I'm in a dark hallway. Dirty water trickles under my bare feet.
Blood drips from my arm.
I lean against a gray cinderblock wall, trying to catch my breath. Fluorescent tubes blink overhead.
Is this a dream? Or a nightmare?
I look right, then left, then right again, searching for the way out. Shivering. Where's my jacket? Wait—
I look down. I'm in a long hospital gown, my feet bare and cold. Where are my clothes?
I stagger forward, determined to get out of here. Somehow. Bare feet and all. Or at least wake up. I close my eyes. Wake up, wake up, wake up—
“No." A whispered voice. A cold hand on my shoulder. "Not yet."
I swing around. What the—
A tall man with a ragged beard raises a finger. “Quiet."
Behind him stand more people, in shadows. Men and women, young and old, standing outside the heavy doors that had once locked them in. A cold breeze chills my scalp and shoulders.
"Help me." An old man kneels on the floor. A long bloody bandage twists around his skull. "Please?"
A naked woman stares at me. "You have to help us."
I rub my eyes. “Uh—who are you?”
“I’m . . .” The bearded man hesitates, as if searching his memory. “Martin.”
Wait, what? “Martin Greer?”
“Yes. I think so.”
“But—” How do I say this? “You’re . . . you’re dead.”
“Yes.” He nods. “For a long time. Help us. Please."
* * *
Cari Sheppard opened her laptop, barely avoiding a coffee spill on the table between us. “Oops. Sorry.” She rearranged things, tapped some keys, then carefully swung her computer around. “Okay, here’s this.”
We sat in a coffeeshop. I don’t have an office, so I tend to meet clients at coffeeshops and diners and bars. Every once in a while someone says, “I thought all private detectives have offices and secretaries?” I explain that they’re expensive, and we go from there.
Cari Sheppard was in her thirties, blond with blue eyes, in a bright white blouse, sleeves curled up on her arms. “Okay. I did one of those DNA tests to find your relatives? I found a cousin I didn’t know I had, and we connected, and that’s all fine.” She moved a finger on the trackpad. “But then I found an uncle. Actually a, uh, a great-uncle? My grandmother’s brother, that I never knew about before.”
I leaned forward and ran my eyes across the screen. I’d seen these kind of reports before—some people were hoping to find lost money, others wanted to prove that someone had cheated, adopted children wanted to find their parents. It didn’t always turn out well.
“Right there.” Cari Sheppard pointed to a line. “Martin Greer. Born 1947. Clarke, Illinois. I found a birth certificate. But there’s no death certificate anywhere. I’m just—curious?”
“Sure. Is there anything in particular you’re hoping to find out?”
“Just where he’s buried. So I can take flowers.” She gulped her coffee. “I know it sounds stupid. We used to take flowers to my dad’s grave every Sunday. And my grandfather, too. My mom has a thing, you know?”
“Not stupid at all. Does your mother know anything about this uncle? Or your grandmother?”
“Mom? No. She's dead. Grandma?” She blushed. “I haven’t had the nerve to ask her.”
“You might want to do that. I mean, I’m happy to help you, but she might be able to give you better answers without, you know, having to pay me for any work.”
“Oh, I can pay you.” She yanked a checkbook from the back pocket of her designer jeans. “I’m sort of rich. Dad was an investment banker. I run his firm. What do you need to start?”
“All of the data you have there. Plus $200 as a retainer.” She might be rich, but I didn't want to milk her. I only have to pay my bills.
“So what’s the case?” Rachel turned in her chair as I walked into the office we share in our apartment.
Rachel’s my girlfriend. We live together. She’s got short red hair, hazelnut eyes, and sort of psychic powers. Plus, she’s hot. Especially in red gym shorts and a loose pink T-shirt, even on a chilly January day outside. Good thing we keep the heat pumped up.
“Looking for a dead uncle. Via DNA research.” I dropped my phone on my desk. “You?”
“Two landing pages, a conference agenda, and a whole website redesign. Fortunately, I’m getting paid big money if I can finish everything by the end of the week. Uh, what are you looking at?”
Her legs. “Nothing. I’ve got work to do.”
She smirked. “Me too, stud.”
So I got to work.
Martin Greer. Born March 3, 1947, Clarke County, Illinois. I found a few government records—started school at age six, but no indication that he’d ever graduated high school.
I found an Army record. He’d gone to Vietnam, then come home and dropped out of sight. I found a photo—a young man with thin cheeks in a uniform, looking embarrassed as a medal hunt on his chest.
Then I got one more hit.
COMMITTED TO LEWISTON INSTITUTION: Martin Greer, June 14, 1981.
