Chapter 18
Thea

The iron gate opened, soundless. Its height surpassed her by at least a head, and once Thea had stepped beyond it, walking in the footsteps of Simeon, she regretted her decision. Whatever Mr. Amos’s investment in this small hospital hidden in the woods, no matter Simeon’s compelling request to assist him, Thea knew that neither of those reasons were good enough for her to risk upsetting her own future. Yet she was hard pressed not to. Tempted by fate, perhaps, or more likely than not, the deep, compelling need to know why? Her mother had disappeared. Ragged hemline, bluish outline of a lithe and dark frame, and then dusky memories that, as Thea grew, became vague impressions that she questioned if they were even real.

There was no reason to assume with such certainty that entering the asylum would be opening the musty tome of her own story. But there was a foreboding in Thea’s soul, the living kind that refused to let go, but instead sank villainous claws of trepidation into her spirit. She knew. For no other reason than that ominous twist of one’s stomach before truth was finally given a voice. She knew that, somehow, she was tied to this place. This place in the woods.

“Over here.” Simeon’s voice was low as he rounded the asylum, the wooden camera box clutched in his hand, the tripod in the other. Tree branches swayed over the roof. Oak trees that reached toward the attic gables, and a few thin, white trunks of poplar spearing their way toward the sky. Any pine was held to the boundaries outside the iron fence, as if unwelcome. A gardener’s shed stood in the backyard of the asylum, and Simeon strode toward it. His steps were familiar and confident. He didn’t seem afraid, and oddly, Thea sensed he was more at peace here than anytime she’d seen him before.

The shed’s door opened quietly. He disappeared inside the darkness while Thea stayed behind. She wrapped her arms over her dress, drawing her crocheted shawl tighter around her body to ward off a chill that rose from within and matched the breeze rustling the leaves. She dared not look at the asylum. At its wide windows on both floors, geometrically in a row and measured identically. Thea was wary of what she would see inside—who she would see inside.

She could understand why family members ended up not paying a visit to the ones they’d left behind here. It wasn’t a welcoming place. It was dark, even outside, and for certain the inside would be sterile and hollow of life. For the patients were, for all intents and purposes, all but dead.

Simeon exited the shed, a small burlap sack in his hand, the photographic equipment missing.

“Where is the camera?” Thea’s heartbeat quickened. That was what they were here for, after all. Simeon had explained that while Dr. Ackerman had requested a photographic log of every patient, Simeon had managed to acquire only four. There were fifteen more patients, and it was laborious to take their photographs. They didn’t understand how they must sit still and not move. Some rocked back and forth, moaning. Others stared into the distance in their chairs each day, but when moved from their routine they became violent. Striking out at anything new, anything strange.

Simeon hadn’t answered her. Instead, Thea watched him walk away, the sack swinging from his hand. She shook herself from her position of pause, waiting for a response that wasn’t forthcoming, and hurried after him. Mr. Amos was still teetering on the edge of getting better or turning for the worse. If for no one else but him, Thea pushed forward. Somehow the old man had won her loyalty in a brief time. Maybe it was the tiny squeeze he’d given her hand last night when she’d stopped to visit his convalescing bed.

Wayward pinecones littered the lawn. Sticks too, and Thea’s shoes snapped one in half. The only noise in an otherwise silent, wooded island of grass. The wind picked up a bit, the branches swaying more, the leaves clamoring for attention. Simeon walked to the back corner of the property where there was another gate. Much smaller than the one in front and far less obtrusive. He opened it and disappeared through. Thea had almost caught up to him, and she hurried after where Simeon maneuvered down a craggy path composed of tree roots and half-buried rocks.

She stopped, catching herself by pressing her left palm against the scratchy bark of an oak tree. A small clearing became exposed. Stones lay in a row. From what she could see, there were at least six in the first row, four behind it, and an awkward granite tower of a marker tilting in the back corner, alone.

A graveyard.

Simeon was kneeling at one of the stones, his back to her, suspenders stretched over his shoulders. Since it appeared he didn’t intend to offer an explanation, Thea mustered the gumption to move forward.

“What are you doing?” Her voice, a mere whisper that was carried away by the breeze over the markers.

He gave her a quick glance but still did not speak. Simeon reached into his sack, and from it he removed a smooth stone. Much like those he’d taken from the river several nights before.

Curious, Thea stepped even closer as Simeon reached out and rested the stone alongside another oval one. The marker had been crudely chiseled.

Ethel Morgan

b. 1872 – d. 1907

But it was the words carved into the stones that captured Thea’s attention.

