Wilderwood Ch. 10

Chapter 10 (of 12) : I is for...

The Newley Institute -- formerly the Wilderwood State Mental Hospital and even more formerly the Wilderwood Insane Asylum -- is up in the hills north of town. It feels further out than it actually is because the road that leads up to it twists and turns through Wilderwood Forest so much it basically turns back on itself a couple of times before finally coming to the Institute. It makes the road up to Wilderwood Hall, on other side of the north road and a mile or so further up, look like a straight line by comparison.

Eventually the road leads to a covered wooden bridge that crosses over this end of the Wilderwood. They valley is at its deepest here, and it's almost a sheer drop from the grounds of the Institute to the forest below on two sides.

There's a lot of stories about this place. Only the Wilderwood itself has more local legends and urban myths attached to it. Some of these are the kind of thing that Alex Trowley comes out with -- underground labs and mind control experiments financed by the CIA/Big Pharma/Reptillians (or all three) -- and some are ghost stories, because the Institute is a former insane asylum on top of a cliff overlooking a big, spooky forest. No surprise that there's more than a few weird tales about it.

It's one of those that's brought me up here today. The one about my great grandfather's younger brother being a multiple murderer who was locked up here back in the thirties. Since my great grandfather was himself some kind of gangster, and for all I know may have dumped a few bodies in the Wilderwood himself by way of 'business', it's not even the murders that bother me exactly. I mean it's not great, but it's the other thing that's really on my mind.

It's the suggestion that Joseph Wilderwood was driven to kill because he was insane, and that the insanity was hereditary. Ever since Emma and I started looking into our family history we've found too many gaps, too many things left unexplained. There aren't many Wilderwoods, far fewer than would be expected for a family as old as ours. If there is some inherent flaw in our line it would explain a lot.

My only source for any of this is allegations made in a book published a few years ago, but it fits too well with what I already know to ignore it, and the fact that Uncle Nathan almost certainly forced the publisher to withdraw 'The Devil's Blood' from sale suggests there might be something to all of this.

Finding out what might not be easy. There's a very real aura of secrecy about this place that has nothing to do with Trowley's wild claims and everything to do with what the place is these days. The Newley Institute has been, for a long time now, a very upscale private clinic -- the kind of place where the rich and famous come to recover from breakdowns and kick bad habits. That it's so secluded and hard to get to, with only one road leading up to it and miles of nearly impenetrable forest on all sides, is probably as useful now as it was when the patients weren't here of their own free will. According to another story I've been told some still aren't.

The Institute is very expensive, very discreet, and very secure, and the first obstacle I have to deal with is the gatehouse at the far end of the bridge. The guy standing there doesn't look much like a security guard - very smart casual in a white polo shirt and tan slacks - but he does act like one.

I called a cab to bring me up here and the guard says hello to the driver, who he recognises, then asks me if I have an appointment. I don't. I made the decision to come up here in a hurry, and I'm not on the visitor list either.

"I'm sorry," he says, though he doesn't sound it, "but without an appointment I can't allow you to enter the grounds."

There's a reason I went home before coming up here, to shower and shave and put on a suit. No tie, but I'm about as respectable looking as I ever get. Now I get to see if it was worth the effort.

"I need to speak to someone about some family records," I say in my best attempt at the tone my great-uncle uses. "My name's Jamie Wilderwood."

I've never put so much emphasis on my surname in my life.

* * * * *

It works. He checks my ID and then makes a call up to the Institute, and after that he tells me that we can go up and I'll be met at reception. I usually think of my family name as an unwelcome drag on my life, but I could get used to this.

I get out of the cab at the entrance and let it go, because I've no idea how long I'll be here. I've seen the Institute before, but mostly from a distance, and up close it doesn't really live up to its ominous reputation. The main building doesn't look much different from Wilderwood College, being a big old red brick building with narrow windows and peaked roofs, and there aren't even any bars on the windows. Maybe those are round the back.

It doesn't look sinister or spooky. Maybe at night or during a thunderstorm it would, but on a sunny Sunday afternoon it's actually kind of bland. I guess all the weird stuff must happen in the secret underground labs.

