That Which Should Not Be (14 page)

Chapter

21

I was immediately surprised by what I saw.  The entranceway was larger and brighter than I had expected, with a great vaulted ceiling rising up above me.  A man in a suit stood a few feet away, speaking cheerfully to a woman who was clearly a nurse.  I stood in the doorway for a moment until he sensed me.  He looked up from the woman, studied me for a second, and smiled. 

“Dr. Hamilton, I presume,” he said, striding over, thrusting out his hand to grasp mine. 

“Yes, sir,” I replied, “though please, call me William.”

“William it is then,” he said, never releasing my hand.  “I am Dr. Harker.  Follow me.”

Dr. Harker moved quickly — this was a man who walked with a purpose — toward the grand staircase sitting at the end of the equally grand entranceway.  I followed, surveying as I went.  It was a beautiful room, richly apportioned as if one were entering the finest hotel.  A concession to visitors, no doubt. 

The hospital itself lay farther on behind a heavy door at the far end of the entranceway.  That steel curtain made me doubt anything beyond would resemble this room.  We walked up the stairs to a series of offices on the second floor.  Dr. Harker produced a key from his pocket and opened one, gesturing inside. 

I had a seat behind the doctor’s desk.  I couldn’t help but notice the human skull sitting on the corner closest to me.  As he walked to his chair, the doctor noticed my gaze.

“I see you are admiring one of my favorite trinkets,” he said, gesturing toward it as he sat down.  “Strange thing, skulls.  If it were a human head sitting on my desk, no doubt you would have
me
committed, correct?” he said with a smile.  “But it is a great tradition amongst learned men — doctors, lawyers, philosophers.  Going back to the Greeks and maybe beyond, if you believe some of the more esoteric tales about the Egyptians.”

“And why do you keep one, sir?” I asked.

“Oh, for the same reason they did,” he replied.  “To remind me, as it would remind them, of the transitory nature of life. It ebbs and flows, and, inevitably, it ends.  Each of us will come to this.  The only relevant question is whether we will end our days sealed in a coffin deep beneath the Earth or sitting on someone’s desk.”

“That’s a rather bleak outlook, isn’t it?” I said with a bit of nervous laughter. 

The doctor simply smiled.  He reached down and lifted an envelope off of his desk, opened it and removed the letter inside.  He picked up his glasses and said, “Dr. Seward has given you quite the recommendation.  I’ve known him for a very long time, and I can say without hesitation he is not one to give false praise.  You should be proud.”

“Well, sir,” I said, slightly embarrassed, “I’m certainly honored Dr. Seward thinks so highly of me.”

“Yes, yes,” he replied, now putting his glasses back on the table.  “And, in your academic pursuits, you show great promise.  But I feel it is my duty to warn you.  What you will see here, what you will hear, they cannot teach in books.  What you will experience in this place,” he continued, leaning back in his chair, “will test your commitment to this field. 

“More than once I have seen bright young students walk through those doors just like you have and leave broken men.  So I want you to always remember this: there may come a time when you know the clinical world is not for you.  Leave then, before it is too late.”

His words were stern, but I had expected them.  Still, I couldn’t help but feel a chill course through my body as he spoke.  This very fear had haunted my steps since Dr. Seward had told me of this opportunity. 

“I will do my best, sir.”

Dr. Harker smiled again, this time a hopeful smile, though tinged with a touch of doubt.  “Yes, my young friend.  That is all we can have you do, isn’t it?”

There was a quick knock on the door.  “Ah, yes,” Dr. Harker said before commanding, “Come in!”

The door opened and a man entered.  He was tall, lean and fit, probably five or so years older than I.  There was a haughtiness to him, but one not altogether disagreeable.  Pride can be one of man’s more distasteful attributes, but when you enter a situation in which you are unsure, as I was that day, it is comforting to have a confident companion. 

“David,” Dr. Harker said as he stood, walking around his desk and grasping the man’s hand.  “This is Dr. William Hamilton.  He is joining us from Miskatonic University.  I was hoping you could supply him with some of your knowledge.  Dr. Winthrop here,” he said, turning back to me, “is my chief assistant.  One day when I am gone, he’ll be in charge.  For now, I want you to rely on him for any questions while you get yourself settled.  And my door is always open,” he said, holding out his hand.

