Traces of Mercy (3 page)

“Good. You’re finally awake,” he said.

She realized she was reclining on a cot, and when she tried to lift herself on her elbows, a heavy, throbbing pain in her head made her moan and sink back into a pillow.

“Where?” she managed to croak out of her parched throat.

“At my clinic in St. Louis,” he answered. He pulled a chair next to the cot and sat down. He reached for her wrist, but his touch made her jerk away. Her instinctual reaction caused her to grimace in pain. “Who?”

“You’re asking the right questions. That’s good,” he said. “I’m Doctor Abe Johnson. I’ve been taking care of you for the past three days.”

Three days?

She was confused. “Why?”

He frowned and studied her. “There was an accident. Don’t you remember?”

She stared at him without answering.

“I’m going to check your pulse now,” he said.

She felt him lift her arm with a confident touch.

“Excellent,” the doctor said with satisfaction. “Steady and strong.” He lowered her arm to the cot. “How is your pain?”

It was as if the question jarred her further into reality, and she quickly became aware of a myriad of things that didn’t feel right. Her head throbbed, her ribs ached, and when she stretched out her leg, she felt something akin to a lick of fire run up her calf. She felt bruised and battered and tender.

“Pain … everywhere.” She lifted a hand to her head and gingerly ran her fingers over the thick wrap that ran across her forehead and, as far as she could tell, all the way around. She swallowed. All she could think of was water. “I’m … thirsty.”

“Of course you are.”

He pushed to his feet and went to a pitcher on a table across the room. He poured her a cup of water, but he handed it to her with an admonishment. “You’re going to be tempted to gulp this down, but I’ll advise against that unless you don’t mind vomiting.”

She nodded her understanding, and he helped her sit up. She tipped the cup to her lips. The water felt like liquid heaven running down her throat.

“Easy does it,” he said. She forced herself to stop drinking and gave him back the cup.

“How did I get here?” she asked.

“Two men brought you in.”

“Where are they?”

“Long gone. They were just passing through this area when they found you tangled up in some wagon rigging at the bottom of a pretty steep hill about five miles outside of town.”

“I was alone?” she asked after a moment.

“Yes, as far as I know,” he said. “Had you been traveling with someone else?”

She searched her memory for the answer. “I don’t remember.”

“Where were you going?”

“I … can’t say.” She looked past him, her big brown eyes filled with worry as her mind raced.

Intrigued, Dr. Johnson leaned forward in the chair and rested his forearms on his knees. “Your secret is safe with me.”

Her eyes flew back to his. “Secret?”

“I am obligated as your doctor to hold anything you say to me in confidence,” he said. “So whatever you were doing—whoever you might have been running from—you can tell me. Maybe I can help you.”

She felt as if she’d come into the room in the middle of a conversation.
Your secret is safe with me.

“How long did you say I’ve been here?” she asked.

“Three days. But I have no way of knowing how long you were lying there unconscious before those men found you.”

Lying there unconscious. Your secret is safe with me.

She shifted again on the cot and sucked in a sharp breath when a ripple of pain shot through her body.

“You have several contusions on your skull,” he said. “The most significant is just above your left temple. I also found one located near the crown of your head—but I’d say that injury is older than the others. You have some bruising consistent with a bad fall, but as far as I can tell, nothing is broken.” He hesitated for a moment, as if carefully giving weight to his next few words. “It very well may be that the binding you had around your chest kept your ribs from breaking.”

Why is he talking in riddles?

“Binding?”

He raised his brows. “Yes. As I said, your secret is safe with me.”

Frowning, she shook her head, then immediately regretted the action. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t understand.”

He studied her for a moment, then said, “You have another significant injury that we haven’t discussed. A gunshot wound to the back of your calf. How did that happen?”

“I don’t know,” she said, more to herself than to him. “I don’t remember.”

“All right. I understand. I’m a stranger and we just met and, understandably, you don’t know if you can trust me or not.”

“No. You
don’t
understand. I don’t remember anything that you’re talking about. I don’t remember an accident, or falling, or being shot!”

