Secret of the Shadows (9 page)

In the early years of the First World War, a young nurse, Mary Duff, worked with wounded soldiers in Italy. She was popular with soldiers and staff alike, always willing to work extra hours, a nurse who would never leave the side of a dying soldier. Then it began to be noticed that the soldiers she remained with usually did die, even when they were expected to survive. She was always on hand when there was an emergency and it seemed there were more emergencies on her shift than anyone else’s.

But soldiers die all the time in the theatre of war so no great notice was taken of it until one young soldier who was brought in refused to be treated by her. The Angel of Death, he called her. No one listened to him. He was considered delirious. That night, on her shift, the young soldier suffered a massive trauma and died. Though nothing could be proved against her, Nurse Mary Duff was sent home. And seemed to disappear . . . or did she?

1925. A veteran’s hospital in Florida, and another spate of unexplained deaths, and always when Sister Catherine Macey was on the ward. But Catherine Macey was a saint, everyone said so. A nurse who spent long hours on the ward tending her patients. But was she in fact, Mary Duff? The ages certainly match. Catherine Macey was almost thirty, the same age Mary Duff would have been. It took another two years, and many unexplained deaths in the hospital before Catherine Macey was forced to resign.

She seemed to disappear too. But did she resurface in a Cincinatti hospital in 1933? The caring Dorothy Blake. Another saint. But once again, patients started dying who had been expected to live. Then, just as investigations about her began, Dorothy Blake resigned and moved on.

Did she move to New York? In 1944 there were more unexplained deaths on the watch of Sister Margaret Campbell, and was this Margaret Campbell also Mary Cameron, who worked at an old people’s home in England in the 1950s?

There is no concrete evidence. The only photograph of any of these women that exists is a blurred photograph of Dorothy Blake taken at a party at the hospital where she worked.

Where did these women go? Or are they all the same woman? And what happened to her after Mary Cameron disappeared? Did she die? Or did she continue her catalogue of killing under yet another identity?

I looked back at the photograph in my hand. Sister Kelly trying to turn her face from the camera, reluctant to have her photo taken at all. Could anyone be this evil? And just how many deaths had all these women been responsible for? In each case, this nurse was at first considered a heroine, a saint, just like Sister Kelly, when in fact she had been something else . . . something evil.

I had to find out more.

I went into the living room and powered up my laptop. I keyed in each of the names in turn, from Mary Duff to Mary Cameron, and read all the information there was about each of them. The same facts emerged time after time.

And then, just when I thought I had exhausted everything, I came across the photograph mentioned in Gran’s book. The one of Dorothy Blake taken at a party. You could hardly make her out, her face was so blurred. She was standing at the back, her hand once again reaching up to cover her face, but the camera had been too quick for her. I stared at the screen, looking from the photograph there, to the other, taken outside this house, trying to see a resemblance.

I clicked to enlarge the image. And as I peered closer I thought, surely this had to be the same person? Same dark hair, same features, same face. It had to be her.

I maximised the image even further, so that the screen was filled with that face. ‘Yes,’ I said aloud. ‘You
are
Sister Kelly.’

And as I spoke her name I heard a roar, a sound that seemed to come from the depths of darkness.

And I screamed in terror.

Chapter 23

Next thing I knew Aunt Belle was hurrying into the living room. ‘I heard you scream. What on earth happened?’

I so wanted to tell her. To share my fear with someone. But not her, not now. I had to think fast.

‘I . . . I got an electric shock off the computer.’ My voice trembled.

She was all concern. ‘Switch that thing off. Unplug it.’ She was looking around for the cable.

‘I’ll do it, Aunt Belle.’ I was happy to do it. I snapped the laptop shut and took it into my room. I didn’t even step over the threshold, just stood at the door and threw it on the bed. Then I slammed the door closed and went back into the living room. Aunt Belle was sitting in one of the armchairs. ‘Now I’m up, I might as well stay up for a while.’

I was so glad she said that, because I couldn’t stop shaking, and I needed her here with me, awake.

She rubbed at her backside. ‘I’m getting bedsores with all this lying about. Have to get myself better. I’m never ill. Don’t like being ill.’ She said it as if she was angry at herself. As if her body was doing this deliberately to annoy her. I would have suggested the doctor again, but I saw that she was afraid. Afraid that something really was wrong with her.

I made her tea and toasted pancakes and we sat looking out at the view down the river. My hand trembled as I lifted the cup to my lips. I was scared.

‘Your gran and I used to joke that we would sit out here in our wheelchairs when the time came.’

‘I’m sorry it didn’t work out like that, Aunt Belle.’

She waved that away. ‘That’s life, Tyler. You just have to accept it. When it’s someone’s time to die, it’s their time.’

‘Do you think that’s true? I mean, that people have their time to die? Or do you think it might be possible to go back into the past and stop someone dying?’

She smiled. ‘That’s why you were on the laptop, wasn’t it? You’re working on a story?’

I smiled back and nodded, glad of the excuse to talk to her about it. ‘I’m thinking of a story about someone who can change the past. Go back in time and prevent someone’s death. Do you think that’s believable?’

‘Well, Einstein said all time was happening simultaneously. And he was a genius. So, if that’s true, then, yes, why can’t you move in and out of other times. I like the idea of that story, Tyler. But I think you’d have to be careful. You should only save the people who are unlawfully dead.’

‘Unlawfully dead?’ I said.

‘I think with some people it is their time to die, you know, if they die of natural causes. I don’t think you should change that. But with the unlawfully dead – people who should not have died, because it wasn’t their time, it was an accident, or murder, maybe even suicide – yes, I think you could change that. It would make a great story.’

The unlawfully dead. I liked the idea of that too.