Inside it's just as ordinary. It's obviously been modernised at some point, though not to anything near the extent of the way Lauren's dad reworked their place up on Hamilton Hill, and it's light and airy and quiet and looks more like an expensive resort hotel than a clinic, which I guess in a way it is. It's not all new, and there's a couple of big oil paintings of old, serious looking guys hanging in slighty recessed alcoves of the reception area like there always seems to be in old buildings, but I don't give them more than a glance as I walk up to the front desk.

The receptionist tells me someone will be with me shortly and asks me to take a seat. There's not many people around, just a few staff going about their jobs and a few others who I suppose are patients or visitors. No one pays any attention to me as I walk idly up and down the reception area, too keyed up to sit down.

"Hi, Jamie, what can I do for you?" asks a female voice. It's a bit more informal than I was expecting seeing as I got in here by leaning on the Wilderwood name, but when I turn round and see who it is I understand why.

Claire Darby. My friend Kenny's older sister.

Shit. I forget she works up here.

My first thought is that I don't want to talk to her about this. I only know Claire through Kenny, and only very casually, since she and her twin sister are seven years older than him and it's not like they hang out. Still, it's closer to home than I'd have liked.

My second thought is that Kenny is a jerk who couldn't keep a secret if his life depended on it and there's no way his sister tells him anything about what goes on up here. If she did I'd know it. So anything we talk about isn't going to get back to him.

My third thought is that if it was Claire who got the call from the gatehouse then they let me in because she knows me through her brother and not because of my flexing of the family name. That stings more than I'd expect it to.

"Oh, hey, Claire." I'd planned on going in very businesslike, but I guess that won't cut it now. Bit of a waste of time going home to get suited up really.

She's very professional though, and once I tell her that I'm looking into some old family history she says to come with her to her office and she'll see what she can do. I can't imagine she'd say the same to any other of Kenny's friends who showed up out of the blue on a Sunday afternoon, so maybe the Wilderwood name is working some of its magic after all.

* * * * *

The admin wing is on the ground floor of the main building, and the offices we pass are mostly small, neat and empty. We don't pass many people in the hallways either.

Claire is slim and sleek, with dark hair. She and her sister Paige, who works at the Wilderwood Hotel, are identical twins, and they don't underplay that. They even wear their hair in the same short, shiny black, bob cuts. I've often thought that Kenny must be adopted, because he's nothing like these two, though I have heard another explanation.

Trowley has claimed that the Darby twins are proof of secret cloning experiments going on up here at the Institute, and that down in the underground labs there are tanks turning out Darbys by the dozen. He went into a lot of detail about the way each new Claire (or Paige) steps out of the cloning tanks, naked, dripping, glistening with oily fluids... artificial minds in perfectly sculpted human flesh... ready to drain unsuspecting humans of their precious bodily fluids. All of this was delivered in an extreme close-up, straight to camera monologue and even Trent agrees that Trowley was definitely jerking off when he made that video.

The thought of a dozen naked Claires (or Paiges) is a distracting one, because they are sexy, in a tv show hot lawyer type way. We usually avoid saying so around Kenny because of the unwritten rule that we don't talk about a guy's sisters like that, at least not when he's listening. That rule does not, I've found out, apply to Emma, at least not since she came home from college and started hanging out with Coven.

The alleged Darbybot offers me a coffee as I sit down, then takes her own seat behind her desk. The screen is angled away from me so I can't see what's on it.

"You said these are old records," Claire says. "You know that I can't answer any queries about anyone who's a current patient at the Institute."

"He was here in the '30s, I think."

"What's the name?"

"Joseph Wilderwood." I'm watching her as I say it, but there's no flicker of recognition on her face. If he was a patient here then he wasn't an infamous one.

"Medical records remain sealed for fifty years after a patient's death," she says, turning to the screen on her desk, fingers poised over the keyboard. "If he died any time after 1970 there's no way I can access them for you, short of a court order."

I think back to what I've already learned about that generation of the family. "He died back in the '40s. Early on, I think."

