Two Graves

85

IT WAS CHRISTMAS EVE AT MOUNT MERCY HOSPITAL. A small Douglas fir, freshly cut, stood in the waiting area near the guards’ station, plastic trimmings attached to its branches by discreet rubber bands. Deep within the hospital, a recording of carols was faintly audible. Otherwise, the vast and rambling mansion was cloaked in a nostalgic silence, its resident murderers, poisoners, rapists, arsonists, vivisectors, and social deviants caught up in reveries of Christmases past: of presents received, and—rather more commonly—of presents inflicted.

Dr. John Felder walked down one of the interior corridors of Mount Mercy, Dr. Ostrom at his side. Over the last several weeks his broken ribs had mostly healed, and the concussion he’d sustained had receded. The only scar—the only external scar—that remained from his ordeal in the Wintour mansion was from the cut on his temple, now a scarlet, jagged line.

Ostrom shook his head. “What a strange case. I still feel we’ve hardly scratched the surface.”

Felder did not respond to that.

Ostrom stopped before a pair of double doors that—like most at Mount Mercy—were unlabeled. A single guard stood outside.

“This is it?” Felder asked.

“Yes. If you need anything, call for the guards.”

Felder extended his hand. “Thank you, Doctor.”

“My pleasure.” Ostrom turned and made his way back down the corridor.

Felder nodded to the guard, took a breath. Then he pushed open the doors and stepped inside.

Beyond lay the Mount Mercy chapel. It was an artifact from the days when the hospital had been a sanatorium for the very rich, and Felder, who had never seen it before, was amazed. It remained unchanged from its late-nineteenth-century zenith, when the numerous bequests of fearful, ailing patients had given the chapel’s designers working capital a Medici would envy. It was a masterpiece in miniature, jewel-like and utterly perfect, the nave only six rows deep, with a single central aisle; and yet the builders had cleverly re-created the ribbed vaults of a gothic cathedral, and in so doing filled both the side walls and the curved ambulatory with delicate, vividly colored stained glass. In the late-afternoon light, the chapel’s interior seemed almost drowned in color; the pews, the slender pillars, the other architectural features, were so dappled and painted with light as to be almost indistinguishable from each other. Felder took a hesitant step forward, and then another. It was like being inside an ecclesiastical kaleidoscope.

Felder advanced up the rows of pews, glancing left and right. All was silent—there was no one here. But then, as he approached the sanctuary, he noticed a tiny side altar off to the left. There, sitting on the single bench, was Constance Greene. She was motionless, camouflaged by the dappled half-light, and it took him a minute to make her out. He turned and approached her. She was leaning forward slightly, absorbed by the book she was holding up in both hands; her lips were just parted; her eyes were half shut, the long lashes giving the false impression that she was dozing. But Felder could tell she was quite alert, her eyes scanning the lines of the book intently. He wondered if perhaps it was a Bible. He tried to control the excessive pounding of his heart.

She turned, saw him. “Good day, Dr. Felder,” she said.

He nodded. “May I join you?”

She smiled faintly, made room for him on the bench. As she closed the book, he noticed that it was not a Bible, but Petronius’s Satyricon.

“It’s been some time since you last came to visit,” she said as he sat down. “How are you faring?”

“Well enough, thank you. And yourself?”

“The same. I hope that you won’t find the holidays—”

“Constance,” he interrupted. “Would you mind terribly if we dispensed with the formalities?”

She looked at him, surprised.

Felder reached into the breast pocket of his jacket. He took out two envelopes—one, old and faded; the other, fresh and new. He laid them in front of her, one after the other.

After a moment she took up the old envelope in both hands. Felder noticed her pupils dilate. Without a word, she opened it and looked inside.

“The lock of my hair,” she said. She spoke in quite a different voice from the one she had used to greet Felder and inquire after his well-being.

Felder inclined his head.

Now she turned to him with something almost like excitement. “Where on earth did you find it?”

“In Connecticut.”

Constance frowned. “Connecticut? But—”

Felder forestalled the question by raising his hand. “The less you know of the particulars, Constance, the better. For both of us.”

Constance’s eyes drifted to the scar on his temple. “When I suggested the existence of this lock, Doctor, it was not my intention that you should put yourself in any jeopardy to obtain it.”

“I know that.”

