The Goodwin house, though a little quiet, was as grand and immacte as ever, kept spotless by the staff.


    While Evelyn went off to y, Magdalen and Eleanor sat on the sofa, sipping tea.


    "I wanted to go see Gina, butn told me not to make the trip," Magdalen said with a sigh. "What kind of illness is it, anyway? She''s been gone for so long." It was clear she was still being kept in the dark.


    "Grandma, try not to worry too much," Eleanor soothed. "Modern medicine is very advanced. Gina will be okay."


    Magdalen looked at Eleanor and smiled. "Well, I have a genius scientist sitting right in front of me, so I suppose I shouldn''t worry. I just wish this house had a bit more life in it." She then asked, "What have you been busy withtely? Are you still at the sameb?"


    "Yes, I am," Eleanor replied, instinctively protecting the old woman from the truth. At her age, she didn''t need any more shocks.


    "You young people are all so busy. It must be tough forn, managing such argepany. If only his father hadn''t passed away so young," Magdalenmented, her thoughts turning to her son, who had died before he was fifty.


    To be precise,n''s father had been forty-five when he died. He had passed away in his prime.


    On the day he died, Eleanor had been at the hospital. Her father, as his lead physician, had been working around the clock, holdingte-night meetings with the medical team. In the end, they couldn''t save him.


    Eleanor''s hand tightened around her teacup as a memory, long buried, resurfaced. That day, she had overheard nurses in the elevator saying the patient in room nine hadn''t made it through the morning resuscitation. She had bolted out of the elevator and sprinted to the inpatient wing, arriving to findn kneeling outside the hospital room while her father and the other specialists stood by in somber silence.


    "Ellie, what''s wrong?" Magdalen''s voice pulled Eleanor back to the present. Eleanor quicklyposed herself, shaking her head. "Nothing, Grandma." "You must have metn''s father, didn''t you?" Magdalen asked.


    Eleanor nodded. "I saw him a couple of times outside the room when my father was his doctor."


    Magdalen sighed. "By the time we got back, it was toote to say goodbye. It all happened so suddenly."


    Eleanor tried to think of a way to change the subject, to steer the conversation away from painful memories.


    nta


    "Afterward, your father askedn donate his body for research. We couldn''t ept it at the time; we wanted him to be buried peacefully. Butn.


    The teacup ttered in its saucer. Eleanor looked up, her eyes wide with disbelief. "Mr. Goodwin''s body... was donated to my father for his research?"


    "Ian never told you?" the old woman asked, clearly havinge to terms with it long ago.


    Eleanor was utterly stunned, her heart pounding as if struck by a heavy blow. She had no idea. She remembered how much pressure her father had been under, how he hadst weight and seemed to hit wall in his research Had the breakthroughe from the donation ofn''s father''s body?


    "That boy has always been strong-willed, even as a child. I couldn''t have made a decision like. that but he had the strength to sign the papers," Magdalen sighed. 4 suppose it was a contribution to medical science in the end.


    Eleanor looked down at the cup in her hands, her mind reeling with a storm ofplex emotions.


    It was her father''s idea?