“Of course, sir,” I said, “and thank you again for this opportunity.”  He smiled again, and with that, I turned and left with Dr. Winthrop.

As the door closed behind us, Dr. Winthrop finally spoke.

“Welcome to Danvers, Dr. Hamilton.  I must say, I cannot imagine what you must be thinking right now.”

I laughed nervously.  “No, sir,” I said.  “I don’t really know what to think.” 

“Well, you will catch on soon enough, I have no doubt,” he continued as we strolled down the main staircase.  “Dr. Harker is an uncanny judge of character, and he clearly found you worthy.  So,” he continued, changing the subject, “I have many things to show you and more to tell you.  And they are all of critical importance.  Never forget where you are, Dr. Hamilton, and you will do fine.”

“I’ll do my best,” I said, nodding once. 

“This,” Dr. Winthrop continued, sweeping his hand in front of him, “is main administration.”  He stopped and looked at me, then said cryptically, “All of this is ours.”

“Ours?” I said as we stopped in the middle of the ornate entranceway.

Dr. Winthrop grinned.  “The rest is theirs, Dr. Hamilton.  This hospital was built to house five hundred patients.  Five hundred.  Half men, half women.  We have nearly two thousand here now.  Make no mistake about it, beyond this door,” he said, pointing at the large portal in front of us, “they are in charge.  We just do what we can.”

Dr. Winthrop pulled two large keys from his pocket.

“These are master keys, Dr. Hamilton,” he said, holding them up in the air.  “These keys will open every door in this complex.  Every one, save for Dr. Harker's office.” He held one key out to me.  As I put my hand on it, he said, “You guard this key with your life, Dr. Hamilton.  No matter what happens, you must not lose it.  Do you understand?”

“Yes, sir,” I muttered. 

“Good,” he said, finally releasing his hold on the key.  “I want you to note the warning,” he continued, as he slipped the large skeleton into the lock.  I heard the heavy tumblers rolling within.  Dr. Winthrop pointed to a large sign placed in the center of the door.  “BEWARE!” it screamed in great capital letters.  “Patients will escape!  Exercise Extreme Caution Upon Entering!  Door Must Remain LOCKED!”

 “This is the last barrier, the final checkpoint before escape.  Always make sure this door is closed and locked.”  He swung the door open, gesturing me in before closing and locking it behind him.  “These are the staff’s quarters.  The staff cafeteria is through the doors on the right,” he said pointing to a large room in front of us.  “You will take your meals there with the rest of us.  Learn to like it.  An unfortunate side-effect of our isolation is we have no other options.  And that set of doors on the left is the staff dormitory.”

“So, this area is sort of a central hub?”

“Exactly.  Are you familiar with the work of Dr. Thomas Kirkbride?”

“Of course,” I said, as Dr. Winthrop opened the door to the cafeteria so I could have a look. 

“Well, as you know then, Dr. Kirkbride believes a patient's surroundings have an effect on his mental health.  That’s why they selected this site.  They wanted tranquility, peacefulness, beauty.  It also had an effect on the architecture of this place.  I’m sure you noticed on your ride up that our little building is quite impressive.”

“How could I not?  It’s like something out of a dream.”

Dr. Winthrop chuckled.  “That is an apt description.  Anyway, as you noted, this is the central hub.  Dr. Harker would tell you the hospital is designed on the shape of a bird.  I’ve always thought it better resembles a bat.  The administrative building is the body.  That’s where we are now.  On either side of us are the two wings.  The wing to your right as you go through the main door is where the women are housed.  The wing on your left has the men.”

We stepped back outside of the cafeteria.  “I’ll take you into the male wing now.” 

We walked to a large iron door adorned with the same sign I had seen earlier.  Dr. Winthrop removed his key once again and slid it into a lock.  I felt myself shiver as he did.  I had done some work with patients while a student, but this was to be a totally different experience.  Dr. Winthrop opened the door and in we went.

“Good afternoon, Jacob,” he said to a white-coated man sitting at a desk near the door. 

“Afternoon, doctor,” he replied. 

