A Deadly Fortune

by Stacie Murphy

  “I shouldn’t have let you take such a risk,” he said.

  She scoffed. “You couldn’t have stopped me. And besides, think of what we’ve found. Unless he has a damned good explanation for all that money, it proves Harcourt is involved.”

  She reached up to smooth her hair, running her fingers through the strands. They curled around her face, brushing along her jawline. Andrew forced himself to look away.

  “It seems likely.” He stopped, gauze in hand. “Now, you’ll need to…” He motioned awkwardly to her shirtwaist. He cleared his throat. “I can’t clean those wounds until…”

  “Oh.” She went still. Then, slowly, she turned her back to him and began to undo the buttons down the front of her dress.

  Andrew held his breath as she opened it to the waist, then pulled her arms from the sleeves and pushed it partway down. She hesitated, then slid her torn shift off her shoulders. Bare from the hips up, she kept her back to him as she glanced over one shoulder.

  “Is… is that enough?”

  He forced himself to meet her eyes, to keep his voice matter-of-fact. He was a doctor tending to a patient, nothing more. “Yes.”

  She dropped her gaze and stood silently, her head tipped down, tendrils of hair trailing over the slender column of her neck. Below the delicate line of her shoulders, Amelia’s back was ravaged, the pale skin marred by scrapes and punctures, some still oozing blood. Something clenched inside Andrew, fierce and protective, at the sight.

  He cleared his throat again and tipped the disinfectant onto the gauze pad. “This will sting.”

  She closed her eyes. Her breath whistled through gritted teeth as the caustic liquid touched the raw flesh. Her head came up, and the line of her jaw hardened. He worked as quickly as he could, gently cleaning the wounds and wiping smears of drying blood from her skin. When he’d finished, he capped the bottle and set it down.

  “There.” He didn’t step away, and she made no move to cover herself. The silence stretched, heavier with each passing moment.

  Andrew watched the rise and fall of her back as she breathed. Without even deciding to do it, he reached forward and trailed one finger down the nape of her neck and along the crest of one shoulder. Her skin was warm and vital beneath his own.

  She gasped at the touch and went still. Her head tipped forward. He stepped toward her, feeling as though he were in a dream.

  The rap of knuckles on the office door sounded as loud as a gunshot.

  They leapt apart. Amelia grabbed at her dress and pressed it against her chest. She looked at him, her cheeks flushed.

  Hardly any more composed, Andrew put a shaking finger to his lips, then he called out, “What is it?”

  A voice replied through the closed door. “There’s a man on the telephone for you, Dr. Cavanaugh. He says it’s important. He says he won’t leave a message, that he must speak directly to you.”

  After a pause, Andrew replied, “Very well. I’ll be along in a moment.”

  * * *

  Andrew turned back to her after dismissing the messenger, but Amelia didn’t give him an opportunity to speak. She held up her dress with one arm and retreated into the storage room. She heard him leave as she shrugged back into the top of her dress and buttoned the bodice with trembling fingers.

  Her blood was still singing in her veins. Amelia caught herself staring at the folded cot beside the wall and wrenched her eyes away from it as heat flooded her face. She pressed her palms to her cheeks and tried to ignore the other, lower heat blooming in her body.

  Her back stung. She focused on it, thankful for the distraction. She wished there was a mirror. She must look a fright. Amelia combed her hair with her fingers, then realized what she was doing and, irritated with herself, forced her hands to her sides.

  Amelia took a deep breath and tried to steady herself. Andrew would be back soon, and she must behave normally. She would not let what had just happened affect her. And, she told herself, nothing had actually happened. And nothing would have happened. If that knock on the door had not come, it was not as though they would have—

  Amelia yanked her eyes away from the cot again as she heard the office door open. She steeled herself and stepped from the storage room, her head down, pretending to fuss with the buttons.

  “Amelia.”

  She looked up at his tone—more serious than she’d ever heard him. His face was solemn.

  Dread thudded into the bottom of her stomach like a lead weight. “What is it?”

