‘You got some knocked out, I guess.’
‘Bill’s old head come bustin’ right in. I reckon it took out a whole passel ob teet, top ’n bottom – eight or ten ob ’em. An’ I got all dese bleedin’ holes in my puckin’ gums. But de booze sorta numbs ’em por me. Damn good stuff.’
She filled her mouth again until her cheeks were bloated, shut her eyes and sighed through her nose, then sloshed the bourbon all around for a while before swallowing.
‘Yer a mighty pine girl, Charly.’
‘Well, I’m glad the booze helps.’
‘I’m gonna hap to buy me some new teet.’
‘Yeah. There’s a lot of stuff we’ll need to do after we get out of here. Are we all hitched up, now?’
‘Yep.’
‘Why don’t we go inside and get cleaned up? I’ll have to unhook us from the tanks, but that oughta be the last thing before we take off. Do you have any clean clothes to wear? I’ve got some in the trailer, but they’d probably be a tight fit on you.’
‘Da trunk,’ Lib said, and filled her mouth again.
Sandy went to the driver’s door of the car. Leaning in, she shut off the lights and engine, then pulled out the ignition key. She hurried to the trunk.
While she unlocked it, Lib sloshed bourbon.
Sandy raised the lid. Inside the trunk, she saw only darkness.
She heard Lib gulping.
Then Lib said, ‘Just reach on in.’
She reached into the trunk. She wasn’t sure what she expected to touch – suitcases, maybe. Instead of luggage, however, her hands met soft piles of fabric.
‘Just grab me out sometin’,’ Lib said. ‘Help yerselp, too. Ya look like ya might be a little low in da duds department.’
‘Thanks. I’ve got stuff to wear, but I’d have to track through a lot of blood to get to them.’
‘Take whatcha want.’
Sandy lifted garments out of the trunk and held them high so she could see them in the moonlight. She put back a couple of dresses, a sport jacket, a pair of slacks, and an evening gown before settling on a two tops that appeared to be shirts or blouses.
‘These okay?’ she asked.
‘Sure. Whatebber.’
Sandy shut the trunk. ‘Let’s go inside and clean up before we put them on.’
Lib nodded, then filled her mouth again.
Sandy led the way. As she climbed the stairs, she warned, ‘Watch out you don’t fall on the way up. This thing’s kind of shaky.’
At the top, she entered the trailer.
And saw what she was carrying. The twin, short-sleeved blouses looked as if they were made of red silk. They gleamed in the lamplight. They looked enormous. Stitched in swirling gold letters on the back of each were the words, Blazing Babes.
Lib stepped into the trailer.
Sandy turned around to face her. ‘Blazing Babes?’
Lib grinned. Though her puffy lips were shut, some bourbon dribbled out. She shrugged. She swallowed. After wiping off her lips and chin, she said, ‘Me and Bill, we piggered it was maybe like a girl’s soccer team or bowlin’ team or sometin’.’
‘They aren’t yours?’
‘Sure dey are. Didn’t used to be, but dey are now.’
‘They’re stolen?’
‘Hey, sugar, damn near everything I got’s stolen. I’m a teep. Been a teep all my lipe. Dat okay?’
‘I don’t know. Are you going to steal from me?’
‘No! What kinda lowlipe you tink I am? Yer my pard, aren’t ya?’
‘I guess so. But if we’re going to travel together, you’ve gotta promise not to get us into trouble. I mean, we’ve both killed guys tonight. We need to disappear quietly. We can’t go around stealing things.’
‘Sure. I get it.’
‘No more crimes.’
‘Whatebber.’ She raised her eyebrows. ‘So, pretty nipty blouses, huh?’
Sandy smirked. ‘Real nifty. Let’s wash up and get them on. This way.’ She led Lib to the bathroom and turned on its light. ‘You can go ahead and use this. I’ll get cleaned up in the kitchen.’
She draped one of the red blouses on a hook just inside the doorway for Lib, then stepped out into the hall.
‘Be done in a jip,’ Lib said. She raised the bottle toward Sandy. ‘How ’bout a sip?’
‘No thanks.’
‘Last call.’
‘You go ahead and finish it.’
