It was with pleasure that I thought I heard footsteps on my office stairs. Normally I’d dismiss such sounds as self-delusion — so few clients ever arrive without an appointment. And then there was the rain. I mean... could I really be hearing footfalls among the plops of those endless raindrops?
As it turned out, I could. There was a knock at my door. Even the most savage rain doesn’t do that. I dashed to respond. The last thing I wanted was for a prospective client to dissolve away.
The last thing I expected was to open the door and recognize the prospective client. My repeat clients always call, make appointments, even summon me to come to them. But then again, this prospective repeat client was not a normal kinda guy.
“LeBron,” I said. “Come in. Get out of the wet.”
I stood back but he didn’t cross the threshold. At first I thought he was being contrary, but then I saw it was hard for him to move at all. One arm hung loose at his side. His clothes were torn. He was standing askew.
“LeBron, what’s wrong?”
Faintly he said something. When I leaned forward and asked him to repeat it he said, “It’s Wolfgang now.”
It took awhile, but eventually I sat him in my Client’s Chair. He groaned with each step. I sat on my desk facing him. “How badly are you hurt?”
He didn’t respond.
“How badly are you hurt, Wolfgang? Should I call an ambulance?”
“We heal quickly.”
I didn’t like the way he held himself in my chair. I didn’t like the sound of his breathing. I didn’t like the sight of blood dripping onto my floor. I picked up the phone.
“No.”
“Yes.”
He passed out. I dialed 911.
2.
St. Riley’s emergency department was full, which surprised me. Ice and snow produce broken bones, but rain? What were they all here for? Near-drownings? Mold?
Whatever the answer, the emergency crew jumped Wolfgang to the head of the line. “So what happened to your friend?” asked the nurse when I followed him to a cubicle.
“I have no idea.”
“What’s his name?”
“Wolfgang.”
“Wolfgang,” the nurse said. “Interesting.” She turned to him. “Wolfgang, my name is Matty. Can you hear me?”
He made a sound. I couldn’t make out, like, a word, but Nurse Matty seemed happy with the noise itself. She turned back to me. “Has he lost consciousness since it happened?”
“He passed out when he arrived at my office, just before I called nine-one-one. Before that I don’t know.”
“How long ago did this happen?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know much, do you?”
“No, ma’am, I don’t.”
“Did you do this to him?”
“No.”
“You know that, do you?”
“He came to where I live, dragged himself up a flight of stairs, and knocked at my door. That was about...” I looked at my watch. “Fifty-seven minutes ago, when I called nine-one-one. I don’t know what happened before he got to me, where it happened, when it happened, or how he got to my place.”
“He’s... your boyfriend?”
“He’s not a friend of any description. Two months ago he hired me to do a job for him. I haven’t seen or spoken with him since.”
“That was September?”
“Yes. I finished the job for him in a day.”
“You’re not a plumber by any chance?”
“No. Sorry.”
She sighed. “So, why did he come to you?”
“Once you and your colleagues put Wolfgang Dumpty back together again, maybe he’ll tell me.”
“That’s his last name? Dumpty?”
“I have no idea what his last name is. When I worked for him he called himself ‘LeBron James.’ If he’s ‘Wolfgang’ now, chances are that the rest of his handle is Mozart. He has an interest in prodigies.”
“What’s all that supposed to mean?”
“He changes his name sometimes.”
“He changes his name?” She looked from me to him and back again. “Why?”
“I’d rather he told you himself.”
“Is he crazy? Is that it?”
“Personally, I think he’s unusually sane. But he does have some quirks.”
“You’re not helping me here.”
“I’m helping you as much as I can.”
“Does he have medical insurance? Wait, let me guess. You don’t know.”
“I can probably remember his address.”
“But he was rich enough to hire you for a day in September?”
“Yes.”
“Are you cheap?”
“I’m fabulously expensive and worth every penny.”
“A doctor will be here in a minute. I’m going to check his pockets now. They might have some ID that will help.”
She checked his pockets. They were empty. Which surprised me, because when he came to my office in September he was carrying a lot of cash. So maybe he’d been robbed.
“Go tell them what you can at the desk,” she said.
“And will you let me know when you find out what’s wrong with him?”
“You’re waiting around?”
“Yeah.”
“Even though you’re not a friend?”
“I give good customer aftercare.”
She made a face at me.
I left to deliver a second batch of “I don’t knows” at the reception desk.
3.
I expected to be left to my own devices in the waiting room for a long time but Nurse Matty came to get me less than a quarter of an hour after I picked a seat.
“You are still here.”
“Didn’t you expect me to be?”
“Not after we found your friend — no, your non-friend — has stab wounds.”
“That’s not nice.”
“No, it’s not.”
“And you thought I was the stabber and had made a run for it.”
“Look, can you come with me and go through what you know with our head of security?”
“While you wait for the cops to come and have me go through what I know with them?”
“Or hunt you down like a stray dog if you don’t stay. Your call,” she said with a bit of a smile.
“Why don’t you tell me something about Wolfgang’s prognosis.”
“The doctor found two wounds in his belly before I came to look for you. Neither looked deep or in a vital place, but they’ll take him up to an operating theater in a few minutes to make sure.”
“And has he said anything about what happened or who did it?”
“He’s been mumbling things. Maybe an old friend like you will be able to understand him better than I can.”
I followed Matty into the treatment labyrinth. I wasn’t sure what to tell the security people — or the cops. When I knew him, Wolfgang’s fickleness about names wasn’t his main peculiarity. That honor fell to his insistence that his father was an extraterrestrial.
But with me he behaved rationally and paid cash. By no means all the terrestrials I deal with do either.
The security guy was a woman who was taller, younger, and arguably more muscular than I am. She waited for me at the foot of Wolfgang’s bed, but as I was about to introduce myself, the patient spotted me and tried to sit up.
He said, “Albert.”
It was quiet but clear enough for Nurse Matty to ask, “Is that you?”
I nodded and went closer to his head.
“Four of them,” he whispered.
“Who were they?”
What he’d already said seemed to have left him exhausted. But then he made one last effort and said what sounded like “Terrorists...”