  “It’s Jonas.”

  45

  Shot,” Amelia repeated. Her voice was flat, and her face had gone white. Andrew strode past her into the storage room and flung open the drawer where he’d hidden the clothes Jonas had brought. He turned and thrust the garments into her hands.

  “Put these on. Hurry.”

  She didn’t move, staring at the clothing as if unable to comprehend its purpose.

  He took her by the elbow and tugged her toward the storage room. “You have to change. We’re leaving. Now.”

  Andrew had made up his mind even as he turned away from the telephone. The voice on the other end hadn’t given him a great deal of information, but if the situation was as dire as it seemed, there was a real chance Jonas would die. Andrew knew all too well how it felt not to get the chance to say goodbye. Amelia had delivered him from it. He would move the heavens to keep her from knowing such regret.

  She looked at him, her expression lost. “Leaving? But what about—”

  He was still holding her elbow, and now he shook it. “There’s no time. If you want to see Jonas before—” He cut himself off, but understanding filled her face, followed by dread. She pulled away from him and hurried into the storage room.

  As he waited for Amelia to emerge, Andrew donned his own coat and picked up his hat, resolutely ignoring the frantic voice clamoring at the back of his mind. There were a dozen different ways the next quarter of an hour could go wrong. Even if her disguise was convincing—and he had his doubts about that—there weren’t supposed to be any adolescent boys in the asylum. If they were seen, they would need an explanation.

  And if they managed to make it off the island, he’d be left with an even larger problem: Amelia’s absence would be discovered. The fever had delayed the reconciliation, but sometime soon—within the next two days, at most—there would be a head count. A missing patient would cause an uproar.

  Andrew turned as the storage room door creaked, and his jaw dropped.

  If he hadn’t known it was Amelia standing before him, he would never have guessed. His eyes jumped from feature to feature, unable to take in the whole of the transformation at once. Corded trousers hung in a straight line from her waist to her ankles. In concert with her worn, patched shirt and lumpy jacket, no trace of her figure was visible. Heavy shoes gave her the oversize feet of a boy not yet come into his full growth.

  But it was her face that was most arresting. She’d parted her ragged hair and slicked it down behind her ears, somehow making them look as though they stuck out from her head, though he’d never noticed any such tendency before. She’d done something to her eyebrows to make them thicker and straighter. Her smooth complexion was now roughened and bumpy. On the whole, she looked slightly dirty and wholly unfeminine. She twisted a cap in her hands beneath his wide-eyed stare, then put it on and tugged the brim down so it shadowed her eyes.

  Andrew cleared his throat. “Come on.”

  He poked his head into the hallway and looked in both directions. Empty. He beckoned to Amelia, and she slipped past him into the corridor, headed for the stairs with a boyish saunter. She really had done this before.

  He was about to step after her when he pulled up short. He had forgotten his medical bag. He ducked back in for it and was in the doorway again when the unmistakable sound of Mrs. Brennan’s voice came from around the corner behind him.

  It was a curious sensation, feeling his heart both leap into his throat and sink into his feet in the sam
e instant.

  Amelia heard it, too, freezing where she stood and looking back at him with a desperate expression.

  He made a sharp shooing motion. She scurried for the stairs. Andrew turned away from her as Mrs. Brennan rounded the corner. She slowed, scowling as she saw him.

  “Ah, Mrs. Brennan,” Andrew said, his mind racing. “I was coming to look for you. I’m leaving for the evening, but I have several assignments I’ll need you to complete before I arrive tomorrow.”

  Her eyebrows shot up. Since Harcourt had scolded him for his treatment of her, Andrew had avoided the nursing matron as much as possible, and he certainly hadn’t presumed to give her orders. Well, in for a penny, in for a pound, as they said. His heart thudding, with no time to compose a suitable list of tasks, Andrew rapped out a random list of demands as quickly as he could think of them, using the most peremptory, entitled tone he could muster.

  Mrs. Brennan’s face was a thundercloud when he finished. She stood staring at him, breathing heavily. Andrew half expected her to box his ears for his effrontery.

