Andrew pushed back from his desk shortly before seven o’clock in the morning and kneaded at his eyes with his knuckles. After so many hours, the light from the lamp felt like sandpaper on his corneas. He hadn’t been this exhausted since medical school—and he’d been ten years younger then. There also hadn’t been a murderer treading on his heels.
He shook himself and went to the door, hoping to flag down a passing orderly to request more coffee. He had barely left the room in the past forty-eight hours. Aside from checking on Winslow and a few visits to the washroom, he’d spent every moment poring over files, making—and discarding—lists of possible victims. He ran a hand over his bristly cheeks and tried not to dwell on the fact that he hadn’t accomplished anything. There were still a few hours. The next file could be the one he needed.
There were no orderlies in the hallway, but to his surprise, Dr. Harcourt stepped out of his apartment. He was dressed but had the wan and befuddled look of a man who had been ill and was not yet quite mended. His gaze sharpened as he found Andrew, and Andrew was abruptly aware that the fresh shirt he’d put on two days earlier was no longer necessarily a better choice than the one he’d taken off.
“Here overnight, I take it?” Harcourt approached, holding a messy stack of loose papers in one hand.
“Ah, I’ve been working on a project,” Andrew said. “The time got away from me.” He paused. “If you don’t mind my saying, you don’t really seem well enough to be up and around yet.”
Harcourt shook his head. “I’m not. But I need to get these down to Winslow’s desk.”
“I’ll take them for you, if you like,” Andrew offered. “I was on my way down, and it will save you the stairs at least.”
Harcourt readily handed over the stack and disappeared back into his quarters.
Andrew turned for the stairs, glancing down at the papers as he did. Certificate of Discharge, read the bold print at the top. He slowed as he flipped through the sheaf. These were discharge orders, all of them. Harcourt had filled out the blanks on the preprinted forms with the patients’ names and dates of release, but his usually copperplate handwriting was shaky and spotted with inkblots. His signature was far less elaborate than usual.
Andrew slowed as a thought struck him. If he could get hold of a blank discharge form, with a little practice, he could replicate Harcourt’s signature. Carolina Casey could be recorded as having been discharged, and one threat would be neutralized. He’d never seen a blank form, but he’d never had any reason to go looking for one, either. Surely they were somewhere in the main office.
He picked up his pace.
Andrew rounded the corner into the main office and pulled up short. Winslow was at his desk.
“You’re here.” His tone was rather more dismayed than was appropriate, so he tried again. “I thought you were going to take another day off.”
“I was, but I felt perfectly well by last night,” the young man replied with a smile. “I don’t know what was wrong with me, but whatever it was, it’s gone now. I came in early to get started on the reconciliation.” He gestured to a neat stack of papers on the corner of the desk. The reconciliation list—all the current patients and the wards to which they’d most recently been assigned.
A weight appeared in Andrew’s gut. He had even less time than he’d thought. He resisted the impulse to snatch the list and run.
“I need… ah.” Winslow peered at the papers beneath Andrew’s arm. “Are those the week’s discharge forms?”
It would hardly be reasonable to say no. Or for him to refuse to hand them over.
“Yes,” Andrew said, after an instant’s hesitation.
“Excellent.” Winslow reached for them. “That’s the last thing I needed.” He took the stack from Andrew’s nerveless fingers and sat.
Andrew turned with a jerky movement and left the office. There had to be a way to delay the count. Perhaps if the list were lost. Or destroyed.
Andrew hurried down to the staff kitchen, his brain fizzing with fatigue and panic. He filled a pair of coffee cups to the brim with the asylum’s dark, bitter brew. It was only barely warm, but it would do for his purposes. He would tip one onto the forms when he set it down. Terribly sorry, how clumsy!
He carried the cups back up the stairs, walking slowly, trying not to spill their contents before he was ready. He took a breath and stepped into the office.
The stack was gone.
Andrew’s eyes darted around the room. There, on the counter beside Winslow, who’d bent and was now pulling open a drawer.
Andrew strode toward him, one hand already extending a cup, the trembling liquid held in check by its own surface tension.
The shrill clamor of the telephone’s bell split the air, and with a violent start of surprise, Andrew sloshed a good measure of lukewarm coffee from both cups. It soaked into his shirt cuffs and splashed the floor.
“Oh dear.” Winslow straightened. “Are you—”
“I’m fine,” Andrew snapped the telephone continued to shriek.
Winslow hurried past him to answer it while Andrew surveyed the wreck of his plan. He was tempted to dash the remnants in the cups over the papers just on principle, but as he surveyed the scene, the tabs in the drawer caught his eye.
He’d found the blank forms.
Andrew glanced back at Winslow, who was shouting into the telephone, “I’m sorry, I can’t hear you, I’m afraid the connection is too poor!”
Andrew moved to set the cups down. Perhaps he could get one of the forms before— But no, Winslow had already disconnected and turned back to him.
The clerk brushed past him and reached into the drawer.
It was on the tip of Andrew’s tongue to ask for one of the discharge forms, to claim he’d just remembered Harcourt had asked him to bring up another. He managed to bite back the request. Winslow might remember it later, might mention it to Harcourt and set the man thinking. Better to come back for it later, now that he knew where they were.
Winslow extracted a black-bordered form and stood. “Don’t worry about the coffee. I’ll get an orderly to clean it up. If you’re headed back up soon, it would be a help to me if you could drop this off with Dr. Harcourt?” He proffered the sheet.
“Certainly,” Andrew said through gritted teeth. He glanced down. Across the top in heavy black letters were the words “Certification of Death.”
He stiffened. “There was a death?”
“Yes. A woman in four, last night. They found her this morning.”
Four. The sound of the word brought the world to a halt. The coffee, the form, all of it vanished from Andrew’s mind.
He stepped into the hallway as his mind replayed the conversation he’d had with Amelia. A woman in ward four, she’d said. Asking someone to send for her father, protesting that she didn’t belong at the asylum. The paper shook in his hand. He’d forgotten. In all the chaos, the search of Harcourt’s rooms, the news about Jonas, his own frantic combing of the files. He’d just… forgotten about her until this very moment. Horror washed over him in a hot, sickening flood. He should have gone to examine her that evening. He could have gone at any point in the last two days. Another woman was dead, because Andrew hadn’t bothered—had forgotten—to save her.