Rookwood Asylum Read online

  Gremlins, she calls them, he thought. Makes the unknown seem all cuddly, small, and trivial. But maybe it isn’t.

  As he passed through the foyer, he thought he glimpsed someone from the corner of his eye. When he stopped to look out at the sunlit driveway, he saw no one. He continued on his way, but could not shake the notion that he had caught someone watching him. And he felt the odd, crawling sensation up his spine as he went along an empty corridor. More than once he glanced over his shoulder, but of course, he was not being followed. He attributed the creepy sensation to the lights, which were triggered by motion sensors. They created moving pools of radiance. A few yards ahead of him and behind, the corridor was dim, with more shadows than he cared for.

  Sure, and how would they track me down here anyway? Declan asked himself. You’re just being bloody paranoid, man. It’s not like you were ever a big boss in the organization. Nah, you were just a daft lad who took messages, kept watch on the corner. Nothing too heinous at all. Thousands did worse and got away with worse.

  “You hid those rifles in your ma’s attic.”

  The words were spoken directly into his ear, the voice an urgent whisper. Declan spun around, anger rising, fists raised. But there was no one to lash out at or defend against. He was still alone in the silent, carpeted corridor.

  “I’m hearing things,” he said aloud.

  He had stood still for just long enough for the lights to go out. Declan waved an arm to trigger the sensors. In the split-second before the light was restored, he thought he saw a figure at the far end of the corridor. It was masked, wearing a black beret, its clothes baggy combats, heavy boots. One arm hung by its side, and in its hand, he saw the sharp outline of a gun, an automatic pistol.

  “Nobody there!” he insisted as the ominous silhouette vanished. “Mind playing tricks.”

  The sound of a drill pierced the air, a noise that would normally be mildly irritating. But now it was a relief, a reminder of the mundane world of work, of practical matters and practical men. Declan turned and walked on, taking his moving pool of light with him, heading for the East Wing.

  I’ll just have a little chat with those builder lads, he told himself. See how they’re getting on. It’s not good to be alone too much around here.

  ***

  The apartment itself was impressive, living up to the pictures and fulsome words on the company website. Paul found himself making approving noises as Kate showed him around, sensed the manager relaxing a little as she picked up on his reactions.

  “It’s the first place I’ve seen so far that I can actually imagine living in,” he admitted to her. “At least, living like a human being. Everything else in my price range is kind of bleak, in terms of location, and space.”

  “Yes,” Kate said, “the rental market in the area is somewhat patchy. This is one of the most competitive developments in the Tynecastle area.”

  Paul checked the small kitchen, then the bathroom. The flat was exactly as advertised. He took off his glasses, rubbed the bridge of his nose. It was a mannerism he had cultivated to buy time when a student asked him a tricky question, or a very stupid one. Now, he was using the brief pause to decide whether to ask an obvious question of his own.

  “Okay,” he said finally. “Why is the rent so low? For a brand-new apartment in a state-of-the-art building?”

  Kate Bewick’s smile did not falter.

  “We had some bad PR because of the whole asylum thing,” she admitted. “So we dropped the price a little, to get people in quickly, and scotch the – well, silly rumors.”

  Paul was about to ask for details about the rumors when a stocky, gray-haired woman appeared in the apartment doorway. Kate, with a hint of relief, introduced the newcomer as ‘Mrs. Prescott, chair of the Tenants Association.’ After some minor chit-chat, Mrs. Prescott started talking about problems with the building. Kate’s smile froze on her face.

  “We have a lift that’s been out of order for nearly a month now,” Mrs. Prescott pointed out. “And there are still major problems with the electrical system in general.”

  “Oh?” Paul asked. “Tell me more.”

  “Power surges,” replied Mrs. Prescott. “Strong enough to blow fuses in several apartments. My own hairdryer nearly exploded the other day.”

  “Let’s talk about this outside, Sadie,” Kate put in, taking the woman lightly by the elbow. “Paul, why not just wait here and get the feel of the place – take a look at the view, it’s quite impressive.”

