It’s what he said about Dougie. It’s rankled me. The idea I would have turned on the one person to make it through this nightmare with me… For the millionth time, I wish I could visit him. I’ve asked, but of course they will never let me. All I know is that Dougie is in a hospital somewhere, bleeping machines monitoring his breathing, his heartbeat. He must still be there. No one’s told me so, but I know. Otherwise they would have switched him off, let him fade away. Then it would be four lives against my name.
Walking slowly back down the corridor, slippers squeaking on the highly polished, marble-effect linoleum, I glance around, make sure no one’s watching. Then I close my eyes—just for the briefest of seconds—and say a prayer.
I need Dougie to wake up.
I need him to wake up and tell Dr. Petersen and my mom and everybody else that I’m not a murderer.
I need him to wake up and get me out of here.
Twenty-Four
Then
I left the hospital in a wheelchair. It wasn’t that I was incapable of walking so much as nobody wanted me to. Because if I could walk, I might run. I really wasn’t capable of that, but no one seemed to want to take the chance.
I was confused. Confused and scared. I’d told them what had happened. Told my story so many times I’d lost count. But that didn’t seem to be enough, didn’t seem to make anyone happy. I was alone too. My parents had been to visit me several times in the little room I had all to myself in the hospital, but the more I’d seen the smiling man—who I now knew as Dr. Petersen—the less I’d seen them.
I was loaded into the back of a vehicle that seemed to be a cross between an ambulance and a prison van. There was a cart-like bed, an array of equipment hanging above it, but the person pushing my chair—a somber man in a spotless white uniform—reversed me up the ramp and guided the wheelchair to a purpose-built space against the other wall. I heard a series of clicks as he locked the chair in place. Right across from me, dead center in the railing of the bed, was a series of loops. Dangling from one was a set of metal handcuffs. That was when the first block of ice dropped into my stomach. As the doors slammed closed on my right, and the engine started up, I felt the chill of a couple more. What was going on?
I twisted my neck around to stare at the man. It was the only part of me I could move. I was strapped into the chair with a seat-belt-type contraption. He had taken a small, fold-down bucket seat, like a flight attendant without the smile.
“Where are we going?” I asked.
I hadn’t questioned anything up to this point because the whole maneuver had been sprung on me so suddenly. One minute I was in bed, forcing down the lukewarm hospital breakfast, and the next I was in a wheelchair, trundling quickly along the corridor, down in the elevator, through the foyer…
“You’re being transferred to another facility,” he said. He looked at his watch as he spoke, avoiding eye contact. He was tense, his rigid posture adding to my discomfort.
“Oh,” I said. “Why?”
This time, the orderly turned to face me, but his eyes were guarded, his expression unreadable.
“I don’t know,” he said. I didn’t believe him.
“Where am I being transferred to?”
He turned away from me again and spoke to the neatly folded sheets on the bed opposite.
“Dr. Petersen will be able to answer all of your questions when we get there.”
Why not tell me now? I tried to slow my breathing, but it felt as if there wasn’t enough oxygen in the cramped space. I plucked at the strap across my front, but that wasn’t the thing making my chest tight. I looked to the doors, desperately wanting them to open, but the gentle vibrations shaking the chair told me we were still moving.
“How long will it take to get there?” I asked, my voice croaky, my throat choked.
“Not long,” the orderly replied.
That was the end of our conversation. I wasn’t wearing a watch, so it was hard to keep track of the minutes as they crept by. I paced them out by drumming the fingers of my good hand against my knee in double time. Under the bandage, my other hand itched to join in, but there wasn’t room to move a fraction of an inch under the painfully tight dressing. I made do with jiggling my whole arm restlessly.
When the door finally opened, I barely had a second to glance at my surroundings before my view was blocked by two men wearing uniforms identical to the one the orderly wore. They went straight to my chair and unhooked it from the wall of the vehicle.
“Journey all right?” one of them asked.
Before I could answer, the man who’d ridden with me spoke. “Fine. The court had the paperwork all in order so the discharge was pretty straightforward.”
Court? What were they talking about?
“Where are we?” I asked, trying to turn my head to see out the door. But they spun the wheelchair around, taking me out of the ambulance backward, and it was another ten seconds before the vast expanse of driveway came into view. There was a thin strip of lawn, neatly mown, but what caught my eye was the very high, very sturdy-looking metal fencing topped menacingly with spiked tips. Before I had time to do more than register the intimidating enclosure, I was whirled around once more and at last I could see the building.
It didn’t look like a hospital. More like a cross between a school and an office block. There were lots of windows, but nothing that looked like an entrance. One of the orderlies began to push me closer and I saw a small door, almost hidden among the glass. I realized this wasn’t the front. I was going in the back way. For some reason, that amplified the anxiety bubbling in my stomach.
“Where are we?” I asked again. I didn’t really expect them to answer, and they didn’t disappoint.
Inside, I found myself in a very short corridor. We paused in front of a door with a small window too high for me to see through. To my left was a larger window, and behind that sat yet another orderly, like a teller at a bank.
