The Other Lady Vanishes (Burning Cove #2)(85)

“Don’t worry,” he said. “You’re never coming back to this place.”

She pulled herself together. “But if I do end up back here, you’ll come and get me.”

“Yes.”

“I’m all right now,” she said. “The staircase that leads to the lab is at the far end of this hall. Whatever you do, don’t look through the grills into any of the rooms. Don’t make eye contact with any of the patients.”

“I understand. The patients deserve some privacy.”

“Of course, but it’s not just a matter of privacy. Only the most troubled are housed on this floor. Some of them can become quite violent. If they weren’t paranoid before they were committed to this place, they became paranoid soon after they were locked up here. I did.”

“You had good reason to become paranoid.”

A face appeared at one of the grills. Adelaide was careful not to look at the patient but she could not ignore the moaning cry.

“It’s the ghost,” he rasped in anguished tones. “She’s back.”

Another face appeared at the grilled opening in the door across the hall.

“You shouldn’t be here,” a woman keened. “Go away. Run. They’ll kill you again.”

“She’s back,” someone shouted. “The ghost is back.”

There was a face at every grill now. One of the patients uttered an anguished howl. The rest took up the cry.

“It’s the ghost . . .”

“The ghost is back . . .”

The glass-paned door of the nurses’ station opened. A large, heavily muscled man with straggly hair emerged from the small room. Adelaide recognized him immediately. His name was Buddy. He ignored her and fixed his attention on Jake.

“Who are you and what are you doing here?” Buddy snarled. “This is a locked ward. No visitors allowed.”

“Government business,” Jake said. He flipped open the leather case and snapped it shut in one smooth motion. In the process he made sure that the holstered gun under his jacket was briefly visible. “There’s been a breach of security concerning the research that is being conducted here at the Rushbrook Sanitarium. I have been sent to collect any and all files pertinent to that research.”

A second orderly charged out of the room. He was as big as Buddy and he was almost completely bald, but there was more intelligence in his eyes.

“Dr. Gill didn’t say anything about letting someone take the files,” he growled.

“Hello, Victor,” Adelaide said. “Remember me?”

Victor stared at her. “Say, you’re that crazy Patient B—I mean, Mrs. Massey. What’s going on?”

“Guess what,” Adelaide said. “I’m no longer Patient B, I’m not Mrs. Massey, and best of all, I’m not crazy. I’m Adelaide Blake. Don’t bother to offer tea or coffee. We won’t be staying long.”

“Where did you get the key to this floor?” Victor demanded.

“As Mr. Truett was just explaining to Buddy, we’re here on government business,” Adelaide said.

Jake looked at her. “You said the lab is at the end of the hall?”

“That’s right.”

Adelaide started forward. But Victor stepped in her path.

“Hang on, Mrs. Massey, or Patient B, or whoever you are. Only authorized personnel are allowed in that lab.”

Jake opened the edge of his coat just enough to reveal the gun again. “We have authorization from the appropriate authorities.” He let the coat fall closed.

“Oh,” Victor said. His jaw hardened. “I should probably call someone to confirm it.”

“You’ll have to call long-distance, Washington, D.C.,” Jake said. “Meanwhile, we’ll be in the lab.”

He fell into step beside Adelaide. Together they went briskly along the hall to the glass-paned door marked Laboratory: Authorized Personnel Only.

The keys shivered on the iron ring as Adelaide tried one after another.

“None of them work,” she announced. “Looks like we’ll need your skeleton key again.”

Jake took out his gun and tapped the glass pane with just enough force to shatter it. Holstering the gun, he reached through the opening and turned the knob.

Adelaide moved into the stairwell and flipped a switch on the wall. The sconces came on, illuminating the twisted stone steps. She tried without much success to repress a shudder.

“I hate this place,” she said.

She didn’t realize she had spoken aloud until Jake answered.

“After we leave here today, you’ll never have to come back again,” he said.

She put one foot on the first step. “The lab is at the top.”

She went up the stairs. Her shoes echoed on the stone. Jake was right behind her. The mad cries and moans of the patients on ward five followed them, echoing in the stairwell.

“You were right,” Jake said. “I did need you to guide me around this place. Whoever designed this mansion must have been as crazy as any of the patients.”

“You can understand why the owner’s bride was not thrilled with her new castle,” Adelaide said.

She came to a halt at the top of the stairs. The early morning light streaming through the tall, arched windows that lined one wall did little to alleviate the invisible miasma that seethed in the space.