Pursued by Shadows by Medora Sale Page A

one like that. Quite a distinctive young lady, too. Hard to miss. Not that many people come in the shop, you know. I tend to remember faces. Especially pretty ones,” he went on, with a leer in Harriet’s direction.
    The child was approaching in little fits and starts as Harmon spoke. Harriet watched his progress with amusement, and then with a sudden jolt of pity. Once he drew close enough, she could see he was probably in his late teens or older, but painfully thin and small. His eyes, bright with fascination, gave his face an even more sickly and under-nourished cast. “Can I see the picture?” he asked, and snatched it up. “Look, Mr. Harmon,” he said, “I seen this girl. Down by the lake. Remember? She’s the girl that man was asking about this morning.”
    â€œWhat man?” asked Sanders quietly.
    â€œA creep,” the boy said and seemed to shrink into himself. “He looked like a biker—he had dark hair. Big guy.” He shivered. “They come here, you know. Bikers . . .”
    John gave Harriet a swift look and turned to the young man. “When did you see this . . .” he started hastily.
    â€œA biker,” interrupted Harmon with contempt. “In here? Really, Tad—I don’t know where you get these stories.” He grabbed him around his stick-thin arm with one hand and took the picture away from him with the other. “It’s time to go home for supper. It’s past four o’clock.” He pivoted him by the arm and shoved him toward the back. “So sorry,” he said quietly as Tad disappeared through a door in the rear wall. “The boy has problems. He’s been very sick. But he tries so hard that I go to a great deal of effort to keep him on, in spite of everything. He still has a few schizophrenic obsessive paranoid delusions—bikers, as you can see, are one of them.”
    â€œSchizophrenic obsessive paranoid delusions?” said Harriet, as they walked along the broad grass verge in front of the lake and watched the swallows, frantically busy, darting in and out of municipally constructed multi-occupancy birdhouses. “About bikers?” She shook her head. “I think Harmon is having us on. Although the kid did seem frightened. Not to say seriously underfed.”
    â€œYeah. Well, whatever it is, I think it’s catching,” said Sanders, and ducked. “What I noticed, though,” he said, and paused, running his fingers through his hair, frowning.
    â€œYes?”
    â€œWell—when you go around with pictures looking for ID, most people take the picture in their hands and give it a really hard look. They’re curious, and sometimes they’re even trying to be helpful. Even the louts give the picture a good look. Then they shake their heads and mutter something like, ‘Sorry, Charlie, I never seen this one before.’ Or maybe they say that she looks kind of familiar but they can’t place her. What they don’t do is take one quick look and give you some long and complicated reason why they don’t know her. Like these two guys. And people who do take one quick look at a picture and say no right away usually have the bastard you’re looking for hiding in the back bedroom.”
    â€œBut you didn’t introduce yourself as a cop. Maybe people aren’t the same with nosy civilians.”
    â€œMaybe. It still felt wrong. Which makes me think that our young friend with the schizophrenic—”
    â€œâ€”obsessive paranoid delusions—”
    â€œâ€”might have seen your friend Jane down by this very lake, and have seen a man—biker or not—in the store asking after her.”
    â€œAnd what in hell does that mean?” asked Harriet.
    â€œThat Jane has been here. That she has showered and shampooed her hair in the house on Lake Street, with the full knowledge of the carpenter, who may or may not have been in the shower with