“Heather Shaw?” he asked. Again, he wasn’t talking to me.
“Yeah.” Confirmation came from behind me.
There was a beep, and the door clicked open. One of the three men escorting me reached out and opened it, and I saw another corridor with lots of closed doors running off it. We traversed the length of it, went through a second door—this time with a key card that one of my entourage swiped smoothly against a discreet wall panel—and behind that there were more corridors, more locked doors. I didn’t bother to try to wrangle any more information from the men around me, but waited with growing alarm. How big was this place, and why did it need so much security?
The silent tour of my new surroundings ended at another door. Somehow I knew this was my destination, even though this door looked much the same as any of the others. I could clearly see the large, complicated lock on the outside, but when one of the orderlies reached out and twisted the handle, to my surprise this door opened silently, already unlocked. The only unlocked door I’d seen so far.
I understood why at once: there was already someone in the room. A familiar figure, dressed impeccably in a three-piece suit, with a genial expression on his face that I didn’t like, although I was never quite able to put my finger on why.
“Heather,” he said, standing up.
Only then did I realize that he was sitting on a bed, that this was a bedroom. Panic burgeoned once more. Why would I be brought to a bedroom with a lock on the door except to be put in it? What was going on? Dr. Petersen, at least, might give me some answers.
“What’s happening?” I asked.
He smiled at me, a reassuring smile. It didn’t work. “What’s happening?” I repeated, louder this time. I was almost shouting. Dr. Petersen didn’t like that. He gestured to the men escorting me to bring me inside, then I heard the sound of their retreating feet and the click of the door closing. I didn’t hear the lock engage, but still I felt trapped, lik
e an animal in a cage.
“Let’s get you up and out of this chair, shall we?” Dr. Petersen said, cutting me off before I could scream my question at him a third time.
I closed my mouth, because I wanted out of the restraining straps of the chair very much. Hands at my shoulders started unclipping the straps, startling me. I’d thought Dr. Petersen and I were alone in the room. The remaining orderly came around and released my wrists, giving my legs a wide berth as if I might lash out at him. He moved back quickly as my arms came up, but I merely wanted to ease the tension in my shoulder, the cramps in my good hand. The restraints had been too tight.
“I know you’ve been sitting for a long time, Heather, but if you have a seat on the bed there, I’ll explain everything to you.” Unsteadily, I rose from the wheelchair. On stiff legs, I took the three steps required to cross the length of the room, then dropped down onto the bed to face Dr. Petersen, who had taken a plastic chair, similar to the ones from school, directly across from me. There wasn’t much else in the room. Just a small table, a bedside cabinet, and a window so high up that from my position on the bed, I couldn’t see the view. Everything was a shade of white or beige. Clean, clinical. Even the air smelled hygienic, burning my nostrils with the faint hint of bleach.
“I suppose you have a lot of questions for me,” Dr. Petersen said, pulling me from my inspection of the room.
“Where am I?” I asked. This was the most crucial question on my list.
“You are at my facility,” Dr. Petersen replied.
“And what happens at your facility?” I fired back.
Dr. Petersen’s smile widened. “I treat patients,” he said simply.
I frowned. That wasn’t an answer. He was being deliberately vague, and that was only exacerbating the very bad feeling I had. “Treat patients for what?” I asked. “I’m not ill.” The only thing I needed help with lay under the swathes of bandages on my right hand.
Another ingratiating smile. “There’s plenty of time to talk about that later.” He stood up, and I knew he was about to leave. The orderly shifted from his position against the wall.
“I want to talk about it now!” I snapped. Unconsciously, I rose and took half a step forward, but quick as lightning, the orderly was in my face, blocking my path. Over his shoulder, I saw Dr. Petersen hold up two hands in a calming gesture.
“All in good time, Heather. First I want to give you a chance to settle into your new environment. Someone will bring you something to eat shortly, then I suggest you concentrate on getting some rest. We’ll talk again tomorrow.”
He turned his back on me, walked out of the door. The orderly put both hands on my shoulders, pushed me gently backward. A second orderly replaced the departing form of Dr. Petersen in the doorway, something with far too many buckles clasped in his hands. I thought I knew what it was, although I didn’t want to ask and discover for sure. Surrendering, I let the hulking figure in front of me guide me to the bed, where I obediently sat down. He backed away, one cautious step at a time. The door closed. Locked. For a brief moment, there was a face at the tiny square of glass, high up in the door. Then it, too, was gone, and I was alone.
I sat there for a long, long time before I finally started to cry.
Twenty-Five
Now
I lie on my back and stare at the ceiling. My stomach is churning, and it has nothing to do with the tray of food that was delivered to me this morning, because I haven’t eaten any of it. It’s lying on the table, as far across the room as possible because the smell of congealing scrambled eggs was making the nausea so bad I actually hovered over the toilet bowl, waiting. Nothing came up though.
It’s not easy to get rid of dread.
Six days and twenty-one hours have passed since my last appointment with Dr. Petersen. Usually I’d have a midweek session too, but I was granted a temporary reprieve that day. Dr. Petersen had not been lying about the release form for the surgery on my hand. At the preliminary consultation, the surgeon was optimistic, fairly certain he could graft some skin, implant false nails. I’d never have a “normal-looking” hand, he told me. But it wouldn’t be too far off.
