In the Heart of the Wind Book 1 in the WindTorn Trilogy (31 page)

“Leave me alone,” he begged, lifting his head and looking up at the man with pleading eyes. “Please, just leave me alone.”

“Try to remember, Jamie,” the old man said. He turned his fading head and looked toward the group of laughing people across the room. “Try very hard to remember.”

Jamie shook his head. He put his hands over his ears to blot out the old man’s words. He tried to suppress the image of the old man, to will it away, becoming more and more frustrated as remembering strove to crowd into his consciousness. He urgently pushed it back, sensing such terrible pain in the memory, refusing it entry into his world.

“Go away,” he shouted, banging his head on the table.

Cobb pushed away from the wall where he had been leaning. He saw Beecher heading toward James Sinclair.

“Get Dr. Lassiter,” one of the nurses shouted. She hurried toward Jamie. “Jamie,” she called, reaching him before either of the orderlies. “Stop that. Do you hear me?” She caught his head, anchoring it against her hip, stroking his rumpled hair. “It’s all right, baby. Nobody’s gonna hurt you.” She glared as Beecher put out a hand to take her patient’s arm. “I’ll handle this, Mr. Beecher.”

Bruce Lassiter glanced at the people standing around Rebecca and her doll’s new cradle. He frowned, but his entire concentration was directed at the young man whose arms were clutched tightly around Marjorie Petersen, the night nurse who had waited around that morning so she could attend Angelina’s birthday party.

“Make them go away, Marge,” Jamie cried. His face was buried in the soft polyester of the nurse’s uniform.

Lassiter pulled a chair out of his way, hunched beside Jamie and put a hand on the young man’s shoulder. “They’re gone, Jamie. The bad people are gone.”

Edna Mae felt her heart breaking as she watched the doctor and nurse help the young man to his feet. She saw another nurse coming toward them with a hypodermic needle. As the young man was being led away, his eyes moved to Edna Mae’s and she could feel his hurt.

“Poor Jamie,” Rebecca whispered, clutching her doll tightly to her chest. “Poor, poor Jamie.”

Kyle looked away. The sight of the man being led like a bewildered child bothered him more than he would have thought possible.

Rebecca sighed. “Jamie’s going away for awhile, Angelina. Poor, poor Jamie.”

“Are you going
to tell him?” Marjorie Petersen asked Lassiter after they returned to his office.

Bruce Lassiter opened his desk drawer and drew out a bottle of whiskey. Pouring himself a liberal amount, he drained the amber liquid before he shook his head.

“He doesn’t need anymore heaped on him right now.” He poured another shot of the scotch and held up the bottle in question.

Marjorie declined. “I’d never fall asleep if I drank that.”

Lassiter sat at his desk, his face creased with the weight of his knowledge. “I hope they find the bastards who murdered Kristen Tremayne!”

Marjorie had heard it all, having been informed by the doctor when he had arrived that morning. The cause of death was, as yet, unknown because most of the woman’s body had been savaged brutally by the denizens of the bayou.

“When will you tell him?” she asked, rubbing her grainy eyes. Sleep would be a long time in coming, she thought.

“His brother will be visiting at the end of the month.” Lassiter grimaced. “That’s
all
I need. Every time one of them comes, it takes us a week to calm James down.”

“Maybe you should let Mr. Tremayne tell him then.”

“The hell I will,” the doctor snarled. “I can just about imagine the glee on that bastard’s face as he tells James.” He shook his head. “No, I’ll tell him. When I think he can handle it, I’ll tell him.”

“Potholes,” Jamie
whispered as he lay in his bed, groggy with the thorazine that had claimed him. “Potholes.”

“Think, Jamie,” a voice he seemed to recognize told him. “Imagine where those potholes are.”

Jamie forced open his drooping eyelids and stared at the dark-haired, brown-eyed man looking down at him. He whimpered.

“Go away, Gabe,” he said.

“Think about the potholes, Jamie,” his visitor insisted. “Think about what causes potholes in the road.”

