The House of Memory (Pluto's Snitch Book 2) Read online

  “Who are you?”

  “Names no more.” One nudged the other in the shoulder. “Names mean nothing.”

  I didn’t understand, but the way they spoke together was unnerving. “Where do you live?”

  “We’re always with you.” The dark-haired girl was in front of me before I could move. Her voice turned gravelly and mean. “No escape. Pretty is quiet.”

  “I’ll help you if I can,” I said. “Tell me your names.”

  The fairer girl joined her. Their eyes were dark and haunted in the illumination cast by the hallway lights, which had come back on. “Bad girl. Wicked tongue. You’ll pay.”

  “Tell me your names,” I said, my voice breaking.

  They shook their heads slowly. Before I could ask another question, they began to struggle, clawing at their necks as if something, or someone, was strangling them. Blood, like crimson tears, began to leak from their eyes again. At last their heads were wrenched gruesomely to the side, the sound of the bones snapping.

  And then they were gone.

  When I came to my senses, I was standing in the middle of the Burchfield hallway in my flimsy nightgown and no wrap. Dread seeped through my bones, and my heart pounded. My brain couldn’t comprehend my circumstances, but I focused on the pattern of gold sprigs in the dark-red wallpaper and at last calmed my breathing. I was alone. No other presence was near me. The hallway lights glowed dimly, exactly as they had in my dream. No remnants of my nocturnal visitors remained.

  The night was stifling; the unventilated corridor felt close. Sweat dripped down my back. I wiped my face with my hand and couldn’t resist checking to be sure I wasn’t bleeding. The dream had been so intense, obviously inspired by my grave concerns for Camilla Granger. The dream girls had been her age, garbed in the flapper attire Camilla had wanted to wear for her brief independence in New York. Enforced silence was the rule they honored. The blood leaking from their eyes puzzled me, but I knew it was somehow connected to Camilla’s illness. Simply thinking about it galvanized me to action.

  I hurried back to my room and locked the door behind me. Walking around strange hotels in my nightgown qualified as dangerous conduct. Had anyone seen me, my reputation would be ruined. In an attempt to catch a breeze, I went to the window and looked out over the Tuscaloosa night. The downtown area was empty of traffic. The city slept, even if I didn’t.

  Too unsettled to go back to bed, I picked up my notebook. While the dream was fresh in my mind, I would start a new short story. I had an idea for a tale of ghosts living among the bold, modern women of a big city. These ghosts wanted life—they wanted what the living had. And they meant to take it. “They Walk among Us” was the title that came to me, and I began with the words I’d heard in my dream.

  We’re always with you.

  By the time I put my pen down, the sun was casting long shadows. I stood and stretched. I’d pay for the lack of sleep, but I’d had no other option. I bathed, dressed, and was ready for breakfast when Reginald knocked on my door.

  “Are you ill?” he asked, stepping into my room to get a better look at me.

  “Lack of sleep. I had a nightmare.”

  We stepped back into the hallway and walked to the elevator.

  “I had strange dreams, too,” he said. “It will come as no surprise that Valkyrie Brady was involved. She had me tied into a chair, and she came at me with a scalpel. She kept saying, ‘It’s just a close shave.’”

  I had to laugh. If Reginald was pulling my leg, I didn’t care. I needed a bit of mirth. “I dread going back to Bryce.”

  “Me, too. But this is our last chance to look around and make sure we haven’t missed anything important.”

  I nodded. “I wish we could bring Camilla home with us.” The dream girls, bleeding from their eyes, quickened my fear. “Dr. Perkins will return from his travels soon, and I have no doubt he’ll push to operate on Camilla.”

  “It would be a feather in his cap to ‘cure’ someone like her, even if he reduces her to the state of a drooling child.”

  “Cure has different meanings for different people, doesn’t it? Come on. Let’s take the stairs.” I wasn’t in the mood for the creaking and moaning elevator.