  Before she could move, he snapped, “Well? You’ve a great deal to do. Best be about it.”

  She flushed a dark red, and her mouth worked as if she would make some reply. Andrew drew himself up and gave her his most contemptuous look. She glared at him, thenspun on her heel and stomped back the way she’d come, muttering under her breath.

  Andrew sagged against the doorframe, limp with relief. Good god, had he really just ordered the asylum’s nursing matron to complete an inventory of the bedpans in the infirmary? No doubt she would complain to Harcourt at the first opportunity. He grimaced. It was a problem for later.

  He hurried to catch up to Amelia, expecting she would be already out the front door. To his horror, however, she stood outside the main office, face-to-face with Winslow in the otherwise empty hall. The young clerk had seized her by the arm, and she stood slumped, her face angled toward the floor, as he harangued her.

  “You certainly never signed in at the office! We do not allow visitors to simply wander about. You will tell me what you are doing here at once, boy, or—”

  Andrew eased closer, desperately trying to decide what to do. He could claim Amelia had come to bring him a message, but that would connect Andrew to the unknown “boy” in Winslow’s mind. That outcome seemed better avoided. Besides, after his encounter with Mrs. Brennan, Andrew was not certain he was up to further adventures in verbal improvisation. He had to do something, however. Winslow was angry and inattentive, but at any moment he might see through Amelia’s disguise. Everything would be ruined.

  Sweat prickled beneath Andrew’s arms. His chest felt as though it were in a vise. Winslow still hadn’t seen him, absorbed as he was in ferreting out how this breach of procedure had occurred. Andrew was two long steps behind the young man when Amelia’s eyes flickered up from the floor and met his over Winslow’s shoulder.

  Winslow caught the movement and began to turn.

  Quick as a flash, Andrew covered the distance between them and, without stopping to think, snaked his right arm around the younger man’s throat. Even in his haste, Andrew was careful to keep his arm bent in a V and the elbow pointed down as he locked the hold with his left hand over his right fist. Getting it wrong could kill the young man, which was the last thing he wanted.

  Taken utterly by surprise, Winslow barely had time to struggle. He flailed for only a moment before he began to go limp. Andrew eased him to the floor, already reaching into his own jacket pocket. His heart raced. They had only seconds before Winslow would begin to wake. Where was it? His hand closed over the hard rubber tube containing the syringe of chloral hydrate.

  “What did you do?” Amelia’s voice was full of horrified awe.

  Kneeling over Winslow, Andrew glanced up at her astonished face. “That hold compresses the carotid arteries without crushing the windpipe.” He looked down and flipped the cap off the tube. Shook the syringe into his hand. “It interrupts the blood flow to the brain, causing the victim to rapidly lose consciousness. It’s dangerous, though. If you hold it too long, it can be fatal.”

  Winslow, however, was already beginning to stir. Andrew located a vein at the back of his neck and plunged the needle in. The syringe contained enough chloral hydrate to knock out the largest patient in the asylum in the midst of a violent episode, so he injected only a third of the dose.

  Andrew dropped the syringe back into the tube and returned it to his pocket. He glanced around. They were still alone. He sagged in relief. But they weren’t free yet. He grabbed Winslow beneath the arms and began to drag him behind his desk. Amelia took his ankles.

  “How did you know how to do that?” she asked, panting slightly.

  They curled the young man’s limp form where he wouldn’t be visible from the hallway.

  “I’m a doctor.” Andrew flashed her a quick smile. “Also, I used to wrestle in college. Young men that age try all sorts of stupid things. That one happens to be useful.”

  “You’ll have to show Jonas how to do it,” Amelia said. “He’ll…” Her face went tight as she remembered. “We have to go.”

  They hurried out the front door without further incident.

  They were halfway to the ferry when Andrew’s misgivings began to get the better of him. He’d done the choke correctly. Winslow had been breathing easily and beginning to regain consciousness when Andrew injected him. And based on his weight, the chloral dose he’d taken shouldn’t cause any problems. He would wake confused and groggy, perhaps even without much memory of what had occurred.

