Hank had never heard her mention the name before. He was sure he’d have remembered if she had. “Is it a guess, or are you positive?”

“I’m positive. The knife—” She lifted her eyes to him. They were doctor-serious. “I should tell you that it was my knife. I grabbed it when I heard you whistling. It made sense at the time.”

“You thought I might be this Prancer character.”

“I didn’t have him in mind as a suspect at the time. He’s one of perhaps a dozen names that I jotted down to look into—patients I’d treated in the past few weeks.”

“Who is he?”

But he doubted she’d even heard him. “I thought I’d covered my tracks, so that no one could follow me from Boston. I didn’t tell anyone where I was going. I even borrowed Carine’s car.”

“That all makes sense now that I know—”

“But I—I had no idea. I hid behind the rosebush out back. It seems ridiculous now.”

“Imagine if it’d been Prancer instead of me,” Hank said. “Not so ridiculous after all.”

“You’re probably right, but when I look at your arm—” She didn’t finish the thought. “I didn’t want to look silly when I realized it was you whistling, so I stuck the knife in the sand and forgot about it.”

Hank shrugged. “Prancer could just have easily got it out of the sink while we were on the other side of the island. Hell, we’re lucky we didn’t find him hiding under the bed when we got back. He’s probably kicking himself for not thinking of it now that he’s outside and we’re in here.”

Her eyes settled on him. “I’m sorry.”

He stood to one side of the back door and looked outside, but saw no sign of Prancer. “If he hadn’t had the knife and the kayak paddle, he might have used his gun on me instead of the window. Maybe the knife’s what saved my life. Antonia—this guy—”

“I treated him for a gunshot wound to his left foot. I had to report him to the police.”

Hank nodded. “It’s the law.”

“I don’t think he realized that. It’s surprising how many people don’t. He wouldn’t tell me what happened—the wound was almost certainly self-inflicted. I sent him for X-rays, and he took off from the X-ray room. I don’t know how he managed it. He was in a johnny, he was on an IV, he had a bullet wound in his foot—he must have pulled out the IV himself.”

Hank pictured the lunatic who’d come after him and could see him pulling out his own IV, running off with a bullet wound in his foot. “How long ago was this?”