  Paul heard Sadie Prescott continue to list gripes as the two women receded along the corridor. Smiling to himself, he wondered if he could risk moving into a place that seemed to have so many teething problems. He went to the large picture window and looked out. The view was impressive, he had to concede. Rookwood stood on a low hill in the northern suburbs of Tynecastle. The ancient English city spread out below it, looking its best in the morning sunlight. He could make out the cathedral, the graceful arch of the road bridge, tower blocks in the business district. He tried to orient himself, find the university, perhaps even his own building.

  “Hello.”

  It was a low, hesitant voice. Paul turned to see a petite young woman standing in the doorway. She was about five foot three, pale, with dark hair and eyes. She was wearing a shapeless, dark gray dress that nearly reached her knees, and black, low-heeled shoes. Paul guessed her age as late teens, no more than early twenties. Her face was a little too round, her mouth too thin, to be considered beautiful. But she was pretty, and he felt himself responding to her shy smile.

  “Hi!” he said. “You live here, I guess?”

  ***

  Sammy had his ear protectors on, so he could not hear Pavel shouting at him. But he could tell from the foreman’s expression that he was in trouble again. Sammy turned off the drill, withdrew the bit from the stonework. He could see Pavel mouthing words, the foreman’s face flushed with anger.

  Jesus Christ, Sammy thought. What have I done now? I hit the mark he chalked there with his own hand, but he’s still pissed off at me.

  Sammy removed his ear protectors and heard exactly why Pavel was upset.

  “You used the wrong bit!” the Pole shouted. “The hole is too big now!”

  Sammy looked down dumbly at the drill bit. Then he looked at the hole where Pavel’s chalked X had vanished. Next to it was a number. Sammy had assumed it was the number of the hole, one of dozens to be drilled in the walls of the old building. But no. Now he looked at it more closely, he could see it was a gauge in millimeters. And he, Sammy, had used the wrong size.

  “Oh,” he said, feeling immensely stupid. “Sorry boss.”

  Pavel seemed to lose the power of speech. Sammy felt an irrational surge of anger, looking round at the other men. They were all careful not to meet his gaze, looking embarrassed for him. All except for Doug, the joker in the pack. Doug was smirking to himself. Doug had sent Sammy to look for ‘a left-handed screwdriver’ on his first day. Sammy had fallen for it.

  “Okay,” Pavel said, sighing out the word. “No real harm done, Sammy. We can make good, fix it. But next time, son, you make sure you check with me, or one of the other guys, before you drill a hole. In anything. Right?”

  “Right, boss,” replied Sammy, staring down at his steel-capped work boots. “Sorry.”

  My first proper job, he thought. And I’m making a right pig’s breakfast of it.

  Pavel slapped him on the shoulder and helped him change the bit on the masonry drill. Then the foreman watched carefully as Sammy drilled the next hole in the sandstone wall. Sammy should have been grateful, he knew that. Pavel had been patient, considerate, and never lost his rag for long. But somehow, he still resented the foreman, almost hated him. Again, thoughts he knew were wrong, unreasonable, kept surfacing as he worked.

  Bloody foreigners, coming over here, taking our jobs, giving us orders. Always finding fault. Why don’t they all go back where they came from?

  Sammy had heard others express the
same views of migrant workers from Europe, and further afield. But he had always been easygoing, someone who made friends with anyone regardless of race, creed, color. Yet, since he had started working at Rookwood he struggled to be cheerful, upbeat. Dark thoughts seemed to invade his mind, unless he was always on the alert to stop them, turn them aside.

  Like something is stopping me being myself.

  Sammy pushed the masonry drill forward gently against the heart of another chalked X. He felt the stone resist. He smiled as the powerful tool cut into the surface, defeating it, penetrating it. Sammy felt an odd, uplifting sensation, an awareness of the power he wielded. He applied more pressure, smiled as he overcame the stone, relishing the raw power of the drill.

  I’ll show them, he thought. I’ll show them all what I’m made of.

  ***

  The girl took a couple of paces into the room, then spoke again.

