Chapter 17

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An elderly man looked down at Earl. “Are you all right?”

“How do you think I am?” Earl tried to prop himself up on an elbow. He flailed, feeling for all the world like a turtle on its back.

“Do you need a pencil to bite on?”

Earl gave the man a look. “Now, why would I need that?”

“When you have a seizure, you’re supposed to—”

“I am not having a seizure!” Earl flailed harder, hoping the man would take the hint and help him up.

“Someone just tried to kill me! You were right here; didn’t you see it?”

The man shook his head. “I can get the nurse if you want.”

“Can’t you just help me up into that chair there—?”

“But that’s a wheelchair.”

Earl grunted. “I was pushed out of it when someone threw a knife at me.”

“If you’re hallucinating, I should probably get you a nurse.” The man left him.

“No! Wait!” Earl reached out, but the man had disappeared into the crowd. There was a massive huddle of people blocking his vision. All standing there, shuffling in place, looking at him, afraid to get involved with the man they assumed was having a seizure. Earl reached out his hand. “Could someone please help me back into my wheelchair?”

Nobody moved. Grunting, Earl rocked himself until he managed to flip onto his stomach. He dragged himself toward his overturned wheelchair, one big wheel in the air.

He finally got a grip on the chair, tried to figure out how to get it upright and how to get himself into it from the floor. He was not exactly well practiced in this particular act.

Finally someone in the huddle came forward. “Here, let me help with that.” The woman grabbed the chair and tipped it back upright. She leaned forward and gripped Earl by his armpits. Aside from his being ticklish, he was also mortified at the thought of a woman rescuing him. He was relieved when the woman called over a couple of men, who came and helped lift Earl and deposit him in the chair.

“There,” the woman said. “Feeling better?” She inspected him for some head injury.

“I was not having a seizure!” Earl wiped a hand across his forehead.

“No one said you did.”

“Well, that other man, he—” Earl let it drop. He looked over at the huddle at the door. Some still watching, others starting to leave. He was a little surprised to notice that, even as they drifted back to their activities—their jigsaw puzzles and their crossword books and their cards and their billiards—they were still between him and the exit. He called out, “Did anyone see anything?” A few looked at him, but nobody answered.

Earl looked at the big glass doors in front of him and then back at the big doorway into the complex. The entire room was between him and the exit. The would-be killer had to have been an excellent knife thrower to successfully throw it through a room full of bustling people and find its way to the wall. Earl turned to the woman. “Did you happen to see it?”

“Well, we didn’t see you until after you fell. If you need a witness for a lawsuit—”

“No, no, no—someone threw a knife across the room. Did you see him?”

The woman looked at him doubtfully. “I thought you said you had a seizure.”

“No, I did not have a seizure!” Earl pointed at the man standing there. “You had to have seen it. Either it was thrown from all the way over there—at the risk of some bystander walking into it—or the knife thrower had to come right into the middle of the room.”

The man and the woman exchanged looks. The man shrugged. The woman said, “There are a lot of people here all the time.”

“I would think he would be kind of conspicuous.” Earl stopped. “I’d think the big knife he brought in with him might have been a big giveaway.”

“Is this it?” Another man walked up, holding the knife in his hands.

Earl growled, “What are you doing? Don’t touch it!”

The man’s eyes went wide, and he quickly handed it off to the second man. The second man panicked and handed it off to the woman.

Earl goggled. “No, no, no! You’ve gotten your hands all—”

“I’ll fix it!” The first man snatched the knife back from the woman and, using his shirttail, wiped the handle clean. He handed it to Earl. “Good as new.”

Earl was unable to reply.

Just as the three split up and went back to their business, Jenny and Conroy returned. Jenny came and hugged Earl. “Are you okay?”

Earl grunted. “Just need to collect myself.” He looked at Conroy. “I take it you didn’t catch him?”

Conroy was still trying to catch his breath. “No, he got away clean.” He pointed at the knife in Earl’s hands. “I shouldn’t have pulled it out of the wall like that, but I was so shocked. Maybe there are still—”

“Trust me, there are no prints on this knife.” He looked at Jenny. “You didn’t see anybody either?”

She shook her head. “What do you think happened? Could it have been some sort of prank?”

Earl shook his head. “No. That was no prank.”

“But where could he have gone?”

Conroy nodded, thinking. “Whoever it was didn’t wait around. He would have gone to the nearest exit.”

Jenny said, “He could have hidden somewhere.” She nodded at Earl. “Like we did.”

Conroy’s ears perked up. “Like you did? When? What did you do?”

Earl waved it off. “Never mind that now.”

Conroy said, “Earl, you’ve been asking a lot of questions these past few days. Pushing a lot of people around. This is a closed community—everyone talks.”

“You’re saying this was because I was being nosy? Seems kind of extreme.”

“Not for someone trying to hide a secret.”

“All the same, it’s not like I’m the sheriff or anything.”

“But,” Jenny said, “maybe someone was afraid you would find something and then go to the sheriff.”

“It isn’t even necessarily someone you talked to,” Conroy added. “Like I said, everyone here talks. It could be that you talked to someone, and they talked to someone else about it, and that second person—”

“So, you’re saying that it could be anyone at Candlewick.”

Earl waved a hand around the room. “It could be anyone in this room now.”

Conroy and Jenny looked around. Conroy nodded. “Scary as it seems, yes. It could. You need to be careful. Maybe even drop this whole thing.”

Earl frowned. “What I don’t get is why nobody saw anything.”

“Maybe everyone was busy. All he had to do was walk by, throw the knife, and keep going.”

