Behind The Veil: A Gina Harwood Novel

  Behind the Veil

  A Gina Harwood Novel

  By Indi Martin

  National Museum of Medicine – Washington, DC, USA

  The Dr. Halsey Collection

  Journal Entry #413 – Dr. Alfred Halsey: November 5th, 1846

  I grow further concerned over the increasing number of patients exhibiting symptoms of what I am calling the “River Plague.” Today alone marked seven more, with no obvious correlation between the affected, other than their proximity to the black water. Today's additions bring the total infected to nearly thirty in under a week, with no respite visible. None of my usual methods have had any impact whatsoever. I have written a letter to the esteemed Dr. Samuel Carmichael in Baltimore, in hopes that he will have a recommended course of action; I have also decided to keep more extensive records on this outbreak in case it is not limited to this town, and begins to spread beyond the river.

  Lyssa has taken our children to Baltimore, not only to deliver the letter but also to remove them from the plagued area. I took this precaution only this morning, after finding two lesions on my lower thigh. I will not pretend this does not frighten me, and I pray that their evacuation was timely. Still, I do not believe I have lost any of my mental faculties yet, as most of the afflicted do. I may have only days before I do.

  As I mentioned in my prior entry, symptoms at first appeared to be large splotchy patches across the body, which develop further into open lesions exuding a terrible odor. I cannot seem to halt the spread of these lesions. I have tried cupping, pressing several different kinds of my glass collection heated to various temperatures and applied until the cup fills with blood. This has been successful in the past to bleed toxins out of the body, but no amount of this experimentation has appeared to have an impact on these lesions. A day or two after the lesions worsen, the patients begin to respond to invisible stimuli, speaking in devilish tongues. The first patients do not seem to remember their own family now. I have administered snake root, quinine, castor oil, and laudanum, to no discernible results. One patient, a small girl named “Cassey,” at first seemed to respond under the laudanum, calling out for her mother when she entered the girl's room. However, she screamed terribly and began to scratch and claw the woman when she approached the bed, so I cannot be sure the girl actually recognized the woman at all.

  I recall my father mentioning a similar sort of plague during his term as the physician of Snow Hill; however the years have quieted my memory and I cannot find any recollections about that outbreak among his sparse writings. I do seem to remember that he stated he was able to fully handle the sickness, curing the town with only scars remaining. I firmly believe he never shared the mechanism by which he did so, and damn my eyes! I never asked. Why did I not ask? The question haunts me. I can only hope that I am as deft a physician as my father was, or I fear this town may be lost without outside assistance. I wish for a speedy return letter from Dr. Carmichael.

  (Curator's note: This is the final journal entry by Dr. Halsey. The journal was found in 1921 at the Halsey residence outside of Snow Hill, MD. The residence had lain dormant and unused for years, and was almost entirely destroyed by fire in 1892. This remarkable journal was discovered in the wine cellar, along with several equally remarkable casks of wine. Please see the Carmichael collection for the letter mentioned in this entry by Dr. Halsey.)

  Prologue

  He stared into the mirror, trying not to notice the dark circles under his eyes, the scar tissue that still ravaged the creases of his face. His nose that wasn't his own. There had been a time when his smile was ever-present, when unwarranted laughter lit up his face at the slightest provocation. He had a hard time remembering what it felt like.

  'Another year,' he thought grimly to himself. 'Time to move on.' He gathered the few personal items he needed from the bathroom – a few rubber bands for his long hair (and occasionally for his long beard), his comb, his half-empty bottle of shampoo. An unopened box of soap, since the old bar was down to a sliver of white against the grimy tiles. These he tossed into a plastic sack with practiced hands, walking out of the bathroom without another look at the mirror. He didn't like looking at himself. Forcing himself to do so was a private torture; he suspected that was why he hadn't shaved in so long. He didn't really like the beard, but he liked the upkeep of a clean-shaven face even less. All the while, he tried to rationalize one more month. One more week, even. It didn't have to be a year to the day. These were his own rules, pressing upon him voluntarily, a time-weight he alone felt. He could stretch them if he wanted to... right? Still, the seconds lay upon his chest like stones.

