Horror Show (10 page)

Now sunken and carrying a wrinkled mass of flesh around them, they still gleamed with an intensity that made most people shrink from his stare. Luboff's eyes penetrated.

His eyes were diabolical, mad, passionate, and searching. They sent complicated, mixed messages of pain to those who chose to look into them. The windows to a troubled and unhappy soul, they glared back at him from the mirror. Even with the pupils constricted to mere pinpoints, they still expressed enough raw anguish for a thousand lifetimes.

Once, they had looked out from the movie screen at millions of paying customers. From his classic 1930s films, which made him a matinee idol, to the cheap, shoddy Landis Woodley productions of the 1950s, those eyes compelled generations of moviegoers.

As a young, darkly handsome leading man, women fought over him. He'd been married five times, bought and sold numerous Hollywood mansions, starred in over a hundred pictures, and was known the world over. Now, in a low-rent apartment in West Hollywood, he waited for the smack to deaden the pain of living so he could once again pull off the illusion of life.

Luboff staggered backward, bounced off the wall, then collapsed heavily in a metal-and-plastic kitchen chair. How the chair had made it from the kitchen to his bedroom, he didn't know. It had appeared there last week, migrating across the filthy expanse of the living room floor to where it now supported his emaciated frame.

His breath came shallow; the room spun.

He knew he had to get up and get ready to attend the party, but his limbs refused to cooperate. Luboff, the consummate actor, knew how to force his body to do things it didn't want to do. He'd been doing it for years. Desire was the key, desire and pacing.

He was still dressed in his bathrobe, a garment he wore constantly unless he had to go out. His black tuxedo with tails hung by the door, still encased in plastic from the dry cleaners. Landis had taken care of that chore for him. He had also purchased a box of decent cigars so that the star of his latest movie wouldn't appear too destitute. Luboff's taste in tobacco ran to the cheap, unpleasant-smelling varieties he bought at the drugstore.

Luboff felt the rush of the narcotic sweep through his system, wiping away the failures and the humiliations that had accumulated since his last fix.

The great Luboff sighed.

He lurched from his chair and bumped into the dresser. His shoulder collided with a framed movie poster proclaiming, “Luboff at his most frightening! The story of a curse that wouldn't die! Experience the horror of THE MUMMY'S BRAIN!” It rattled against the wall but didn't fall. Jonathon steadied himself. This was Luboff at his most frightening right now, far more disturbing than anything he'd portrayed in that or any other film.

His hands were clumsy and huge as he opened the cigars and attempted to light one. Everything seemed small and delicate, and he felt as if he were wearing gloves. He fumbled with the cigars, managing to unwrap one and put it in his mouth. Lighting it was another story. The matches fought him, frustrating him to the point of mental exhaustion. At last he struck a match and brought one of the fine cigars to life, puffing it frantically. His hollow cheeks worked in and out like a bellows as he fought to keep the ember glowing.

Luboff's eyes burned like distant warning signals.

He swayed and leaned, his shrunken, quivering body as unsteady as his mental state.

As the plumes of bluish smoke filled the air, he felt warm and weightless. The skeleton of a smile crossed his lips.

He stayed, leaning across the dresser, cigar in hand, for almost thirty minutes. His legs had locked into position, and, instead of falling, as he often did after a fix, he remained upright, his mind wandering.

He vaguely remembered Landis Woodley telling him he'd arranged for a starlet to accompany the actor to the party.

Could it have been a dream? Luboff's mind swam. His sex drive had shriveled away years ago, and now the only vicarious thrill Luboff got from beautiful women was in the status of their proximity.

His hands shook all the time now, so he could no more caress a shoulder or a breast than he could perform brain surgery.

For the great Jonathon Luboff, the grave beckoned.

Eventually he donned his tuxedo, slipped a worn vampire's cape over his shoulders, and straightened his back. A comb slicked his graying hair back, and a little theatrical makeup added color to his pale visage. He looked in the mirror and compared this latest reflection to the one he had beheld earlier.

It was improved. Not greatly, but some.