“Even one of your Vegas entertainers wouldn’t be able to make that kind of shot. Look at the distance.”

“But an expert knife thrower—”

“Then add the ridiculousness of it being an expert knife thrower who tried to kill me. I am hardly a threat to the Vegas entertainment industry.”

“Um—well, when you put it that way...”

“No, whoever it was had to have come to at least the middle of the room. Had to have passed right by people to come in, had to have run past them again to get out. If he left at all.”

“So you really think he’s still here somewhere nearby?”

“He has to be.”

“Then we better get you out of here.”

As they wheeled him through the hall, Earl nervously took stock of every person they passed. He watched for any sudden movements.

You’re getting paranoid, Earl, he told himself. Then what was that knife back there? Did you imagine that?

Jenny said, “Do you want to call anybody?”

Earl asked, “Who do you suggest?”

“I don’t know. Emergency people.”

“Seems to me that the emergency has passed.”

Conroy said, “Any family we should call?”

“No.” Earl did not elaborate.

Jenny whispered, “He doesn’t have any family.”

Conroy said, “I’m sorry to hear that. I don’t know what I would do without my family.” Then he stopped. “Oh, sorry. I didn’t mean to sound like I was rubbing it in.”

Earl waved it away. “What do you know about George Kent’s family?”

“I don’t think he had any. I mean, we were friends all the way back to when we were kids. As far as I know, he doesn’t have anybody.”

They reached Earl’s apartment. “Well, I guess I’m home now.”

He held out a hand to Conroy. “Thanks for your help.”

After Conroy went away, Jenny helped Earl into his apartment. They weren’t there long before there was an insistent pounding on the door.

It was Gloria. “Oh! Blue eyes, are you okay?”

“Um. Yes.”

“Did you call the doctor yet?”

“Where did you come from? I thought you were working.”

“As soon as I heard about your seizure—”

“It was not a seizure!”

Suddenly a woman and a man, both in white, appeared at the door. “Is the patient in here?”

Earl growled, “I’m fine! Go away!”

“Sir, if you had a seizure, we need to—”

Earl tried to regain his composure “Look. My friend and I were in the recreation room. He got kind of excited and knocked my chair over. That’s all.”

Jenny started, “But, Mr. Walker—”

Earl cut her off. “I did not have any kind of medical emergency.”

The nurse looked at him doubtfully. “Well—”

“I promise.”

“All right then. But you really should have waited until we got there.”

“I apologize. Since there was no emergency, it never occurred to me there would be any excitement. The next time I do not have an emergency, I’ll be sure to loiter until someone asks whether or not I am dying. Does that sound fair?”

The man frowned. “Huh?”

“You don’t have to be rude, sir,” the woman said. “We just have your health in mind. Be sure to let us know if you do have any trouble.”

“Of course.” After they were gone, Earl closed the door.

Jenny tore into him. “How could you not tell them about the killer?”

Gloria’s eyes widened like dinner plates. “What? Who was killed?”

Jenny said, “Someone just threw a knife at Mr. Walker! It plunged into the wall right next to him!”

Gloria, horrified, reached out to Earl. “That’s so terrible! But who?”

Earl waved a hand. “Stop!”

The women both were silent.

Earl wheeled himself farther into the apartment. The women each took a seat, Jenny on the couch, Gloria in the chair next to it. He looked at Gloria. “I’m glad you came.”

Gloria’s face lit up. “Oh, that’s—”

“I need to ask you a few things about Kent.”

Gloria deflated. “Oh.”

“Everyone hated him. Right?”

Gloria frowned. Looked at Jenny then back at Earl. “That’s the question? I mean, I hate to speak ill of the dead, but it’s hardly a secret he gave everybody a hard time. He was a pushy man.”

“But they hung around him. Gave him money.”

Gloria thought for a second then nodded slowly. “Now that you mention it, I guess I saw it every once in a while. Someone handing him a few dollars. But I thought he was just a bully taking their lunch money.”

“Hey!” Jenny sat up suddenly. “They were buying him off ! He knew their secrets!”

Gloria looked at her uncertainly. “W–what?” She looked at Earl. “What are you saying?”

Earl put his fingers together in a steeple. “I’ve been working at a disadvantage. I’m the outsider. But you know the people. You know Candlewick.”

“O–okay—”

“You might also have an idea who would have secrets around here. Whoever tore up Kent’s apartment was looking for whatever incriminating evidence he had on them. They had to find it before the sheriff showed up—or before his family came and took all his stuff away.”

Jenny said, “But the sheriff never came. And Kent doesn’t have any family.”

“Yes. But the burglar didn’t know that. As it was, the movers almost beat us to it.” Earl scratched the side of his nose. “Of course, Nelson was the one who stopped your boy Caine from calling the sheriff.”

Jenny said, “And since Kent didn’t have any family, there was no one to raise any serious questions about his death.”

Earl said, “And Nelson was the one who called the movers, too.”

Gloria watched the back-and-forth like it was a verbal tennis match. “What questions about whose death? What are y’all talking about?”

Earl looked at her. “Hasn’t anyone come to the office asking about Kent?”

“Well, I’m not there all the time, but now that you mention it, one or two people may have come in. They wanted to know about his estate. I told them that Mr. Nelson was handling George Kent’s will.”

Earl narrowed his eyes at Gloria. “They were asking about his possessions or about his money?”

She thought for a second. “I think his money.”

Jenny frowned. “So they wanted to try and get their money back?”

Earl sat back in his wheelchair, thinking. The two women watched in silence, occasionally trading glances between them. Earl scratched his nose and finally smiled. “I know why Kent had all that money.”

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