“No.” Jamie squeezed his eyes shut. “You go away!”

“Ah, come on, Jamie. Just try to remember about the potholes.”

He turned his face into the pillow, pulled its softness over his ears to shut out the invisible man’s words. The drug was racing through his system, calming him, making him sleepy, waiting to trip him up. He concentrated on the numbness, the hollow sound in his ears, the rushing noise, and tried to ignore his visitor’s soft voice.

“Potholes, Jamie. What causes potholes?”

As he drifted into sleep, the question remained, echoing through his brain. He mumbled the words and let them sink down into oblivion with him, a welcome partner in the darkness.

“Paddy?”

Patrick Tremayne ground his teeth. “Yes, Bridey?”

“The authorities in Louisiana are releasing Kristen’s body to the mortuary in Baton Rouge today. Papa will have one of his jets there to bring the body home. The Mass will be said this Friday at two o’clock with cremation to follow.”

His hand tightened on the phone. “Is that what Kristen specified she wanted?”

There was a long moment of silence. “It’s what Papa thinks best under the circumstances, Patrick.” His sister’s voice was cold, as frigid as the snows on Mount Everest. Her next words chilled him to the marrow. “There was very little left of her to be buried.”

“I’ll be there,” he answered and hung up the phone, feeling as though he desperately needed a bath.

Jamie stared at
Bruce Lassiter.
Kristen? Dead? Who the hell was Kristen?
What did she mean to him? He looked away.

“Are you all right, Jamie?” Lassiter asked, his eyes squinted with concern.

Jamie nodded. He couldn’t remember ever knowing anyone named Kristen.
What did it matter if she had died?

“Your daughter will be taken care of. You don’t have to worry about her.”

Jamie looked back at Lassiter. He had a daughter?
No.
He would remember if he had. Or would he? If he couldn’t remember having a wife named Kristen, how could he expect to remember having a daughter? His dulled senses reacted with puzzlement and he shrugged. None of it seemed to matter.

“Are you sure you’re all right?”

Jamie got up and walked to the door. “May I leave now?”

“Have you spoken to James lately, Jamie?”

A strange, startled look shot over the young man’s face. “Just Gabe.” He put his hand on the knob. “May I go, please?”

“What did Gabe say to you?” Lassiter was more concerned than ever. The faraway, blank look in his patient’s eyes was eerie.

“He asked me what causes potholes.”

Lassiter’s brows shot up. “Potholes?” At Jamie’s slow nod, the doctor thought he understood. “You mean like holes as in someone’s memory?”

Jamie shrugged. “I guess.” He turned the knob. “May I go?”

“Yes.”

Lassiter sat back in his chair, made a temple with his fingers and stared at the closed door. “You’re getting worse, aren’t you, son?” he asked quietly. “Much, much worse.”

Kyle saw Jamie
Sinclair weaving aimlessly around the day room, stopping to look out the barred windows, running his hand along the chair rail above the wainscoting. There was such a strange look in the young man’s eyes, so empty of life, so devoid of energy and alertness, that it was painful to see. As Jamie sank to the floor, his back pressed against the wall, Kyle could see the lack of understanding emblazoned on his face. It was as though he existed on a different plane, in a different dimension from those around him. He appeared oblivious to the comings and goings of the other patients and the staff. He stared straight ahead, eyes dull, face slack, and simply stared.

“They told him about his wife,” Rebecca whispered as she brought Angelina over to Kyle’s table and began to change the doll’s diaper.

Kyle looked up at her. “He’s married?”

“He was.” Rebecca pulled the fresh diaper on her doll and began to fasten the tabs. “She died.”

“Recently?” He saw Rebecca nod.

She lowered her voice in a conspiratorial manner. “She was murdered.”

Kyle flinched. “And they told him?”

“Uh-huh.” Rebecca picked up her doll baby, hooked it over her shoulder, and began patting its back. “But Jamie doesn’t remember her.” She looked at the young man sitting on the floor. “I do. She was nice. She liked my baby.”

“She used to visit him?”

