“What is it?” Nemi asked.

“Nothing new.”

Ressa had thought, during the wait, that the number might turn out to mean something else. A classification. A coincidence. The copied page lay beside Petra's extract, and the same reference stood on both.

She turned the old sheet over. There were other entries. She did not want to talk about them with a salesperson. She had not wanted to talk about them with most people even in 140.

“Make copies of all of it,” she said.

“For the complaint?”

“For anyone who wants to tell me I signed it away.”

Nemi gathered the sheets but did not put them into a fresh envelope.

“How many copies?”

Ressa opened her mouth. She had no answer that sounded like a useful number.

“The archive will know.”

“Then shall we ask them before I spend your time doing these?”

Ressa looked again at the little box about food. The absurdity had gone out of it.

“Yes.”

The independent archive occupied rooms behind a narrow public desk. There were chairs for people waiting to make deposits, and a shelf where someone had left a parcel too large to fit beneath the counter. The worker who received Ressa's papers had to finish recording its dimensions before turning to her.

“I'm sorry. If I leave this now, somebody will have to measure it again.”

“Finish it.”

Ressa watched the string pull taut along the parcel. One corner was badly wrapped. She wanted to fold it down, but the person had not asked her to help.

When the parcel had been entered, the worker spread Ressa's papers on a clear board.

“What do you want preserved?”

“All of this. And a copy I can send out.”

“To whom?”

“The people investigating the sale of these profiles. And anybody who says there wasn't a sale.”

“We can preserve the entire deposit without making the entire deposit public.”

Ressa pointed at the authorization. “They need to see what I agreed to.”

“Yes.”

“Then they need this.”

“This page, certainly. There are things on the back that may not be necessary.”

“Will it look as if I am hiding something?”

“It will look as if this is a copy made for a stated purpose. The sealed deposit can be checked if the question arises. Your signature, the record number and the permission will remain visible.”

The worker put an empty sheet beside the copy and showed her where a narrower reproduction would begin and end. Nothing was cut from Ressa's paper. The proposed copy left the date, the purpose, the pear entry and the signature together.

“Does that prove they sold it?”

“It shows where you should ask. The commercial records will have to show what happened after this.”

Ressa leaned back. She had brought the matching numbers as if putting them on the same board might finish the work.

“What happens if I let you keep this and the complaint goes nowhere?”

“The deposit remains under the terms you give us. A complaint does not turn it into a public collection.”

“Write that down.”

The worker turned the deposit form toward her.

“It is here.”

Ressa read it. The worker waited without offering to read faster for her.

She chose the bounded copy. The other material was sealed with the original scope of the deposit recorded beside it. Nemi wrote the receipt number on the outside of Ressa's folder, then stopped with the pencil over the page.

“Do you want the appointment letter in here too?”

“In the front pocket. I want to be able to find that without opening everything.”

The worker gave Ressa the information for the existing inquiry in Requiem City. Other complaints about personality files had reached it already. Ressa's was given a reference of its own.

On the way out, the parcel was still beside the desk. The loose corner had been fastened. Ressa was pleased to see it.

*   *   *

Petra came to the second consultation with a new calculation.

The extra credit would pay for two hours every week, enough for the second visit Ressa had wanted. Her own payment would remain close to what she was paying Nemi now. The authorization had changed too. There was a separate document, shorter than the first, which provided for withdrawal of the profile from the intermediary's active use and closure of Ressa's complaint against it.

Petra laid the calculation on top.

“We have no wish to make care more difficult because of unwanted personalization.”

Ressa read the hours.

“Would it be the same person each week?”

“We aim for continuity.”

“That isn't what I asked.”

“Subject to sickness and leave, yes. A regular worker.”

“And if I needed to move a visit?”

“We would ask for notice, but there is provision for that.”

Ressa imagined the cupboard full of clean linen, the appointments dealt with before the letters became a pile. She would be able to leave the blue box on the table until the paint dried. She would not have to clear it away because something more urgent required the space.

Petra let her read the calculation all the way to the end.

“The credit is guaranteed for the period stated.”

“Provided I sign the other page.”

“The two form one arrangement.”

Ressa moved the calculation aside.

“What does withdrawal mean?”

“We delete the preference profile from our active service system.”

“Who has had copies?”

“The service team would no longer have access.”

