"I'm asking him, Mattie. He doesn't have to show me. Ancil, you don't have to show me. I'm asking."
Ancil stood there. He thought of Ivah saying, Be sweet, whatever comes. He thought she had known, somehow. She always knew. And he thought that if he did not take it out, it would be worse, that the sheriff would ask him to come over to the office, and he would have to say no, and then it would be a different thing altogether, and he would not be home by one o'clock when Ivah woke up. So he reached into the inside pocket of the coat and took out the quart freezer bag and held it out, flat on his palm, the way you'd hold out something to a horse.
Nolan took it. He held it up to the light from the window. An amber vial with a white childproof cap, inside a plastic bag, zipped. A rubber band around the vial. A strip of masking tape across the label, with a word written in black marker in square capitals: DISCONTINUED. Under the tape, through the bag, he could read the pharmacy label. HOLCOMB DRUG. SIZEMORE, IVAH M. OXYCODONE HCL 10 MG. TAKE 1 TABLET BY MOUTH EVERY 4 HOURS AS NEEDED FOR PAIN. QTY: 90. Filled 08/14/2026.
He unzipped the bag. He did not ask. He took the vial out and turned it in his hand so that the pills inside slid and ticked against the plastic, and he could see without opening it that it was nowhere near ninety.
"How many in here?"
"Nineteen."
"Out of ninety."
"She took seventy-one," Ancil said. "Over four weeks. Then they changed her."
"You count them?"