  Sitting heavily on the bed, the springs creaking beneath him, he scanned the items one more time to make sure he hadn't forgotten anything. Two pairs of his favorite jeans, one pair of brown corduroys. Four shirts. Boxers. Socks. Some flip-flops. He was wearing his sneakers and another outfit he wished to keep. His journal. All present and accounted for. The rest would collect dust in the closets, collect questions from his landlady once she was no longer collecting his rent. He wouldn't be around to give her answers, even if he could.

  Scowling, he started stuffing the items into his backpack, with no real order. Another year. He'd liked this place, this city. He had friends. And Liz. He closed his eyes, seeing her face. Last night, he'd stayed awake and watched her sleep, wanting to preserve her beautiful face, her comfortable and warm body, in his memory. He sighed heavily, his face drawing further down into his now-customary frown. He had wanted to wake her, to ask what she saw in him. Why she could see through the scars when so few others could. He had wanted to ask her to come, to explain everything that had happened to him, why he had to leave – keep leaving. Never stay too long. Not overstay his welcome. His anonymity.

  Of course, he couldn't. He tried every now and then, but that blonde bitch had been right. It simply wasn't possible. He tried with Liz, too, but she had just laughed at him. They all laughed. And when he listened to what he was actually saying, it sounded laughable, indeed.

  The man scowled. It wasn't funny at all. If they only knew what he was really trying to say, they wouldn't chuckle. They would scream. Which was why he had to leave before it happened again. Before it found him, punishing him for the potentialities that would keep it imprisoned forever. Or so he hoped.

  Without looking back, he zipped up the pack and closed his eyes for a moment – almost praying, but having long forgotten the words – and walked out of his apartment, never to return.

  Five Years Ago

  1

  “You smell like a corporate asshat,” his friend said slowly, his tongue sounding too thick to properly pronounce the words.

  Jake coughed and batted at the thick smoke as he walked inside the hovel that passed for Marcus' apartment. “And you smell like a ganja factory, jesus, Marcus.”

  Marcus barked a laugh. “Factory? I don't think there're any weed factories, man.” He paused to think. “I mean, maybe...”

  Jake looked at his friend as his head lolled back to the horrible decades-old, orange sofa, apparently pondering the business logistics of such a factory. Marcus (no one called him Mark, unless they wanted a swift kick in the ass) was a great friend, his brother almost, although when he got this high he was only half-Marcus. The other half evaporated in the acrid sizzle of the grass.

  Luckily, the part that could make a bass guitar throb with emotion seemed to be unaffected by the drug. “Come on,” announced Jake, grabbing Marcus by one of his huge paws and pulling. “Late for practice. Again,” he added pointedly.

  “Dude, it's a cover band,” whined Marcus, who nonetheless allowed his lanky frame to be pulled off the sofa. “Nobody ca
res if we're late.”

  “Right,” snapped Jake, throwing the arm over his shoulder and lurching toward the door, his friend in tow. “Matt will be cool. He's always cool about things like being late.”

  Marcus guffawed. “Okay, okay.” He snatched his hand away from Jake in one clean movement, and took his weight upon himself. Matt was never cool about anything regarding the band, least of all being late. Marcus had once tried explaining that it was “just” a cover band, which had almost immediately sent Matt off into a rage. It was almost comical, watching the short-statured, charismatic-but-cowardly Matt rant and storm around the tall, nonchalant Marcus who stood silently, curiously eying the lead singer. Almost comical, until Matt decided to fire Marcus and find a new bass player. Marcus didn't really seem to care, but Jake knew he needed the scant money they made from the gigs; Jake tried for a week to talk Matt into taking him back. He finally did, but Jake suspected it had less to do with his pleading, and more to do with Matt's inability to find another good bass guitarist before their next show.

  Really, Jake agreed with Marcus. Much as he loved being on stage, performing, closing his eyes and hearing the cool notes of his guitar over the occasional outbursts from the crowd, he disliked playing covers. Still, in Tulsa, it was one of the only ways for a band to make money. The other option was for the band to move somewhere else. Local original music just got no love at home.