He tented his hands together, tapping his fingertips while he studied her. “Your mind is most likely protecting you from what was certainly a traumatic experience.”

When she didn’t respond, he pressed on. “Let’s start with simpler things, shall we?”

She licked her dry lips and dipped her chin in agreement.

“I can hear a trace of the South in your speech,” he said. “Where are you from?”

She searched her mind, but it was filled with dark corners that seemed to be hiding the answers.
I don’t know. I don’t know … how can I not know?

She uttered the words aloud. “I don’t know.”

He stroked his chin thoughtfully but sounded skeptical when he asked, “No recollection of that either?”

She tried again and reached inside herself for the information, but it wasn’t there. The moment stretched, and silence boomed in the small room. Panic started to swell in her throat.

“We’ll leave the geography questions for later, shall we?”

She swallowed and nodded.

Dr. Johnson offered a confident smile. “Let’s start with the very basics. What’s your name?”

She automatically opened her mouth to reply with the answer. Surely she knew her own name. But trying to retrieve the memory in the deep black chasm of her mind was like trying to catch the wind. There was nothing. Not a shred of anything to grasp and unfurl like a sheet where all the minutes, hours, days, and years leading up to this moment might be hiding. With frightened, heart-pumping adrenaline, she whispered her answer.

“I don’t remember.”

The admission hung in the air between them. Her large, frightened eyes studied the man sitting by her side as he studied her. It dawned on her that he was the only person she ever remembered having a conversation with. The thought stabbed through her, and she fought the urge to scream. Despite the splitting pain in her head, she swung her legs over the side of the cot and pushed herself to stand on her injured leg.

“Be careful now,” he said, slipping a steadying hand under her elbow. Even with the terror rising up inside her, she was cognizant enough to hear the intrigue in his voice.

“What’s happening to me?”

“As I said earlier, your mind might be trying to protect you from something you don’t want to remember.”

She turned to face him. “But my own
name
?”

He didn’t answer—just kept looking at her in a way that was becoming increasingly irritating.

“Let me reiterate—you
can
trust me,” he said. “I know we just met and you are likely skeptical about confiding in a complete stranger …”

Her voice was shaky when she replied. “You’re not hearing me. I don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t know where I was headed, why I was traveling—where I’m from or even my own name!”

She looked down at the white gown she was wearing. Down at her bare feet on the floor. She wiggled her toes and shook her head at the same time.

“Those might as well be a stranger’s feet because I don’t recognize them!” She raised a shaking hand to examine it. “This could be a stranger’s hand.” A new thought took shape, and the tears she had held at bay spilled down her cheek. “I don’t even know what I look like.”

“What is the last thing you remember?” he asked, clearly more intrigued by the second.

She took a deep, steadying breath and looked up at him. “I heard whistling, opened my eyes, and saw you.”

He went to a small closet in the corner of the room and pulled some clothing from a shelf. Carrying the clothes back to her, he put them in her hands.

“You were wearing these when the men brought you in,” he said. “They are clothes that would be worn by a man, not a young woman.”

She inspected the wool shirt and pants. “If that’s true, then why would I have been wearing them?”

“Your chest was bound, and your hair is cut in a masculine style. My hypothesis is you did all of it on purpose in order to be perceived as a man.”

Tears slipped down her cheeks as she ran her hands over the rough wool of the brown shirt. “But why?”

“That’s a good question,” he said. “One I was hoping you would have an answer to when you woke.” He crossed his arms over his chest and slowly shook his head. “Your cognizant skills seem fine. You can carry on a conversation and have knowledge of everyday things, have reasonable expectations—have a healthy fear level of what’s happening to you. It is as if only one part of your brain has been traumatized by your head injury.” His expression went from perplexed to revelatory. “I’ve read about cases like this, but in all my years I’ve never seen it firsthand. A once-in-a-lifetime thing, really.”

“Cases like what?” she asked. A feeling of deep foreboding settled over her like a drape.

“Amnesia,” he said. “It’s the loss of one’s memory—usually due to a brain injury or sometimes even a terrible shock.”

