Falls the Shadow

by William Lashner

  “Victor, you don’t know. It’s her father. She’ll miss him forever.”

  “Probably, yes. I’ve spoken to the Cullens. They said the daughter is going to need some support. The Cullens were looking at the Big Sister program. I gave them your name.”

  “Victor.”

  “You stuck me with Daniel Rose. I’m returning the favor.”

  “I won’t be able to help.”

  “Sure you will.”

  “She’ll miss him forever. It will never go away.”

  “But you’ll still be able to help.”

  “I don’t think so. I’m all wrong for it.” She paused for a moment. “Before, you asked about my father.”

  “Did I?”

  “I don’t think I ever told you about him.”

  “No.”

  “I don’t think I ever told anybody.”

  “You don’t have to.”

  “Yes,” she said. “Yes, I do.”

  “Want to go somewhere?”

  “No, this is fine,” she said. “We might be a while.”

  “That’s all right,” I said. “But first, it’s sort of hot. Do you mind if I take off my pants?”

  79

  Tommy’s High Ball.

  I suppose I had become something of a regular, because as soon as I poked my head in the door, the bartender shouted out, “Yo, Pork Chop, your factotum is here.”

  I looked at Whitey, standing stoop-shouldered behind the bar. “Factotum?”

  “I call it like I see it,” he said.

  “I’m not even sure if I know what it is.”

  “You don’t need to know,” said Whitey. “But you sure is it.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “I think.”

  I turned to the booth closest to the door. Horace T. Grant was deep into a game of chess with his usual whipping post. He looked up from his board.

  “I’m in the middle of something here,” he said. “Can you wait a minute?”

  “We’ve got to go,” I said.

  “Simpson,” he said to his opponent, “we’ll have to resume this exercise in controlled mutilation when I return.”

  “Oh, no, we won’t. You play or you resign.”

  “Resign?” Horace sputtered with indignation. “I have you on the ropes, old man. If you didn’t take so long to plot your foolish moves, I’d have beaten you twenty minutes ago.”

  “Just taking my time, setting my traps. My position’s got possibilities.”

  “And all of them calamitous,” said Horace.

  “Play or lose,” said Simpson.

  Horace looked up at me. I nodded to the door. His shoulders slumped as he tipped over his own king.

  Horace’s opponent let out a yap and raised his hands high. “I got you, Pork Chop, yes I did. Got you clean and fair. You surrendered to the overwhelming possibilities of my position.”

  “Enjoy it,” said Horace as he stood. “It’s going to have to last you another twenty years.”

  On the way out of the bar, Horace said to me, “This better be good.”

  “Oh, it’s good,” I said.

  My car was parked outside. Isabel Chandler, the Social Services caseworker, sat in the front passenger seat. And in the back, in a car seat Isabel had provided, sat Daniel Rose.

  When Horace was seated beside Daniel, I leaned in the car door. “Horace, do you know Daniel?”

  “I’ve seen the boy in the neighborhood,” said Horace. “How you doing there, son?”

  “Okay,” said Daniel.

  “I haven’t seen you around much lately,” said Horace.

  “I’ve been living somewhere else,” said Daniel.

  “Someplace good, I hope?”

  “It’s okay.”

  “Daniel, Mr. Grant’s the one responsible for arranging to have me be your lawyer.”

  Daniel smiled at the old man. “Thank you.”

  “It’s my pleasure. And I like them teeth of yours, boy. It’s an improvement from what I remember.”

  “They’re not real,” said Daniel proudly.

  “Neither are mine,” said Horace.

  “You were the one talking to my sister all the time.”

  “I might just be,” said Horace.

  “I remember.”

  “Have you seen your sister?”

  “Not for a while,” said Daniel.

  “Okay, then. Well, it’s nice to finally say hello to you.”

  Horace reached out his withered old mitt. Daniel slipped his small, pale hand inside, watched as it was swallowed whole. And then the gentle shake.