“Who has had them already?”

Petra rested her pen on the open folder.

“The supplier would have to answer questions about its wider distribution.”

“Have you asked?”

“We can confirm our own handling.”

Ressa waited.

Petra picked up the pen again but did not write.

“Does this document require them to tell me?” Ressa asked.

“The remedy concerns the service we provide you.”

“It asks me to close the complaint.”

“Yes. We would have resolved the issue between us.”

Ressa read the release from the beginning. Petra had used a generous space between the lines. It was pleasant to read, and easy to find where the obligations changed from theirs to hers.

The care hours were on the other sheet.

“I want to take this away.”

“Of course.”

“Both pages.”

“Yes.”

At home, she put the improved offer beside Nemi's book of appointments.

Nemi had brought in the small provisions they had agreed on. She was checking the receipt against the change while Ressa read the weekly hours aloud.

“It would mean another afternoon,” Ressa said.

“It would.”

“I could have the washing done on one and the letters on the other.”

“Yes.”

“You don't think I should sign it.”

“I haven't said that.”

“You've gone quiet.”

“I'm adding.”

Nemi touched the receipt with her pencil. Ressa waited until she had finished.

“I don't know who has your information,” Nemi said. “I can help you ask. I can't tell you what it is worth to you.”

“What would you do?”

“I don't have to choose between these.”

Ressa looked away. The blue box was still unpainted.

“Could we fit the washing and the papers into your two hours? If I had everything ready?”

“Some weeks. If there's an appointment to arrange and we have to wait for an answer, no.”

“I could do the folding before you came.”

“That would help. It wouldn't make time for everything.”

Nemi closed the book, then opened it again when Ressa put a finger on the edge.

“An extra half-hour?”

“I have someone after you.”

“Another day?”

“Paid as an extra visit, when I have room.”

“I know how extra visits are paid.”

“I thought you did.”

Ressa took her hand off the book.

Nemi put the provisions away. She did not leave in anger. Before she finished, she brought the jar from the high shelf where Ressa wanted it and set it beside the bread. Ressa thanked her.

When she was alone, she read the improved offer once more. It was possible to cross out the extra visit on her own list. The price did not change when she did it.

She put the release back into its envelope unsigned.

The next morning she set the new credit calculation beside the refusal she was writing. The figures still offered the second afternoon she wanted. She read them once more, finished the letter declining the release, and sent it. She kept both pages of Petra's offer. The complaint continued, and she booked Nemi's two hours for the next several weeks, with the washing ahead of the letters.

On the first of those afternoons, the letters waited while they changed the bed.

Ressa sat on the edge when they had finished and ran her palm over the sheet. Nemi had tucked the lower corner too firmly for her liking. She loosened it.

“Is that better?”

“Yes.”

“I'll remember.”

“Don't injure yourself doing it.”

Nemi laughed and took the used linen away.

*   *   *

The journey to the claimant appointment in Requiem City had required its own booking and its own money. Nemi had helped Ressa arrange the appointment during paid time; she had another client on the day and did not come. Ressa carried the copies requested in the letter and left the sealed deposit where it was.

She arrived early enough to choose a chair away from the door.

The man beside her had brought an envelope with a stiff backing. Each time someone entered the inner room, he looked at the appointment list and then at the clock.

“Have they called yours?” Ressa asked.

“No.”

“Then I haven't missed mine.”

He looked at her letter. She had left it open across her lap.

“Erskine?”

“Yes.”

“I'm Dorin Hale.”

She moved the letter so its address was covered.

He took out the paper he had been reading.

“They told me there were other receiving records. Surviving ones.”

“Yes.”

“Yours was one?”

“A preference record.”

“Was it difficult getting it back?”

“The clinic sent a copy when I asked.”

He looked down at his own paper, then up again.

“Which memory did you get?”

Ressa had been about to ask whether he had brought a transfer receipt. The inquiry's letter had said that external records could help establish the route between suppliers and buyers. Dorin had a carefully kept envelope; she wanted to know what was in it.

“None,” she said.

“Then what did they send?”

“A form. What I said before my transfer, and what I agreed they could use it for.”

His finger remained between two sheets.

“That's a kind of memory.”

“It says I like a sweet pear dish. I don't. I never did. I said it because someone had cooked it for me, and then I went on saying it.”