  We ate a quick, cold breakfast of biscuits and butter and were on the street just as the hired car arrived. The drive to the hospital was beautiful, but I couldn’t shake the sense of depression that clung to me. I stepped onto the grounds of Bryce Hospital with some reluctance. My gaze went to the window I knew to be Camilla’s, and I was surprised to see a young woman standing there. Not Camilla—someone close to her age but taller. She was gone before I got a clear image of her.

  Soon I was walking the grounds with Camilla and two stout aides, who followed twenty paces behind. If Camilla was bothered by her guards, she didn’t show it. She was courteous to them, as she was to the patients and the staff we encountered. I watched her closely for any hint that something dark lurked behind her gaze, but I saw nothing. The mist of darkness I’d perceived earlier was gone. Perhaps I’d only imagined it.

  We walked beneath the shade of oaks and sycamores, ignoring the humidity and yellow flies, until we came to the south bank of the Black Warrior River that bounded the hospital grounds. “I love coming here,” Camilla said. “Even with my keepers.” She smiled at the two men. “The flow of the river is like life. It moves on, no matter how sad or happy I am. Life sweeps past. It reminds me to think of the good things.”

  True though it might be, I couldn’t imagine that she truly wanted to remain at Bryce. “Come home with me, Camilla. Your mother said you came here voluntarily. Call her. Tell her you’re ready to come home. Tell her you’re ready to marry David, and give us a chance to figure out what’s going on with you.”

  Hesitation and longing crossed her face.

  “What if it’s something at Roswell House?” I pressed. “What if you have the surgery only to discover that the problem was external? Think, Camilla. You’ve had trouble only at that house.”

  “That’s true.”

  “We can pick you up in the morning,” I urged. “You can stay at the Sayre house, I’m sure. Zelda is leaving for New York soon, but Minnie adores you. She spoke so highly of you when I was visiting there. It would give you a chance to recover in surroundings you know and love, and you would be right there to help us unravel why this is happening to you.”

  “Mama will demand I return home.” Her face was now blank of any expression. It gave me a chill to think that might be her permanent demeanor if she allowed Dr. Perkins to operate on her.

  “Once you’re free of here, you don’t have to obey your mother. You’re almost eighteen.”

  “If I leave here, I have to do as Mama tells me. I’m not of age.”

  “You’re old enough to fight for your future. If you don’t want to get a room of your own, stay with the Sayres.”

  “Mama will make a scandal of it, and the Sayres will suffer.”

  I couldn’t deny her statement, and I was about to suggest that she elope with David simply to escape the dragon when I saw a fleet of small boats coming down the river. They were flat-bottomed, two-man boats used for fishing near the banks and inlets. They drifted on the current, spread across the Black Warrior. Each boat contained a man with a paddle and another who pulled a rope dragging something.

  “I wonder what they’re fishing for,” Camilla said. “Look, it’s Deakon, one of the groundskeepers.” She went to the edge of the river and waved at him. “Deakon!”

  The black man looked away, ignoring her.

  “What are you doing?” Camilla called out.

  He didn’t have to answer. Nurse Brady had come up behind us and startled me to the point that I actually jumped.

  “They’re dragging the river for a body,” she said. “Now go back to the hospital. I’ve warned all of you about coming to the river. You could stumble into the swift current and drown. Dr. Perkins will have my head for this.”

  “I didn’t come alon
e. I wasn’t in any danger. I had Raissa and two aides. We—” Camilla’s attempt to explain was cut short.

  “Go back to the hospital. Now.”

  Camilla turned and walked away, an aide on either side of her. Margaret Brady gave me a long glare, but I merely absorbed it. She couldn’t boss me. “Who’s missing?” I asked, knowing it had to be one of the patients.

  “I don’t need you poking about here.”

  There was likely liability attached to a patient walking into the river and drowning, so I ignored her snappy attitude. “Probably not, but I am here, so you might as well tell me. Perhaps I can help.”

  She pushed a strand of hair from her face. “It’s Cheryl, one of Dr. Perkins’s success stories. I don’t know how she got out of her room. The staff assures me the door was locked, but obviously it wasn’t. Dr. Perkins will be furious if she’s drowned.”

  “What makes you think she’s drowned?”

