“Why don’t you sit, Ms. Rasnake and let me do that for you? I won’t eat but I’ll have some coffee. I ate before I came over.” Inga said, guiding the woman back to her chair.
“I’ve been on my own so long, it’d be a luxury not to have to cook. I get scared up here, by myself sometimes. I used to have a nurse but the social put a stop to that once I got off all that dope. Now it’s just me and I’m afraid of dying alone.” Anne’s old, rheumy eyes looked incredibly, despairingly sad to Inga.
Inga made a promise to herself that Anne wouldn’t be alone anymore, whether she was the woman’s daughter or not. Inga prepared the woman biscuits and gravy with a couple of patties of sausage, and then the woman started to reveal her tale to Inga in depth. Anne’s words filled in the blanks for Inga, things she’d wondered about the three women that could possibly be her mother but didn’t think she’d ever find out.
“You know, I’d heard there were three women that went missing the last few years but nothing ever came of it. I’ve always wondered what happened to them, if they met Doctor Nelson somewhere along the way.”
Inga sat stunned, looking at the woman wondering if there could possibly still be victims alive somewhere? The story Anne had told her had been enough to leave Inga utterly shocked but then Anne dropped in that line about three other missing women, women that had not been mentioned in the files. Where were they?
As the woman’s story and words wound down she looked more closely at Inga. “Don’t I know you from somewhere? You sure do look familiar.”
Chapter Eleven
Inga sat across from the elderly woman now sleeping in her chair at the table and looked for signs that this woman might be her mother. Inga couldn’t see any similarities, not really, but who knew what the lines and age spots hid? Inga looked away from the woman and out of the window over the kitchen sink. The sun was well up now and she was losing time. She needed to find the doctor now. And maybe save three women in the process.
As Inga stood up she blinked and her burning tired eyes reminded her she hadn’t slept yet. Rest would simply have to wait. She managed to get Anne up and the woman went to the couch, pulling a blanket over herself. Inga promised to come back that evening to check on Anne and walked out into the fresh air and morning sunlight. She stood there for a moment, letting the beams of warmth play over her skin, warming her face and refreshing her enough to get down to the bottom of the mountain.
Inga drove with the window cracked, heading in the direction Anne had told her to take. She saw the house from far below, driving on a winding road. She couldn’t have missed the white monstrosity of white stucco and glass, completely out of place in a mountain town in North Carolina. The house might look appropriate on the Spanish coast, maybe even a major city in Florida or Texas but not North Carolina.
Inga frowned and took the turn that would lead her to the house. She knew she wasn’t going to get a taped confession out of the man but she had to see him for herself before she went to the police department. Something was driving her to go up to that house, to not wait for the police to make a decision and get all of the warrants that would be necessary to raid the house, if they even made that decision.
Inga suspected those missing women were up there, she knew that’s what was driving her. Nothing had been done to protect a string of women over dozens of years, it was time someone stepped up for all of them. Inga figured it might as well be her, as she was also a victim in all of this. Who better to bring down Doctor Nelson’s little private hellish empire?
Inga saw a large circular driveway and parked in the front of the house, not seeing an actual parking area. She dug in her handbag for her press pass and her phone. She set the phone to record audio and stuck the device in a pocket of her jacket.
Moving to the door Inga saw a doorbell and pressed the button, looking around the property that her sale had bought, along with a few dozen others. For this the man inside sold children, destroyed lives, and tore families apart. Inga wanted to set a match to it all but didn’t have it in her. She plastered her “news” smile on as the door opened and a young woman, maybe in her late twenties, greeted her.
“Hello, I’m Inga Parr, I’m a reporter with a news channel out of Charlotte and I’m doing a story on the struggles of small-town doctors. I’ve heard so many wonderful things about Doctor Nelson from the people in Louisa Falls that I thought I’d come out and meet the man. Is he available?”
The woman scrutinized her for a moment then pulled the door open after Inga presented her press badge. “Please come in. I’ll find out if the doctor is available.”
Inga felt as though she’d been invited into a demon’s den, the home that should have been filled with sunlight and white walls was somehow dark and gloomy instead, the few spots of sunlight sparkling with dust motes. Masculine dark wood furniture filled almost every space making it hard to see a path and Inga was glad the woman was there to guide her.
Inga moved through the small path, following the woman as she tried to avoid banging her knee on some demented looking statue of a twisted and gnarled man, and narrowly missed tripping over a metal rope designed to look like a cobra. Inga followed the woman through a door and walked in, heading straight to the only light to be found in the room. Deep red velvet curtains parted just enough to allow Inga to see the room but she wished she couldn’t.
The place was like a memorial garden for cemetery angels with marble figures placed on every available surface. Obviously Doctor Nelson was a collector of the odd but he had very poor taste in displaying it. Inga looked back at the woman who had shown her in and waited for instructions.
“I’ll see Doctor Nelson and tell him you are here. Please, do not leave the room or you may be injured.” The woman then left, never giving her name or what exactly she was to the doctor.
“I may be injured?” Inga wondered if it was a threat but then looked around the room. Maybe not, the place was a death-trap waiting to happen.