  Jake packed his friend into the passenger side of the beat-up Camry. Marcus accordion-folded into the seat, his knees knocking against the glove compartment. “Man, it is bright, and I'm seriously starving,” complained the human origami.

  Jake sighed, but had to grin at the clockwork conversation. “Sunglasses on the dash, Cheetos in the backseat,” he announced as he slid himself into the driver's seat and twisted the key in the ignition. Clicking on his seat belt, he felt a tug at his neck, and realized he still had his name badge lanyard on. Irritated, he pulled it off and threw it in the backseat, next to a warm six-pack of Heineken. Like most other twenty-somethings in Tulsa, Jake worked at one of the dozens of call centers in the area, this one a telemarketing service. He was pretty good at it, but he hated it. Still, there was a script, an auto-dialer, free coffee in the break-room, and it paid enough for him not to have to worry about this month's bills. It was good enough.

  At twenty-five, Jake supposed he should have more to show for his time on the planet, but it didn't drive him into a depression like some of his coworkers. It didn't really resonate at all within him, emotionally; the supposition was just a passing fact. He should have gotten married and bought a house, maybe even had a kid or two by now, like his always-more-responsible older sister. He was mildly aware of time, staring down at him like a stern, disapproving father, but overall, Jake O'Malley felt content with his life. He had a mind-numbingly easy job, a band (even if it was “just covers”), a sweet computer, every video game system ever made, and a big TV. And a few buddies. And beer. And the occasional girlfriend. Life was good, as far as he was concerned.

  “Seen your mom lately?” asked Marcus, squinting out the window through his sunglasses.

  Jake blinked. He'd been driving on auto-pilot, and had to glance around to consciously figure out where he was. Only a mile to the rehearsal space, a storage unit outside the main city. Far enough from everyone to be able to be as loud (and bad) as a band could be – which is why instead of disused furniture and boxes, every other unit housed wailing teenagers revamping this week's hits or setting their own emo eyeliner-poetry to synth-keyboards and power chords. “No, why?” asked Jake, although he already knew. Marcus had had a crush on Jake's mom since he was a boy.

  “Just seeing if she's still happy with Peter, cuz if she's not...” Marcus turned and grinned at him. Jake rolled his eyes exaggeratedly.

  “Still happy, no deal.”

  Marcus chomped away happily on a Cheeto and turned back to the window. “S'okay, man. One of these days.”

  ⇼ ⇼ ⇼ ⇼ ⇼

  Detective Gina Harwood never used “he” or “she” for bodies; they were always “it.” The semantics helped somehow; it was one of several tricks she'd adopted over the years to try to remain impassive, clinical. Otherwise, she wasn't sure she could have handled these scenes, over and over, all these years. “After a while, you get used to it,” one of her criminology professors told her once. She thought that guy was full of shit. Every time she visited a new scene, her nostrils flared as the metallic odor hit them full-force, and she had to force her tongue back to stop herself from gagging. The stench of death was always the same, underneath any unusual odors that differentiated the corpses or their surroundings, and she couldn't understand how anyone could get used to that smell. Still, Gina noticed the cold, quick way some of her colleagues moved through crime scenes, and wondered if she were defective somehow; it didn't seem to affect them nearly as much. Of course, even in her discomfort, she noticed things others didn't. Smells. Details. Patterns. Traces.

  Gina turned her attention to the crime scene and ignored Snyder's impatient glare from the other doorway. The detective said something to her, but she wasn't listening, and made a little half-wave in his direction. She could feel his glare intensify and smiled inwardly.