That thought had cheered me through the last few days, but when I woke up this morning, dull, gray light filtering in through the tiny window, I felt only cold, unmoving trepidation.
I do not want to go back into Dr. Petersen’s office.
I don’t have a clock, but it’s easy to measure the hours as they pass. The orderlies have a set routine that they follow every day. Food round. Meds round. The token hour of “exercise” for those of us with nothing else on our schedule. Checks round. It was just after ten thirty. Not three minutes ago, a face had peeked in at me, making sure I was not attempting to hang myself with some ingenious rope made out of strips of my bedsheets bound together with desperation and despair. I’m not; I’m not that inventive. Although I might be getting that desperate. I’m beginning to realize that I may never get out of here.
A rattle at the door turns my head. I roll up into a sitting position, my face expectant. The churning in my stomach has gone into overdrive.
I hear a whoosh as the door is pulled back. An orderly who has been tending to me for almost a year, but whose name I still don’t know, gives me a perfunctory smile.
“Time to go, Heather.”
I sigh, swallow, take a second to gather myself. But I don’t try to resist. I know from previous experience that there is no point. It does more harm than good. The orderly takes a step back as I approach, ever cautious, following protocol to the letter.
We walk past door after door, and as usual I hear the strange orchestra of sounds that belong in a place like this: screaming, wailing, shouting. Banging. Voices, talking to themselves. It never ceases to unnerve me; this is the only time that I’m glad there are locks on every door. Crazy people frighten me. I both relax and grow tenser as we cross the threshold into the plush, visitor-friendly section of the facility and the noise diminishes, replaced by more normal sounds. Businesslike conversations, the click of heels, the tap of fingers typing at one hundred words per minute, phones ringing. I pause in the waiting area—Helen’s domain—ready to take one of the seats against the wall, but a hand on my shoulder urges me on, and as soon as I feel the pressure, I realize that Petersen’s office door is already open, waiting for me.
I am relieved that I won’t have to wait, can just get on with it, but at the same time I was counting on those few precious minutes to compose myself, to prepare for the coming assault. When I enter the room, Dr. Petersen is not at his desk. I frown, look around, and spot him at a filing cabinet almost behind me. He is rooting through the top drawer, and I have never noticed before that he is so short. He has to stand on tiptoes in his shiny black shoes to see all the way into the back. This knowledge raises an illicit smile across my lips. It will probably be the last genuine one for a while.
“Heather.” Dr. Petersen acknowledges me slightly breathlessly. My eyebrows rise up my forehead in surprise. It’s very unlike him to greet me this way, very unusual. He’s usually ensconced behind his desk. I wonder if it is an elaborate trap, some strange new strategy he has devised to deal with me. But no, he definitely seems on edge, uncomfortable. I watch silently as he sifts through files, then plucks one free. A relieved look on his face, he slams the drawer closed, then dumps the file onto a huge stack of papers untidily piled on his desk. As I move to take my seat, I see that the one on top has my name on it.
“There’s been a development, Heather,” he says as he eases himself down into the chair opposite me. He takes a moment to settle himself into a comfortable position, old bones creaking, a twinge of pain on his face.
Development? I keep my face impassive, but curiosity is burning just beneath the surface. What could have happened that would unnerve the unflappable Dr. Petersen?
“The judge has sent through a summons. You are
to go back for a second hearing.”
If this were a Tom and Jerry cartoon, my mouth would pop open, hitting the floor with a comical thunk. This is real life, however, and there is no jaw-dropping. I just stare at him, astonished.
My first hearing was something of a joke. I wasn’t even there. I was in the hospital. My parents went, though. They sat in a room with a judge, some lawyers, and good old Dr. Petersen, and in a conversation that I doubt lasted more than ten minutes, they decided that I was insane. Crazy. Off my nut. Not fit to stand trial. That’s how Dr. Petersen got away with locking me up without any questions. Perhaps there had been another doctor there to give a second opinion—I certainly saw enough men in white coats while I was lying flat on my back in my isolated room in the hospital, trying to make sense of the world around me—but if there were, he must have agreed with Petersen. My parents didn’t even put up a fight. Maybe they thought it was better than jail. Less shameful. Better a lunatic for a daughter than a criminal.
A second hearing. It’s not something that Dr. Petersen has even hinted at in our sessions together. Judging from the way he’s twitching in his chair, the sheen of sweat on his forehead, it’s come as kind of a shock to him too. I like that he’s flustered, but I’m too overwhelmed myself to take advantage of it.
“Why?” I ask. What has changed?
Dr. Petersen coughs, adjusts his tie, purses his lips. “The judge wishes to reevaluate your case.”
Yes, I know that, but… “Why?”
He sniffs, takes a deep breath, then looks me square in the face. “A new witness has emerged, and the judge feels this person has the potential to shed a fresh perspective on the events at Black Cairn Point.”
The Last Witness Page 19