  It wasn’t too long a drive. We hit the Cobbs Creek Parkway, followed that down to Haverford and then up toward the golf course. A left and a right and a left again, and then there we were, in the neighborhood of small brick row houses, of children playing in the yards, of families. The house I was looking for was easy enough to find, what with the balloons all tied up to the light beside the door.

  “This is it,” I said as we stopped in front of it. “What do you think, Daniel?”

  “It looks okay,” he said.

  “The Hansons are very excited to meet you,” said Isabel. “This won’t be like the last place, a short-term thing. They’ve promised to take care of you as long as it’s required.”

  “What about Mommy?”

  “She’s working hard, Daniel,” said Isabel. “When she’s ready to take care of you the way you deserve, we’ll go before the judge and figure out what to do. But until then this will be your home.”

  “I miss my mommy.”

  “I know you do, Daniel,” I said.

  The front door opened, and Mr. and Mrs. Hanson came out. They had big smiles on their faces, and they each held a wrapped present.

  “Let’s go meet your new family,” said Isabel.

  She got out of the car, bent over, and unhooked Daniel. The two of them walked slowly toward his new home.

  “You want to get out?” I said to Horace.

  “Nah, give the boy some time.”

  “This is going to work out for him,” I said.

  “It can’t be no worse than what he had.”

  “You did a good thing for Daniel.”

  “It was nothing nobody else wouldn’t have done.”

  “Don’t bet on that,” I said as I got out of the car.

  The Hansons were leaning forward, talking to the boy as he clutched hold of Isabel’s leg as if it were a life raft on a choppy sea. When they reached toward him, he shied away. When they tried to give him the gifts, he hid his face. God, it seemed so simple when Isabel and I were setting it up, it seemed so obvious. But it wasn’t working out, there was no joy or excitement in Daniel’s face. Just fear and disappointment, another stop on a train to nowhere.

  “Daniel?”

  We all looked up. Standing in the front doorway was Tanya Rose, dressed in her Sunday best, smiling nervously.

  Daniel peeked at her from behind Isabel’s leg.

  Tanya reached her arms out.

  Daniel shouted, “Tanya,” and then ran to her.

  Brother and sister, they hugged and jumped and fell into a heap and hugged some more, and suddenly Daniel couldn’t stop himself from laughing.

  In a very real way, this tender moment was brought to us by Dr. Bob. He fixed Daniel’s teeth, he found for me Tanya’s new family, he taught me to do more than the expected, to find a way to make the exceptional the norm. And maybe for the first time, I felt the pull of what he had been trying to find all his life, the almost painful satisfaction that comes from trying to do something good and seeing it work out better than you could have hoped. Dr. Bob was the ultimate do-gooder, unwilling to let custom or law get in the way of his attempts to help.

  Except without custom or law, where the hell are we?

  But it wasn’t over, was it? Dr. Bob was still at large somewhere, never to answer the charges that could have been lodged against him: the burglary for sending Seamus Dent into Leesa Dubé’s apartment, felony murder for
the way it turned out, conspiracy, obstruction of justice in the framing of François Dubé. Nor even the charge of kidnapping me. He was gone, and he wouldn’t be found. My guess was he had set up an office in the South of France, or in French Guiana, or in Martinique, someplace where he could practice his new language. Go ahead, take a walk, maybe in Pointe-à-Pitre, in one of the poorer sections of the town, and you’ll hear the tale of a dentist with gentle hands and a helpful temperament, a kind and brave soul who does magic tricks for the needy children whose teeth he treats for free, the mysterious Dr. Poivre.

  But wherever he was, he was, beyond all else, a dangerous man. He liked to help, he said, but things often turned out wrong. Remember, Leesa Dubé was dead. And Seamus Dent, who killed her by accident, was also dead. Dr. Bob was living proof of the old adage about the road to hell. And, sad to say, my efforts to help had more often than not turned out badly, too. Julia Rose was left bereft, without her children, as she slipped deeper into a sad state of helplessness. And it only took a week for Kylie to abandon the treatment center where Father Kenneth had placed her. She was back on the street, still trying to kill herself, bound to succeed. And sadly, François Dubé had determined to seek custody of his young daughter. I had fought to get him out of jail, and in so doing, I feared, I had put his daughter in harm’s way.