Slumber

Stillness

“What do they mean?” Thea dared to ask the very silent, almost reverent Simeon.

He ran his thumb over the words on both stones, then drew back, rising to his feet. He shoved the bag into his coat pocket. Thea could hear more stones rattling together in the bag.

“It’s who she should have been,” he replied cryptically, still fixated on the stones around the deceased woman’s name.

“I don’t understand. Who was she? Was she a resident here?” Thea heard a bang. A door somewhere had shut wildly from the wind. She startled and looked over her shoulder, but all she could make out was the trail leading to the asylum, the woods, and glimpses of the third floor and its roof.

Simeon turned and brushed past her, the air around them growing thick with unspoken thoughts and questions. He started up the trail, and Thea hoisted her skirts in her hands and hurried after him.

This time, however, she was unwilling to let it go unanswered. “Simeon,” she demanded.

He stopped and twisted to look at her, his gray eyes a certain type of haunted that burrowed deep into her soul.

“You’ve known such grief, haven’t you?” Without thinking, she extended her hand, her fingertips. Maybe if he grasped them, she could pull him back to life.

Simeon didn’t respond to her reach. He looked over her shoulder, at the cemetery. “I buried a few of them. I was alone.”

The meaning of his observation cut through Thea. Alone. No minister. No grieving family. The patients had slipped into eternity, and when he’d arrived to work, their burials were on his task list.

“You immortalize them with words?” she ventured.

Simeon blinked. Then blinked again, coming back to the present moment, rather than wherever depths he’d been in his mind. He gave her a wan, crooked smile and nodded. “Words they should have been. The woman? Buried there? She rarely slept. She was never at peace. So I gift her with them now. Slumber and stillness.”

“Forever,” Thea acknowledged.

“Yes. Forever.” Simeon turned back and headed up the trail.

Simeon had vanished through a doorway and left Thea standing in a back room of the asylum. She’d prepared herself to enter through the front door. Perhaps be received in a waiting area, staring through the windows toward the road she’d come down. She’d expected there to be a room prepared, a nurse or two, to assist with the patients. She’d planned on setting up the photography equipment and reminding herself that these would be very different interactions than when she photographed someone who had already passed on.

But no. They’d entered through a back door meant for asylum staff, and she stood in what seemed to be a cloakroom for employees. Three women’s cloaks hung on pegs. An extra pair of men’s shoes rested on the floor beneath them. Three wooden chairs lined the opposite wall.

A long hall stretched through the doorway, with several doors on either side. Thea had no wish to try to find Simeon, assuming he’d return for her. Yet he hadn’t. His wordless exit had left her feeling bereft, but perhaps he’d expected her to follow? And she hadn’t. Now what should she do?

She waited for another minute or two. The insides of this place were gray and dull, but very quiet. Thea sniffed. The noise seemed loud and obtrusive.

Finally, footsteps!

Thea peered down the hall. A woman in a dress, also gray, was walking toward her. A white apron covering most of her torso and draped over her dress. A triangular white hat perched on top of black hair.

“Rose!” Thea was surprised.

Rose’s smile was gentle and welcoming. A relief after Simeon’s silent vigil at the cemetery.

“Thea. I’m so sorry. Simeon makes assumptions . . .”

“I was supposed to follow him, wasn’t I?” Thea offered a sheepish smile.

Rose’s eyes seemed brighter today. She nodded. “Yes. But you didn’t, and he gets lost in his thoughts and didn’t notice until he was in the office. I’ve come to retrieve you. I can’t blame you for staying here and not venturing forth.”

Thea stifled a sigh of relief. Thankful that Rose understood her apprehension in wandering the halls of a mental asylum.

She followed closely this time, unwilling to lose sight of Rose—which seemed unlikely. Rose wasn’t particularly chatty, but she was very aware of Thea’s presence, offering her comforting looks over her shoulder as they traveled down the long hall, ignoring the closed doors.

They came into an open foyer, where daylight spread through the windows. The floors were worn but clean linoleum, not fancy or decorative. The walls in this room were whitewashed. There were no pictures, no extra décor that a patient could grab or launch or break. Only plain wooden chairs against the wall and a coat tree. The tall double doors of the front entrance made Thea realize that if she only had traversed the hall on her own, she would have wound up waiting in the place she’d originally envisioned.

Rose paused and turned. “Simeon has gone to prepare the room. I’m not certain you’ll get more than one photograph today. The patients are kept on a routine and a schedule and . . .” Her voice waned, and Thea nodded.

“Simeon did explain that to me.”

