The Colour of Death by Michael Cordy Read Free Book Online Page A

the paint and beautiful the grounds.  Her problem, after all, lay in the shadows of her mind, not out her in the sunlit world.  Her worst fears were confirmed when she saw the two white-suited orderlies and the smiling doctor waiting to greet her.  They looked no different to all the others she had seen.  How could they hope to understand her when not one of them was even the right color?
     
     
    A few yards away, in one of the main offices near the Tranquil Waters reception, Nathan Fox sat in a handover meeting with Dr. Tozer, Jane Doe’s doctor from Oregon State.  The other three people in the room were Tranquil Waters’ two other senior psychiatrists, Frank Miller and Walter Kolb, both considerably older than Fox, and their boss, the redoubtable Professor Elizabeth Fullelove (which she insisted was pronounced fully love ).
    The head of Tranquil Waters was in her late fifties, hair more gray than black, but her bright eyes and unlined black skin made her look younger.  She was a formidable presence; Fox had known her for some years but still called her Professor.  As did all the other staff.  He didn’t know anyone who called her Elizabeth, let alone Liz.  He suspected that even her husband addressed her formally.
    Tozer passed Fullelove a thin manila folder labeled ‘Jane Doe’, the name the authorities gave to all female patients — and corpses — whose identity was unknown.  Fullelove flicked through it and then passed it to Miller, who passed it to Kolb who handed it to Fox.  Fox knew that both Miller and Kolb had already read the contents and wanted to treat the patient.  Jane Doe was high profile and her unusual circumstances added up to a potentially reputation-making case study.  “Is this all you’ve got on her, Dr. Tozer?” said Fullelove.
    “That’s all we’ve discovered so far, Professor.  Not just medically, everything.  Remember, she had no records of any kind before last week.”  Tozer looked tired and harried.
    Fox scanned the meager notes.  There were no entries prior to the date Jane Doe was admitted to Oregon State.  “She was wearing a locket?”
    “Yes, a heart-shaped silver locket.  Not particularly valuable or distinctive, I’m afraid.  It contains a faded picture of a baby.”
    “Does Jane Doe have any idea who the baby is?”
    “No.  All I can tell you is she’s never taken the locket off — not even to let me study it.”
    Fox nodded.  “I don’t blame her.  Its’ all she’s got from her past life.”  He recalled Jordache telling him about the night the police had found her, and how she had been unable to remember even her own name.  “She’s really got full-blown retrograde amnesia?”
    “Total,” said Tozer.  “It’s unclear if it’s retrograde amnesia caused by the physiological head trauma or her bullet wound or a psychological fugue state caused by what she experienced in the basement, but the result’s the same:  she’s lost her memories, identity, everything.  She can remember how to do certain things but nothing else from before the night she saved those girls.  And there are other symptoms we kept out of the press.”  Fox flicked through the tightly typed assessment.  When he came to the third page his expression must have changed because Tozer smiled.  “You found them, I see.”
    “Hallucinations?”
    “Not just any old hallucinations.  Hers are high-definition visions in glorious Technicolor, with Dolby Surround sound.  We moved her five times before we found a room in which she didn’t hallucinate.  Strangely enough it was in the new palliative ward — where terminally ill patients are sent to die.”
    “Any brain damage?” asked Miller.
    “Her head injuries were minor.  MRI scans have shown nothing abnormal.”
    Fox read the sketchy descriptions of her hallucinations.  There was a recurrent theme.  “I suppose they could be repressed memories.”
    “Pretty horrific repressed memories,” said