The Jumper

by Brian H Groover

him from the recordings, and they were remarkably consistent, for eyewitness accounts.

  The old man had been standing on the ledge, on the outside of the window. That he had managed to climb out there at his age was remarkable in itself, but no one had seen him do that. The stepladder had apparently been how he had done it.

  The young man had been standing in the apartment, on the inside of the window, holding the old man’s shoulders through the open upper half of the window. The cameras picked up the young man shouting, but the only words of which they could be certain were, “Don’t do it!” It looked as if Mr. Crane was considering what the young man was saying, because he suddenly leaned back, so his head was close to touching the head of the young man. For almost a minute, they had their heads together at the window, and the cameras could not pick up what the young man was saying. They could see that the old man’s lips, at any rate, were not moving.

  The next thing the cameras showed was Mr. Crane, slowly falling away from the window, while the young man fell down inside the apartment. Mr. Crane’s body fell limply to the street below. He did not flail or scream. From what the cameras showed of his face, he appeared to be unconscious before he left the window ledge.

  That alone would make Jeff suspect foul play, except for one thing. The young man, whom they had seen fall to the apartment floor, was still unconscious on the floor when the police arrived a few minutes later. They took him to the hospital, where it was confirmed that he was in a coma, barely alive.

  There had been a thick carpet on the floor, so it was unlikely he had harmed himself that much by falling. The cameras had shown that no one else was close to either of them. One of the cameras even showed the apartment door, which had remained closed until the police arrived. No one else had been in the apartment.

  There were no drugs in either body. The young man had no identification, and they had no record of his fingerprints.

  Without any knowledge of his medical history, they could not do anything except wait for him to wake up. Aside from being in a coma, he seemed to be in excellent health–so much so that Jeff thought they might start taking his picture around to local gyms, to see if local fitness enthusiasts might recognize him.

  The coroner verified that the old man’s heart had been beating when he hit the pavement. He may not have been conscious, but he was alive.

  In the department, Jeff got a lot of razzing about the case, because he didn’t want to close it. Most of the other cops thought it was open-and-shut, and they didn’t see anything about it which could be anything but a suicide. Given the immense age of the man, he was on borrowed time, anyway, they told Jeff.

  It had some weird elements, to be sure, but the neurologist in charge of the young man had explained to Jeff that, yes, the brain was a funny thing, and yes, even falling down and bumping one’s head on thick carpet could, theoretically, put one in a coma.

  Everything could be explained, but all Jeff could tell his colleagues was that his gut was telling him he was missing something important. That was something they all respected, so they cut back on the razzing, and let him stew on it.

  Late at night in his empty bed, Jeff admitted to himself that he wanted the case to be significant, because it had cost him Carol. He had not tried to call her, but he heard from her a few days later, when she let him know that she had left two of his suits at the cleaners.

  He tried to explain about the case, but she just said, “I heard.” After getting the particulars of the clothes straightened out, she told him that she had left her apartment key in the top drawer of his desk.

  “Oh. Right,” he said. Grasping for something to say, he blurted out, “Are you doing okay, Carol?”

  Long pause, then “Yeah, I am, actually. It was the right decision, even though it hurt like hell. There is no way it would have worked, in the long run.”

  “Carol, I–”

  “Don’t, Jeff. I hope you find someone who can be so important to you that you can’t take your mind off her. Good luck on that. I’ll probably cry when you finally get married, unless I get married first. Just don’t call me, unless it’s about something like the dry cleaning.”

  When he hung up the phone, Jeff still felt empty, but he shook his head, and a moment later he was immersed in the case again. It was the only way to keep the pain away.

  3 John Doe

  The hospital called, a week after the death of the old man. The young man–their “John Doe”–had awakened from his coma.

  By the time Jeff arrived, they had already moved him out of the ICU, into a step-down room. The doctor was finishing a series of tests on him. “Young man, as far as I can tell, you’re in perfect shape,” he said, as Jeff came into the room.

