Nell traced the nameplate. Karl Krupp. She hadn’t imagined it; the name didn’t disappear under her touch like so many other things did. Her fingers, with their swollen knuckles and fragile bones, looked defenseless beside that name. Slowly she let her hand fall back onto the cold metal rim of her walker. He would be how old now? When she had been ten, he had been twenty-five—a fifteen-year difference that would now make him…ninety-five. She glanced at the door to his room. It hadn’t been open since he arrived, and that frustrated her. She wanted to see how badly age had changed him.
She supposed it hadn’t changed him much, since he was in. Household 5. The other residents were reasonably intelligent and ambulatory—except for Sophronia. But the nurses had removed her as soon as her senility became evident. Nell’s own memory lapses and growing tendency to daydream worried her. She wasn’t
sure how much provocation the nurses needed before they moved her to a more restrictive household.
Nell lifted her walker and moved away from the door. She didn’t want Karl to catch her snooping. Her name was different and she certainly didn’t look like the scrawny tomboy he had known, but she didn’t want him to know that she was watching him until she knew exactly what she was going to do.
Karl slouches indolently in the settee. His long legs stretch out before him and cross at the ankles, his left arm is draped across the armrest, and his finely chiseled head rests against the upholstered back. He should not be comfortable, but he clearly is.
Bess sits in the armchair across from him, leaning forward. Wisps of hair frame her flushed face, her eyes sparkle, and her hands—looking naked without Edmund’s ring—nervously toy with her best skirt.
Nell lets the door swing shut. Karl doesn’t turn at the click, but instead says in his deep, rich baritone, “Is that my Nell?”
She freezes, not expecting the well of emotion that voice raises in her. She imagines herself running to him and burying her face in his neck, then pulling back and slapping him with all her strength.
“Nelly, it’s Karl.” Bess can’t quite keep the happiness from her voice.
“I know,” she says, flicking dried mud off her thumb. She is covered with sweat, her glasses are dirty, and her topknot is coming loose. She probably doesn’t even look like a little girl.
“Nelly…”
She hates the nickname almost as much as she hates Bess’s tone. “I’m gonna go wash up.”
“Go around front so you don’t get mud on the floor.”
Nell suppresses a sigh and turns around to let herself out. Just then her father opens the door, bringing with him the scents of tobacco and hair tonic. He ignores his youngest daughter’s appearance and starts to go into the parlor.
“Who owns the fancy Model-T? Is it yours, Edm—?”
He stops just inside the parlor and Nell takes a step forward so that she can see everything. Karl rises quickly and extends his hand. Bess is biting her lower lip, and Papa has flushed a deep scarlet.
“I told you,” he says in his lowest, angriest voice, “never to cross my threshold again.”
“Mr. Richter, things have changed.”
“I don’t care if you’ve become the richest man in the world. You are not welcome here.” Papa’s voice grows even softer. “Now get out.”
“Sir, please—”
“Get. Out. Or must I escort you?”
With one swift, graceful movement, Karl sweeps his hat off the table and places it jauntily on his head. He nods at Bess, steps around Papa, and musses Nell’s hair as he goes out the door.
Papa doesn’t move until he hears the automobile crank up. Then he says tightly to Bess, “You know he’s not allowed to be here.”
“But he’s different. He’s got a new job in Milwaukee, and he’s got prospects, Papa.”
“Fine. Let him find another girl.”
Nell leans back against the door. They have forgotten that she’s there.
“Papa.” Bess rises out of the armchair. In her high-buttoned shoes, she is almost as tall as her father. “Things are better. He promised.”
“Oh? Did he promise he would never hit you again, or did he just talk about money?”
Bess whirls away and looks out the window. “Papa, that’s not fair.”
“No, it’s not fair.” Papa pulls his watch from his pocket, opens it, and then closes it without looking at the face. “But I don’t want him back. After he hit you, I heard Nelly crying herself to sleep every single night.”