‘Know what you are? A princess, dat’s what. A real puckin’ princess.’
Sandy laughed and shook her head. ‘That’s me,’ she said, then stepped away from the bathroom door. As she headed for her kitchen area, the shower started to run.
She tossed the other Blazing Babes blouse onto the kitchen counter, stepped to the sink and turned on the hot water. She took a clean dishwashing cloth out of the drawer.
Without a mirror, she couldn’t see how her face looked. She assumed it must be a mess, though. Because, looking down, she could see her shoulders and arms and breasts and belly: they were filthy and scratched and even smeared with blood, here and there. Her shorts were dirty in front. Her legs had taken the same kind of punishment as her torso.
I probably need a shower worse than Lib does.
‘What she needs,’ Sandy whispered, ‘is a puckin’ dentist.’
Laughing softly, she soaked her cloth with hot water. Then she bent over the sink and started to wash her face.
She supposed she ought to use soap.
Soap seemed like too much bother.
This’ll be fine.
The hot, sodden rag felt very good on her face. Water spilled down her neck and chest. She leaned against the edge of the sink, hoping to keep her shorts from getting wet. But when she started mopping her breasts, so much water sluiced down her belly that she knew it was hopeless. She tried to stop some of it with the rag. Too much got by, so she tucked the rag under her chin, took a step backward and reached for her belt, figuring to get out of the shorts before they became completely drenched.
Should’ve taken them off in the first . . .
Someone screamed.
Sandy’s heart slammed. Her hands jumped away from her belt. She whirled around and ran for the bathroom, the dish cloth sliding down from under her chin, clinging to her chest, falling down between her breasts.
She shoved a hand into the right front pocket of her shorts.
She pulled out the small revolver from Slade’s glove compartment.
And wondered if it was loaded.
Sure it is. Has to be.
And it had to be Lib screaming. Who else could it be?
But why?
Slade on the move, not really dead?
Nobody in the hallway.
Through the roaring in her own head, Sandy realized that the scream had stopped.
She lurched to a halt at the bathroom’s open door.
The wet cloth unpeeled itself from her belly, tumbled, brushed her left thigh and fell to the floor.
The shower curtain was shut. She couldn’t see through it. So she raced across the floor and threw it wide open.
Lib was standing in the shower stall, feet wide apart, knees bent, clutching Eric with both hands as if she’d braced herself and caught him in mid-leap.
She was breathing hard.
Water still sprayed from the shower nozzle.
Lib’s naked body was smudged with bruises. Bruises the size of a fist. The size of an open hand. The size of a knee. Others the size of a bite, a pinch. Brown ones, purple ones, green ones, yellow ones.
She’d been beaten up plenty, over a long period of time.
Tonight must’ve been once too often.
Eyes fixed on Eric, she didn’t look at Sandy.
After a while, she drew Eric in against her chest. As she cradled him, her eyes met Sandy’s. ‘What is he?’ she asked, her voice soft.
‘My kid.’
‘Yer pet?’
‘My baby. I’m his mother.’
‘No p
oolin’?’
‘No fooling.’
‘Well, I’ll be.’ Shaking her head, Lib gently stroked Eric’s back. ‘Sorry I screamed like dat. Da little shit scampered in, ya know, and scared da hell outa me.’
Nodding, Sandy lowered the revolver. ‘Don’t call him a little shit,’ she said.
‘What’s his name?’
‘Eric.’
‘Hiya, Eric. I’m Lib. Dat’s short for Libby.’ To Sandy, she said, ‘Can he talk?’
‘No.’
‘He’s sure an ugly little pucker. What’d his dad look like?’
‘The same as him. And he isn’t ugly.’
‘Cute-ugly.’
‘That’s better.’
‘Is he human?’
‘Sort of.’
‘Looks like he’s part sometin’ else. Like a bald monkey, or da creature prum da Black Lagoon or sometin’. But cute. Cute as a button.’ To Eric, she said in baby talk, ‘Yes, you are.’ Then she kissed his forehead.
‘You can’t tell anyone about him,’ Sandy said. ‘He’s my secret. And now he’s your secret. He’s the last of his kind – at least I think he is – and they’ll kill him if they ever find him.’