“I am not trying to remember what I wanted for dinner.”

“No.”

“My partner is dead.”

Ressa put her letter back into its envelope.

“There is something I used to remember. I know that I used to. I know where we were.”

He stopped. She could hear somebody moving chairs in the room beyond the door.

“I've returned more than once,” he said. “There are things missing.”

She did not ask him what the missing thing was.

“If they wrote it down,” he said, “I could read it.”

“You could.”

“And that might be enough.”

“To tell you what somebody recorded.”

He looked at her sharply.

“What do you know about it?”

“I know what is in mine.”

“Then talk about yours.”

Ressa felt her face warm.

“My paper is outside me. It can tell somebody what I said. It can't give the experience back. What was consumed isn't sitting in that file.”

Dorin put the two sheets together. For a while he did not answer.

She could have left him with the possibility. He might then have been glad to show her the receipt. She kept her hands on her own envelope.

“They should have said,” he told the door.

Ressa did not know whether anyone had. She waited.

When the clerk came out, Dorin stood.

“If I submit this,” he asked, “do you keep my only copy?”

“We can make a certified copy for the inquiry. You can retain the original.”

“And what goes with it?”

“Your account of what you authorized and what the receipt shows. We can go through that with you.”

Dorin looked at Ressa. There was no invitation in it.

She stayed seated.

He went to the desk. She could not hear every word, but she heard him correct the date on the clerk's form. He turned his receipt toward the light, checked the copied line and put the original back in its envelope.

When he returned, he had a smaller receipt in his hand.

“They sold it onward,” he said.

“That's what you brought?”

“Yes.”

He sat down without showing her. Ressa was glad she had not asked.

A few minutes later the clerk called her name. Dorin moved his feet so she could pass. His expression had not softened.

Requiem City, Year 199 AGH

The custodian put a strip of blank paper over the names that did not concern Ressa.

“Your item is here.”

She leaned forward. The inspection table had enough room for the documents to sit apart without overlapping. On her side lay the bounded copy of R140/6. In the middle was the derivative profile identified as D197/204. At the far side, beside the custodian's hand, was an invoice.

Ressa had booked a new journey to Requiem City for this appointment. She had been told what she could inspect and what would remain closed. The papers she had brought stayed in her bag until the custodian asked for them.

Petra's representative sat opposite, with a clean copy of the improved offer. Petra herself was not there.

“This inspection concerns the records obtained in the proceeding,” the custodian said. “I will ask you to identify your authorization. The supplier and transfer records have been produced under the court's direction.”

Ressa looked at the original purpose, reproduced above her signature.

“Yes. That is mine.”

“The signature?”

“And the permission. I asked for receiving care. They were to use the preferences for that.”

“In 140.”

“Yes.”

The representative turned a page.

“Preferences may subsequently be inferred from a number of sources. It is not accurate to treat a developed profile as a simple copy of a clinical document.”

The custodian moved D197/204 toward Ressa.

The pear entry was still there. Around it were categories and short assertions she had never supplied in that form. She looked for the reference before trying to read the rest.

R140/6 appeared in the source field.

“That part came from mine,” she said.

“The reference identifies it as one source,” the custodian said. “We are not asking you to identify the origins of the other entries.”

“Good. I couldn't.”

The representative put the clean offer flat.

“Our client's service is intended to support care. A preference used to offer suitable food is not in itself an injury.”

“I didn't want the food.”

“Then the preference could be corrected.”

Ressa had heard that answer before. She took a little longer over the profile this time. It described her with an assurance she had never managed for herself. A person who had read it might have expected her to be easier to arrange.

“Where does this one go next?” she asked.

The custodian drew the invoice nearer.

“D197/204 is included in this transfer. The recipient is the intermediary licensed here. The stated use is commercial targeting of care offers.”

The invoice had a line for the derivative record. Ressa followed the identifier with her finger, stopping before the blank strip that covered other names.

“Is that the sale?”

“It is the surviving record of this transfer. The corresponding receipt acknowledges delivery. Those records agree on the item and the recipient.”

“And this is why she had it when I came in.”

“The intermediary's use of the profile in your offer provides the receiving end of the chain.”

The custodian placed Petra's original extract beside the later profile. The source reference was the same. The profile identity in the supplier's record led to the item on the invoice. Ressa looked from one to the other until she could follow the course without the custodian's hand.