  The kitchen had been taped off and plastic hung, but otherwise it was untouched. She slipped on her boot covers and gloves and crept in, pausing once she crossed the threshold from the sparkling living room. The blue and white tiles were coated with blood, looking gruesomely patriotic. There were no blood sprays on any other surfaces that she could see, not even traces visible. Gina's brow furrowed. There was only a generally symmetrical pool of blood under the body. No evidence the body had been killed elsewhere and then moved; there was too much fluid here for that. The only other part of the kitchen that had any blood on it, at first glance, was the stainless steel refrigerator; it bore a single, red hand-print, about the same size as the body's. It was a middle-aged woman with tawny brown-colored hair, flecks of coarse gray at the temples, barely visible under the red mask. The face was twisted away from Gina's doorway; the body was huddled in the center of the kitchen, nearest the refrigerator. From Gina's perspective, the body could have just been napping, were it not for the crimson ichor in which it lay. The exposed skin still had some color, indicating the body was fairly fresh. Gina stepped carefully into the room and inched her way around the outskirts of it, avoiding the puddle.

  Involuntarily (and immediately hating herself for it), she gasped. She heard a snicker from Snyder's direction.

  The woman's face was a muddle of gore. The ear Gina should have been able to see was gone, leaving a gaping hole; the jaw was dislocated and stretched so wide that the skin and muscle had been partially torn from the skull and hung in ragged strips. She wondered what sort of person would have the strength to do that to someone, or if some sort of tool or machine would have to be used. Small, circular puncture marks covered the face like leprous freckles. The shocking green eyes were wide and staring, the dull sheen of the dead. The woman's clothing had been ripped open down the front of the body, but only a part of the chest was visible; it was huddled with its knees underneath and its hind in the air.

  Gina glanced around the rest of the kitchen and strode back to where Detective Snyder was standing, waiting for the photographers to finish their cataloging. He grinned evilly at her and gasped. She ignored him and took her coffee out of his hand. “Any ideas, then?” he asked, still smiling.

  “I think she's dead,” she said as she sipped her coffee and grimaced. No sugar, no milk. Too bitter. Surely intentional, she figured, glancing at his face and scowling. Petty.

  “You mean, you think 'it's' dead,” he teased.

  Harwood and Snyder had been partners for about six months. She pretty much hated him. He certainly seemed to hate her. Unfortunately, they worked extremely well together, and so their superiors were loathe to split up the decorated team. She peered impassively into his handsome face; Gina hated that he wasn't ugly. Anyo
ne so ugly on the inside should have the common decency to advertise the fact. Instead, he had soft blue eyes that glinted like steel when they looked at her, turning cold and hard in an instant; beautiful gold hair, and a tanned, boyish face. He even had a lovely name: Morgan. She always loved the name Morgan. And here, he had to go and ruin it. She only ever called him Snyder. “I think 'she's' dead,” Gina repeated, accentuating the pronoun. Snyder gave her terrible trouble about her sensitivities.

  “Have it your way,” he shrugged, his eyes sliding back to the scene, pupils dilating after each photo flash.

  The photographers nodded at the detectives and excused themselves back outside to let the detectives have their few first minutes alone with the body. Snyder looked sidelong at Gina and swept his arm forward in a “ladies first” motion. She placed her coffee cup back in his hand and walked back toward the body. “Help me turn it over,” she asked, ignoring the glee on his face when she slipped back into 'it-speak,' as he called it.

  Snyder set the cups down and walked over to her, leaning as far over as possible in an attempt to not disturb the pool. Together, they pushed the body over as gently as they could. It landed with a small splash. Gina gasped again, and this time Snyder didn't even appear to notice.

  The body's shirt had indeed been slashed open on the front, but the bra was still mostly intact. Dozens of puncture and scratch marks criss-crossed the slightly pinkish flesh. But the feature both detectives' eyes had been immediately drawn to was further down the body's torso; a crude carving in the lower abdomen consisting of one word:

  MINE

  2

  The first time the cell phone rang, Wheeze was in the middle of “Smoke on the Water,” something they'd thrown in to the set to please the older crowds that sometimes showed up to the bars. Marcus wasn't sure why it was in the list, since that crowd didn't show up to listen to them, but to drown their middle-aged sorrows in a bucket of booze. The second time, Jake was just about to wrap up his guitar solo in “Paint it Black,” one that appealed to the same crowd but that the band liked as well. The final time it rang, Marcus had just played them out of an original tune, “Courtyard,” one of only three in the set. Too many originals and the bar owners didn't pay as well. It sucked, but those were the rules.