‘Who? Who’d wanta kill him?’
‘Damn near everyone. To them, he’s a monster. A beast.’
Lib’s eyes widened. ‘Is he one ob dem Beast House beasts?’
‘His father was.’
‘Holy smokin’ Jesus. Ya tellin’ me dey’re real? I always piggered dey was made up. Like Martians, ya know? Or werewoops or sometin’.’
‘They’re real. You’re holding one.’
Shaking her head slowly, Lib eased Eric away and lifted him in front of her face. ‘Look at ya,’ she said to him in a gentle, lilting voice. ‘Just look at ya. Wowy, wowy. I sure wish I’d known yer old man.’
‘Do you promise not to tell on us?’ Sandy asked.
‘Sure. Cross my heart an’ hope to die.’
‘If you tell, you will die. I’ll see to it.’
‘We’ll be a pamily, da tree ob us.’
Pocketing the revolver, Sandy stepped over to the shower stall. She reached out for Eric. Lib passed the child gently into her hands. ‘See ya later, baby,’ she said.
Sandy saw tears in the woman’s eyes.
‘Are you all right?’
‘Nebber had me no pamily bepore.’
Feeling a tightness in her throat, Sandy smiled at Lib and said, ‘I don’t know if we’re quite a family yet, but I reckon we’re partners.’
‘Pards.’ Lib sniffed, then reached out and squeezed Sandy’s shoulder. ‘Pards to da end.’
Chapter Ten
The Day Tour II
After the brilliant sunlight, the gloom inside Beast House made Owen feel as if he’d stepped into a dark closet. He took off his sunglasses. That helped.
‘Good morning,’ said a guide who was waiting inside the doorway. The nameplate on the front of her tan shirt read SHARON. Blonde, blue-eyed, slender and deeply tanned, she was the best-looking guide so far. ‘Station Number Two is just inside the parlor there, but feel free to wander anywhere.’
‘Thanks,’ Owen said.
As they crossed the foyer, he noticed people starting up the stairway and others wandering into a narrow corridor beside the stairs. A couple came out of the parlor. He recognized them from the group in front of the porch. He thought they’d been on the bus, too, but wasn’t sure. They didn’t act as if they recognized him or Monica.
Which didn’t surprise him.
Put a set of earphones on someone, he’d noticed, and the rest of the world pretty much disappears. Everything goes away except the sounds inside the person’s head.
In the parlor, Owen found half a dozen people standing near a plush red cordon, gazing at the body on the floor. He couldn’t find a sign to confirm that this was the second station of the tour; maybe someone was standing in front of it. But Janice on the tape and Sharon had directed them here. Also, some of the tourists looked like those who’d been gathered near the porch stairs.
Monica didn’t seem to be in doubt. She thumbed her cassette player into action. Owen went ahead and turned his on.
‘Welcome to Station Two,’ said Janice’s voice. ‘You should be in the parlor, where Ethel Hughes was the first to die on the night of August 2, 1903. That’s her body, stretched out on the floor beside the couch.’
Owen stared at the wax figure. It was sprawled on the floor, one leg up, its foot still resting on the seat cushion of the couch. There was terror on Ethel’s face. She looked as if she’d died in the midst of a scream. Her white gown was bloodstained and shredded. Its tatters hung down her body, showing skin that had been savagely torn by claws and teeth.
Owen was surprised by the near nudity of the figure. The way the gown was ripped, Ethel’s breasts were bare except for the nipples. Her hips and legs were exposed. Only a few dangling strips of white cloth saved her from being completely naked below her waist.
‘Ethel was the sister of Lilly Thorn,’ Owen heard Janice saying through his earphones. ‘She actually lived in Portland, Oregon.
‘Earlier that summer, Lilly had sent her children away to stay with Ethel, so that she could be alone in the house. She’d apparently wanted privacy in order to indulge in certain adult behaviors that are beyond the scope of our tour.’
After a brief pause, Janice’s voice continued. ‘On about June 29, Ethel returned to the Thorn house with Lilly’s two children. She then stayed on, possibly planning to attend Lilly’s wedding to the local doctor. Here’s Maggie to tell you about it.
