Chapter 1.
“Have you ever lay in bed in the morning and tried to remember a dream, but find it’s just out of reach?” Still in her hospital bed, Ettie raised a stretched-out hand in the air. “You lie there and when you almost remember, it’s gone.” Ettie coughed, and her lungs wheezed. She did her best to take a deep breath. “Although you can’t recall the events of the dream, you can feel the essence.” She turned her head toward her schweschder Elsa-May, who sat in the chair by her bed.
“Are you sure you’re alright, Ettie? You’re not making sense, and you shouldn’t talk so much.” Elsa-May stood and poured her a glass of water. “Here, have some of this.”
Ettie dug her hands into the hard bed and pushed herself up further. After she had taken a sip of water, she handed the glass back to Elsa-May. “I’m okay. It’s just that I thought I had a dream and when I woke up and tried to recall it, I knew that it wasn’t a dream at all.”
Elsa-May placed the glass back on the cupboard and sat down. “Should I call the doctor? I’m worried about you.”
“It’s not me you should be worried about; remember Judith in the next bed?”
Elsa-May half stood and peered over Ettie to the only other bed in the room. “Where is she?”
“They told her yesterday that she’d be going home today and this morning she’s dead.”
“Ach.” Elsa-May trembled and took a deep breath. “At our age we expect that Gott could take us home at any time. You close your eyes and rest for a moment. They’ll be bringing the breakfast around soon enough.”
Ettie relaxed her head into the pillows. She had woken up that morning with the familiar lurch in her stomach when she realized she was still in the hospital. Her desire to leave the place grew with each passing day. I knew I should never have come to this place, she thought as the stench of antiseptic invaded her nostrils.
Scenes from before Judith died swirled in Ettie’s head. When she’d woken that morning, she had glanced over at Judith to see she was still asleep. She had drawn comfort from the knowledge that her new friend Judith had the all-clear to go home. Ettie remembered Judith’s smile after the doctor had told her the good news of being released; hopefully, she’d hear similar news for herself. Earlier that morning, Ettie’s attention had been drawn to the doorway as a nurse entered.
“Good morning, Ettie. How are you?”
It seemed silly to Ettie that people asked how she was all the time; after all she was in the hospital. “Still sick it appears otherwise I wouldn’t be here.”
The nurse had smiled and the she’d glanced at the still sleeping Judith. Her smile turned into a frown as she moved closer. “Breakfast will be soon, Judith.” With her hand on Judith’s shoulder, the nurse had whispered, “Judith, would you like some breakfast?”
Ettie had grown concerned when she saw the nurse check Judith’s pulse. When the nurse hurried from the room, Ettie’s suspicions were confirmed—Judith was dead.
Minutes after that, the nurse had returned with a doctor who made a thorough examination. He looked across at Ettie, then whispered something to the nurse who promptly drew the curtain between the two beds, blocking Ettie’s view.
After a minute, the doctor then strode past Ettie’s bed and out through the door. When the nurse followed, Ettie had asked her, “Is she dead?”
“I’m sorry. I’m afraid so.” Moving closer to her bed, the nurse stared into Ettie’s face. “Can I get you anything?”
“Yes, an explanation. Judith was told she could leave the hospital this morning.”
The nurse had averted her eyes and hurried out of the room without providing an answer. Ettie had leaned forward and seeing no one nearby she got out of bed to have a closer look at Judith.
Judith had looked peaceful as though she were asleep. Ettie pulled the sheet down and noticed a small puncture mark on her neck. It was then that Ettie remembered the nurse hovering over Judith’s head in the dead of the night. From what Ettie could tell, the nurse had given Judith an injection.
In the dark it had been hard to see which nurse it was. Ettie thought it unusual but had drifted back to sleep. Shaking her head, Ettie hurried back to bed. The orderlies wheeled in a bed and behind the closed curtain, Ettie heard the sounds of them lifting Judith’s body onto the other bed, then they wheeled her away.