Nell’s face grows warm. She thought no one knew.
Papa stuffs his watch back into his pocket and adjusts his waistcoat. “Now, I would like some dinner.”
Nell slips out the front door and heads around the house to the pump. Her body is shaking. She remembers Bess’s swollen and bruised face, but she also remembers the fun they had laughing on the front porch with Karl. Her tears those nights hadn’t been just for Bess. They had also been for those summer afternoons filled with laughter, lemonade, and Karl mussing her hair!
Even though it was difficult, Nell liked to walk. She felt that each slow step added a minute to her life. Without her walker, she would have to use a wheelchair—and the wheelchair was a sign of weakness. Lifting the walker and then taking a step gave her the same sure feel that she used to have after hitting a home run the way Karl had taught her to.
Sometimes she spent the entire day walking up and down the hallways. She got to go outside on those rare occasions when her family visited. They took her out so that they could avoid talking.
Each household was painted a different color. The walls in Household 5 were robin’s egg blue and covered with artwork done” by the residents. Shortly after Karl arrived, a painting of a multicolored spiral had gone up beside his door.
Nell found her gaze drawn to the painting. She pushed her glasses up so that she could study it. The spiral had rungs, like a ladder. At the bottom, instead of a signature, was a notation that tugged at a memory she couldn’t reach: deoxyribose nucleic acid. She read the phrase twice, then saw with a start that Karl’s door was open. Strains of a Chopin etude slipped into the hallway. Intrigued, she leaned closer.
The residents were encouraged to fill their rooms with their personal effects. Most rooms had a television set, a stuffed armchair covered with a quilt, and a cross on prominent display. But Karl’s room was lined with bookcases, and the bookcases
were full. Karl stood near the door, holding a book in his hand.
“It’s the pretty woman from across the hall.” His voice hadn’t changed. It was still rich and full, and it still sent shivers down her back. His black hair had become silver and his skin was covered with delicately etched lines. Age hadn’t bent him. He extended his hand. His movements were as graceful as ever. “Would you care to come and visit for a moment?”
Nell found herself staring at his hand. The last time she had seen it, it had been covered with blood. “No, thank you,” she said. “I’m taking my walk.”
“Surely you have just a moment—?” He inclined his head toward her, waiting for her to give him her name.
“Eleanor,” she said.
“Eleanor?” He took a step back so that she could pass him. She hesitated, then smiled a little bit at herself, realizing that this was the man who had given her a taste for charm.
“A moment.” She turned her walker and started toward him, feeling awkward for the first time in years.
He watched her shuffling movements. “Arthritis?”
She shook her head. “I broke both hips pinch-hitting for some Little Leaguers in 1975. The doctors said I’d never walk again.”
“Did you win?”
She looked up at him, startled to find herself only a foot away. “I’m walking, aren’t I?”
He chuckled. “No, no. The game.”
“Oh.” She pushed the walker through the doorway. Bookcases made the entrance narrow. His room smelled like ink and old books. “We lost by three runs.”
“It’s a sha
me,” he said quietly. “You should always win your last game.”
She stopped near the window. He had a view of the back parking lot. “Who says it was my last game?”
She turned and looked at his room, then. It was filled with books. A desk covered with papers stood in the center of the floor and a stereo, like the one her granddaughter was so proud
of, took up a shelf of one of the bookcases. The bed in the far corner was neatly made and covered with a manufactured spread.
“Would you like to sit?” He pulled a chair back for her. Nell shook her head.
“Tea then?” He reached behind him and plugged in a coffee machine. Cups, canisters, and vials filled with liquid rested beside the machine.
“What are you doing here?” Nell’s question slipped out. He turned sharply to look at her. Nell felt herself blush. “I mean, you don’t look as if you need to be here.”
He smiled and the lines cascaded into wrinkles. “My grandnephew runs this place. He figures I’m getting too old to live alone.”