“Yes, I will not be long. Just stay here.” The woman, a tall but well-built blond in a pair of jeans and a pullover then left, leaving Inga on her own.
Inga looked more closely at the statues, what she had originally thought were angels all had vicious teeth that could easily tear flesh from bone. Perhaps they were a more biblical type of angel? Weren’t there supposed to be good angels and bad?
Inga wasn’t sure what the statues were exactly but tried to avoid touching any of them. No matter what she did, however, she felt as though the statues were watching her, judging her, and finding her lacking. Inga knew she wasn’t a bad person, but lately she’d told a few fibs and broke into a hospital. Her guilt was about to drive her out of the room and straight out of the house when the woman came back, an amused look on her face.
“A bit disconcerting, aren’t they? For some reason Doctor Nelson has dictated that this is to be the receiving room, however, so I always put visitors in here. Now, if you’ll follow me I’ll take you to the doctor.” The woman said, taking pity on Inga.
Inga now suspected the room was designed to not only get the point across that the doctor was a judge but to disconcert visitors on purpose. She clamped down on her feelings and straightened her back. She would not be intimidated. Besides, the man was old and had recently had a stroke, how terrible and fierce could he be now?
Inga followed the woman through the house and tried to fortify herself against the sight of a feeble, old man. People looked at old men and considered them somehow innocent of the crimes they’d committed in their more formidable years. Inga had seen it with former guards at Nazi death camps when people campaigned to have their crimes forgiven because the men were all old and innocent now.
Inga had done reports on serial killers, child killers, and other vicious criminals and every single time there was that one group that felt the elderly somehow became innocent as newly born babes. It didn’t matter the crime, there was always one group that advocated for the dismissal of charges to allow the crimina
l to live out the rest of their natural life, conveniently overlooking the fact that the person had greedily stolen someone’s chance to experience that natural death.
With her resolve renewed Inga followed the woman out of the room, down a hall, and through the house. She then followed the woman down a set of rickety steps that seemed out of place for the very expensive, well-appointed home. You spend thousands, perhaps millions, on art and furniture and less than one hundred on a set of steps? Very odd, Inga thought, as she carefully placed a foot on each step before letting her weight go to each new step.
Inga peered into the vast room that made up the basement level. A room that certainly wasn’t big enough to make up the entire space of the basement held the usual items found in a basement: tools, broken furniture, a power tool or twenty. Then the woman pushed aside a part of the wall and stepped into a small bedroom.
The room was decorated as any other bedroom with two people in the room. An older woman dressed in a nurse’s white uniform, right down to the hats nurses used to wear and an elderly man. The woman was elderly, her hair white and her skin showing the evidence of age, but something about her eyes, about the way she held herself belied that age. The woman’s presence screamed danger to Inga and put the younger woman on guard. Inga also noticed the woman’s eyes widened in what she assumed was recognition when she saw Inga but the surprise was soon gone, replaced with a hard stare that seemed to be a natural resting look for the woman.
Inga stared at the woman for a moment then looked at the man resting in the bed barely clinging to life. This was the man that had made it his decision to ruin so many lives, and to change the course of hers. This fragile skeleton of a man, his skin like tissue paper, had appointed himself God and made decisions that led to murder and tragic deaths. Inga tried not to let her disgust and anger show through as she looked at the man, calling on years of experience as a reporter to keep her face bland as she looked at the skeletal frame of the man that had stolen her from her mother and sold her.
The slight frame of the dying man in the bed wasn’t what Inga had envisioned at all but she could see a slight gleam in his eye, a judgement that should not be there. Apparently he found her worthy because he reached out to her. A tube went into his throat, making it impossible for the skeleton in the bed to talk to her but he glanced at the woman and she started to speak.
“What can we do to help you Miss Parr? I’m Doctor Nelson’s nurse, you may call me Nurse Pracket.”
Ah, Inga thought, as I suspected, super-bitch incarnate. Inga hid her disdain for the woman behind a polite smile and held out her hand to the woman as she introduced herself.
“I’ve been assigned to investigate health services in the poorer areas of North Carolina. I was sent here first. Many people in town told me about Doctor Nelson and how wonderful he is so here I am. I suppose few would have the experience Doctor Nelson does with dealing with the medical needs of those in rural and poverty stricken areas like Doctor Nelson does.”
“Indeed, Doctor Nelson spent the better part of forty years caring for the needs of the community here. What exactly do you want to know?” Nurse Pracket asked, her hands still on the rail of the doctor’s bed, as if to protect him, or hold him in the bed.
“I have quite a few questions that could take some time to answer. I’d like to ask a few initial questions, if it’s alright with you, and then come back later with a film crew to interview the doctor properly.” Inga said surmising that Nurse Pracket was the guardian at the gate.
“That could be arranged, although Doctor Nelson no longer speaks. Let me just go get his lunch and then I’ll return to answer what I can for you. The rest will have to be written responses from me. Can you wait here for a moment?” The nurse asked, a gleam in her eye that Inga didn’t trust.
“Sure, do you need me to do anything while you’re gone? “ Inga asked, nervous about being left alone with the doctor now that she noticed the other woman had left.