"Then it won't be an issue," Claire says, tapping a few keys. "The thing is..." she begins as she enters a query, "it's unlikely that files from as far back as that will have been transferred over to the digital records."

"Yeah, Rey at the library said something similar about the Gazette's archives."

"Sounds like you've been busy."

She's just making casual conversation, so I'm casual back. "Just taking an interest in the family history. For once."

"There's a lot of it." Claire smiles, then shakes her head as the computer beeps in an unhelpful sounding way. "Nothing in the database."

"So there's no way of finding out?"

"There might be but..." Claire gives a doubtful shrug and then enters another query. She continues talking as she reads whatever's on her screen. "This place has went through a lot of changes since then. At one time it really was like the stories say -- straitjackets and electro-shock therapy and if you weren't crazy when you went in then you would be by the time you came out, if you ever did." She glances up at me and gives a small, apologetic smile. "Sorry, I know we're talking about one of your relatives."

"It's okay. I've heard those stories."

"Anyway, there were a lot of reforms in the '40s and the place was renamed to the Wilderwood State Mental Hospital. That was happening all over the country at that time and Dr. Newley, the director at the time, was at the forefront of that. Later, after his death in the mid-sixties, the Hospital was renamed again, to the Newley Institute, in his honor." Claire smiles again and gestures to the screen. "It's all on the website, if you're interested. I'm just saying that with all the changes there's been to this place over the last eighty years there's no way of knowing for sure where Joseph Wilderwood's medical records would be now. They may have been moved off site to a central archive, or been lost, or destroyed."

"Destroyed?"

"It happens, fairly routinely." She smiles. "It's not as sinister as it sounds. The records might also still be here, but you could look for a week in the archive and not find anything down there. If you had access, which you don't."

Something in the way she says 'down there' makes me think again of Trowley's claims about underground labs. Maybe there really are vats full of naked Claires just below my feet. I wonder if the lab techs take commissions? I try to shake the image of multiple Emmas out of my head before I go full Trowley.

"I could request a search," Claire continues, "but it would take time and I would have to go through channels to get the proper authorisation."

I shake my head. I don't want to stir things up that much. Not right now anyway.

She thinks for a moment. "There might be something in Dr. Newley's personal files. He was the director for thirty years, so he'd have been running the place as far back as you're talking about. Dr. Reinmar would know, but she's not here today. She rarely comes in on a Sunday."

That's good to know because I really don't want to have to ask the current director. I just know that as soon as those ice blue lasers she calls eyes locked onto me I'd tell her everything. To change the subject I ask Claire, "How did she get the job here?"

She gives me a look which I recognise mainly from when Emma and I were in high school. It's the disapproving big sister look. Kenny probably saw that look even more than I did. Kenny probably still does.

"Not the way you've heard," she says, in the disapproving big sister voice that goes with the look.

"Hey, I never said a thing."

"Sorry, but people do." Claire rolls her eyes. "A few of the senior staff here feel like they were passed over when Dr. Reinmar was appointed."

"Yeah, I met one of them at the hotel on Friday night," and I remember the look on his face when Dr. Reinmar's name came up in the conversation. "Dr. Dunning."

Her expression is still cool and professional, but there's definitely a flicker of dislike in Claire's face when I mention that name. She doesn't say anything though.

"I heard it was my great-uncle who got Dr. Reinmar appointed." It's not that I believe the stories. I'm just making conversation. Uncle Nathan just doesn't seem like someone who'd use his power to get a woman to sleep with him, and Dr. Reinmar definitely doesn't seem like someone who would do that anyway. If any guy did try that she'd probably just stare at him until his cock shrivelled up and fell off.

"I wouldn't know about that," Claire says, "though he is on the board of trustees for the Institute, so he would have had a say in it." She shrugs and changes the subject. "Have you asked him about Joseph? If anyone would know about this I'd think he would."

"No, not yet."

I'm even more wary of asking Uncle Nathan about any of this than I am of asking Dr. Reinmar, though it's hard to say exactly why. He was friendly enough at the event at the hotel, at least to me, and he was ready enough to give me the inside info about Pete Warren. Still though, he's never been exactly approachable.