Her old permission remained on the near side of the table.

The representative drew the improved offer forward.

“My client proposed a remedy. Continued care would have been available on favorable terms, without use of the unwanted entry.”

“It would have been useful,” Ressa said.

The representative paused.

“The extra visit. I wanted it.”

“Then we agree that the offer was of value.”

“Yes.”

Ressa laid a hand beside the 140 authorization.

“Where is the permission for this use?”

“The newer arrangement would have regularized the information handling going forward.”

“I didn't sign it.”

“The proposal was made.”

“Yes. In 198.”

The custodian looked at the representative.

“Is any earlier additional authorization being produced?”

“None beyond the materials already supplied.”

The custodian wrote that down.

Ressa wanted to ask how many people had looked at the profile and believed it. The question was too large for the papers on the table. She asked instead whether the invoice named another recipient.

“This record identifies this transfer,” the custodian said. “The audit will require further disclosure of onward handling where records survive.”

“Where they survive.”

“Yes.”

“And until then?”

“This chain can be established without resolving every later use. The unresolved handling is not being treated as permission.”

Ressa read the line the custodian had marked in the inspection record. It stated the limited purpose of her authorization and the absence of any produced permission for the commercial use.

She signed the statement identifying her own document.

Before leaving, she asked for the date on her inspection copy to be made clearer. The last digit had run into the edge of the ruled box. The custodian wrote it again below and initialed it.

Outside, the street was wet. Ressa stood beneath the doorway while a delivery was carried past. She had no wish to go straight back to the room where she was staying. There was a place nearby with chairs and food, and she had time before her return booking the next day.

She ordered something hot and ate it slowly. Nobody asked her to identify it as a preference.

*   *   *

The proceeding continued after the inspection. Letters arrived. Some asked for an answer; some told her what had been done. Ressa learned to open those first, because Nemi could read them during a visit without using half the afternoon to compose a reply.

The heavy work still took time. In weeks with more correspondence, Ressa paid for what extra help she could manage and left something else. The blue box acquired its border at last. The line around one corner was thicker than she had intended. She let it dry.

Nemi admired the color.

“You've missed a bit.”

“Where?”

“Inside the lid.”

“You cannot see that when it's shut.”

“I can when it's open.”

“Then don't open it to admire the outside.”

Nemi opened it anyway, to put in the spare pegs that had been scattering across the table.

The box made them easier to find.

Requiem City, Year 200 AGH

The award was on the fourth page.

Ressa found it before the official finished explaining the conditions on the surviving records. She kept her finger beside the amount and listened to the rest.

The implicated license was suspended. The remaining derived material would be held under controlled custody. There were terms for access, disclosure and audit, and an enforceable right to an account of handling that the available records could establish.

“This does not mean every copy has been recovered,” the official said.

“I know.”

“The order requires production and disclosure. It cannot make a recipient cease to know information already received.”

“Does it pay this to me, or to a care provider?”

“To you.”

“And I may choose one that has nothing to do with them.”

“Yes.”

Ressa read the amount again. It was not enough to pay for all the help she wanted for the rest of her life. It would pay for some. She could work out how much when she was home, with the actual rates beside it.

She had come to Requiem City to collect the authorized copy and attend the explanation. The journey home was booked for the following morning. There was no need to make a decision in the corridor.

The official showed her which part of the order could be used when making administrative arrangements. The private supporting material was not attached to that copy.

Ressa put the pages in their folder and closed it.

Dorin was waiting outside. She had seen him at other appointments, though they had not always spoken. Today he held his own copy of the order.

“Did you get what you asked for?” he said.

“Some of it.”

He nodded.

“They've kept the surviving records.”

“Yes.”

He opened the folder enough to look at the top page.

“I read that part. I know what it says.”

Ressa waited.

“If they let me see the record, the experience still won't be there.”

“No.”

He rubbed a crease flat with his thumb.

“I thought I would ask once.”

She did not remind him that he had asked before.

“There may be things written down,” she said.

“I know.”

He closed the folder.

The people who had handled his material would have to account for what they could. He had kept the receipts that established the onward use. He told her this without satisfaction, as if checking that the things he did possess were still where he had put them.

“They didn't get to keep the only copy,” he said.

“No.”

He put the folder under his arm.

