Lisa Gardner - Hide

I had read about the Boston State Mental Hospital site online. I knew it started as the Boston Lunatic Hospital in 1839, before becoming the Boston State Hospital in 1908. Originally, the compound had housed a few hundred patients and operated more like a self-sustaining farm than a role model for One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest .

By 1950, however, the patient population had ballooned to over three thousand patients, with the compound adding two maximum-security buildings and an enormous wrought-iron security fence. Not such a tranquil place anymore. When deinstitutionalization finally closed the hospital in 1980, the community was grateful.

I expected to feel an eerie chill as I entered the grounds, maybe goose bumps rippling down my arms as I sensed the presence of a lingering evil. I would gaze upon some spookily Gothic structure, like the abandoned Danvers mental hospital that still towers over I-95, spotting-just for an instant-a pale, haunted face peering from a shattered window

Actually, from this vantage point, I didn't see the two remaining buildings at all. Instead, I gazed upon a thicket of snarled bushes, capped by an enormous hundred-year-old oak tree. When Sergeant Warren followed a narrow trail through the shrubs, we entered a yawning expanse of drying marsh grass that winked gold and silver in the rippling wind. The view was lovely, more of a nature hike than an impending crime scene.

The ground firmed up. A clearing appeared on our right. I saw what appeared to be some sort of refuse pile. Warren halted abruptly, gestured toward the overgrown heap of debris.

"Botanist started poking through that," she commented to Dodge. "Found the remains of a metal shelving unit similar to what we saw in the chamber. Sounds like the hospital had a lot of those kinds of shelves. I've got an officer combing through archive photos now."

"You think the supplies came from the hospital itself?" Detective Dodge asked sharply.

"Don't know, but the clear plastic bags… word is, they were commonly used in government institutions in the seventies."

Sergeant Warren started walking again, Detective Dodge falling in step behind her. I brought up the rear, puzzling through their exchange.

Suddenly, we passed through another copse of trees, burst into a clearing, and a brilliant blue awning rose up before me.

For the first time, I paused. Was it my imagination, or did it seem quieter here? No birds chirping, leaves rustling, or squirrels squawking. I couldn't feel the light wind anymore. Everything seemed frozen, waiting.

Sergeant Warren marched ahead, her movements determined. She didn't want to be here, I realized. And that started to unnerve me. What kind of crime scene scared even the cops?

Underneath the blue awning were two large plastic bins. Warren removed the gray lids, revealing white coveralls made of a thin, papery fabric. I recognized the Tyvek suits from all the true-crime shows on Court TV.

"While technically the scientists have already processed the scene, we want to keep it as clean as possible," she said by way of explanation, handing me a suit, then one to Detective Dodge. "This kind of situation… you never know what new experts might step forward with something to offer, so we want to be prepared."

She stepped into her own coveralls briskly I couldn't figure out what were the arms and what were the legs. Detective Dodge had to help me. They moved on to shoe coverings, then hairnettings. By the time I got it all figured out, they'd been waiting for what felt like hours, and my cheeks burned with embarrassment.

Warren led the way to the back of the awning. She stopped at the edge of a hole in the ground. I couldn't see anything; the depths were pitch-black.

She turned to me, blue gaze cool and assessing.

"You understand you cannot share what you see below," she stated crisply "Can't talk about it to your neighbor, your coworker, your hairdresser. This is strictly on the QT."

"Yes."

"You may not take any pictures, sketch any diagrams."

"I know."

"Also, by virtue of visiting this scene, you may be called to testify at trial. Your name now appears in the crime-scene logbook, which makes you fair game for questioning by both the prosecution and the defense."

"Okay," I said, though I hadn't really thought of that. A trial? Questioning? I decided to worry about that later.

"And in return for this tour , you agree to accompany us to Arizona tomorrow morning. You will meet with Catherine Gagnon. You will answer our questions to the best of your ability."

"Yes, I agree," I stated, sharply now. I was getting impatient- and more nervous-the longer we stood there.

Sergeant Warren pulled out a flashlight. "I'll go first," she said, "flip on the lights. When you see that, you'll know it's your turn to descend."

She gave me a last measuring look. I returned it, though I knew my gaze wasn't as unwavering as hers. I had been wrong about Sergeant Warren. Had we met in a sparring ring, no way would I have dropped her. I might be younger, quicker, physically stronger. But she was tough. Down to the core, willfully-descend-into-a-pitch-black-mass-grave tough.

My father would have loved her.

The top of Warren's head disappeared below. A second later, the opening burst into a pale glow.

"Last chance," Detective Dodge murmured in my ear.

I reached for the top of the ladder. Then I just didn't let myself think anymore.

FIRST THING THAT struck me was the temperature. It felt warmer belowground than above. The earthen walls offered protection from the wind and insulation against the late-fall chill.

Second thought-I could stand up straight. In fact, I could swing my arms, walk forward, sideways, backward. I had expected to be hunched over, claustrophobic. Instead, the chamber was positively roomy, even as Detective Dodge joined us in the gloom.

My eyes adjusted, sorting out the quilt of dark shadows intermingled with bright spotlights. I moved to a wall, touched the lightly grooved side, felt hard-packed dirt.

"I don't understand," I said at last. "There's no way one man hand-dug a space this big. You're talking backhoe, heavy machinery. How can that be going on and no one notice?"

Sergeant Warren surprised me by doing the honors: "We think it started out as part of another construction project. Maybe a culvert for drainage, or just a pit where they harvested fill for another area. In the late forties, early fifties, the facility was racing to erect enough buildings to keep pace with the increasing patient population. You can find half-started foundations, supply dumps, all sorts of stuff all over the property."

"So this pit was once part of something official?"

"Maybe." She shrugged. "Not a lot of people around from those days anymore to ask. You're talking fifty years."

I put my hand up, felt the wooden ceiling, moved forward, touched the support beams. "But he did all this? Converted it, so to speak?"

"That's our guess."

"Must've taken him time."

No one argued.

"Expense," I continued, thinking out loud. "Wood, nails, hammer. Effort. Would one of the mental patients really be that organized, have access to leave and reenter the grounds like that?"

D.D. shrugged again. "Everything here could've been harvested from the construction dumps on the property. So far, I've seen everything from cement dust to tiles to window frames."

I grimaced at that. "No windows down here."

"No, not for what he had in mind."

I repressed a shiver, walked to the far wall. "When do you think he started?"

"Don't know. There was about thirty years of plant growth over the plywood, so that puts us in the seventies. The hospital was dying by then, the property more abandoned than used. That makes some sense."