The heroin had left him dazed, and he stayed in that dreamland between worlds even after the doorbell rang, signaling the arrival of his car and driver.

He walked slowly to the car, in character, high as a kite.

Landis Woodley's house was
lit up like a nightclub. Cars lined the street in front on both sides. Neighbors complained bitterly to the police, but nothing came of it. This, after all, was Hollywood on Halloween, a town and a holiday made for each other. People in costumes paraded past the gawkers. There were dozens of Draculas and Frankensteins, handfuls of mummies, and a small army of sexy witches.

The guest list included over a hundred names, many from the horror film business. The stars were Jonathon Luboff and Devila.

Landis stood by the front door and welcomed people by filming their arrival on 16 mm film. When Devila and Albert Beaumond drove up in their hearse, the flashbulbs popped.

Once inside, Devila played the room like the pro that she was, posing and vamping for the cameras. Most people didn't know or recognize Albert. Devila herself knew that the delayed reaction to that would be worth its weight in gold. Wait until the world put two and two together! The Satanist and the horror show girl!

Luboff's entrance came off a bit less splashy but every ounce as electric. The limo wheeled up to the house and ejected the fragile actor and his young cohort. Their arranged “dates” trailed behind. People rushed to greet them and get a closer glimpse at how bad Luboff looked. He drove them off with his eyes. One level stare, and they were repelled back into the faceless crowd.

Landis and Jonathon embraced, cigars puffing, and exchanged pleasantries. Woodley was pleased to see that the old man had controlled his dose to manageable proportions. Tad Kingston stood by impassively. His hair, of course, was perfect.

Landis had hired photographers to photograph the celebrities, knowing that some of the pictures would run in various newspapers and magazines and thereby promote his movies. In this way he could not only control the dissemination of information, but he would own the photos. Landis Woodley loved publicity.

Plus, he had a few surprises planned.

Buzzy Haller and Roberta Bachman entered arm in arm and went straight to the bar, where Buzzy began the night-long project of trying to get her drunk.

She thwarted his efforts by sipping a controlled amount of champagne, pacing herself and making Buzzy crazy. Roberta knew how to take care.

When Neal Cassidy arrived, the upstairs bedroom became the reefer room and guests came and went all night. Bongo music drifted into the hall along with the sweet scent of burning pot. Poetry was being recited, people were expressing themselves. Neal was a magnet for the beats. He spent hours pontificating about Kerouac's real mission, the message of Zen. Everyone listened with the rapt attention of tea-heads.

Luboff himself spent at least an hour in there, inhaling marijuana and making small talk. His date, the actress Lillian Mansville, abandoned the old junkie five minutes after they arrived. The cigar smoke made her sick, she complained. Before she dumped him for a male fashion model from Santa Monica, though, she made sure that they had their pictures taken by every available photographer in the place.

Neil Bugmier, wearing a baby blue chiffon prom dress and white pumps, attracted as much attention as the celebrities. He laughed and danced, enjoying the limelight. Halloween meant a lot to him; it was a chance to show the world his most inventive side with total legitimacy.

He circulated freely, leaving a trail of astonished looks and rolled eyes. As per his instructions, he talked about the new script to anyone who would listen.

In the center of the house, next to the great spiral staircase where the ceiling stood as high as the structure would allow, was a twenty-foot-high guillotine. It dominated the wild landscape of the party like a huge antique curiosity. The blade, perched high above the crowd, gleamed mirrorlike and appeared razor-sharp.

In conversation, Landis explained to anyone who would listen that it was real, an original French Revolution model. He claimed that he'd purchased it from a broker in Paris for a movie he would eventually make about Marie Antoinette,
Headless Beauty
.

People looked up at the blade with ghoulish fascination. Landis explained that this particular guillotine had been in service for many years and had the blood of hundreds of victims soaked into it. This instrument of death, he declared, must be respected and feared. “It's probably haunted.”

Partygoers stared up at it all night, wondering what happened when that heavy blade was loosed. They could almost see it in action, the headless bodies jerking spastically while the heads thumped into a bloody wicker basket.