“No, he should be fine, just talk to him. He won’t really respond but he knows you’re here.” Nurse Pracket said as she left the room.
Inga patiently waited, giving the woman time to get upstairs before rushing to the doctor’s side.
“I’m Inga Parr, one of the children you sold. I know what you’ve been doing, where are those other three women?” She asked quickly, not playing around now.
“Accck.” Was the only noise the doctor made, looking away.
“Come on, doctor, you could actually save three women this time instead of murdering more. You’re close to death; can you deal with three more dead women on your conscience?” Inga asked, hoping the cruel words would stir the man.
The doctor continued to look away but Inga felt his slight arm, barely more than a whisper of movement, as his finger pointed at another wall and his arm lifted a few inches from the bed. The talon at the end of his finger told Inga he wasn’t being properly cared for but she didn’t care at this point, the man was near death, the women she sought were being tortured.
Inga walked to the wall and though it wasn’t visible at first a press of the wall produced a door that pushed back, then slid within the other half of the wall. Inga pushed the door aside and stepped into a room similar to the sublevel she’d found within the hospital. Five beds separated by screens with a large office at the end. The office even had the same Plexiglas window spanning its front.
As Inga passed each bed she heard machinery working, beeping and low tones filling the air with noise guaranteed to keep patients awake rather than allowing the rest they needed. Each area with a bed in it was covered and Inga couldn’t see into them. She did count only three with noisy machines working, though, and that chilled her.
Inga knew those beds could hold the three missing women. She walked through the door leaving the comforting room, a bedroom the same as any found in any luxurious home with a fake window and curtains even included. The machinery couldn’t be hidden in that room or the room Inga now found herself in, however. This was obviously a medical facility.
“What are you doing in here?” A grating voice called from behind Inga and she turned just as something came swiping out at her head, glancing off of her temple but hard enough to cause pain and to stun her. Falling to her knees Inga looked up to see Nurse Pracket standing over her with a maniacal look in her eye just before her eyes blurred.
Chapter Twelve
Inga felt the world go blurry for a moment as she staggered and fell against one of the beds. She knew if she passed out, if she gave the elderly but still strong nurse the opportunity she’d be strapped to one of those beds herself, never to be seen again. The most horrifying thought was that she hadn’t bothered to let anyone know where she was going!
Inga struggled for consciousness, grasping onto one of the rails of the bed before pulling herself up. She turned around just as the woman made another attempt to subdue her, this time with a syringe filled with clear fluid. Inga knocked the woman’s arm away and managed to push the woman to the floor.
“What are you doing? Are you crazy?” Inga shouted at Nurse Pracket. “You’re what? One hundred years old and you’re still trying to abuse unfortunate women? You’re still trying to hide your secret? The doctor’s secrets?”
“I’m just a poor old woman and you hurt me…” Nurse Pracket began, adding a feeble shake to her head as she moaned, sitting up in the floor. She looked up at Inga with a mournful, pitiful look but then let the look drop away. “Not buying it huh? No, I expect not, your mother wasn’t one for being placated either. I took care of that, though.” The woman stopped speaking and a vile look of satisfaction twisted her face.
“You knew my mother?” Inga gasped, surprised by the woman’s quick change from pitiful to stern and the mention of her mother. Nurse Pracket was shrewd and cagey, Inga would have to remember that.
“Of course I did, we’ve been dealing with the woman for years, though your eyes are a different color. If your eyes weren’t brown you’d be the m
irror image of her. And how she has plagued us! It’s hardly a shock you’re here now, doing the same exact thing, trying to ruin all of Doctor Nelson’s hard work. The ingratitude! Saving you from a life of poverty and degradation and giving you a life of privilege and you throw it away to come back to this backwards place. I guess breeding will tell, after all.”
“Which one is my mother?” The words shot from Inga, a demand for the final answer to her question.
“Oh you haven’t figured that one out yet then? I’ll just hang on to that information for now then.” The woman tried to stand back up but Inga pushed her back down.
Inga didn’t want to be as cruel as the woman on the ground but giving Nurse Pracket any opportunity to come at her again would just be silly.
“No, don’t get up, stay where you are.” Inga demanded, picking up the syringe from the floor to get it away from the other woman. “In fact, scoot over there against that wall. No the empty part.” Inga ordered as the woman tried to slide over to a cart full of medical supplies.
Inga pulled out her phone, saw she only had one bar on her signal meter and pushed in the number for emergency services. The call connected and Inga gave directions, asked for the police and ambulances, and held the line open as instructed but told the woman her signal may disappear. It did after a couple of minutes and Inga put the device back in her pocket.
“You have a few more minutes to try and make up for what you’ve done what can you tell me about my mother?” Inga asked, sitting on the bed, watching the woman.
“Make up for what I’ve done? What I’ve done is save countless children from poverty and Doctor Nelson has worked diligently to keep the spread of the unworthy from taking over this area? Didn’t you see the fruits of his labor in town? Small families, few people of color, why even the government is saving money because of Doctor Nelson!” Nurse Pracket argued.
Thriller: Horror: Spirit Doll (Mystery Suspense Thrillers) (Haunted Paranormal Short Story) Page 17