Our Infinite Fates

THROUGH THE SMALL, HIGH window on the asylum wall, Vermont was a single square.

It was an insult, the beauty of it – the bonfire of autumn leaves in red and orange and brown, the yellow-bellied goldfinches bright against the clean blue sky. A postage stamp of exaggerated colour against the peeling wallpaper, once a calming pale green but long since faded to grey. The pipes snaking along the bottom rusted raw, dripping a metallic grunge on to the tiled floor.

And still the birds sang.

As with so many such institutions, Allum had started off admirably enough. A place to heal, to repose, to make new. Burgeoning philosophies and morally sound treatments. Reading, painting, writing, walking, prayer. A grand turreted building surrounded by landscaped gardens and sprawling woods, with a close central core and long annexed wings, giving patients privacy and comfort, sunlight and fresh air.