The Raven Spell (Conspiracy of Magic #1)(6)
“Very good.” The doctor held the calling card at arm’s length as he read, squinting through his pipe smoke. “Does the name Henry Elvanfoot mean anything to you?” He turned the card around to display the print—a rather ornate script done in garish green ink with an embossed thistle at the top. A reddish-brown splotch sullied the front of the otherwise professional card as well. “Is that you? Is that your name?”
The name Elvanfoot, once spoken, seemed to fill in some blank spot he’d been oblivious to before. Like a shadowy image coming into focus in his mind. Was he Henry? He must be, and so he said so. And yet nothing else arrived with the name. No memory of home, no relations, no job. These were things he must have, and yet none of it would coagulate in any cohesive history of him he could recall with clarity.
Disappointed, perhaps, that his patient wasn’t the career-making amnesia case he’d hoped for, the doctor tossed the card back in the bedpan and pronounced him a lucky man after coming within a hair’s breadth of permanent damage from his injury. Out of an abundance of caution, though, the doctor ordered him to remain in the hospital for a night of observation, seeing how there were a few coins among the rest of his belongings lining the bottom of the bedpan to cover the cost.
The nurse set the tray on the table beside the man’s bed, then turned to follow the doctor down the row of cots to attend to the next helpless bugger.
“Wait,” he said, gripping her forearm. “I . . . it’s like my mind isn’t part of my body anymore. My head feels like it’s floating up along the ceiling instead of sitting on my shoulders.” He swallowed. “Will it get better?”
She pitied him with a solemn look. “You’ve had a nasty hit to the head,” she said. “You’ve only just regained consciousness.” He let go of her arm, and she tugged her sleeve back down before sorting through the contents of the bedpan. “There are some personal belongings here. Maybe one of them will help jog your memory.”
He could see only a glimpse of what the bedpan held inside, so the nurse made a space for it on the blanket beside his hip. Though he recognized none of the contents, the nurse’s instincts proved correct. The items did stir his curiosity back to life. So much so that he didn’t take notice of her leaving until she was halfway down the row of cots and assisting the doctor with a man whose arm was elevated and wrapped in white linen.
Left alone to examine his purported belongings, he tentatively reached in through the pan’s slotted opening—sparing a moment’s thought as to when the damn thing had last been used for its intended purpose—and retrieved the coins. Though he had no recollection of how he’d obtained the money, he did know its value. Enough to live on for a week in the city, if he was careful. Yes, that was something. He could build on that. Like the card, maybe the other items would ring a bell of recognition. Bullheaded determination backfilled the space under his rib cage until his chest heaved with new resolve. To what purpose, he didn’t know, but it was as though his body was prepared to remember what his mind could not.
He dug through the rest of his items, a man on the hunt for answers. There was a broken pocket watch that wouldn’t open. As plain as porridge on the outside. No decoration of any kind on the cover, but there were the initials “I.C.” along with the number “#03” inscribed on the back that made him wonder if his name really was Henry Elvanfoot. Was the card his? He’d absorbed no sense of connection to the shape and feel of the name on it as his own, but it carried a sense of the familiar. But the watch was his. As with the coins, his body announced the truth of it with the solid sureness of a thumping, strong heartbeat that made him nod in confidence. But then what did I.C. stand for?
Having no idea, he sorted through the rest of the items to hunt for another clue. There were a few scraps of paper, a skeleton key, and a rosewood pipe with interlocking stag horns around the bowl, the color tarnished black around the rim. He sniffed the charred tobacco and recognized the scent of cherries. The scent pierced his ignorance. It had once been attached to a memory of a room with a high mullioned window, but his mind couldn’t hold the rest. A wisp of smoke that dissipated before he could grasp the damn thing and make it solid in his thoughts. He set the stem of the pipe in his teeth, for that’s where it felt most comfortable, and flipped open one of the folded-up pieces of paper. A receipt for a telegram. The name Elvanfoot was written in one of the spaces. But had he sent it, then? Frustration overtook him, and he wondered if he’d ever sort the mess out. The initials I.C. appeared scribbled on the bottom, but they made no more sense to him than any random letters in the alphabet. None of it did, despite the echoes of familiarity.
Then his hand reached for the final object: a collapsible knife. It wasn’t the sort of thing a gentleman was apt to carry, although he supposed the weapon, like most everything else in the bedpan, must belong to him. He turned the handle over to study the staghorn grip, wondering why he’d felt the need to keep such a thing on his person. And if he wasn’t a gentleman, then who was he? His breathing sped up, and a layer of sweat seeped out of the pores above his lip.
He flicked the knife open and inspected a line of rust-colored crust that had dried along the blade just as a policeman entered the hall and asked the nurse which cot belonged to the John Doe.
Chapter Four
The boy loitered in front of the shop window, waving his hands and making faces, a fresh taunt no doubt sitting ripe on his tongue. He sneered through the glass, his features as misshapen as a ghoul’s from the distortion of the thick panes. Or perhaps that was merely his true self shining through, the nasty little nipper. Edwina smiled at her wicked thought as she searched beneath the counter for a proper box to display the ring in.