“Oh good.” Rose ran her hands down her apron and lifted her eyes. “I suppose this surprises you.”

“That you’re a nurse? Yes,” Thea admitted honestly. The other day, outside the asylum, she’d assumed by implication that Rose was here solely for Dr. Ackerman. That perhaps he was a beau.

“Oh, I’m not a nurse. I’m an aide. Only an aide. We’ve three nurses here. Two for the daytime, and one who works the night shift,” Rose explained.

Thea thought it curious she’d not seen nurses in town, or that the townspeople rarely spoke of the asylum at all. Rose seemed to read the question in her eyes.

“It’s a small hospital. We’ve only nineteen patients. The nurses dorm in the attic rooms. That way, in the case of an emergency at night, they can be summoned for extra help. I’m the aide who helps during the days, as well as Dr. Ackerman, and also another doctor from a town about eight miles from here. He visits frequently for additional support. We always have Simeon too, if things get really out of hand.” Rose’s eyes shadowed briefly. “That doesn’t happen often, thankfully,” she added.

It seemed woefully ill supplied with staff, but perhaps, Thea acknowledged, that was her own ignorance of the matter.

“We’ll go upstairs now,” Rose said, her tone dropping a notch. She captured Thea’s gaze with a solemn expression. “It’s very different upstairs. The patient quarters are there. Please. Don’t be disturbed by anything they say or do. While you may be surprised by some things, be assured we are not. It’s best to stay silent and let us work with the patients.”

The small room had a lone window, four-paned, barred, and overlooking the front cobblestone walk. Simeon stood in the middle of the room, the Kodak box camera mounted on the tripod. How or when he’d retrieved it from the shed out back confused Thea, but then many things did that to her lately. She eyed the wooden chair against the white wall, natural light illuminating it. It would make for an easy photograph in terms of setting the camera to capture the image. Once taken, she would need to develop the plates in a darkroom. Simeon had explained that he and Mr. Amos had constructed such a room in the basement. It did not excite her to go into the basement of the asylum, but the negative plates would need proper attention, so she had little choice.

Simeon looked up as Thea entered with Rose, who quietly excused herself on pretense of collecting their patient.

“I’m sorry.” His eyes reflected a transparent honesty.

“That’s all right,” Thea responded with a small smile.

Simeon moved aside, and Thea naturally took over the process, preparing the camera. It was what she was familiar with. What Mr. Mendelsohn had taught her to do. She could feel herself distancing from the moment, becoming mechanical as she prepared the plates. It was a blessing, really, to not feel. To insert herself behind the tool that would capture a moment forever, yet stand between her and the stark reality of death . . . or in this case, suspension between the here and the hereafter.

Footsteps drew her attention, and she looked up as a slight figure entered the room. Simeon stood to the side, his eyes sharp now, attending and kind. Thea instantly knew why Simeon needed assistance in lieu of Mr. Amos. He was the familiar, the camera the foreign. If he hid behind it, the patient would panic, but with Simeon methodically directing the moment, the other photographer became merely an extension of the camera. An object, rather than a person to be feared.

The woman’s expression was distant. Her head tilted to the left, and she stared ahead as if seeing beyond the walls. A dress covered her, stained but clean, and too short for her already petite body. Her legs that peeked out below were scrawny and bruised. Her feet wore stockings. Thin ones that rose above her bony ankles and sagged behind to her heels. Her graying, dark hair had been pulled back into a low bun at the nape of her neck. It seemed, from the waist up, that someone had gone to great lengths to attempt to prepare her for the photograph.

Rose followed the woman, who must have been in her late forties. She didn’t touch her but kept a careful radius, as if any physical contact might send her into a tantrum.

“This is Effie.” Rose met Thea’s eyes.

Thea offered a nervous smile. She couldn’t deny that a little part of her was frightened by the tiny woman, who looked as if a slight breeze would lift her off the floor and carry her into the heavens.

“Hello, Effie,” Thea offered.

Effie stopped in the middle of the barren room. Her eyes surveyed Thea, and for a moment Thea thought she saw a hint of awareness—realization, perhaps. And then it disappeared, and Effie’s face returned to vacancy.

Simeon intervened and stood behind the chair. “Here, Effie. Please, sit.”

Effie’s feet shuffled across the floor. She followed the sound of Simeon’s voice and lowered her body onto the chair. Now that she was facing Thea, Thea could see her pale skin was marred by bruises on her cheeks. She frowned, studying her as she did anyone whose picture she was about to capture.

Rose had come near Thea, and she leaned in to whisper softly into Thea’s ear, “Effie has horrible spells some days. She’ll flail her body and hit things. She had one a few days ago. It’s why she has bruises.”