She slipped the lock out of the envelope, placed it in the palm of her hand. Glancing down at it, she traced a single fingertip along its brief extent with the gentlest of motions. In that strange aquarium of color and silence, her expression seemed to go far, far away. For many long minutes, she remained silent. Felder said nothing.

At last—quite abruptly—she collected herself. She returned the lock to its envelope and passed it back to Felder. “Forgive me,” she said.

“Not at all.”

“I hope you were not… unduly put out in its recovery.”

“It proved an interesting experience.”

Now Constance picked up the other envelope. It bore the return address of a laboratory in Saratoga Springs. “And what is this?”

“The DNA results on the lock of hair.”

“I see.” Constance’s demeanor—which had grown more than usually informal—became more reserved. “And what does the report say?”

“Take a look at the envelope,” Felder said. “You’ll see that I haven’t opened it.”

Constance turned the envelope over. “I don’t understand.”

Felder took a deep breath. He felt his limbs begin to tremble, ever so slightly. “I don’t need to read the results. I already believe you, Constance. Everything.”

Constance looked from the envelope to him and then back again.

“I know how old you are—and how young you are. I don’t need any DNA analysis to tell me that. I know you were telling the truth when you said you were born in the 1870s. I don’t understand it—but I believe it.”

Constance said nothing.

“I also know you didn’t murder your child. No doubt you had a reason for the deception—and as soon as you feel able to tell it to me, we can proceed.”

Something flickered in Constance’s eyes. “Proceed?”

“With overturning your involuntary commitment. And getting the murder charges dropped.” Felder moved a little closer. “Constance, you were sent here on my recommendation. I see now that was a mistake. You’re not insane. And you didn’t murder your child—that was a smokescreen. If you tell me where your child is, I will have it duly verified by the authorities. And then we can begin the process of obtaining your release.”

Constance hesitated. “I…” she said, before stopping. She seemed uncharacteristically at a loss.

Felder had brooded, planned, dreamed about this moment. But now that it was actually happening, it seemed to take him by as much surprise as it took Constance. “I took a terrible risk obtaining that lock.” He touched his scar. “This is the least of it.”

He let that sink in.

“I had to know. It’s not your fault, of course, but now that it’s done, I want you to know that I’d do it again. I’d walk through fire for you, Constance. No—no, let me speak, please. I’d do it again because of… of my feelings for you. And it’s not just because I’ve wronged you, by putting you in here. It’s because of the way I’ve grown to feel about you. I want to undo the wrong and get you out of here, because it’s my hope that by setting you free, by putting us on an equal basis, in time you can come to look at me, not as a doctor, but as… as…” He hesitated, more confused than ever. “And naturally at that point, because of professional ethics, I’ll have to recuse myself as your doctor… if, of course…”

He finally fell silent, overwhelmed, and then, tentatively, reached out and took her hand. With trepidation, he looked up to meet her gaze. One glance was all it took. He looked down again and released her hand, feeling ill.

“Doctor,” Constance said gently. “John. I’m touched—I am, truly, deeply. Your belief in me means more than I could put into words. But the truth is that I could never return the feelings you seem to have for me—for the reason that my heart belongs to another.”

Felder did not look up. As Constance spoke, her voice had grown increasingly soft and troubled, until the final five words were just barely audible.

He thought back to that day in the Mount Mercy library, when Constance had first mentioned the existence of the lock; when she’d implied that his finding it, bringing it to light, would do more than simply vindicate her—for him it would be a lover’s test, a way to prove the depth of his feelings, to wipe out the past with all its false steps and dubious medical observations. But he realized now it was all in his head, that she had implied no such thing. He had projected his own hopes onto what she’d been offering him: simply an opportunity to satisfy himself about the truth of her age. And only because he demanded it.

He felt Constance take his hand. He looked up to see her smiling at him. She had fully recovered, and her smile held its usual suspension of cool amusement and benevolent distance.

“I can’t return your feelings, Doctor,” she said, giving his hand a gentle pressure. “But there’s something else I can do. I can tell you my story. It is a story I’ve not told to anyone else, at least not in its entirety.”

Felder blinked. Her words were slow to settle in.

She went on. “I fear this story must remain between us. Are you interested?”

“Interested?” Felder repeated. “My God. Of course.”

“Good. Then please consider this my gift to you.” Constance paused. “After all—it is Christmas Eve.”