‘Ethel Hughes, Lilly’s sister, was in this very room on the night of August the second, 1903. She’d come down for Lilly’s wedding, which would’ve been the next week if tragedy hadn’t suddenly struck down their plans. Tragedy being the beast. Nobody knows how it got into the house, or where it come from. But it snuck up behind the couch and took Ethel unawares while she was busy reading her Saturday Evening Post. It jumped her and ripped her up till she looked just like you see her – all torn and dead.’
Janice’s voice returned. ‘The Post that Ethel was reading at the time of the attack was found on the floor near her body, exactly where you now see a later issue of the same magazine. The original Post stayed here in the parlor for many years while Maggie ran the tours. For the sake of preserving it, however, it has been moved to the Beast House Museum. The gown worn by Ethel is also on display at the museum. What you see here is an exact duplicate of the original, identical down to every rip and bloodstain.
‘This is the original figure of Ethel Hughes, created in wax by M. Claude Dubois in 1936. The work was commissioned by Maggie Kutch. When placing the order for this and the figures of the two boys that you’ll see upstairs, Maggie included photographs of the murder scenes, plus morgue photos of the corpses. She asked that the positions of the bodies, and all the injuries, be recreated with complete accuracy of detail.
‘Generations of visitors from all over the world have stood where you are now standing and gazed down at this very replica of Ethel’s ravaged body. This mannequin has also been seen in several popular films of The Horror series, which were based – sometimes very loosely – on my books about Beast House.
‘Before we go on to the next station, I’d like to point out that the information we’re presenting in this tour is based almost entirely on the tours given by Maggie Kutch from 1932 to 1979. Now, Maggie didn’t always tell the truth – far from it. She knew much more than she ever told. When I bought this place, I made the decision to stay with Maggie’s version for a couple of reasons. First, even though it’s full of lies, it is the authentic Beast House tour. I wanted to give you, and all our visitors, a taste of how it might’ve been, many years ago, to be guided through the house by the woman who created the attraction in the first place. Second, the actual truth about Beast House isn’t suitable for family entertainment. If you want to know the actual, true details of the history of Beast House, yo
u’ll find it in my books or on the Midnight Tour.
‘And now, a few more words from Maggie. When she’s finished, it’ll be time to turn off your recorders and proceed to Station Three at the top of the stairway.
‘After the beast got done murdering Ethel,’ Maggie said, ‘it went on a rampage around the room. It knocked over this bust of Caesar, breaking off his nose. See, there’s his nose on the mantel.’ Owen spotted the nose. Though it was out of reach beyond the cordon, it looked dirty, as if it had been handled too often by people with grimy fingers. He was surprised that nobody had stolen it.
‘The beast just run amok for a while, dashing some figurines in the fireplace, turning over chairs. See this rosewood pedestal table? The beast threw it out the bay window over there. Must’ve made a mighty loud noise, all that glass getting smashed to smithereens.
‘I reckon the racket likely woke up everybody in the house. Lilly’s room was right above us. Maybe she got out of bed, and the beast heard her. It scooted out of here and went running for the stairs.’
Owen heard a click as Monica hit the Stop button of her player. His own player hissed quietly for a moment before he shut it off.
He and Monica had eased their way closer and closer to the cordon as those ahead of them finished listening and wandered off. Now, they stood at the rope.
Owen had been able to see Ethel all along, but this was as near to her as he could hope to get. Without stepping over the cordon.
He stared at her.
And tried to imagine her real. Tried, in his mind, to transform her like Pygmalion or Pinocchio into a human with soft, smooth skin.
But he couldn’t make it happen.
Too many distractions. The other people in the room, especially Monica. And how Ethel’s gown barely covered her. Owen wished a breeze would come along and blow some of those tatters aside.
Instead of making Ethel turn real in his mind, he pictured himself climbing over the cordon, kneeling over her, and peeking underneath the loose shreds of her gown.
Get off it, he told himself. She’s a dummy.
Even so . . .
Monica nudged him with her elbow and whispered, ‘Let’s go, Owie.’
He followed her to the door. They stepped aside to make room for a couple of people trying to come in, then headed for the stairway.