Was Eleanor one of the unlawfully dead? Could I save her, so she could go on and expose Sister Kelly as the ‘missing murderess’? I was sure that was what my gran wanted me to do. To make sure Sister Kelly’s evil was exposed. Gran hadn’t had time to find out the whole truth. But now I had the time and the opportunity. And a sudden realisation hit me. It wasn’t Eleanor who had been keeping me here at all. It was Gran.

I had found out what my gran had already discovered. That Sister Kelly and Dorothy Blake and all of the others were one and the same. She had disappeared to this small town on the wild west coast of Scotland, but she hadn’t stopped killing. The frail old Eleanor had been her next victim. Sister Kelly had still wanted to be seen as some kind of a saint. Looking after the old lady as if she was her own mother, yet, in reality, keeping her prisoner. A hero complex, they called it. She thrived on the excitement of seeming like a heroine, but she was no heroine, she was a villain.

And no one had ever guessed.

But now I knew.

Aunt Belle was shaking my arm. ‘You were off in a dream there, Tyler. You know, if I did that they would say it was my age.’

She was ready to lie down again. I could see the weariness in her. I so wanted her to go back to being my lovely, funny, Aunt Belle. If only I could get her out of here. But she was afraid that if the doctor was called she would end up in hospital, and to tell the truth so was I.

Because where would I go if she went into hospital? I could not stay here on my own.

‘I’ll be on my feet tomorrow, you wait and see,’ she said.

The house won’t let you, I felt like saying. Sister Kelly won’t allow it. I would have to do something to help her. And do it soon. I had to expose Sister Kelly, save Eleanor.

But what proof did I really have? An old photograph with a passing resemblance to a murderess.
I need more evidence, Gran
, I thought.
There has to be more
.

‘You’re off in a dream again, Tyler,’ Aunt Belle said, as I helped her back into her room. You need a good night’s sleep. So you have to promise me that you won’t sleep in here tonight. Get into your own comfortable bed. If I need you, you’re only a shout away.’ Already her eyes were closing. ‘Promise me, Tyler.’

But I could never sleep in that room, not with that shadow coming ever closer. I went back into the living room and watched the sun set. I’d never felt so alone. Not knowing what to do, or how to do it, if I did. And I was too tired to think about it. Aunt Belle was right. I needed a good night’s sleep. But not in that room.

In the living room there was a big squashy sofa. I could sleep in here. No coldness in here. No shadows. And the sunset filled it with golden light. I took a soft velour throw from the chair in my aunt’s room and checked on her once again. Then I went back into the living room, switched on the television and settled myself on the sofa.

I’d be able to sleep here. I shivered at the memory of that voice, that terrifying roar, but I pushed it to the back of my mind. A voice could not hurt me. I refused to be afraid. I was safe here, with the light on. With the television on. No evil in this room. Nothing could reach me here.

But I was wrong.

Chapter 24

I dreamed. I was floating through the house, in the darkness, leaving the front room, winding my way along the hall and into Aunt Belle’s room. I hovered over her as she lay sleeping, watching her draw laboured breaths before I moved away and floated once again into the hall. I came to the closed door of my own room, and I watched it slowly open, and though I knew I didn’t want to – even in my dream I tried to pull myself away – I couldn’t stop myself from moving forward. It was as if some unseen force was sucking me in. The room was in darkness. I could just make out the bed, the table beside it, the lamp. I tried to keep my eyes from that chair in the corner. But no matter how I tried, and oh, how I tried, my eyes were drawn there.

Don’t look, Tyler. Shut your eyes
, I prayed. But my eyes remained wide open. And fixed on that chair.

At first it seemed empty. I felt relief, but it only lasted for a moment. How long is a moment in a dream? Less than a heartbeat. Longer than a lifetime. And then something moved, something dark and shapeless. It seemed to rise from the chair. I shrank back. There was no form to it. No face. Yet I could feel its eyes on me. Eyes that petrified me. I wanted to get out of that room. But I couldn’t move and the shape was rising from the chair, rising to my level, floating towards me, and I knew if I once saw its face, I would be finished. I began to shake. I tried to scream, but no sound came and the dark shadow was coming closer, closer, reaching out to me.

No!

I woke up, still shaking, but so relieved it was only a dream. I sat up. The room was lit by the flashing static of the television screen. I took a deep breath and tried to blot out that image, that shadow. Tried to wipe my memory clean of that nightmare.

I changed the channel. There had to be something on, something that would take my mind away from it. Anything would do. I finally found one of those American talk shows. Two young woman arguing about something, carefully orchestrated and meant to entertain. I started to watch it, but without wanting to, without meaning to, I fell asleep again.

Something was tugging at my cover. I pulled it back and turned on the sofa, tucking the throw round my chin. My feet were cold. Cold, as if fingers of ice were gripping my ankles.

My eyes opened. Another dream. Another nightmare.

Had to be.

Let it be.

But I was awake now. The room was in darkness. No television, no light, yet I hadn’t switched either of them off. I lay still, too afraid to move. Something was there. Something moving. I was paralysed with fear.

I wanted it to be another dream. I would leap awake in a second. But no, this was real. I
was
awake, and something was next to the sofa. I could feel the icy cold of it near me. I couldn’t breathe.

She was here. She’d found me. Nowhere was safe from her. Not for me.

I had to move. Had to get away. Yet, still I couldn’t breathe.

My body was freezing into solid ice. Any closer and I’d be trapped.

I squeezed my eyes tight shut and leapt from the sofa, rolled across the floor. Didn’t stop till I hit the wall on the other side of the room.

My shaking hand reached for the lamp and light flooded the room.

There was nothing there. The cover lay on the floor. The door of the front room was closed.