“Who was your brother’s primary physician at the hospital?” Tony needed a name.
“Dr. Lance McLarty.” She shook her head. “He had a car accident right after I filed the lawsuit. Killed the bastard.”
McLarty. Tony hadn’t noticed the name in any of Blume’s notes. Interesting that, like Dr. Alexander, he died in an automobile accident. “The lawsuit was dismissed despite your brother’s statements?”
She nodded resignedly. “He had a heart attack right after I went to see a lawyer. So I didn’t have no evidence except my word and that was considered hearsay since the person who said it was dead.”
“Did any other doctors work with your brother?” Jo asked. “Do you know a Dr. Blume?”
Tony wished she hadn’t mentioned Blume’s name. They needed the facts, not supposition. If Blume had been involved with what this woman—a potential witness—knew, she would have said so. Leading her to what they wanted to hear was the wrong move.
The older woman perked up. “Do you mean Professor Blume from out at the college?”
Jo nodded as if she had realized her mistake.
“Oh yes, he was so kind. A friend of mine who works over at the college suggested I talk to him. He went over to talk to my brother about two months ago. He wanted to help. But my brother died pretty quick after that so I was too late. Professor Blume told me how sorry he was and that he’d see what he could find out anyway, but I never heard from him again.”
Tony’s hopes hit rock bottom again. Ruley certainly wanted to see Blume as the angel of mercy or hero of sorts, but was he the reason her brother had the heart attack? Didn’t help the investigation that the persons of interest kept dying on them.
Jo asked, “Were there any other patients that you’re aware of who had a similar experience at the hospital?”
“I talked to another woman, Geneva Corliss,” Ruley said. “She was a patient in the hospital for a while. She claimed they did stuff to her but she couldn’t remember much. She was seventy and never had any problems with her memory until her stay at that hospital. She was bedridden and dying of cancer. That’s why she got out. But she refused to talk to the lawyer about it. Then she died. As you can see I didn’t have no choice but to let it go.”
“You’ve been through a terrible ordeal,” Tony offered. “Did you ever speak with Professor Blume outside the hospital? In a private office perhaps?”
So far they hadn’t found one, past or present.
“No. He hadn’t seen patients for years, spent all his time helping the kids at the college. What he did for me was mostly a favor.”
“Did you know his wife?” Tony asked.
Orson Blume wasn’t the only Dr. Blume. Tony might be grasping at straws but he wasn’t about to overlook any aspect of this flimsy lead. It was the only one they had at this point.
Ruley shook her head. “Can’t say that I do. He wore a wedding ring so I presumed he had a wife but he never mentioned her and I never asked. I only met with him once but he spoke to Eli twice.”
Had Dr. Blume, the professor, walked blindly into a situation that sent he and his wife fleeing to Europe? Maybe their vacation had been about escaping the trouble he’d unknowingly stepped into. Or this could simply be another dead end.
“Mrs. Ruley,” Jo said, “were you aware of any other unusual treatments conducted in the area? Maybe in another of the buildings on the old asylum property?”
“I’m seventy-five years old,” Ruley said, “and I’ve known people who were patients out there back in the late sixties and early seventies. I even talked to a few who had kin who was sent to that place way before that. What I can tell you is that nothing good ever comes outta that place. The patients suffered unimaginable horrors. From little kids on up to old people, it was like a mad scientist was running the place, trying to create his own versions of monsters like in the old movies.”
“That’s all closed down now though,” Tony offered, trying to wrap his head around looking at the Blume situation from an entirely different angle. “There’s not much happening out there anymore.”
Ruley made a harrumphing sound. “So they say, but I hear rumors about all the secrets still buzzing around out there, like black flies after a rotting carcass. If I was you, I’d stay away from that place.”
“I heard those missing girls were being held there somewhere,” Jo suggested.
“I wouldn’t doubt it a bit.” Ruley bobbed her chin. “This town, for all its Old South, genteel ways, has that awful place right in the middle of it. Like a cancer sprouting right up from the heart. I don’t think we’ll be free of that nightmare until they tear down the last building and leave the dead to rest in peace.”
Tony stood. “Thank you for your time, Ms. Ruley.”
Jo followed suit, thanking the lady again.
The elderly woman saw them to the door and wished them luck. Tony had a feeling they were going to need it. Worry that he wouldn’t be able to find his niece in time nagged at him.
“They did that to us.” Jo stared at him across the top of the car.
“They did what to you?” Tony braced for more news about what his niece might be enduring to haunt him.
“The movies—images of people murdering other people. It was crazy and intense and all around us like the very walls, even the floor and ceiling, were one big movie screen.” She shuddered. “It went on for days. But it was the screaming and moaning that was the worst. It was as if they wanted to desensitize us to the images and sounds.”
Tony absorbed the information and filed it with the rest for later dissection. “Thank you for telling me. Anything you remember could be useful. Any connection to what happened to you could be relevant.”
She nodded. “There’s so much I buried. I hadn’t thought of that until today.”
As they loaded into the BMW, she asked, “What now?”
“I think it’s time to go to Phelps and give him our theories and see if he’s willing to follow up on what Blume was looking into and how the hospital ties into it. At this point, we might get more done working with the locals rather than around them.”
Tony had thought he could come in here, work his magic and all would turn out the way he wanted, but that wasn’t happening. The unsub—presumably Blume or someone he knew—hadn’t made a new move since Tiffany and Vickie went missing. He was lying low and biding his time. What did that mean for the victims—like his niece? Had they simply been left to die? Fear coiled like a hissing snake in his gut. Tiffany and Vickie could be tucked away somewhere with no water or food while this sick son of a bitch waited for the heat to pass.
Tony had to find him.
There appeared to be three certainties in all this—the college, the clinic and the tie to the old asylum. The victims were plucked from the college. Jo had admitted that it was possible they were held on the old Central State asylum property. Blume was a logical connection. His work at the college and then his investigation of patient treatment issues at the hospital on the Central State property. It had to be him.
He’d had the file on both patients Mrs. Ruley mentioned in his desk, her brother and the Corliss woman. Had Professor Blume accidentally stumbled across the person behind the abductions who also abused patients at the hospital?
How the hell would they lure the bastard out of hiding?
It was damned hard to find a monster whose tracks ended at the edge of the forest.
40
Day Nine
Eighteen years ago...
It’s dark again.
I awoke on fire. My skin burns as if I’ve been scorched by flames.
The slashes where the leather whip bit into my flesh. My legs and arms feel so weak and limp. My body aches.
The only good news is that today there is water.
I’m grateful for the darkness. My eyes are still stinging from the movie images.