Ettie’s mind drifted from the early morning events to the present moment when Elsa-May booming voice sounded in her ears. “So what’s all this about?”
“She died when they said she could go home. At first, I thought it was a dream, and now I know it wasn’t.” The more Ettie thought about it, the more she realized that it was a recollection and not a dream. “A nurse gave Judith an injection. I assumed it was something relating to her condition, but now that I think about it, she never had an injection while she was here. I know because we discussed how we both disliked needles. She only had pills and her blood pressure watched.”
“That is a little odd. Anything else?”
“Not yet, except for the puncture wound on her neck. I checked her quickly before they took her away.”
“So someone gave her an injection?” Elsa-May asked.
“Jah.”
Emma, a dear friend of Ettie and Elsa-May’s, appeared in the doorway and hurried to Ettie’s side. “Ettie, things seem to be rather tense amongst the staff in this ward. Is everything okay?”
“I’m fine.” Ettie’s voice was monotone.
Emma sat on the bed after she glanced at Elsa-May who was unusually quiet. “I’ve known you two long enough to know when you’re keeping something from me.”
Ettie glanced at Elsa-May and exhaled deeply. “The woman sharing the room with me died this morning.”
Emma’s hand rose to rest against her lips. “That’s awful, the nice lady in the next bed?”
“Jah, she was nice.” Ettie nodded, and her eyes drifted to Judith’s side of the room.
“But that’s not unusual is it?” Emma asked.
Elsa-May said, “Ettie thinks that it is unusual.”
Emma frowned. “What do you mean? Wasn’t she ill?”
“She was here to have her blood pressure monitored. She wasn’t here for any life threatening condition, and her blood pressure was not that bad. She told Ettie that. That’s why Ettie is so upset,” Elsa-May said.
Emma looked from Elsa-May back to Ettie. “Do they know how it happened?”
“I know,” Ettie replied, her jaw flexing. “I woke last night and saw a nurse give Judith an injection.”
“I would imagine that happens a lot here; it is a hospital,” Emma said.
Ettie shook her head. “She wasn’t receiving any medication apart from pills and I know that for an absolute fact. I am certain it was the injection that caused it and that it was intended.”
Emma stared at Ettie and Elsa-May for moments. “Ettie, do you realize what you are saying?” Emma shook her head. “Maybe it was simply something you were unaware of. What if she was in pain or asked for something to help her sleep?”
Ettie pursed her lips. “They would have given her a sleeping pill if she couldn’t sleep, and she had no actual pain with her condition. I asked if she had any pain and she told me that sometimes her face burned, and she got dizzy when her blood pressure became too high. She never complained of any pain. I’m right, and I will stay here and find out what happened.” Ettie folded her arms across her chest and looked straight ahead.
“What are you thinking?” Emma replied in a high-pitched voice. Lowering back down to just above a whisper, she continued, “If you are right, then you could be in danger.”
“If I’m right, think of the others who could be in danger.” Ettie pressed her lips together. “I could not live with myself if I left and others were to fall victim to whatever is going on here.” Reaching out, Ettie took hold of Elsa-May’s hand; she looked at her schweschder with pleading eyes. “I need to do this, Elsa-May. You’ll let me stay in here, won’t you?”
Elsa-May patted Ettie’s hand. “If the doctor says you’re okay to leave then you must go. They don’t like people taking up the beds for no good reason.”
Ettie looked up at the ceiling “Yesterday, I asked the doctor if I could go home as soon as possible. I will say I have no one to look after me at home, and I need to stay until I’m fit and well.”
Meeting her sister’s gaze, Elsa-May gave a soft nod of her head. “If the doctor says you can stay it’ll be fine with me.”
Emma said, “Did Judith have any enemies? What possible reason would someone have to want her dead?”
Ettie put a hand in the air and said, “I know none of that yet. I know that something is not right, I can feel it.”
Emma looked between the two elderly ladies once again. “Suppose there is something wrong; what could you do?”
Elsa-May leaned forward in her chair and said, “The same as we always do, Emma.”