Spells. Thea tried not to interpret what that might signify. She’d heard Mrs. Mendelsohn speak once of a woman who had “spells.” Some thought she was possessed by the devil himself, such a fit she would throw. Drooling from the mouth, eyes rolling, her body arching and then finally collapsing into an exhausted state. It was terrifying, Mrs. Mendelsohn admitted. She’d also mentioned how that woman had been committed to a hospital. Just like Effie.

Simeon squatted in front of Effie and captured her attention. “Effie, I’d like for you to recite me a poem.”

Thea readied herself at the camera. She could tell that Simeon was preparing Effie for a photograph, and the opportunity to take one might be just a sliver of a moment.

“Can you, Effie?” he urged gently.

When she didn’t respond, Thea sensed Rose shift beside her. “She likes that poem ‘A Chilly Night.’ The one by Christina Rossetti.”

Simeon gave his sister a blank look.

Rose took in a small breath and began to quote softly:

“I rose at the dead of night

And went to the lattice alone

To look for my Mother’s ghost

Where the ghostly moonlight shone.”

Thea watched, transfixed, as Effie’s head came up. Her eyes focused, and a tiny smile tilted her lips. She looked first at Rose, then Simeon, then back to Rose. A little nod and her body relaxed. Her lips moved as she continued the verse with a soft, reedy voice that sent shivers through Thea.

“My friends had failed one by one,

Middle-aged, young, and old,

Till the ghosts were warmer to me

Than my friends that had grown cold . . .”

Simeon stood, caution in his movement, so as not to bewilder Effie. He gave Thea a quick look, and she nodded, attempting to ignore Effie’s recitation and instead take the photograph. She framed the potential image and made sure Effie was centered from the chest level and up.

“I looked, and I saw the ghosts

Dotting plain and mound:

They stood in the blank moonlight

But no shadow lay on the ground;

They spoke without a voice

And they leapt without a sound . . .”

Thea was ready. She gave Simeon a look. Effie needed to stop. Her lips were moving, and it was critical that nothing moved. Simeon tried to interrupt the woman, who sat hunched in the chair.

“Effie,” he said.

She ignored him, her voice a continuation of the words that seemed as though etched in her mind.

“I called: ‘O my Mother dear,’—

I sobbed: ‘O my Mother kind,

Make a lonely bed for me

And shelter it from the wind . . .’”

Thea straightened, her eyes connected with Effie’s. The woman blinked rapidly, softness absent from her face, the words of the poem frozen on pale lips. She stared at Thea.

“Please, stop,” Thea breathed. The horror of the poem touching the places she’d tried to tamp down, the fears she harbored of this place. This prison.

Effie fixated on her. Her eyes wide, sincere. It seemed she was very aware of what she said and what it implied.

“My Mother raised her eyes,

They were blank and could not see;

Yet they held me with their stare

While they seemed to look at me.

She opened her mouth and spoke,

I could not hear a word

While my flesh crept on my bones

And every hair was stirred.”

Thea stumbled back from the camera, but Effie’s gaze speared her. Captured her and refused to let her move anywhere but back against the bare wall.

“Stop!” Thea cried out.

She vaguely saw Simeon scramble toward Effie.

Rose was but a blur in Thea’s vision.

For a moment, Thea thought Effie would keep reciting, but she didn’t. She stopped and stiffened, leaning forward. “You.” The words, shaky and laced with shock, filtered through Effie’s lips. “It’s you.”

Thea gave Simeon a bewildered look, and Rose moved quickly to Effie’s side.

“Come, Effie.” Rose motioned for Effie to rise. The woman did as she was beckoned to, yet her eyes remained focused on Thea.

Thea was shaking. Almost violently. A terror shot through her like a bullet fired from a gun held in Effie’s own tremoring hand. The recognition in Effie’s eyes. Her mother? Had Effie seen her mother in Thea’s face? Was Effie her mother? Maybe the woman who had left Thea at the orphanage had indeed found her way to Valley Heights Asylum and Effie—

“Misty Wayfair . . .” Effie drew out the name in awe. As though she were transfixed by seeing the ghost herself in the room.

Coldness saturated Thea. Simeon’s hand wrapped around her elbow, to steady her. Maybe she’d wobbled a bit on her feet at the name on Effie’s tongue. Maybe she’d grown pale. Thea didn’t know. All she knew was, Effie was staring at her, not in fear but in fascination.

“You’ve come back to me,” Effie breathed. “You’ve come back.”