“How are our guests today?”

“Nothing unusual.”

“Good.  Jacob, I want you to meet our newest addition.  This is Dr. William Hamilton.”

The man nodded to me. 

“My pleasure,” I said with a smile.  He didn’t smile back. 

“Jacob is one of our orderlies.  He keeps things quiet around here.”

Jacob coughed out a laugh.  “We can barely hold on, doctor.  There are just too many of them.”

“I know, Jacob.  Do the best you can.”

Jacob simply frowned.  I could tell this conversation had happened many times in the past, and the result was always the same.  I looked around the corridor in which we stood.  It was brighter than I had expected, with high windows arrayed along the walls.  Patients, wearing ill-fitted white gowns, milled about, more or less oblivious to our presence.  Dr. Winthrop said a few more words to Jacob, and we continued walking. 

“Don’t worry about Jacob,” he said.  “He is less than pleased with our current patient population.”

“About that,” I began, “you said earlier the hospital was designed to house five hundred, and yet you have four times that number.  Why is that?”

“Honestly, you’ve put your finger on a bit of a mystery,” he replied as we passed an elderly man sitting on the floor, rocking himself back and forth while muttering a bit of unintelligible gibberish.  “We take all who come to us, of course, but we never could have predicted the last few years.  It seems they come in greater numbers every month.  I fear the situation will only grow worse.  Sometimes, it’s as if the whole world has gone mad.”

As we walked toward another door at the far end of the corridor, Dr. Winthrop returned to his description of the hospital layout.  “In this section,” he said, “we house our most docile patients, the ones least likely to cause problems.  But I caution you to remember that, although there is little to worry about here, these men and the women across the way are disturbed.  Do not trust them.”

We reached the other door, and Winthrop once again removed the key from his pocket.  “Now, in the next corridor we have our less well behaved guests.” 

He slid the key in the lock and threw open the door.  What met my eyes was something out of Dante’s Inferno.  There seemed to be ungodly screams and howls emanating from all around me.  Directly in front of us, two orderlies were struggling to attach a strait jacket to a wild beast of a man.  I knew now why the old London Royal Asylum had spawned the term Bedlam. 

“The previous ward,” Dr. Winthrop yelled above the noise, “houses the curables.  Here are the incurables.  Our job is not to fix these people.  We treat them as humanely as possible, we study them to the extent they are interesting, and we try and keep them from killing themselves, other inmates, and most importantly, us.  There will always be a large number of orderlies in this area, for obvious reasons.”

We strode into the midst of that hellhole, the viscous, vulgar taunts, the hate-filled howls, the threats of violence and death.  And, then, we reached another door.  Dr. Winthrop unlocked it, pulled it open and gestured for me to enter.  The next chamber was dramatically different.  It was not, as the previous one, a dormitory.  Instead, it was a short antechamber of sorts.  Dr. Winthrop closed the door behind us and locked it.  He then moved toward the other door only a short walk away.  He unlocked and opened it, and, once again, waited for me to enter.

I was surprised at what I saw.  Given the extra security provided for this section of the hospital and considering my previous experience, I had expected it to be somehow worse, louder, more frantic.  Instead, it was eerily quiet, darker, the air thick and unmoving.  There were no patients I could see here, and none of the rooms were open as they had been in the other wards.

Dr. Winthrop closed the door behind him, acknowledging two orderlies who stood guard at the entrance.  He turned to me and said, “And this, my new friend, is the A wing.  It is here where we house the particularly dangerous — the criminally insane, the psychotic.”

“It’s quieter than I would have expected,” I said.  Dr. Winthrop smiled. 

“Surprising, isn’t it?  But no, the wildly mad are the howlers, and while they can be dangerous, theirs is a more animalistic rage.  They are no more threatening than the beasts of the fields,” he said as we continued to stroll, almost leisurely, through the darkened corridor.  “Man has long conquered them, no?  The truly dangerous are not men who have lost their ability to reason, but those who retain it while being thoroughly evil, those without remorse or compassion.  No, my friend, it is not reason that separates us from the rest of the animals, it is our moral nature.  It is these creatures — I dare not call them men — that are truly demonic.”