"Is the doctor in?"
"Who's calling, please?"
"Name's John Robertson. I'm a private investigator."
He'd met the real Robertson a few years before his death. A sharp old dude who'd liked to wear a Stetson. Jack had kept his card and made duplicates, adopting his identity now and again but not his sartorial taste. He'd changed Robertson's address to one of his mail drops and kept renewing his investigators license. Anyone checking with the New York Department of State would learn that John Robertson was the real deal.
The identity had proven handy over the years.
"And what do you wish to speak to the doctor about?"
"That would be between him and me."
Jack sensed a sudden drop in temperature on the other end of the line.
"I'll see if he's in."
After a full minute's wait—she probably had her answer in ten seconds—she came back on the line.
"I'm sorry, but Doctor Levy will be in meetings for the rest of the day."
"Okay. How about tomorrow?"
"He's booked all day then too."
"And the next day?"
"I'm sorry, but Doctor Levy is a very busy man. Perhaps you could send him a letter?"
"Perhaps I could."
Jack broke the connection.
Okay. After his brief conversation with Levy last night, he'd pretty much expected that. He'd have to follow him after work and look for an opening for an ambush conversation.
He checked his watch. Still hours to go before quitting time.
Time to go exploring.
4
He wound up in the Rathburg Public Library. A computer search had yielded nothing—the Creighton Institute did not have a Web site and other hits yielded nothing useful. So he'd started searching through the microfilm files of the Rathburg-on-Hudson Review and again came up empty. Lots of passing mentions, but no background. Maybe a local paper was the wrong place to look. It seemed to take for granted that its readers knew all about Creighton.
He gathered up the microfilm rolls and returned them to the desk.
"Find what you need?" said the withered, blue-haired lady behind the counter.
"No, unfortunately."
He studied her. She had a Miss Hathaway voice, rickety limbs, a slightly frayed dark blue skirt and jacket with a white silk scarf loosely tied around her neck—to hide the wrinkles? A cloud of gardenia perfume enveloped her. She looked old enough to have dated Ichabod Crane. If she'd spent most of her days around here…
"Are you a native of this area?"
"Born and bred."
"Then maybe you can help me. I'm doing some research on the Creighton Institute but I can't seem to find much on it."
"I'm not surprised. There's not been much written about it." She raised a gnarled finger and tapped her right temple. "But there's a lot stored right up here."
"Would )uu care lo share some of that? I'd be willing to compensate you for your time."
She frowned. "Pay me for letting me ramble on about the old days? Don't be silly."
"Well then, why don't we find someplace where we can sit and have some coffee. I'll buy."
She winked. "Make that a Manhattan and you've got yourself a deal."
This lady was all right.
"Deal. When do you get off?"
"Any time I want. I'm a volunteer." She turned toward a small office behind the counter. "Claire, watch the front desk. I have to go out."
Within seconds she'd shrugged into a long cloth coat and was heading for the door.
"Time's a-wasting and I've only got so much of it left. Let's go."
Jack followed her outside. The sky had gone from clear blue to overcast while his nose had been stuck in the microfilm viewer.
She stopped at the foot of the front steps and thrust out her hand.
"I'm Cilia Groot, by the way."
Jack shook her frail hand. "And I'm Jack." He looked up and down the street and spotted a pub sign hanging over the sidewalk. "What about that place?"
"Van Dyck's? I've been in there once or twice. I suppose it will do."
As they started toward the pub Jack had to ask: "Do you have a dog?"
She looked at him with concern, then down at her coat. "Why? Do I have hair—?"
"No, just curious."
"What an odd question. No, no dog. Three cats though."
Good. Ladies with dogs had been popping up in his life for the past year or so. They all seemed to know more about his life than anyone should. He'd seen one of them right after the accident, but none since. He wouldn't mind sitting down with one—he had endless questions—but he didn't like them sneaking up on him.
He held the door to Van Dyck's and followed her in. Her arrival was greeted by calls of "Hi, Cilia" from the half dozen or so men around the bar.
She waved, then turned to Jack and said, "Let's take that table by the window where we can have some peace."
Fine with Jack.
He helped her out of her coat and they were just seating themselves on opposite sides of the table when the bartender arrived carrying a straight-up Manhattan with two cherries. He placed it before Cilia with a flourish.
"There you go, my dear."
'Thank you, Faas."
Jack smiled. Only been here once or twice, ay?
Faas—was that a first or last name?—turned to Jack. "And what can I get you, sir?"
Jack asked what was on tap and Faas recited a depressing list of Buds and Michelobs and various lights that ended on an up note with the Holland Holy Trinity: Heineken, Grolsch, and Amstel. Jack took a pint of Grolsch.
"So, what can you tell me about the Creighton Institute?"
She took a sip of her drink and closed her eyes. "Nothing so perfect as a perfect Manhattan." Then she looked at Jack. "It didn't start out as an institute of any sort. The original building, with its French chateau design, marble terraces, and classical revival gardens, was built in 1897 by financier Horace Creighton as a summer cottage."
"Cottage?"
"Yes. The Creightons lived there only during the summer months when it was too hot in the city. He said that he chose Rathburg rather than Newport because he liked the climate better and it was more convenient to his business in New York, but I suspect he avoided Newport so as not to have to compete with the Vanderbilts and Astors. Here he could be quite literally king of the hill."
"But I take it there are no more Creightons there now."
"Correct. He lost everything in the stock market crash of twenty-nine. The state government took it over for back taxes and it remained abandoned and boarded up for years. That didn't stop children—yours truly was one of them—from breaking in and using it as a playground. After the war the federal government took it over and turned it into the Creighton Hospital for Disabled Veterans."
"And that's when it was expanded, I take it?"
"Correct." She made a face. "Have you seen those wings they added? Abominations! What an awful, terrible, wretched thing to do to such a grand old house."
She tossed off the rest of her Manhattan and held up her empty glass. In less than a minute Faas appeared with a full replacement. He pointed to Jack's half-finished pint. Jack shook his head.
"When did it become a booby hatch?"
Her brief glare told Jack what he'd hoped to learn from the remark: The locals weren't happy with having an institute for the criminally insane in town.
"In nineteen-eighty-one it passed from the Veterans Administration to another federal entity. That was when it was renamed the Creighton Institute."
Jack finished it for her: "—for the Criminally Insane."