  “She disappeared last night—and no one called me. I would have had search parties out for her. A fisherman saw her wading into the river this morning. He tried to save her, but the current caught her and pulled her under. Now the most we can do is recover the body for an autopsy.”

  “Surely the current has taken her downriver.”

  “Possibly. Or she might have been caught up nearby. If she’s stuck here, they’ll find her with the grappling hooks.”

  I turned away, appalled at the picture she painted. “How could she have gotten out unnoticed?” I managed after a moment.

  “You’ve been here for what, six hours, and you think you know everything? Would you prefer to have these patients chained to the wall? Maybe tied in bed or a chair? We don’t have the staff to send an aide with every patient who wants to walk on the grounds. So it’s either let them walk by themselves or tie them in their rooms or beds. Which sounds kinder to you?”

  I swallowed. “Could she swim? Isn’t there any chance she survived?”

  “I doubt it,” Nurse Brady said. “Cheryl was troubled. Dr. Perkins did what he could, but she never came out of it. She came here so angry she lashed out at everyone. She escaped repeatedly, only to be brought back. Her family didn’t want her returned to them, but that’s all she talked about. Going home. She slipped out of her bed all the time and walked the property. Punishment didn’t stop her, so we quit disciplining her.”

  “What about her family?”

  “They dropped her off and never came back. It happens more than you’d ever imagine.”

  “You’re right. I don’t know anything. I’m sorry if I came across that way.”

  “Believe it or not, I care about my patients, but I can’t be soft. They need structure and routine. Some of the treatments are painful and unpleasant. But Dr. Perkins and I want to see these people returned to normal life, to live with their families able to work a job and contribute. We want to give them the simple things that so many take for granted.”

  My opinion of Nurse Brady had begun to shift. Her manner was gruff and aggressive, but she did seem to care.

  “We got her!” One of the men in the boat stood up and waved.

  As the boat moved to shore, the man in the stern began pulling in the rope he held. Something white bobbed up in the water and then submerged again.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  The grappling hook had caught her just under the rib cage. The men pulled their boats up on a small sandbar and then waded into the river to grasp her arms and legs. They brought her out, her clothes molded to her thin form. I wanted to weep, though I didn’t even know her.

  “It’s Cheryl Lawrence,” one of the men yelled up to Nurse Brady.

  “Damn.” The nurse strode down the bank to the little patch of white sand where the men put the body. She knelt beside the girl, but it was no use. She was long dead, her skin a luminous lavender.

  Clutching tree limbs and roots, I made my way down the bank and stopped. “Is there anything I can do to help?”

  “No.” Nurse Brady looked up at me. She brushed wet strands of hair from the dead girl’s face. “After Dr. Perkins treated her, she became a sweet girl. Slow and prone to running away, but she wasn’t bad.”

  She might once have been pretty, but it was impossible to tell. What held my gaze, though, was the scar and bald patch on her skull that showed the efforts of Dr. Perkins’s surgery. “I’m sorry.” I stepped back, intending to find Reginald. I had no idea where he might be since he wasn’t with Nurse Brady.

  “I’ll have the body brought to the hospital,” Nurse Brady said as she rose to her feet slowly. “Would you find Dr. Bentley and ask him to be on hand? I’d like to get the necessary documents signed and the body ready to be taken home. The water and the heat . . . she needs to be embalmed. Her family will have to take her, like it or not.”

  “Dr. Bentley? I wasn’t aware another physician worked at the hospital.”

  “There are two others. Dr. Bentley is a superb alienist. Dr. French is an apprentice physician working under Dr. Bentley and Dr. Perkins. He’s studied anatomy in France and was a field medic during the war.”

  “I’ll find Dr. Bentley,” I said as I scrambled back up the bank.

  Dr. Samuel Bentley and Dr. Millard French were making rounds, and I found the Mutt and Jeff duo with ease. Bentley was a short, round man with the demeanor of an ambulatory cadaver and a painful smile. French was something else. He was movie-star handsome, tall with broad shoulders. His slicked-back hair glistened, and he sported a thin mustache. He gave Reginald a run for his money in the looks department.

