William Lashner - Falls The Shadow

“What’s next?” said Horace T. Grant on our way out of the apartment.

“I don’t know.”

“You better figure out something, boy.”

“Yes, I better. That was quite the speech in there, Horace.”

“A bunch of horse crap tied in a pretty knot.”

“I don’t think so.”

“Think whatever the hell you want.”

As we stepped out the door, two men stood on the porch. One was older, bent, wearing a black mourning suit. The other was far younger, a teenager almost, holding on to the old man’s arm.

Horace stared at the two men for a long moment and then held the door open. “Go right on in, gentlemen,” he said. “She’s expecting you.”

With my search for Tanya Rose stymied by Madam Anna’s milky-white eye, I turned my attention back to the François Dubé case. Which explains why I was sitting next to Beth in my car in the salubrious environs of the Peaceful Valley Memorial Park.

“There’s something almost cheerful about a cemetery on a shining day, isn’t there?” I said. “The bright grass, the gleaming stones.”

“I find it morbid,” said Beth.

“Or maybe I just enjoy the peace and serenity, as if a manifestation of the promised sweet kiss of death.”

She leaned back, looked at me. “The sweet kiss of death?”

“Wouldn’t it be nice to just be finished with all the striving, the hopes, the jarring needs, the raging disappointments? Wouldn’t it be nice to just be done with it all and to fall into the arms of that final, gentle sleep?”

“You don’t have to die for that, Victor, just retire to Boca.”

“I can’t eat dinner at four.”

“I think you like cemeteries because it’s the one place in the world where you’re surrounded by people with less promising futures than your own.”

“That must be it. You’ve been cheery lately.”

“Have I?”

“Oh, yes. Smiling at your desk, dancing in alleyways.”

“Maybe anyone who doesn’t look forward to the sweet kiss of death seems cheery to you.”

“No. It’s something else. You’re glowing.”

“As promised by that infomercial for this year’s revolutionary new skin-care treatment.”

“Is that it? Did you make that call to change your life?”

“No. I still haven’t used up last year’s revolutionary new skin-care treatment. Where is she?”

“She should be here soon.”

“You couldn’t have just called her?”

“Where’s the impact in that? Our intrepid investigator, Phil Skink, left us a schedule of her regular visits around the town. Today it’s the Peaceful Valley Memorial Park before she heads to her upscale nail salon.”

“And you don’t think it’s rude to intercept her here?”

“Perfectly appropriate, if you ask me.”

“How’s Carol?”

“Fine.”

“I agree, mighty fine. But how are things with her?”

“Progressing.”

“You don’t sound so excited.”

“She’s rather assertive.”

“And that’s a problem how?”

“I don’t know, Beth. I sort of like to dress myself in the morning. Wait, over there. Is that a hearse or a limo?”

“A limo.”

“Bingo,” I said.

The long black car eased to a stop at Row U. The driver hopped out, opened the back door, and out slid Velma Takahashi. She was dressed for the part of the grieving friend with a terrible secret: white scarf around the hair, dark glasses over the eyes, deep red lipstick on her puffy lips, a single white rose in her hand. She walked slowly down the row and then stopped at a granite marker and stared for a moment before kneeling in front of it. We gave her some minutes to perform her ministrations, smoothing the grass, tossing off the seedpods from the maple overhead, we gave her some minutes to wallow in her guilt before we stepped out of the car.

Her head rose at the sound of our doors closing. She aimed her dark, round glasses our way, stared for a few seconds, and then turned back to the gravestone as if she had been waiting for us all along.

We walked slowly toward Velma until we were standing behind her. In front of us was a marker that spread across three sites. CULLEN. And carved over the site to the right, where Velma kneeled, was the name LEESA SARA, and beneath that the words BELOVED DAUGHTER AND MOTHER. Her parents had scrubbed her married name and wifely status from Leesa’s gravestone, and you couldn’t really blame them.

“We need to talk,” I said.

“Uh-oh,” she said without turning around or rising at the sound of my voice. “Does that mean we’re breaking up?”

“Something like that. We need to talk about Clem.”

“What is there to talk about?” she said. “He is nothing, a figment of a bad dream from a different life.”

“But you think he might have killed Leesa.”

“Since when does what I think matter? I think people mourning their friends at a cemetery should be left in peace, and yet here you are.”

“What is Clem’s full name?”

“Clem.”

“Where is he now, do you know?”

“He’s nowhere. He’s a phantom. He appeared as if by magic, did his damage, and now he’s gone.”

“We’re going to need you to testify about him. About how you met him, how you gave him to Leesa, how they fought, how after she was brutally murdered, he disappeared. We’re going to need you to tell the jury everything.”

“You know I can’t do that.”

“Why the hell not?” said Beth with a snap of anger in her voice. “What kind of witch will pay for François’s defense but not tell the truth to save him?”

Velma Takahashi turned toward Beth and stared at her through the dark glasses. “He’s quite charming, isn’t he?” she said, a spider’s bite in her voice. “So much the gallant. But maybe, dear one, he’s not as gallant as he seems.”

“He needs your help,” said Beth.

“Why does he need mine when he already has yours?”

I didn’t like the tone of Velma’s voice, the way the two women had squared off. I didn’t like any of this. She was playing with us, was Velma Takahashi, tossing us about like balls of catnip placed here for her amusement. But I knew how to shut off the game. I reached into my jacket pocket, pulled out a legal document stapled on a blue backing, dropped it onto Leesa Dubé’s grave, right in front of the still-kneeling Velma Takahashi.

“You’ve been served,” I said.

“What is this?” she said, scooping up the subpoena and rising angrily to her feet. “What the hell are you doing?”

“The trial starts next week,” I said.

“You know that my situation is delicate.”

“Funny thing, Velma, I don’t care about your prenup. If you don’t show up when I tell you, I’ll have a bench warrant issued. And then I’ll have you arrested. A picture of you in the paper with your hands cuffed behind your back will be just what your husband wants to see.”

“You must leave me out of it.”

“Can’t,” I said.

“Don’t do this, Victor.” She took a step forward, reached a hand to my chest, let her expression turn dewy and moist. “Please.”

“It’s done,” I said.

“Victor?”

“This Grace Kelly, Kim Novak thing you have going on is very becoming, really. That scarf, nice touch. But I have to say I like you better in your tennis outfit.”

Her moist expression turned bitter in the blink of an eye. “Don’t forget your place, you dickless wonder,” she said.

I laughed, which only made her angrier. She threw the subpoena at my chest. As the paper slid to the ground, I laughed harder.

“You thought by controlling the money you controlled the story,” I said, “but I don’t work like that.”