Behind Sanity

Chapter Forty-Two

Behind Sanity

Chapter Forty-Two

1

                John had fallen asleep.  He had been sitting with Alice for almost an hour now, and for a while, he had been thinking, but the greater part had been spent sleeping in the wooden chair beside her bed.  It had been many nights since he’d slept well, and now he found himself catching a nap during his work.

                He’d been doing all the researching he could over the past days, searching through files that had not been combed sufficiently from years before, trying to find any more mention of Wonderland and anyone who had any clue what was going on there.  Actually, he had found a few with mention of it, but most were patients talking in their sleep, or patients that would do nothing but babble and speak in riddles.  Nothing the records had to offer made sense.  John had been discouraged, but decided his main focus should be on Alice.  If she stayed collected, then they could figure it out together through her travels.  She stayed gone for days at a time though, and he wasn’t quite sure how much longer he could stand to wait.  Those downstairs were making no progress.

                The sun had long ago sunk below the trees outside the window, the only light in the room coming from a dim lantern Elisa had set inside for when the doctor decided to awake.  She hadn’t wanted to disturb him.  She knew how tired he had been of late.

                Robertson dozed on in the deep night until a light touch on his hand aroused him.  He’d like to pretend he hadn’t jumped or been startled by it, though he was sure he had at least moved in shock.  He opened his eyes to see her lying against the pillow, wide awake.  She smiled warmly when he looked at her, probably for the surprised look on his face.

                “Back so soon?” he asked her, taking his glasses off to wipe them and his eyes.

                “Plans were delayed,” she said.  “I was in the woods, but then I had to leave.”

                “The rumbling again?”

                She nodded her weary head, not bothering to sit up.

                “Yes, but I’ve gotten a new devotee who will tell me where the Hatter’s planning his march.   That’s one more obstacle I’ll conquer, and then the fight with the Queen will be nigh,” she said.

                “Curious,” he noted. “Why do you not say the Queen’s defeat will be nigh?”

                “Promise only what you’re prepared to deliver,” she said simply. “I am destined to battle the Red Queen.  The outcome is uncertain.”

                “I see,” he nodded, placing his glasses back on his nose.

                “I just want to make sure Morgan is out before…  Oh, I wanted to ask you something,” she said, stopping in mid-thought. “Is there an asylum record for Victor Purric when he was very young?”

                “Actually, the patient was admitted to the hospital several times when he was younger.  He’d always been a bit on the sickly side.  Not that he was in the asylum, that is.  There were always headaches and seizures and the like.  After he was about ten, he got a bit better – until once again when he found himself back here with a proclaimed mental illness.  Complicated record, that…  Why do you ask?”