“Sometimes. Not often. No one comes to visit him much any more. Not since that mean woman gave him those awful shock treatments.”

As Kyle’s head jerked up and he looked at her, she nodded. “I used to get them, too. I know what they’re like.” She lowered her voice. “They make you forget things.” She shrugged. “Sometimes you remember...” She looked over at Jamie again. “Sometimes you don’t.”

Kyle looked back at Jamie. No wonder the man was so confused. What kind of emotional problems had brought him to The Chancel? What kind kept him there? For the hundredth time, Kyle Vittetoe felt immense sympathy and pity for the young man across the room.

“Why does he
stare at us like that?” Edna Mae asked Kyle. It had been a week since her last visit to her ‘son’ and Kyle was happy to see her.

“Who, Jamie?” He glanced at the man and saw Jamie look away. “He’s lonesome, but he won’t talk to me. He thinks I might jump him, I guess.”

“I feel so sorry for him,” Edna Mae said. “It just breaks my heart to see anyone that alone.”

“Rebecca told me he was married, but that his wife was found murdered.” Kyle shook his head at Edna Mae’s look of horror. “She’d been dead several days when they found her.” He glanced at Jamie. “He took it well. I don’t think he even remembers having a wife.”

“Poor thing,” Edna Mae said, tearing her eyes away from Jamie Sinclair. There were more important things than the poor man’s problems. She lowered her voice. “Have you been able to get outside? To have a look at that bungalow?”

Kyle shook his head. “They watch us like hawks. I was hoping maybe you could talk Lassiter into letting you take me out on the grounds. I don’t know of any other way.”

“I’ll see what I can do.” Her eyes strayed to Jamie Sinclair once more and found him watching her intently. A slow, hesitant smile formed on his face; hope lit his dark eyes. Edna Mae smiled at him, watched his smile widen before he shyly looked back at the cards with which he was playing.

Jamie slowly put the red two on the black three. The old lady’s smile had made him feel better. He sighed, smiling to himself. She hadn’t ignored him as most of the others always did.

“Heavy trucks will do it.”

Jamie looked up. His smiled slipped away.

The brown-eyed man was sitting on the edge of the table, his left leg swinging. He glanced toward the old woman, then looked back at Jamie. “Or defective asphalt.” He leaned closer to Jamie, who moved back away from the man. “Or sink holes under the asphalt.” He nodded. “All those things cause potholes, Jamie.”

Jamie’s hand shook as he laid down the small deck of cards. He fused his dark gaze with the man’s steady brown stare.

“Please go away, Gabe,” he whispered.

“Can’t do it, Jamie. Not until you remember about the potholes.” He folded his arms over his chest. “Can’t you think of some other causes for them?”

“No!”

Kyle glanced at Jamie, saw him staring—no, glaring—straight ahead as though he were looking at someone. He let out a long breath.

“Here we go again.”

Edna Mae tensed, expecting another episode like the week before, but it never came. Instead, she watched as the young man got up from the card table and walked rapidly to his room.

“What’s wrong with him?” she asked Kyle.

Kyle shrugged. “Manic depression they said.”

“It must be awful,” Edna Mae commented. She shook herself, spying Lassiter heading their way. She put on a haughty, demanding face and looked the doctor in the eye. “I’d like to walk outside with my son, Bruce. Do you have any objections to that?”

Jamie flung himself
down on his bed, his hands digging into the blanket. The word pothole kept echoing in his mind, driving him to a different kind of madness than that which he already knew had claimed him.

“Why don’t you leave me alone?” he shouted, turning over, curling himself into a fetal ball.

“No self-respecting Southern woman would birth no baby in the snow!”

There she was, Jamie thought with exasperation. The black woman who didn’t like snow. He got tired of her litany about snow. He ignored her.

“You need a scoop, Jamie. A scoop shovel will just push the snow right out of your way.”

Now it was the old lady, the wife of the man who came more often than the others. He ignored her, too, squeezing his eyes shut to keep from seeing her there at the foot of his bed.