  “Hello,” she said. “I’m Liz.”

  Paul walked over to her, extending a hand as he introduced himself. She reached out, and he felt the cool grip of small fingers. She withdrew her hand quickly.

  “Pleased to meet you,” she murmured, looking up at him, her expression suddenly serious. “You’re American. Or from Canada.”

  “USA,” he said, “but I’ve been here a good while now. Warm beer, fish and chips – I love ‘em all.”

  Liz looked puzzled for a moment, then laughed.

  “I’ve never met an American,” she said. “You’re quite handsome, I suppose. Are you a millionaire?”

  Paul struggled to think of a reply, then Liz laughed again.

  “Sorry,” she said. “I can be quite silly sometimes. Are you going to live here?”

  She half-walked, half-danced across the apartment to the window, gestured out at the view. Paul was startled by how animated the girl seemed all of a sudden. He caught himself checking out the contours of her young body as she moved inside the sack-like dress. She was, he noted, fuller-figured than her slender arms and legs suggested.

  Liz looked him squarely in the eye, put a finger to her lips, made a coy face. He felt himself grow red in the face.

  Caught me looking, he thought. Now she’s in flirt mode.

  “Um, I guess I might move in,” he told her. “I haven’t really decided yet.”

  “I hope you do,” she replied. “It would be nice to have someone – someone nice, to talk to. I get lonely sometimes.”

  Paul was about to ask how someone so young came to be living alone in a high-end apartment, but stopped himself. He had learned from many awkward moments that the British did not like such direct questions. And there was something else. For all her playfulness, Liz had an air of melancholy.

  “I have to go!” she said abruptly. “But I’ll see you again, won’t I?”

  Before Paul could stammer out an answer she had moved with startling quickness from the window, past him, and out of the door. A moment later he heard the voices of Kate Bewick and Sadie Prescott growing louder. He went outside the flat, looked both ways. The motion-sensitive lights were just switching off to the left. Then, to the right, lights came on as Kate and Sadie rounded the corner, the latter still talking animatedly.

  The stairway was opposite the front door of apartment 212. Paul caught a glimpse of a small figure watching him from around the corner and thought for a moment that it might be Liz. Then he realized that it was a much younger girl, a child, in fact, her eyes huge in a heart-shaped face. He began to smile, raise a hand to wave, but the girl was already gone.

  “I’ll make sure Declan gets onto it,” Kate was saying. “But now I must attend to Doctor Mahan.”

  Sadie Prescott looked at Paul with more interest than before.

  “Doctor?” she said. “I’ve got terrible osteoarthritis in my left knee –”

  “My doctorate is in American history,” he cut in, smiling apologetically. “Sorry, no medical knowhow.”

  Sadie looked at him in mild disappointment.

  “Oh well,” said Sadie, “it was nice meeting you.”

  Kate and Paul watched the formidable woman set off down the stairs. When she was out of sight, they exchanged knowing smiles.

  “Guess she takes up a lot of your time?” Paul asked.

  Kate shrugged, and asked him if he needed to know anything else about the apartment. Paul again sensed her borderline desperation to close a deal, and wondered how many people had declined signing up to live at Rookwood.

  Am I going to turn this place down because of its history, plus a few teething troubles? Paul asked himself. That would make me a coward and an idiot.

  “No,” he said, “I’ve seen enough. I’ll take it. I can move in right away.”

  Kate looked up at him with apparent disbelief, but that soon gave way to pleasure. She ushered him downstairs to her office where various documents were ready to be signed. As he went through the formalities Paul chatted with Kate, trying to stay focused on sensible, grown-up matters. But in his mind’s eye, he kept seeing Liz, her slightly immature face, the way her body filled out her nondescript dress.

  For God’s sake, he thought. You’re thirty-six, you can’t drool over teenagers. Imagine she were one of your students.

  Chapter 2

  Declan lifted the plastic sheeting that marked the end of the habitable area of Rookwood. From now on he was on a building site. He picked up a hard hat from a small pile on a bench.

