stuffed it in my own pocket, on the assumption that he didn’t want my snot in his pocket. He didn’t object, so I figured I was right. “Thanks,” I said as politely as I could. “What’re you doing here, anyway?”
“He called me up while you were on your way over.” Gary tipped his head at Billy. “Said you were gonna need a ride back to your car and he had to go down to the station to get his ass chewed.”
“Oh.” The minute Billy had agreed to take me to the hospital I’d fallen asleep. He could have run a brass band over my head and I wouldn’t have noticed, not with the comforting thrum of wheels against concrete soothing me.
Mrs. Potter was in a private wing down a rat’s maze of gated hallways. Billy stopped and talked to the guard, who opened the gates and ushered us through into a corridor that looked like its sole purpose was keeping important people safe. There were no windows, the walls were prison gray and the lights did nothing to cheer it. My boots echoed on the linoleum. “What do they do, bring people down here to encourage them to die?”
“It’s a little morbid, isn’t it? Supposed to discourage people from exploring down this way.” Billy waved a hand at the nearly empty hall.
“Like they can get past the guards,” Gary muttered. “What’s the point?”
“Used to be a psychiatric wing.”
“Sure,” I said. “Like crazy people need another reason to be depressed.”
Billy scowled at me. “They converted it about ten years ago, and the primer color paint got donated. These days it’s used for celebrities, criminals and emergencies. The isolation helps keep sightseers and ambulance chasers away.”
“And visitors,” I opined. “I’d have gotten discouraged three corridors back. What happens if sainted Aunt Sally wants to visit her precious movie star nephew who got hurt filming on location?”
“First sainted Aunt Sally gets a background check, then she gets brought down here with a police escort. Just like you did.” Two more guards stood at attention as we came around a corner and up the hall. I wondered if they’d been like that the whole time, or if there was a poker game hidden around the next corner.
“Does that mean you did a background check on me?” Gary asked. Billy ignored the question, walking up to the guards. Gary grinned. “Bet that means no.” Billy gave him a dirty look and pushed the door open, gesturing me in.
I had an image of Mrs. Potter built up in my mind. She was young, in her early thirties at the most, with heavy blond hair she usually wore up. It would be down now, and she would be pale under her light tan. She’d be tall, although not as tall as me, and muscular like a swimmer. She’d have blue eyes and not need much makeup.
A woman who was at least in her mid-sixties lay on the bed, the oxygen mask they’d given her set askew on her face. An orderly tried steadily and without the slightest success to get her to put it back on.
She had gobs of white hair that stood out in random directions, a state that seemed natural rather than caused by a traumatizing day. She was, in fact, both tall and muscular, and she had an amazingly solid feeling to her, like Mrs. Claus on steroids. “My lungs, young man, are perfectly functional,” she was saying as I walked in. “I do not need this ridiculous contraption and I will not wear it. The doctor has verified that my brain is operating quite within normal parameters. If you insist, I will sign paperwork absolving the hospital of all responsibility should my lungs suddenly collapse, leading to my demise through suffocation, but I have had quite enough of that silly mask.”
“You like Star Trek? ” I asked, surprised. Mrs. Potter removed her gaze from the orderly, who sagged in either relief or resignation, and fixed it on me.
“I do,” she said crisply. “How ever did you deduce that?”
I grinned and walked forward. “I don’t think anybody who wasn’t a Trek fan would say ‘operating within normal parameters.’ Hi, I’m Joanne Walker.” I stepped up to the side of her bed and offered my hand. She had a strong grip.
“Good evening, Joanne Walker. My name is Henrietta Potter. To what do I owe the pleasure of your acquaintance? And who are these two ruffians?” Sharp blue eyes glanced over Billy and Gary, and she waved a hand. “Who is the one ruffian,” she corrected herself. “I see our detective with the unfortunate name has returned. You are a very polite interrogator, young man.”
Billy grinned and half bowed, all charming modesty. “I try, ma’am. This is Gary Muldoon.” Gary hung back in the door, trying to look small. It didn’t work.
“Well, Gary Muldoon. I normally prefer to be a little more attractively attired before entertaining gentlemen callers, but you may as well come in.” Henrietta returned her gaze to me. “You were about to launch into a detailed explanation of why you were here,” she reminded me. “As I have never seen you before, I can only gather that either you are involved in the police investigation of this morning’s events, or you are a shyster hoping to trick the last few pennies out of a dying old lady.” The precision of her tone never failed, but I saw tremendous pain flicker in her eyes as she referred to the morning.
“I don’t think you’re dying,” I said slowly. I could all but feel determination pouring off her, a refusal to be beaten by the injuries she’d sustained. I wondered how much of the strength she was showing was a facade, and how much she was buying into it herself. I was buying it, anyway. “You may be aged, but I’m not sure old is exactly a word that applies to you, Mrs. Potter. If I’m a shyster, I’m in trouble.”
She graced me with a small smile. “It is the morning’s tragic business that brings you here, then. Sit down, child, and tell me who you are. Go fetch us some coffee,” she added imperiously. Billy, the orderly and Gary all flinched and started for the door. The orderly recovered first.
“Ma’am, you’re not to have any caffeine for at least forty-eight hou-”
“Then make it decaffeinated,” she suggested, and this time all three of them bolted for the door. There was a moment’s struggle while they stuck there, be fore the orderly squirmed out and Gary and Billy had room to follow. After a few seconds, the door swung shut.
“Wow,” I said, impressed. “How did you do that?”
“Years of practice,” she said modestly. “I had six suitors, at one time. I had to find some way to deal with them. Now, what can I do for you, Joanne Walker?”
I studied her curiously for a moment, trying to see the young woman who had had so many suitors. It wasn’t hard: she still had magnificent cheekbones and a firm chin, and I realized suddenly that she bore a striking resemblance to-
“-Katharine Hepburn, yes, I know,” she said patiently. “And no,” she continued as my jaw fell open, “I don’t read minds. I’ve heard that from nearly everyone I’ve met since I was fifteen, and everyone gets the same expression just before they say it. I never,” she added, for emphasis, “met Spencer Tracey. Now,” she said again, and pushed herself up carefully, a faint wince crossing her features, “tell me why you’re here.”
I didn’t know where to start. “A friend of mine was murdered yesterday evening,” I finally said. Had it really only been last night? “I think by the same man who came into your classroom this morning.”
Henrietta’s expression tightened. “I’m very sorry.”
“Me too.” I stared at my hands. “I’m…” I trailed off. Henrietta waited patiently.
“Young lady,” she said eventually, when I didn’t speak, “the creature that killed my students walked into my classroom without anyone seeing him. Mark was dead before we saw his killer. Whatever you are trying to work yourself up to telling me, I don’t believe it can possibly make my day any more unpleasant.”
“Sorry.” I looked up. “I need to find him. I have to try to help him.”
Her eyebrows, white as her hair, shot up. “Help him?”
“He’s very sick.” I remembered the bleak fall through blackness and found myself standing up, taking a few steps as if I could get away from the memory. “Help him. Stop him. I think they’re almost the same thing. Can you tell me everything you remember about him?”
“The police have already taken my statement.” She pushed herself up a little farther, wincing again. “I presume you’ve received the physical description. As tall as you, brown hair, green eyes?”
I nodded. “Very well,” she said. “The classroom door was closed. I never heard it open. I have no idea how he entered. I was writing on the chalkboard-whiteboard,” she corrected herself, “and for a moment I thought the sound I’d heard was the marker against the board. It was that kind of sound, a high-pitched squeak, enough to raise hairs on the neck without causing real alarm. But then the children started screaming.” Her voice shook.
I could feel the unlocked energy inside me bubbling with the impulse to help her somehow, to ease her pain. I