“But there are other places to stay if you’re in good health. You don’t seem to need medical care.”
“I don’t yet.” He hooked his thumb in his front pockets and leaned against the door frame. Nell wondered if he’d stop her if she tried to leave. “I’m helping him with some research.”
Nell glanced again at the desk. Some of the papers lying there were covered with the same spiral that was near the door.
“We’re trying to find a way to slow down the aging process,” he said. “You’ve heard of Leonard Hayflick?”
“No.”
“Hayflick is a biologist who found that cells have a clearly defined life span. He figured that the life span was determined by the number of cell divisions instead of chronological age. But some cells deteriorate before they reach their maximum divisions. And that, some believe, causes aging. Follow me?”
Nell realized she had been staring at him blankly. “Sorry.”
“Let me put it simply,” he said. “Everyone can live to a certain maximum age, but not everyone reaches that age because of physical deterioration. What we’re trying to do is prevent that physical deterioration so that people can live out their entire lives.”
“What is this maximum age?” Nell asked.
Karl shrugged. “We don’t know. But some people have claimed that they were well over a hundred. And I just read about a woman recently whose baptismal records prove she is a hundred and twenty.”
“Why are you telling me?”
“You asked, Nelly.”
Nell’s entire body went cold. She gripped her walker tightly and tried to think of a way she could get out of the room.
He took a step toward her, and she cringed.
“I’m sorry,” he said softly. “I should have let you know right away that I knew who you were. My family stayed in Wisconsin, Nell. They let me know what was going on in your life. I knew you were here well before I came.”
“What are you going to do?” Her voice trembled.
He took another cautious step toward her. “Well, first, Nelly, I’d like to explain about Bess.”
“No,” she said and her fear was as real as it had been that sunlit July morning when he had clamped his bloody hand against her mouth. “If you don’t let me out of here, I’m going to scream.”
“Nelly—”
“I mean it, Karl, I’m going to scream.”
He opened his hands wide. “You’re free to go, Nell. If I wanted to hurt you, I could have done it a long time ago.”
She pushed the walker before her like a shield. Her hands were slipping on the metal. As she passed Karl, she didn’t look at him.
The walls seemed narrower and the distance to her room much too short. When she got inside, she closed the door, wishing that it would lock. But she knew that part of her fear was irrational. There wasn’t much a ninety-five-year-old man could do to her here, not in this home filled with bright lights and young nurses. All she had to do was scream and someone would come to her. They didn’t ignore screams in Household 5.
Nell tugs at her knickers. No matter how tightly she ties them, they always stay uncomfortably loose about the waist. She has
been reluctant to slide into a base like Chucky tells her to because she’s afraid that if she does her knickers will come off.
She takes the path that goes through Kirschman’s apple orchard. Mr. Kirschman hates it when the kids take the shortcut through his orchard, but they do anyway.
As she turns the corner to the center of the orchard, someone clamps a hand over her mouth and drags her back against the tree. The hand is tight and slippery. It smells like iron.
“Nelly, promise not to scream if I let you go?”
The voice is Karl’s. She nods. Slowly he releases her.
“What were you trying to do?”
He raises a grimy finger to his lips. His dark hair stands out in sharp relief to his pale skin. “I don’t want you to go any farther, okay? I want you to go back and get your father right away. Promise?”
Nell nods again. She’s staring at his stained white shirt and she realizes that it is covered with blood. She wipes at her mouth and her hand comes away bloody.
“Nell—”
She turns and starts to run, not realizing until she’s rounded the corner that she’s disobeyed Karl. There, lying across the orchard path, is her sister. Bess’s hair is strewn about her, and her blouse is covered with blood.
