“I know who I am,” she blurted out. “I know who I am! I remember everything! Oh, why aren’t you there when I need you? Come and see me and I’ll tell you everything.”
She hung up, her heart pounding. It reminded her of being onstage. Another memory: the sweet rainfall of applause gusting over her. She had played Miss Julie in the graduate production at Simon Fraser. Other parts, too. Smaller parts, after that.
A restaurant kitchen. Slamming plates, the clash of silverware and the chef shouting at everyone: “Pick up! Pick up! Pick up!”
“I know who I am,” she said aloud. She wanted to tell someone, but there was no one there. The other bed in her room was empty. She got up and opened the closet. Why shouldn’t she be dressed like everybody else? It wasn’t as if she had cancer or something.
She slipped into the jeans and the green T-shirt she had been wearing the night she had been brought to hospital. The green of the shirt really picked up the green of her eyes. At least I had good taste, she thought, and realized that she still thought of the person she had been before the blank days as a separate being. Those days—or was it just hours?—were still blank.
Out in the hall she made a beeline for the nurses’ station.
“Hey, hey,” a voice called from behind. “Hold up, there.”
She turned and saw the guard cop catching up to her.
“Where you off to?”
“The nurses’ station. I just got my memory back.”
“You did? Hey, sweetheart, that’s fantastic. What’s your name?”
“Terri,” she said. “My name is Terri! I know who I am,” she said to the nurse behind the counter. “I know my name and where I’m from and everything.”
“Well, that’s wonderful,” the nurse said, and her face lit up. “That’s just great—I probably shouldn’t call you Red any more.”
“My name’s Terri,” she said. “Terri. It sounds kind of funny to me at the moment. I know it’s right, but it still sounds funny.”
She called to the black man who was dry-mopping the corridor. “I know who I am! I just got my memory back!”
“That’s good,” he said. “Hope they’re good memories.”
She looked around for someone else to tell. The cop was talking into his radio.
15
THE FORMER JANE DOE WAS certainly looking a lot better, Delorme thought. There was some colour in those cheeks, now, and a lot more spark in those green eyes. She and Cardinal were sitting on a couple of uncomfortable chairs in the girl’s hospital room. Terri Tait was on the bed, but only because there was no place else to sit. She was fully dressed and, except for the small white bandage on her temple, you would never know she had been injured at all, let alone shot in the head.
“I’m an actress,” she told them. “An actress in Vancouver. Well, I think I’m mostly a waitress just now.”
“And an artist, too, it looks like.” Cardinal held up a sketch pad that showed a pretty good likeness of Dr. Paley in pencil. It caught the good humour in his eyes.
“Dr. Paley gave me that. He’s always trying ways to jog my memory. He thinks I don’t notice.”
“My daughter’s a painter,” Cardinal said. “Still a starving artist at this point, much like yourself.”
Terri nodded, her hair rustling audibly against the starched sheets. “Basically you have to expect fifty rejections for every part you get. I bet half the waitresses in Vancouver are actresses.”
“Where do you work?” Delorme said. She wanted some hard facts. “Do you remember the name of the restaurant?”
“Not yet, I’m afraid. But I will.” She smiled broadly, but her eyes—to Delorme, at least—seemed focused somewhere else.
“And Vancouver? Can you give us an address?” Delorme asked.
Terri shook her head. “Not yet.”
“What about an address for your parents?”
“I don’t want you to call my parents. I’m not a child, Detective.”
“Of course not. But talking to your family will help us piece together your background, sort out possible enemies.”
“I left home when I was eighteen. I’ve looked after myself ever since. My parents moved out of the city and I only see them every couple of years, if then.”
“Why is that?”
The girl shrugged. “We don’t have anything in common.”
“Do you have any brothers or sisters?”
“One brother. He’s a few years younger than me.”
“What’s his name?”
“Kevin.” The girl’s hand flew to her mouth.
“What’s wrong?” Delorme said.
“It’s just, I’m not sure. I said Kevin but I’m not sure. It may be Ken or something like that. Some things are still pretty fuzzy.”
“Can we contact him?”
“He’s away right now.”
“Away where?”
“Um, I don’t know.”
“You hesitated. Why is that?”
“Because I’m not sure if I just don’t remember where he is or if I never knew.”
“Really,” Delorme said. This girl could end up being a lot less helpful than they had hoped. “Do you live in a house? An apartment?”
“A house. In a house with a bunch of people. It’s downtown, I think.”
“Are there any landmarks nearby? Churches? Clubs? Bridges?”
“I don’t know. I don’t think so. It’s a rundown house somewhere downtown. I called directory assistance to see if they had a listing for me, but they don’t. The phone must be in someone else’s name.”
“Do you remember the names of your roommates?” Delorme said.
Terri shook her head. “I don’t. I can see their faces, some of them, but I don’t have names yet.”
Cardinal pulled out photographs of Wombat Guthrie and other members of the Viking Riders. “What about these faces? Any of them seem familiar?”
The girl peered at them for a few moments. “No. But that doesn’t mean much just yet.”
“Do you remember where you were staying in town here?” Delorme said.
Terri winced a little, wrinkling her nose. “Very vaguely. A motel out on a highway.”
“Do you remember the name of this motel?”
“Sorry.”
Delorme leaned forward in her chair. “The highway—did it have a lot of shopping malls on it? Or was it kind of empty?”
“There were malls. And motels and cottages.”
Cardinal looked at Delorme. “Lakeshore,” he said. “Has to be.”
“Can you describe the motel?” Delorme asked.
“I don’t think so.”
“Anything at all would be helpful. Was it wood or brick, for example? Or if you remember the colour …”
“I just told you, I don’t remember.” Terri put a hand to the small bandage on her temple. “I’m getting a headache.”
“All right,” Cardinal said. “Just a couple of more questions.”
“Do we have to? I was feeling so good and now I feel so lousy.”
“How many days were you at the motel?” Cardinal said.
“I don’t know. It could be one, it could be three, I just don’t know.” She sniffed, and her eyes watered a little.
It looked—to Delorme’s skeptical eye, at least—a little rehearsed. She was an actress, after all. But all she said was: “What made you come to Algonquin Bay?”
“It was to see my boyfriend. Tom. His name’s Tom.”
“Tom what?”
“Josephson. Tom Josephson.”
“He lives here, and you live in Vancouver? How does that work?”
“We split up, sort of. He came here to stay with some friends—I don’t know them. I came here to talk him into coming back. They were staying at this place out on the lake. Oh, my head really hurts.”
“Which lake?” Delorme said.