In general, folks gave it a wide berth as they passed—but they couldn't help but look. When the shivers ceased crawling up their backs, they edged closer, eyeing the blade poised above them, a graphic reminder of Landis's monstrous imagination.

Buzzy introduced Roberta to Landis, and he promised to star her in his next movie if she would “go for a walk” with him around the grounds. She declined, but he persisted. At some point during the evening, he paid Buzzy one hundred dollars for the right to steal his date.

Her cigarette girl costume was drawing the wrong kind of attention, and she now felt uncomfortable. She draped her jacket over her shoulders to dampen the effect.

Roberta's modesty made an impression on Landis, and his desire for her increased in direct proportion to her rejection of him.

“Come on, you've got to see the tree house,” he insisted. He pointed out the window to an elaborate building perched in an old oak tree.

“That's the fourth time you've asked me,” Roberta replied, becoming annoyed.

“It's a special place; you've got to see it.”

“You're not going to leave me alone until I go out there and see your stupid tree house, are you?”

Landis smiled. “Nope.”

“All right, I guess I have to, but the only way I'm going out there is if my friend Laura goes.”

“Laura Grootna? The costume designer's assistant? Sure, the more the merrier, I always say.”

“And Buzzy.”

“Why Buzzy?”

“Because he's my date.”

They climbed the ladder and entered through a trapdoor in the floor. Buzzy made the girls go first so he could sneak a peek up their dresses as they ascended.

There were three windows in the tree house, all shuttered. Landis insisted on opening all three, the last one affording a beautiful panoramic view of the city.

The two girls watched as he unlatched the shutters and folded them back.

Framed in the window, backlit by the lights of the city below, was a body hanging by the neck. It pivoted slowly in the slight breeze. The face was discolored, the lips blue, and the tongue lolled grotesquely out of the mouth like a huge purple slug. As the body swung into view, Landis shone a flashlight in its face. Laura screamed.

“My God, it's Fred, the key grip!” Landis shouted.

Roberta felt the champagne rise in her throat and knew she was going to be sick. She looked down at the trapdoor and the ladder below with trepidation. Her eyes went back to the dead man, his face now fully in view as Landis's flashlight illuminated the terrible grimace there.

Then, Roberta's legs turned to rubber as she saw something that scared her beyond reason.

The dead man's eyes snapped open, the purple tongue curled back, and an ugly smile split his unearthly lips. The mouth opened, and a voice from the grave crackled, “Hey, baby. How about a little kiss?”

Roberta screamed again and bolted for the trapdoor. She was through it and down the ladder in a matter of seconds, Landis right behind. Buzzy stayed above in the tree house, laughing maniacally.

Roberta bent over in the bushes and vomited. Landis stood behind, quiet and concerned.

He waited respectfully while she emptied her stomach, then offered her a handkerchief as she straightened up.

Their eyes met, hers wild and fearful, his strangely excited.

“What was it?” she coughed.

“A joke … I think.”

“What?”

“A sick joke, that's all.”

Roberta looked at Landis with undisguised disgust. He winced. She held her gaze for several seconds, then turned abruptly on her heel and began to walk briskly away.

“Hey, wait a minute!” Landis shouted.

“Don't talk to me!” Roberta said with icy conviction.

“It wasn't my idea! It was Buzzy's!”

“You knew?” Her angry eyes surprised him. It wasn't the reaction he'd anticipated.

“Yeah, I guess I did.”

“You're an asshole, Landis Woodley!” she shouted, and began to walk away again.

“Are you leaving?”

She answered by walking faster, up the incline toward the street.

“Laura's still up there!” Landis said quickly. “What about her?”

Roberta stopped and turned to face him. “Oh! What's he got planned for her? More fun and games? You guys are really sick!”

Roberta heard Laura's voice calling.

“See? She's all right.”

“No thanks to you.”

Laura ran after Roberta, her face still wet with tears. They embraced, Roberta staring daggers at Landis over Laura's shoulder. Then the two women turned and marched up the hill.

“Wait! Where are you going?”