“Nell,” it’ll be okay, just—”
Nell screams. Karl is standing behind her. She pushes him out of her way and runs down the orchard path toward home. This time running seems easy although the air still catches in her throat. She can’t hear Karl behind her, and as she nears the house, she knows she’s safe. Karl won’t hurt her, Karl would never hurt her. The only one Karl hurts is Bess, and that is Bess’s fault because she doesn’t listen to Papa and now it’s too late, it’s all too late because Nell has left her there, bleeding and helpless, with Karl, the man who hurts her, the man whose hands are covered with blood.
“Did I ever tell you that my sister was murdered?”
Anna smoothed her already neat skirt and sighed. “Yes, Mother.” Her tone said, A thousand times, Mother. Do I have to hear it again?
Nell clutched her hands in her lap, trying to decide if she should continue. Anna would never believe her. Even though she was fifty-five, Anna rarely thought about anything more serious than clothing and makeup. And, of course, she had never known her Aunt Bess.
“I saw the man who killed her.”
Anna suddenly became stiff, and her eyes focused on something beyond Nell’s shoulder.
Nell’s heart was pounding. Her oldest, Elizabeth, would have listened. But Bess had been dead for six years. “I think I told you this once,” Nell said. “But the man who killed her—his name was Karl—also killed her fiance, Edmund. And they never caught him. And it used to frighten me, thinking that someday he’d come back for me.”
“That was a long time ago, Mother.” Anna’s voice had an edge to it.
“I know.” Nell’s fingers had grown cold. “But I wouldn’t be telling you now if it weren’t important.”
Anna looked at her mother full in the face, a deep, piercing look. “Why is it important now?”
“Because he’s here,” Nell whispered. The words sounded too melodramatic, but she couldn’t take them back. “He’s across the hall.”
Anna took a deep breath. “Mother, even if he were here, there’s nothing he could do. He probably doesn’t even remember you.”
“He remembers,” Nell said. “I talked to him.”
“Even so.” Anna reached out and took Nell’s hand. Her palm was warm and moist. “He’s an elderly man. He probably won’t live long. If we called the police and they verified what you said, he probably wouldn’t even make it to trial. I mean, who else knows about the murder, besides you?”
“My father knew and—”
??
?Anyone living?”
“No.” Tears were building in Nell’s eyes. She blinked rapidly.
“Then it would be your word against his, and frankly, Mother, I don’t think it’s worth it. I mean, what can you gain now? He’ll die soon and then you won’t have to worry.”
“No.” A tear traced its way down Nell’s cheek and stopped on her lips. She licked it away quickly, hoping Anna didn’t see. “He won’t die soon.”
Anna frowned. “Why not?”
“He’s working on an experiment to prolong his life.”
“Oh, for God’s sake, Mother.” Anna pulled her hand away. “How many other people have you told this piece of nonsense to?”
“I haven’t—”
A nurse knocked on the door and walked in. She set a tray next to Nell’s armchair. “I have your medication, Nell.”
Nell reached over and took the Dixie cup. The liquid inside was brown. “This doesn’t look like my medication.”
She looked up in time to see Anna shaking her head at the nurse.
“Just drink it, Nell,” the nurse said in her fakely sweet voice, “and it’ll be all right.”
Nell took a sniff of the cup. The contents smelled bitter. “I really don’t want it.”
“Mother,” Anna snapped. Then in a confidential tone to the nurse, she said, “Mother is having a bad day.”
“The past few days have been difficult,” the nurse said. “She hasn’t gone to meals and she won’t leave her room at all.”
“Is that true, Mother?”
Nell swirled the liquid in her cup. Sediment floated around the bottom. Suddenly she realized that it didn’t matter. No one would care if Karl poisoned her. She put the cup to her lips and drank before she could change her mind.
The liquid bit at her tongue like homemade whiskey. She coughed once and then set the cup down. “I don’t see why you want to know,” she said.
Anna pursed her lips. “Mother, really.”
Nell rubbed her tongue against the roof of her mouth, but she couldn’t make the taste go away. She grabbed the side of her chair and got to her feet. Her hips cracked slightly when she stood. The nurse handed her the walker.