William Lashner - Falls The Shadow

“How do you do that?” I said.

“It takes talent and coordination,” he said, “which means you can count yourself out.”

I was about to get up and go looking for her when the far door opened and a woman stepped inside. She was wearing a shimmering green robe, her eyes were closed and her feet were bare, and she was chanting softly in some language that sounded like it was long dead. I swiveled my head and looked at the door we had come in, then turned back to the chanter. It was the same straggly-haired woman who had greeted us at the front door. Madam Anna, I presumed.

“You couldn’t have just come in with us?” I said.

“I was preparing for our session,” she said as she sat down across from us at the table, “and it helps for me to get a sense of my visitors.” She spoke now with a slight accent that I couldn’t quite place, as if she had been born somewhere in the ocean between Haiti and West Philly. “Now, you said you have questions.”

“That’s right,” I said.

“Of course. We all have questions. And I know what it is you are seeking.”

“You do?”

“You have lost someone. Someone you care about very much. And you’ve come to me to find this person.”

“How do you know?”

“It is my business to know. Just as I knew that you were coming. Take off your shoes, please.”

“Our shoes?”

“Oh, yes. It is very important. Our reception from the other world comes through every part of our bodies, including our feet.”

“You want us to take our pants off, too?” said Horace.

“Just the shoes.” As I untied my wingtips, she said, “I will also need an offering of good faith.”

“What kind of offering?”

“Something to show that your heart is pure, your intentions honorable, your search sincere.”

“Let me guess,” I said. “How much?”

“Two hundred dollars for our first contact.”

“You must be confused,” I said.

“But it is you with the questions, so which of us is confused? The offering is not a gift to me, it is a gift to the spirit world in which we will be looking for answers. It is not easy to enter the world of the dead. But before we can discuss the offering, we have business to finish.” She turned her milky eye to the old man beside me, lowered her voice into a schoolmarmish snap. “Horace, you haven’t yet taken off your shoes.”

“I don’t take off my shoes for no one,” he said. “I didn’t take them off in Japan, I didn’t take them off in Korea, I didn’t take them off in my Aunt Sally’s house with all them stupid white carpets, and I’m not taking them off here.”

“You must humble yourself, old man.”

“I’m too old to be humble and not old enough to be called old by the likes of you.”

“Madam Anna,” I said, “I think you have the wrong idea about us.”

“You’re not lost souls?”

“Well, maybe you’re right about that part.”

“And you don’t want to communicate with the dead?”

“Who wouldn’t, actually? But that’s not why we came to you. We’re looking for a missing girl.”

“And you want me to ask the spirits to help the search. It is not what I normally do, but it can be arranged. Though the offering will of course be higher.”

“We’re not here to ask the spirits, you half-blind witch,” said Horace. “We’re here to ask your sorry ass.”

I put my hand on Horace’s biceps to calm him down, squeezed hard to remind him that I was to do the talking, was surprised at the thinness of his arm.

“What my friend means is that we are looking for a missing girl and we hope that you can help us. Her name is Tanya, Tanya Rose.”

She didn’t move after I said the name, didn’t so much as twitch. She stared at me with her one good eye as if trying to banish me with only her gaze. Then she closed her eyes and started her chanting once again. It was strangely beautiful, her chant, strangely haunting, but she could sing all she wanted, we weren’t going anywhere.

After finishing, she opened her eyes and saw, with a flash of disappointment, that we were still at the table. “Who are you to her?” she said.

“I’m her lawyer,” I said.

“How does such a girl have a lawyer?”

“A judge appointed me to find her, to make sure she is all right.”

“I can’t help you.”

“You mind if I look around?”

“You don’t believe me?”

“No, frankly, ma’am, I don’t.”

“She’s not here, I promise you that.”

“But you know where she is.”

“What would you do if you found her, Victor Carl? Would you send her back to the mother that gave her away? Would you send her back to that man who lives with her mother? Would you feel she is safe, her with him?”

“She’s my client. I’ll do whatever is in her best interests. And I have the law behind me.”

“Where was your law when the mother was trying to toss her aside?”

“You took her, didn’t you?”

“I did what I could for her.”

“And if she’s not here, you gave her away. Again. But I’d bet it wasn’t free. I’d bet there was one of your offerings involved. How much did you sell her for?”

“This session is over,” she said, blowing out one candle. The room darkened.

“What have you sold her into?” I said. “What terrors is she feeling now? Tell me where she is, Madam Anna, or I’ll bring the police with me next time I come.”

“You want to bring the police here? That’s a laugh. I’ve been calling them for months. The prostitutes are working this corner every night now, and they do nothing. The cars come by honking, they park in front of my house. Every morning I sweep up the condoms. Tell them to come. Please.” She blew out another candle, the room darkened further. Only one candle now burned, its faint flicker reflecting on all our faces before dying at the room’s edges.

“Maybe when they come, they’ll check your license,” I said. “I’m sure you have a business-privilege license as required by law. And this house, I’m sure, is zoned for commercial use.”

“Oh, yes, that is the work of your law. Shut me down, the scourge of the neighborhood. Forget the whores, forget the drugs, the gangsters. Good day, Victor Carl.”

She was about to blow out the last candle when Horace said, “We care about her, too.”

Madam Anna held her breath, raised the gaze from her one good eye to Horace. I turned my head, too, because there was a note of tender softness in his voice.

“The way her eyes squint when she laughs,” said Horace. “The way she skips instead of walks. The cool feel of her hand when she’s holding yours. The way she looks up at you with a face full of trust. You care about her, I see it in you. And we do, too. A girl like that, with a mother like that, she needs all the help she can get in this world.”

“What do you want?” said Madam Anna.

“We just want to know where she is,” I said. “And that she’s okay.”

“Leave your card,” said Madam Anna.

I took a card from my jacket, tossed it on the table. While it was still spinning on the wood, she blew out the last candle.

The room plunged into darkness, nothing to be seen but the faintly glowing tip of the incense stick. I stood up quickly, went to grab hold of her, grabbed only air, and howled out in pain.

“What happened?” barked Horace from the darkness.

“I stubbed my toe.”

“What kind of fool takes off his shoes whenever any old lady says so?”

I took out my phone, flipped it open, turned it on, used the faint light from the display to check out the room. Madam Anna was gone, and so was my card.

With the cell-phone light, I found my shoes, slipped them on, moved around the table, and opened the door that the fortune-teller had come through. There was a hallway and a bedroom and a kitchen and a bathroom, but no sign of the old woman and no sign of the presence of Tanya Rose either. I took the liberty of searching the rest of the apartment. Nothing. Madam Anna was gone, and Tanya, if she had ever lived there, lived there no longer.