Free The Shadow Man by John Lutz

didn’t take long for Willy to become as enthusiastic as I about it.”
    “Did he ever hint that he might want to move in with you?”
    “God, no! It wasn’t like Willy to hint at anything. If he’d wanted to he’d have asked directly, and he never did so.”
    “Did you ever offer?”
    “Once. Willy said no, tactfully.”
    “Did Dr. Larsen happen to mention to you where he’d been, whom he’d talked to besides you?”
    “Sorry.” Kelly shook his head no. The reddish frizz rippled like sun-touched resilient wire. “We kept to the immediate subject.”
    “Did he happen to say anything that struck you as odd, as if he might be in some sort of trouble?”
    “Nothing whatsoever.” Kelly arched an eyebrow neatly yet unaffectedly. “You don’t suspect... ?”
    Andrews shrugged. “Dr. Larsen drowned. He’d also suffered a fractured skull. That’s all anyone knows.”
    “Of course. Well, I never thought about something like that.” Kelly laced long fingers, made a steeple and raised it to the tip of his chin in contemplation. “I really wish I could recall something that might help you, but I can’t.”
    Andrews stood up and smiled. “Thanks for trying, anyway.”
    Kelly rose and trailed him to the door with the slight limp. It was evident now that beneath his tight jeans one leg was considerably thinner than the other, suggesting the result of a long-ago illness.
    Andrews opened the door to the stairs.
    “Mr. Anderson,” Kelly said wistfully beside him, “this might sound naive, but do you think there’s a chance that Willy might ever come back?”
    “About as much chance as there is of Dr. Larsen coming back,” Andrews said, and watched Norris Kelly nod grimly. Andrews turned away from such naked grief. He descended the plush, blue-carpeted stairs, that possibly Willy Bennet had suggested, and pulled open the heavy door to the street.

Chapter Twelve
    Dr. Laidelier had, as usual, left his office door open. As he sat at his desk, studying a stack of vouchers by the narrow beam of a bullet-shade lamp, he became aware of someone standing just inside the doorway, watching him. He ignored this insubstantial figure on the fringe of his vision and finished reading about the purchase of sides of beef for the sanitarium kitchen.
    When he pinched the bridge of his nose in weariness and then looked up, he saw that his visitor was Joseph Morgan. Probably Morgan wanted to talk with him again about reshuffling the night hours of the security force.
    “It’s late, Joseph,” Dr. Laidelier said. In the harsh light from the lamp, his eyes were invisible, in deep shadow beneath his prodigious gray eyebrows.
    “I’ve been doing some investigating,” Morgan said. He walked farther into the office and stood with a calm hand resting lightly on a chair.
    Laidelier motioned for him to sit down. “Investigating?”
    “Asking some questions in town,” Morgan said, choosing to remain standing. “I thought, just for possible reference, it might be a good idea to check out some of what Senator Andrews mentioned.”
    “The senator is still a comparatively young man, Joseph. I got the impression that he was unduly upset with himself over the death of a friend.”
    “He is a U.S. senator, though. And he was a friend of Larsen.”
    Dr. Laidelier pushed his glasses higher up onto his nose and studied Morgan. The coolly competent security chief didn’t seem to be in any sort of an agitated state. He was merely doing his job, prudently touching bases.
    “Martin Karpp told me that Larsen claimed he got a threatening note at his motel,” Morgan said. “Signed Paul Liggett.”
    Dr. Laidelier’s only indication of surprise was a shifting of his long frame in his chair. This must be the evidence Andrews had mentioned.
    “I talked to the desk man at the Clover Motel,” Morgan said. “He remembers a message for Dr. Larsen. He says the doctor read it right there at the desk and seemed to be rattled. Larsen grilled him on who