  But out of sight as he was, it was possible no one would find him for hours. It was also possible that the combination of the hold and the drug could have some unanticipated effect. If it did, if Winslow were seriously harmed, it would be Andrew’s fault. He liked the young clerk. Wouldn’t it be better if Andrew were to “find” him on his way out for the evening and try to rouse him? He could monitor his condition and perhaps even plant the suggestion that Winslow had merely fainted—perhaps he was coming down, like Harcourt, with a trailing case of the fever that had so ravaged the asylum.

  Andrew skidded to a stop under the branches of the oak tree as the ferry’s warning whistle pierced the air. He shouldn’t let the ferryman see them together, either. It would be safest for Amelia to go alone from here. He explained as quickly as he could, and Amelia nodded as if she understood, though in her haste to be away he wasn’t certain she was hearing everything he said.

  Andrew squeezed her hand once in farewell and remained in the shadows as Amelia picked her way down the remainder of the path to the dock, never looking back. He held his breath as she stepped onto the ferry. Surely the ferryman would question a lone boy boarding from the asylum dock. But whether he was eager to keep to his schedule or merely counted his passenger’s business as none of his own, the man said nothing, casting off at once and turning the craft for shore.

  Andrew watched until Amelia’s silhouette disappeared into the darkness. He’d done it. She was free. He turned and started back toward the dark bulk of the asylum, knowing his own task was now far more difficult—and far more urgent. Despite his precautions, Amelia’s absence would be discovered, and it would likely be traced to him. She was known to be one of his patients.

  Andrew was almost out of time. He had, at most, a few days to expose the truth of what was happening at the asylum. And now he would have to do it alone.

  46

  The city docks bustled with activity despite the hour. Amelia took a deep breath, dizzy at her first sight of the world outside the island in months. The air around her was close with the scents of smoke and sweat and river mud. She still felt as though she were in a vivid dream, expecting any moment to wake in her cell and find that the last hour had never happened.

  She stepped off the ferry and strode into the crowd, shouldering her way through without apology. She was nearing the sidewalk when a hand reached out and took a firm hold on her elbow. Amelia whip
ped her head around and looked up into the face of a young man for a confused instant before fury bloomed in her chest.

  She yanked away. “Let go of me this—”

  “Miss Matthew?” he interrupted, some uncertainty on his face. “I was told to expect—you are Miss Amelia Matthew, are you not?” He went on at her guarded nod. “I’ve been sent to fetch you. Please, come with me.”

  “Who are you?” she demanded, as he urged her toward a cab waiting at the curb. “I’m not getting in there.” She tried to pull away. “Bellevue is only a few blocks from here. It will be faster to walk.”

  “Mr. Vincent isn’t at Bellevue. Didn’t Dr. Cavanaugh give you the message? I know Mr. White told him—”

  “Who?”

  “Mr. White,” he repeated. She must have looked confused. “Mr. Sidney White? I believe he is a friend of your brother’s? I heard him tell Dr. Cavanaugh I would be waiting for you. Did he not relay the message?”

  He may have done. But with the shock of hearing that Jonas had been shot, and the subsequent drama of her escape, it was entirely possible she’d missed some details.

  It didn’t matter now.

  They reached the cab, and Amelia allowed the man to hand her in. He said something to the driver and climbed in after her. As the door swung closed behind him, the air of unreality vanished, and Amelia was abruptly aware of being alone in a cab with a strange man, who’d just ordered the driver to take them… somewhere.

  She took a deep breath and tried to focus.

  “Who are you?” she asked again. “Where is Jonas?”

  “My name is David Morris.” He settled back into his seat. “I am Mr. White’s law clerk and assistant. I was told to meet you at the dock and bring you to Mr. Vincent.”

  She looked him over. He was perhaps twenty-five, with dark hair and patchy side whiskers. He wore a sedate but well-cut suit, although it was rumpled. Dried blood stained the cuffs of his shirt.