  It was almost enough to make me swear off helping in the future, almost enough to convince me that I had been right all along, that my surest path in this uncertain world is to mind my own damn business.

  A car door slammed behind me. Horace T. Grant was out of the car, walking toward us, something in his eye.

  Tanya Rose stopped her hugging and rolling. She stood up, took a hesitant step forward.

  “Grandpa?” she said.

  Only almost.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  The Support Center for Child Advocates in Philadelphia, with the aid of hundreds of volunteer lawyers, offers free legal and social services to Philadelphia’s abused, neglected, and medically needy children. I was honored to be one of those lawyers. In this book, Victor was winging his pro bono representation as best he could, but the volunteer attorneys working with the Support Center are given extensive training and ongoing support. The services the center provides to the city’s at-risk children are a wonder.

  For her valuable assistance in the dental portions of this novel, along with helping me keep my teeth, I wish to thank Dr. Ruth S. Rosenberg, D.M.D. I may be a deep-seated antidentite, but she has kept my shoe flipping to a minimum, though I have left a few scuffs on her walls. I also wish to thank Wendy Sherman, my excellent agent, Dr. Andrew Gross, and, as always, my mother for their help with the manuscript, and Mark Pfeffer for lending me his name. Much credit for my work goes to Michael Morrison, Lisa Gallagher, Sharyn Rosenblum, and the whole gang at Morrow, and especially to my editor, the very brilliant and very tough Carolyn Marino, who was enthusiastic about my boy Bob from the beginning.

  Finally, as always, I am nothing without my family, and so I thank them all, especially my dear wife, Pam.

  About the Author

  A graduate of the University of Iowa Writer’s Workshop, William Lashner served as a trial attorney in the criminal division of the United States Justice Department. He Lives with his family near Philadelphia.

  To receive notice of author events and new books by William Lashner, sign up at www.authortracker.com

  ALSO BY WILLIAM LASHNER

  Past Due

  Fatal Flaw

  Bitter Truth (Veritas)

  Hostile Witness

  Credits

  Cover photograph by George Toland

  Cover model:�Lark Batteau Bailey

  Copyright

  Grateful acknowledgment is made to reprint the excerpt from “The Hollow Men” in Collected Poems 1909–1962 by T. S. Eliot, copyright 1936 by Harcourt, Inc., copyright © 1964, 1983 by T. S. Eliot, reprinted by permission of the publisher.

  This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author�s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  FALLS THE SHADOW. Copyright © 2005 by William Lashner. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books™.

  ePub edition April 2005 ISBN 9780061742798

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Lashner, William.

  Falls the shadow / William Lashner.�1st ed.

  p. cm.

  ISBN 0-06-072156-1

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  About the Publisher

  Australia

  HarperCollins Publishers (Australia) Pty. Ltd.

  25 Ryde Road (PO Box 321)

  Pymble, NSW 2073, Australia

  http://www.harpercollinsebooks.com.au

  Canada

  HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.

  55 Avenue Road, Suite 2900

  Toronto, ON, M5R, 3L2, Canada

  http://www.harpercollinsebooks.ca

  New Zealand

  HarperCollins Publishers (New Zealand) Limited

  P.O. Box 1

  Auckland, New Zealand

  http://www.harpercollinsebooks.co.nz

  United Kingdom

  HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.

  77-85 Fulham Palace Road

  London, W6 8JB, UK

  http://www.harpercollinsebooks.co.uk

  United States

  HarperCollins Publishers Inc.

  10 East 53rd Street

  New York, NY 10022

  http://www.harpercollinsebooks.com