Ressa wished him a good journey. He said the same to her, and went to find the person who had called his name.

The journalist approached after he had gone.

“Ressa Erskine?”

“Yes.”

“Could I speak to you about the order?”

“About which part?”

The journalist had an open notebook and a proposed account already taking shape.

“The personal story behind it. Your first life, the transfer, and now this. We thought of the woman who ended memory theft.”

“You will have to find her elsewhere.”

“Perhaps that's too strong. The woman who stood against it.”

“There were other people.”

“Of course. We could include them.”

Ressa looked toward the door through which Dorin had gone.

“You would have to ask them.”

“We would. But your history gives people a way to understand what happened.”

“What happened to the records is in the order.”

“Most people won't read a custody order. They'll read about you.”

Ressa had painted windows to make somebody stop and look. A well-placed object, a little room around it, something the eye wanted before it knew why. She had also removed things when the owner of the shop told her they were not for sale.

“You can use the public substance of the order,” she said. “The license, the custody, the audit, the award. You can say I brought a complaint and contributed these records.”

“And the earlier history?”

“No.”

“Your reason for refusing the care offer would help.”

“I wanted the care. I didn't sign the release. You can say that.”

“Could we arrange another meeting? At home, perhaps.”

“No.”

The journalist stopped writing.

Ressa waited for the next question. It did not come at once.

“May I give you a copy of what we intend to publish?”

“Yes.”

She gave an address for the correspondence. She did not open her folder.

*   *   *

Nemi put the care charges beside the amount Ressa had written on a clean page. They were at home again. The window was open a little, and the page lifted whenever someone passed through the doorway.

Ressa laid the blue box on its corner.

“If I use this much every month,” she said, “I can pay for the rest from what I already set aside.”

“For two visits?”

“Yes. But not every extra thing people may decide I need.”

“We can put the work in the agreement.”

“I want the washing in it.”

Nemi wrote it down.

“Appointments?”

“Some. We'll have to see how many.”

“The agreement can say how the time is used. It won't make the appointment shorter.”

“I have learned that.”

They checked the figures again. The independent arrangement would give her regular help without the profile credit. The award paid part of the cost. Her own budget paid the rest.

When they had finished, Ressa put the calculation away with the agreement. Nemi gathered the order and the working copy.

“Those don't go together.”

“Where do you want them?”

“The order in the back of the drawer. In the folder. The working copy at the front.”

Nemi opened the drawer.

“This front pocket?”

“Yes. That can be used when the provider needs it for the payment arrangements. Nothing from the sealed packet.”

Nemi put the working copy in the pocket and showed her before closing it.

Ressa took the folder containing the order. She checked that the pages lay flat, closed it and set it beside the blue box.

Nemi entered the end of the visit in her book. She put away the pencil and stood.

“What are you having tonight?”

Ressa considered the shelf where the bread was kept.

“Eggs. Unless I have already eaten them.”

“There are three.”

“Then eggs and bread.”

“How do you want the eggs?”

“I haven't decided.”

Nemi fetched her coat from the chair. Ressa moved the folder to the far end of the table to make room for a plate.

“Would you like supper?”

Nemi looked at the clock.

“I can stay for supper.”

“There's bread enough.”

“Then yes.”

Ressa took out a second plate. Nemi put her coat over the back of the chair and sat down while Ressa cut the bread.

“Two eggs for you,” Ressa said.

“One is enough.”

“There are three.”

“You can have two.”

“I didn't ask you to stay so you could give me your supper.”

Nemi laughed.

“Put them in the same pan. We can divide them after.”

Ressa set the pan on the stove with its handle within reach. She broke the first egg into a bowl, examined it, and broke the others beside it.

“Pepper?”

“Yes, please.”

She stirred in the pepper and poured the eggs into the hot pan. When they had set, she divided them between the plates. Nemi drew the bread toward the middle of the table while Ressa carried the plates over.

For a while they ate without discussing the case. Nemi wanted to know whether the blue on the box would come off on her fingers. Ressa said it had had plenty of time to dry, and Nemi turned it to see the corner that was thicker than the rest.

“You've done that one differently.”

“I know.”

“Were you going to do the others to match?”

“I was going to eat my supper.”

Nemi put the box back.

The folder stayed closed beside it. Ressa reached for another piece of bread, and Nemi passed the plate.