  “Safety first,” he murmured, as he settled the plastic dome onto his hairless scalp. “Ironic if you got killed by a bit of dodgy scaffolding.”

  Declan had worked construction in Belfast in his youth. He could tell the men currently refurbishing the East Wing were a mix of experience and incompetence. He felt some sympathy for the Polish foreman, Pavel, who had been saddled with a less than brilliant outfit.

  Poor bugger has to spend too much time supervising, correcting mistakes, Declan thought. That always slows work to a snail’s pace.

  Declan picked his way past piles of debris and building materials. He could tell from unopened packages and untouched items that work had not progressed very far. The place was stark, dirty, and felt chilly despite the June sunshine outside. Declan paused to look out of one of the unglazed windows. He saw Kate Bewick showing the American guy out to her car.

  No doubt she’ll give him a lift to the Metro station, he thought, walking on. She’s so desperate to make her quota, she’d probably shag him senseless on her desk.

  Declan stopped, surprised and dismayed. He had never thought harshly of Kate before, but the prurient image had flashed into his mind. He felt ashamed, and an irrational fear that someone knew his sordid thoughts.

  It’s this place, he thought. I wish I’d known more about it before I took the job.

  The piercing whine of a drill biting into stone shook him out of his unpleasant reverie. He walked on, saw movement inside a room, waved as a face turned toward him. It was one of the men he did not like much. Doug, a local with an unsubtle sense of humor; had a propensity for what he called Irish jokes. He would trot out some outdated stereotype about what he called ‘our Celtic cousins,’ then add ‘No offense!’ as if the phrase was some kind of protective charm.

  “Hey, there, Doug, how’s it going?” he asked, raising his voice above the noisy drilling.

  “Not so bad,” Doug replied, putting down his tools. “Another day, another dollar, as they say.”

  Declan looked at the wall that Doug had been plastering. The work was barely adequate, nothing like as good as that in the rest of Rookwood. Rather than comment on the slipshod work, Declan asked if the team had experienced any electrical problems. Doug shrugged.

  “Not that I know of,” he said. “Why?”

  Declan gave an evasive answer and made to go on, wanting to talk to Pavel. But there was a lull in the drilling and Doug, predictably, took advantage of it.

  “Hey,” he said, “here’s a good one. Mrs. Murphy goes up to Father O’Malley, and she’s all crying and upset
, and she says, ‘Oh Father, my husband passed away last night!’ So the priest says, ‘Oh Mary, that’s terrible! Did he have any last requests?’ And she says –”

  “For Christ’s sake put the gun down,’” cut in Declan, smiling thinly and heading for the doorway. “See you later, Doug.”

  “What do you call an Irishman sitting on a couch?” demanded Doug.

  “Paddy O’Furniture,” Declan shot back. “Get some new material, pal.”

  Typical bloody Brit, he thought bitterly, as he made his way back out of the East Wing. Too damn stupid to know how stupid he is.

  ***

  The main gates had been left open. “There are some pending lawsuits over the electrical systems,” Kate remarked. “But of course, everything moves so slowly. In the meantime, any problems, just get in touch with Declan or me.”

  Paul nodded, distracted by someone standing on the opposite side of the road. It was a white-haired woman of around sixty. She was apparently staring at the gates of the apartment complex. As Kate’s car turned onto Blaydon Avenue, Paul found himself looking into the woman’s dark eyes. She seemed vaguely familiar, and he wondered if she had some connection to the university. Then they had passed her, and Paul saw her still figure receding in the wing mirror.

  “Somebody seems fascinated by Rookwood,” he commented.

  “Oh?” Kate replied. “I didn’t notice.”

  After she had dropped him off at Temple Grove station Paul had a six-minute wait for the next train into Tynecastle. He wandered restlessly up and down the platform, wondering if he had made the right decision. Finally, he called his friend Mike, explained that he no longer needed to crash with him. Mike, to his credit, did not sound too enthusiastic about Paul moving out and offered to help.

  “What’s the place like, anyway?” Mike asked. “Any top tottie? This Kate woman sounds a bit of all right?”