  Jeff stepped up to the young man, who looked up at him. He does look in perfect shape, like he’s a bodybuilder or something like that, Jeff thought. The young face did not react to Jeff, but his pupils dilated. Jeff’s nostrils flared as his cop’s instincts lit off. Something about this man, Jeff decided, was definitely fishy.

  “Can I go now, doctor?” the young man asked him.

  He wouldn’t be afraid if he thought I was a doctor. Jeff smiled and flashed his Detective’s badge. “I’m not a doctor, and no, not just yet. We’re still trying to make sure you’re okay, and we’re still trying to figure out what happened. We’re hoping you can help us with that.”

  The man swallowed. “Okay.”

  Definitely nervous. Jeff smiled some more. “Why don’t we start with your name?”

  “Okay.”

  After a pause, Jeff went on, “What’s your name?”

  “Oh! I thought you were going to tell me that. Don’t you know?”

  “Don’t you?”

  “No.”

  After about twenty minutes of asking him questions, Jeff thanked him, smiled, and went out. He was still polite and cheerful on the outside, but inside he was seething.

  The John Doe appeared to have complete amnesia. He did not know how he had gotten into the apartment, or even his name. From his accent, Jeff was pretty sure he was from out of the area–maybe Los Angeles, but he could have lived in San Francisco all his life. He appeared to have a complete grasp of English, missing only every single detail of his own life.

  Sure that the man was lying, Jeff got a detail of officers assigned to watch him. When the doctor cleared him to leave the hospital, Jeff took him down to the station.

  Jeff got him some water, and sat him down in an interrogation room. The man was watching him cautiously, but he no longer seemed nervous. He even had a half smile.

  It was time for a little pressure. Maybe I can shake him up a bit.

  “We know you did away with the old man,” Jeff told him. “We don’t have enough evidence to prove it yet, but we will.”

  The man laughed, his blonde hair shaking. “I was in the apartment at his invitation,” he said.

  “How do you know that, if you can’t remember anything?”

  Startled, the man recovered quickly. “The nurse showed me the video camera footage. Besides, they were talking about it on TV. The old man was a weirdo, and he committed suicide, according to the TV. The cameras showed I tried to stop him, and the doctor told me I almost died myself. From where I sit,” he said with a smirk, “that makes me some kind of hero.”

  It was the smirk that did it. This wasn’t just a killer, Jeff decided. This was a stone-cold killer who was sure he was going to get away with it. Jeff had been a homicide detective for two years, and seen all kinds of things, but this was the first one of these he’d seen outside movies or television, watched on lonely nights at his apartment before Carol. You are not getting away with this on my watch, he thought behind his glare.

  Jeff had never lost his temper with a suspect yet, but he badly wanted to, now. “Listen, punk! I know you did him in, and I am never going to stop looking, until I prove it. Never. For starters, I’m going to go over all of your finances and his, for the past ten years. I know, I know, you’
re pretending you don’t have any memory. You do, though, and you and I both know it. You know exactly who you are, and I’m going to keep looking until I do, too.”

  Jeff was pleased to see that he had broken the man’s composure, when he talked about the money. He had seen the eyes widen just a touch at that. That had to be it, of course. The answer was in there, somewhere. Somehow, this guy had either gotten the old man’s money, or was working for someone who had. Money always left a trail, and they would always be able to track it.

  The young man stood up, slowly. He was taller than Jeff, and looked down into his eyes.

  “Either charge me with something or let me go, Detective,” he said, evenly. “Now.”

  Jeff was not intimidated by the younger man, even though he looked very fit. In excellent shape himself, Jeff clenched his jaw. Damn. He knew he had no choice. His bluff had been called. With no real evidence, he would have to let him go, and hope he was there when the creep messed up. He knew he would. They all did. Maybe it would take a few months, but it would happen.

  He had already started the paperwork to investigate Mr. Crane’s finances. Jeff knew the old man was broke when he died, but what he really wanted to know–and he fully expected it to be tied to his John Doe–was how he had gotten broke in the first place.

  They held the man a few more hours, but that was all they could do. They let him go, after instructing him not to leave the jurisdiction for any