She frowned. “That sounds—very bad.”

He pressed his lips together, and she saw pity in his expression. She dug the heels of her hands into her eyes as if she could press her memories back inside her head.
Try harder! Remember something. Remember!

Moments later, she felt him gently pull her hands away from her face. He leaned closer to her as if the very action would help convey the sincerity of what he was going to say.

“It might very well be temporary.”

A ray of hope leapt up inside her. “Temporary?”

“Yes. I’ll need to do more research, of course, but I know the condition can last anywhere from minutes to hours to …”

“To what? Days? Weeks?”

“I don’t see the point in speculating about that right now,” he said. “Let’s just concentrate on the present.” He pulled something from his pocket and held up a silver medallion dangling from a silver chain. “You were also wearing this.”

She reached for it. Feeling his scrutiny, she fingered the medal and willed something to come back to her. The black drape across her mind remained firmly intact.

“It’s beautiful … but I don’t remember it.”

He reached out for it, but she tightened her fingers around it. “You said it’s mine.”

He withdrew his hand. “Yes.”

Careful of the bandage around her head, she slipped it on.

“There is something else we haven’t tried,” he said. “Something that might jar your memory.”

“What?”

“I have a mirror in the next room. Let’s go have a look, shall we?”

She didn’t answer. It wasn’t vanity that made her hesitate. It didn’t matter to her if she was homely—if her nose was too big for her face or her chin too weak. What mattered was her quicksilver hold on sanity and how fast that might disappear when the face of a stranger stared back at her from the glass. What if the shock of seeing herself did nothing to help her remember?

“I promise you won’t be disappointed in your reflection,” he said, leading her to the next room.

Her first impression of the woman who stared back at her from the mirror was that she looked lost. Lost and terrified and sad. Her hand went to the short, dark hair cut above her chin. The bandage wound around her forehead served only to make her eyes look huge. Her nose was fine. Her chin was chiseled like a porcelain doll. Her memory stayed locked up tight. She shuddered with disappointment.

“Nothing, eh?” the doctor asked.

She barely managed to shake her head.

“Steady does it,” he said, peering over her shoulder. “We’ll sort it all out.” She saw him frown into the glass. “You are a handsome young woman. I would surmise you’ve barely had twenty birthdays—if that. Somewhere, someone is probably frantic about you.”

She continued to stare at the woman in the mirror. At a face that might have been anyone on the street for all she knew. She spoke to her own reflection as if she expected a reply. “What are you going to do?”

Dr. Johnson became pragmatic. “First things first. You’ll need more time to recover from your injuries. Perhaps as your head heals, your memory will return.”

“And if it doesn’t?” Her voice was laced with fear.

“Let’s not borrow trouble,” he said.

She shifted her gaze from her own reflection to his. “I hardly have to borrow it. I’m consumed with it. I have no idea where to go or what to do next.”

“Let’s just take things one day at a time,” he said. “The mind is a fascinating thing. A mysterious part of the body I could spend a lifetime studying and have only a scintilla of answers for the questions I have.”

“That’s what worries me most,” she admitted. “That I’ll spend the rest of
my
lifetime looking for the one answer I need.” She found her own eyes in the glass again. “Who am I?”

C
HAPTER
T
HREE

I have woken up thirteen different times without a name. The doctor taking care of me has a name—it’s Abner—but he says to call him Abe, or Doc.

Abe is very nice, and he is trying to help me. Every day he leaves the clinic to go from place to place and ask people if they are missing someone. I don’t go with him. I stay behind at the clinic, where it is safe. And quiet. And I don’t have to be in the busyness of the streets outside the window. So far, no one is missing me.

Doc gave me this book called a journal, with a quill and ink. He asked me if I remembered how to write—and it turns out I do. He said that means I have some kind of education, which seemed to make him happy. He told me this book would be a good place to write down all my thoughts—the things I am feeling and seeing. He said it can be like a paper memory. I think it’s a good idea. There are a few things I didn’t remember, but now I know: