“I’ve seen it happen—folks believing they have some enemy, someone out to get them.” A hint of maternal concern flickered over her features.

“Come, I’ll show you.” I shoved a hand into my apron pocket. “You’ll know the handwriting, I assume, if you know the staff here as you say.”

With a tightening frown, she waited as I pulled out the tri-folded paper with lines of music on it. There, I wasn’t imagining things. Wasn’t dreaming it all. I flipped it open with trembling hands, but there was no writing. No scrawled note. I blinked, turned it over and back again.

Branson lifted her eyebrows.

“I . . . I must have . . . it was dark. Very dark.” I couldn’t swallow. I folded it up and stuffed the paper back into my apron pocket.

Branson leaned near and looked me full in the face, getting a read. “As I’ve said, you’re long overdue for some rest, Miss Fletcher.”

“I just need to go home.” My skin was cold with perspiration. I turned and took long, decisive strides away from her, but she caught up and held my arm, guiding me back downstairs in her no-nonsense way. At the row of offices on the main floor, she knocked on one and urged me in. “Here she is, Doctor. She won’t rest, though.”

“Very well, send her in.”

A small clock ticked on the desk, and the man sat, arms crossed over a narrow chest. It was the one who’d set me on slop duty after nearly catching me snooping. He waved me toward a seat. My senses felt unnaturally leaden, much like when I’d taken that tea on my first night. I could barely think.

The tea. Yes! Someone must have slipped the same powder in my food. Or in a drink. Something.

I stiffened against the wall, refusing the proffered chair. A stern glare compelled me, so I complied—and nearly fell over the chair as I came around it.

The doctor’s eyes narrowed.

“Someone must have added . . . you know, a little sleeping powder to my supper,” I said, my mind struggling to form the right words. “I assure you, I’m quite well, just in desperate need of a little rest.”

“I’ve gotten word of your behavior this morning.” The clock continued its ticking as he set his papers down on the neat desk. “We looked into your background today, and it seems you have a history of erratic behavior. Friendships with many men, in and out of positions, drifting about, violent bursts of temper.”

“But that’s absurd. I’ve never—”

“We’ve found a great deal of information on you, Miss Fletcher, and none of it points to sanity.”

I laughed, high and awkward. “Yes, well, here’s the thing. I’m not Cora Fletcher. Whatever you found about her . . . I merely gave the name to avoid using my real one.”