"Maybe you should, if..." she doesn't finish the sentence though I'm fairly certain it was going to end with '...if he's still talking to you after Friday night.' "Other than that there's not much I can tell you."

"It's no big deal," I say, very casually because I'm becoming a much better liar these days. "Thanks, Claire."

* * * * *

It feels like I've wasted my time up here. Claire walks me back to the front desk, and I idle in the reception area for a few minutes while deciding whether or not to approach Dr. Dunning. I only spoke to him for about fifteen seconds at the event but he was toadying around my great-uncle like everyone else so maybe I can try out the family name on him. It's a less intimidating prospect than asking Dr. Reinmar, that's for sure.

While I'm thinking about this I wander over to look at the paintings. I'm very familiar with the style since I've seen it a lot in the houses up on Hamilton Hill, and there's entire rows of portraits on the upper floor of the Hall. Walking along those hallways is like browsing Facebook with an oil painting filter on.

I walk over to the one in the alcove on the left. There's a brass plaque underneath the painting and I read that first.

RICHARD WILDERWOOD. 1895 -- 1973.

Then below that, in slightly smaller letters...

FOUNDER.

Founder? This place isn't as old as Wilderwood Hall but it's still been here for at least two hundred years. Unless one of our family secrets is that we're a dynasty of immortal vampires -- and admittedly Emma would get a big kick out of that - I don't see how my great grandfather could be described as a founder.

We're not vampires. I'm sure I would have noticed by now if we were. This has to be referring to when this place was renamed to the Newley Institute, and that only happened in the mid-sixties. That makes a lot more sense.

I take a long look at the portrait. Like Gloria Barton said at the bookstore, he looks nothing like Uncle Nathan, except for the same look of confidence and authority. Richard is taller, slimmer and sharper featured. His eyes are dark grey, like mine, and he has a small, neat mustache. He's old in the picture, and dressed in a brown, pinstriped suit. He's wearing a ring that I only notice because the stone is one of the few strong colors in the picture, a bright emerald green.

I'm not really surprised to see his portrait hanging here. At one time or another the Wilderwoods have been the benefactors of so many public and private institutions in and around the town there are statues, busts and paintings all over.

I walk across to the alcove on the other side of the reception area to look at the other painting. This one is of a thin, elderly man in a grey suit. He's sitting down, with the suggestion of a desk behind him and a cigarette in his hand. Seems like a mixed message in a place that deals with addictions but he does look like he smoked about a hundred a day.

I look at the plaque underneath.

DR. ERIC NEWLEY. 1898 -- 1961.

If he ran this place for thirty years he would have been almost the same age as Dr. Reinmar is now when he became director. I wonder if any of the old dudes think of that when they're bitching about her? I'm betting they don't.

I am curious though. I don't believe the stories, but even I wonder how she did get to be the director of this place at her age. So I take out my phone and do a quick search -- though I have to think for a moment to remember that her first name is Renate -- and get a bunch of results. All of them are about the Newley Institute -- gossip and rumors about celebrity patients - and most only mention her in passing as the director. A few do include a picture, but it's obvious that's only because she's an ice cool blonde.

The search also throws up a few links to Trowley's stuff but I know that already. Dr. Reinmar is a reptillian, a mind control expert for the CIA, the next generation of a eugenics program the Nazis have been running since World War 2...

Then there's one article that I find in one of the really sleazy gossip blogs, which mentions her in the middle of an article about... something. I forget what the actual article is about almost instantly when I read this...

'...and the sexy blonde's appointment to the Institute raised some eyebrows. Almost as many as were raised by an article the doc had written some months earlier for one of the most prestigious journals of the psychiatric profession, on the subject of genetic sexual attraction...'

I look that up. I know what it's going to say, but I look it up anyway.

'...a concept in which a strong sexual attraction may develop between close blood relatives...'

Oh. Fuck.

He can't know. It's my first thought. Dr. Reinmar is the director of this place and it was our great-uncle that got her the job. Only that was a year ago. Emma hadn't even gone to college yet and we were barely talking to each other, like all through high school. He can't know about us. We didn't know about us then. There was no 'us' then.