What the hell? It came from a database of Illinois mental institutions, licensed by the state, but there wasn’t a lot of other information, aside from names and dates. Dates of incarceration, dates of release . . . for some of them. Not everyone. Not Martin Greer.
I searched deeper. Lewiston had been shut down in 1991, after complaints from family members and an investigation by the state. Abuse, malnutrition, lack of sanitary conditions—the place was a snake pit, and lots of lawsuits had been filed. Millions of dollars got paid out.
I found a list of payouts and scrolled down. No sign of anything close to the family of Martin Greer, or anyone named Sheppard. But there could be other names.
I called my client. “It looks like Martin Greer was committed to a mental institution in, uh, Beacon, Illinois in 1981. It’s near Joliet. There were lawsuits about the place. You might want to look into the list of payouts. See if you recognize any relatives who might have filed. I’ll send you the link.”
“I’ll look at it. Is there anything else? Why was he there?”
“I’m trying to find out. I’ve sent emails to the state regulatory bodies that cover places like this. And there’s a historical society. It apparently gives tours of the site, at least part of it. I’ll call them next.”
“All right. Thanks.”
The Lewiston Memorial Society had a website. It featured old pictures of the facility—three buildings, a hospital, an infirmary, and a sanatorium. The structures were crumbling, with loose bricks and broken windows. Those images came from the mid-1990s, after the place was closed. Photos before that showed tall, solid walls and bars across dark glass.
Named for a doctor named Walter John Lewiston, the place was built in 1921 as a poor house and farm, later converted into a hospital and asylum in the 1930s. At its height, it housed up to 200 patients and had a staff of 75 doctors, nurses, and clerical and maintenance workers.
Patients tended to be poor people who were locked up against their will because their behavior was "inappropriate"—women who were probably too promiscuous, men who were suspected of being homosexual. Some possible pedophiles. There wasn’t a lot of information about their treatment, although the website noted that doctors performed lobotomies, and many "patients" remained at Lewiston for the rest of their lives.
Over time the facilities were modernized. Then, in the late 1980s, some families started complaining about the treatment of their relatives, and the state investigated. Lewiston was shut down in 1991, but a lot of the records were still sealed. However, at least two doctors working there went to jail, and some fled the country before they could be tried.
I called the society’s number, got voice mail, and left a message. Then I sent an email. And then I spent an hour trying to track down any of the families that had been paid in the lawsuit. I left some messages, sent some more emails, then went on to other work.
Two hours later my phone buzzed. “Tom Jurgen speaking.”
“Mr. Jurgen?” The voice was young and female. “I’m Patty Jerelle, from the Lewiston Memorial Society? Returning your call.”
“Thanks for calling me back.” I’d explained the situation in my voice message. “Like I said, I’m looking for any information you have about Martin Greer? He’s apparently a long-lost uncle of my client who looked like he was there at your institution.”
“We have access to lots of records, but obviously—you understand—we have to know we’re dealing with a family member.”
“Of course. I’ll talk to her, and we can set something up.”
“Why don’t you come down for a tour? We hold them at 10:30 and 3 p.m. Then we can talk.”
“Sounds good. Thanks.”
We hung up. I turned to Rachel. “So, you want to take a tour of an insane asylum tomorrow?”
“Only if they don’t try to keep you there.” She rubbed her eyes and sipped some coffee. “What’s for dinner?” It was 3 p.m., and it was my day to cook.
“Leftover lasagna.” I hunted for Cari Sheppard’s number on my phone.
“That’s cheating. It’s only left over because I made it last night.”
“Then tomorrow I’ll make split pea soup in the slow cooker and we can have that for two nights.”
“Mmm . . .” Rachel licked her lips.
I called my client, and we arranged to meet up at Lewiston for the 3 p.m. tour tomorrow.
Rachel stood up and stretched. In her red shorts and loose T-shirt. “You ready to take a break?”
I looked her up and down, and quickly saved my work. “I think I could manage that.”
My phone buzzed in the middle of dinner. Unknown number. Rachel glared, but in my job you can’t ignore calls just because they come at inconvenient times. “Tom Jurgen speaking.”
“Mr. Jurgen? I’m Noah Trammel. You called me about the Lewiston place?”
“Yes, thanks for calling me back. Can we talk?”
“I’d like to talk to you, but not over the phone. Could we meet later tonight?”
“Of course.” We agreed on a bar midway between my apartment and his. Eight p.m. “Sorry.” I hung up. “Work.”
“Fine. I’ll just watch Poldark without you.” But she winked. “Good lasagna.”
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