The Last Time I Lied(96)

To avoid the camera outside Dogwood completely, I have to cut behind the other cabins on my way to the latrine. I move in a half crouch, trying not to be noticed by anyone inside the cabins or roaming about outside.

The only real threat of being spotted comes from the helicopter and its stupid spotlight, which passes overhead within a minute of my being outside. I throw myself against the wall of the nearest cabin, my back flattened against it, arms at my sides. The spotlight’s beam sweeps past me, oblivious to my presence.

I don’t move until the helicopter skims over the lake. Then I run, sprinting to the latrine, my phone sliding around in my pocket. Inside, I turn on the lights and check each bathroom stall and shower. Just like during my search for the girls this morning, it’s empty. Unlike then, I’m relieved to be alone.

I make my way to one of the stalls, closing the door and locking it for extra privacy. Then I pull out my phone and call Marc. The connection is weak. When he answers, static stutters into his words.

“Billy and . . . found . . . thing.”

I check the phone. There’s one bar of signal. Not good at all. I stand atop the toilet seat, holding the phone toward the ceiling, hoping for a better signal. It now shows two bars, the second one wavering and unsteady. I stay on the toilet, my body tilted, bent elbow jutting toward the ceiling. It works. The static is gone.

“What did you find?”

“Not much,” Marc tells me. “Billy says it’s hard to research something like a private asylum. Especially one so small and remote. He ended up looking everywhere. Books. Newspapers. Historical records. He had a friend search the library’s photo archives and made a few calls to the library at Syracuse. I’m going to email everything he found. Some of it couldn’t be scanned because it was too old or in bad condition. But I wrote those down.”

The sound of rustling paper bursts from the phone, high-pitched and screechy.

“Billy found a few mentions of a Mr. C. Cutler of Peaceful Valley in the ledger of Hardiman Brothers, a wig company on the Lower East Side. Do any of those names sound familiar?”

“Charles Cutler,” I say. “He was the owner. He sold his patients’ hair to wigmakers.”

“That’s Dickensian,” Marc says. “And it would explain why the Hardiman brothers paid him fifty dollars on three different occasions.”

“When was this?”

“Once in 1901. Twice in 1902.”

“That lines up with what I saw in the book Vivian found at the library. There was a picture of the place from 1898.”

“Did the book mention when it closed?” Marc asks.

“No. Why?”

“Because something strange happened after that.” There’s more rustling on Marc’s end, followed by more static, which makes me worry the signal is again getting worse. “Billy found a newspaper article from 1904. It’s about a man named Helmut Schmidt of Yonkers. Does that ring a bell?”

“Never heard of him.”

“Well, Helmut was a German immigrant who spent ten years out west. When he returned to New York, he sought out his sister, Anya.”

That name is familiar to me. There was a photograph of someone named Anya tucked into the box I found in the Lodge. I even remember her hair color. Flaxen.

“Helmut described her as ‘often confused and prone to nervous exasperation,’” Marc says. “We both know what that means.”

All too well. Anya suffered from a mental ailment that probably didn’t even have a name at the time.

“It appears that while Helmut was gone, Anya’s condition worsened until she was committed to Blackwell’s Island. He looked for her there and was told she had been put into the care of Dr. Cutler and taken to—”

“Peaceful Valley,” I say.

“Bingo. Which is why Helmut Schmidt then traveled upstate to Peaceful Valley to retrieve his sister. Only he couldn’t find it, which is why he spoke to the press about it.”

“Are you saying it didn’t exist?”

“No,” Marc says. “I’m saying it vanished.”

That word again. Vanished. I’ve grown to hate the sound of it.

“How does an insane asylum just disappear?”

“No one knew. Or, more likely, no one cared,” Marc says. “Especially because the place was in the middle of nowhere. And those who lived even remotely nearby wanted nothing to do with it. All they knew was that it was run by a doctor and his wife and that the land had been sold a year earlier.”

“And that’s it?”

“I guess so. Billy couldn’t find any follow-up articles about Helmut Schmidt and his sister.” I hear the clatter of keys, followed by a single, sharp click. “I just emailed the files.”

My phone vibrates in my hand. An email alert.

“Got them,” I say.

“I hope it helps.” Darkness creeps into Marc’s voice. The telltale sound of concern. “I’m worried about you, Em. Promise me you’ll be careful.”

“I will.”

“Pinkie swear?”

“Yes,” I say, smiling in spite of all my fear, exhaustion, and worry. “Pinkie swear.”

I end the call and check my email. The first item Marc sent is scans of two pages from the same book I found in the library. One contains the paragraphs mentioning Peaceful Valley, minus Vivian’s pencil mark. The other is the photograph of Charles Cutler cockily standing in front of his asylum.