  I relayed Nurse Brady’s request, only to be met with Bentley’s sour response. “I’ll be in the west wing. She can find me there. I spend more time signing forms here than I do healing patients.”

  Dr. French smiled. “Tell her we’re evaluating new patients. She’ll know where to find us.” He had sandy-blond hair and an easy smile. He was only a few years older than I, but he exuded confidence. I wanted to ask him about his experiences on the battlefield, but I didn’t. Thinking of Alex and what he’d endured would only lead me down into melancholy, which would do little to help me do my job.

  “Are you studying to be a psychiatrist?” I asked. “Nurse Brady said you had served as a medic in Europe.”

  “My chosen field is general surgeon. Bryce offers me a tremendous opportunity. There are a number of patients who need surgical care, but the state doesn’t have the budget to pay for a surgeon. Under the guidance of Dr. Bentley and Dr. Perkins, I can operate and help the patients while also gaining invaluable experience. I come here two days a week. Dr. Bentley does most of the orthopedic operations, and I assist him. I handle the soft-tissue cases.”

  I suspected that Dr. French would have no dearth of female patients suffering ailments simply for a chance to see the handsome doctor. His ring finger was bare, and a prestigious doctor would be a fine catch.

  “Millard, we have patients.” Dr. Bentley stood five feet away, impatiently waiting.

  “Of course.” Dr. French gave a nod and a smile before he sauntered after the rotund Bentley and disappeared. Instead of going back to the river, I found an orderly and sent a message to Nurse Brady. My job was to find Reginald.

  I heard his laughter before I found him in the third-floor records room. He was sitting on a young woman’s desk, telling her stories of the New Orleans street musicians. I hung back, enjoying the way he offered a few titillating details. He had the young woman in the palm of his hand. Word of the tragedy at the river hadn’t spread to the offices yet, but it wouldn’t be long.

  Reginald might have sensed me, because he looked at his pocket watch and made an annoyed face. “I have an appointment, Faith. I should go.” He stood. “It’s been a real pleasure talking with you.”

  “And you, Mr. Proctor. Will you be at the hospital for a few days? If you haven’t found the best places to eat, I can make a list. I’d start with Carmichael’s Catfish Cabin. Best fried catfish in the state. They bring them straight out of the river.
It’s close, too. Maybe, if you wanted, I could show you where it’s at.”

  “I’d love that, but I have a dinner appointment. Work takes precedence over pleasure, I’m afraid. By the way, I’m working with Dr. Perkins on some new treatments for patients. Might I have a look at Camilla Granger’s file? And her friend Connie Shelton’s?”

  “Those are surgery patients,” she said, going to a file cabinet. “Here you go. Granger, Shelton, Lawrence, Wilkins, Hebert, Tanner, Welford, and Knight. They’re all Dr. Perkins’s surgery patients. Joanne Pence is to be evaluated.”

  “Did Connie Shelton have the surgery before she went home with her uncle?”

  “I don’t know. The file will tell you.”

  Reginald took the folders and indicated a chair. “Mind if I rest my posterior?”

  “You go right ahead.” She was pleased he’d decided to stay a little longer, even if it was only to look through the files.

  I backed away, unwilling to disturb Reginald’s quest for information, though I wondered what he hoped to find in the files. The hand on the back of my arm almost made me scream. When I whipped around, I found a young woman with dark hair and dark eyes grasping my arm. She wore the jet earbobs we’d found in the hall.

  “Help me,” she said in a whisper.

  “Joanne?” I remembered Camilla calling her that.

  She nodded. “I can’t stay here anymore.” She looked up and down the hall. “Can you help me leave?”

  “I don’t know.” I answered honestly. There could be charges if I simply took her from hospital care. “Why are you here?”

  She backed away. “I’m sick.”

  “You’re here to be helped.”

  She turned and ran. She was small and thin, and her shoes barely made a sound on the hardwood floors. Someone else approached, and I ducked into a linen closet just as Dr. Bentley rounded the corner and headed into the records room. I couldn’t see what was happening, but I could hear.

  “What are you doing here?” Dr. Bentley asked.