The Linen Cart’s Route

In the autumn of 1978, I was a housekeeper at St. Anne’s Hospital, a sprawling red-brick complex that had once been a tuberculosis sanatorium. The building had that institutional smell of disinfectant and old paper, and its corridors were lined with peeling linoleum that always felt cold, even in summer. My husband, Mark, worked sporadic shifts at a warehouse, so my paycheck was the only steady thing we had. We’d moved to a cramped apartment in the town of Ashford after our previous place had made us uneasy—doors opening on their own, whispers in the vents—but this new flat was just as drafty, and the janitor there had a habit of humming the same tune every time he passed our door.

My job at St. Anne’s was simple: I pushed a heavy linen cart from room to room, collecting soiled sheets and leaving fresh ones. The cart had a squeaky wheel that made a rhythmic ‘uh-uh’ sound as I moved, and in the quiet hours of the night shift, that sound echoed down the halls like a heartbeat. I worked the 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. shift, and I got to know the rhythms of the hospital, the flickering fluorescent lights, the nurses who nodded as they passed, the patients who slept or moaned in their rooms.

But there was one place I dreaded: the basement. The elevators were old and unreliable, and the basement hallway was where the laundry chute opened. It was a gaping metal mouth that swallowed our bundles of linen, and the only light was a single bulb that swung slightly, casting dancing shadows on the grimy walls. The basement also housed the old boiler room, which thrummed with a constant low growl, and the morgue, which I never had to enter, but whose door was always ajar, leaking a chilling draft.

One night, about a month into my job, I found something in the bottom of the laundry chute. I had just dropped a load of sheets down and heard a muffled thud, not the usual soft fall. Against my better judgment, I propped the chute’s access door open and peered into the darkness. There, crumpled in the bin, was a photograph. It was wet with some dark liquid, but I could make out a face—a woman with hollow eyes and a slack jaw, her skin mottled. I knew I shouldn’t have touched it, but I picked it up with my gloved hand and turned it over. On the back was written, ‘She will come for the linen.’ I shoved it into the pocket of my uniform and hurried back upstairs, my heart beating faster than the squeak of my cart.

I couldn’t shake the image. The photo was like a splinter in my mind. The next night, I mentioned it to one of the nurses, an older woman named Doris who had worked at St. Anne’s for decades. She went pale as a ghost and whispered, ‘You found that picture? That’s the one they keep finding. It’s been happening since the 60s. There’s a story—that a patient died in the basement, right near the laundry chute. They say she was a seamstress who used to mend the linens. She had a daughter who got sick and died, and she went mad, climbed into the chute and fell all the way to the bottom. They never found her body, but sometimes they find that photo, like it’s been left for someone.’ Doris crossed herself and said, ‘Just ignore it. She wants you to acknowledge her.’

I tried to ignore it, but the next night, my cart got stuck. I was on the third floor, and the wheel jammed. I bent down to inspect it and saw that the obstruction was a piece of cloth—a torn strip of fabric, soaked through with something dark. Before I could touch it, a cold hand closed over my ankle. I screamed and yanked my foot away, spinning around, but there was no one there. The strip of cloth was gone. My cart rolled freely again, as if nothing had happened.

The following day, I couldn’t stop thinking about the hand. I started to take a different route to avoid the basement, but one night, I accidentally pressed the elevator button for the wrong floor, and the doors opened onto the basement level. The hallway was darker than usual, and the single bulb at the end was buzzing. I stepped out to see if I could find a storage room, but the light flickered and went out. I pulled out my flashlight and aimed it down the corridor. At the far end, I saw the silhouette of a woman—tall, gaunt, with long hair that hung like a curtain. She was standing by the laundry chute, holding a bundle in her arms. She turned her head slowly to face me, and in the beam of my flashlight, I saw her face—it was the same face from the photograph, the same hollow eyes, the same slack jaw. She seemed to smile, but it was more a baring of teeth.

She took a step towards me, and I fled. I ran up the stairs, two at a time, not daring to look back. When I reached the ground floor, I felt a cold breath on the back of my neck, and a voice whispered, ‘Bring me the linen.’ I didn’t stop running until I was out of the hospital, in the parking lot, leaning against my car, gasping for air.

I wanted to quit, but Mark and I needed the money. So I went back the next night, carrying a small talisman from my grandmother, and I tried to stay away from the basement. But the hospital seemed to conspire against me. The elevator would open on basement level by itself. The laundry chute would rattle even when not in use. And whenever I passed a room, I would see a flash of that face in the window.

One night, I was alone on the fourth floor, which was closed for renovation—empty rooms with stripped beds, dust sheets on the furniture. I was collecting the last of the linens from the nurse’s station, when I heard the squeak of a cart behind me. I turned, and there was a cart identical to mine, but in it, there was no linen—only her. The woman was lying in the cart, face up, her eyes open and fixed on me. She stretched out a bony hand and pointed to a pile of dirty sheets on the floor. ‘Take them,’ she mouthed. ‘Take them to the chute.’

I felt a coldness seep into my bones, and I knew that if I refused, something terrible would happen. So I picked up the sheets, which seemed heavier than they should be, and they were stained with something warm and wet. I walked to the laundry chute, the cart following me without my pushing it. When I opened the chute’s access door, I heard a voice from below: ‘Drop them.’ I did. The sheets slid down, and there was a wet thud. Then silence.

I staggered back to the nurse’s station and collapsed into a chair. Doris found me there, shivering. She looked at me with pity. ‘It’s too late,’ she said. ‘She’s marked you. She needs someone to take over her job, to watch the linens. It’s not a job you can resign from.’

I didn’t believe her then. I finished my shift and went home. But when I unlocked the door to my apartment, I saw that the hallway mirror was cracked, and on the floor was a photograph—my own photograph, taken without my knowledge, with my eyes black and my mouth open in a silent scream. And written on the back in that same wet handwriting: ‘Your shift begins now.’

I haven’t been back to St. Anne’s since. But every night, at 11 p.m., I feel a tug at the sleeve of my nightgown, and I hear that squeak of a cart, coming closer. And sometimes, in the corner of my eye, I see a pale figure standing by my bedroom door, holding a bundle of linen, waiting for me to take it.