Horror Show (32 page)

“I'd say, ‘holy shit.'”

“And what would you say if I told you he confided all his deepest, darkest secrets to me?”

“I'd say, ‘why the fuck have I been all over town digging up rumors when you've got the facts?'”

It was Roberta's turn to smile. “A story is a story. You still have to do your homework.”

“You're the boss.”

Roberta sniffed. She was the boss, and as long as she was running the show, she'd put whatever writer on whatever story she wanted. It just so happened that Clint was a natural for this one. He was familiar with the subject matter, he was sharp and resourceful, and, she thought, a talented young writer.

“Why do you think I sent you out on this?” she asked.

“I don't know. Because I like his movies?”

“Crap,” Roberta snorted. “His films are garbage. How you can watch 'em, I'll never know. You're a sick puppy, kid.”

Clint shifted in his seat.

“From what you've gathered so far, tell me what you think,” Roberta said.

Clint hunched forward, his face aglow. The sparkle of excitement in his eyes was intense. “I think there's a curse.”

Roberta smiled. She looked over his head, letting her eyes drift across a Peggy Hopper Hawaiian print. She gathered her breath and asked, “Okay, why do you think that?”

“Because, several of the people who worked on
Cadaver
have all met untimely deaths. Most recently, a year ago, Buzzy Haller committed suicide. In 1989, Chet Bronski was murdered in his apartment, strangled. It's still in the ‘unsolved crimes' file at the LAPD. Before that, in 1971, Neil Bugmier disappeared off the face of the earth, again, no clues.”

Roberta nodded. “And you think it's a conspiracy?”

“Conspiracies are for wimps. I think there's a curse, a big, fat, juicy curse, and that's the story I'm gonna write.”

Roberta smiled anew. “I knew you'd think that.”

“You did?”

“Of course. That's why I put you on it.”

Clint's jaw dropped. “What?”

“First of all,” she continued, “just getting in to see Landis Woodley is a challenge. I know that. He's turned into quite the recluse, not to mention he's just about the most unpleasant man in the known universe.
I certainly wasn't going over there
. And it's too good a story to go to waste.

“With your enthusiasm for his films and your encyclopedic knowledge of the man, the myth, the miracle, I figured you would find a way in. Then, once you got in, you'd be able to hold his attention, even if it was just some kind of sicko hero worship.”

Clint nodded. “Yeah, you were right about that.”

“He likes hero worship. He never got his due in the glory years,” Roberta explained. “I figured you were just the man for the job. A good curse story is dynamite, and you're a good writer, Clint. Good writers are worth their weight.”

Clint ran his fingers through his hair, raking it back loosely. “The thing is—the story about real corpses in
Cadaver
is true. He actually confessed to it on tape: Now, that in itself is a hell of scoop and would sell a ton of magazines, but then I started thinkin'. I thought, hey, most of these people are dead.”

“Good, good, go on,” she said.

“Well, think about it. They use real corpses, later on people start dying. It's like—they're pissed off, you know? The dead are pissed off and they want revenge.”

Roberta nodded. “So?”

“So, they're back from the grave and they want their residuals!”

Roberta thought Clint's idea of a joke was weak. She let it crash and burn on her desk without flinching.

“What about the others?” she asked.

“What others?”

“Didn't you check the rest of the cast and crew of
Cadaver
, to see who was left alive?”

Clint shook his head.

“Fred Sanchez, AKA Beatnik Fred, was Buzzy Haller's right-hand man on the film. He was one of Buzzy's pot-smokin' buddies from San Francisco. He disappeared a year after Chet. They found his shoe out in the driveway.”

“Wow! Just one shoe?”

Roberta nodded. “There was blood on it.”

“Jeez.”

“Jonathon Luboff, overdose of heroin, October 31, 1958.”

Clint cocked his head. “I knew that.”

Roberta took a sip of some mineral water that had been sitting on her desk all afternoon. It was as warm and flat as the air in San Fernando Valley that day.

“Yes, I would have thought you'd know that, Clint. Everybody knew that Luboff was a junkie, and it was only a matter of time before he died, but, he
was
the star of the movie. Who's to say it wasn't an accidental overdose?”

Clint nodded. “I lost track of Tad Kingston,” he said with a tinge of resignation in his reedy voice. “I tried everything, tracked him every way I knew how, but he's a blank page. Now, if he—”

“Canada,” she said.

Clint stopped talking.

Roberta continued, “He moved to Canada in 1966, made a few more terrible films and retired. He married Becky Sears. You wouldn't know her, she was a script girl who worked for Woodley.”

“Great. I'll look him up right now.”

“Dead,” Roberta said flatly. “Dead. Dead. Dead.”

Clint's eyes widened. “Jesus Christ! Dead? Are you sure?”

“Yes, I'm sure. Same deal, as far as I know. Strangled. He'd come back to Hollywood to bury his mother. They found him in his hotel room.”

Clint slid back into the chair. He started to put his frayed sneakers up on the chair across from him, but stopped in mid-swing. Roberta's knowing eyes bored into him, and he lowered his feet back to the carpet. “Don't even think about it,” they seemed to say, and Clint didn't.

“Did you see
Cadaver
when you were young?” she asked.

“Sure. Of course. It scared the shit out of me.”

Roberta nodded. “You're not alone. Aside from
Night of the Living Dead
, it's most people's favorite horror movie of that era, certainly the most frightening. Did it give you nightmares?”

“Boy, did it ever. I was one of those kids who had all the plastic models of monsters all over his room, and I also had my army men. At night, I was so scared that the dead bodies from the movie were gonna attack me that I set up my army men all around the room, facing the windows and doors. I had tanks, bazooka guys, everything, plus the model monsters to protect me. The only problem was that I thought that maybe during the night, the model monsters would come alive and turn bad and attack the army guys, then come for
me
. I was one screwed-up kid, let me tell ya. A couple of times I woke up to find that some of them had moved or gotten knocked over during the night.
That
made me wonder.”

“You're still wondering, aren't you, Clint?”

He nodded his head thoughtfully. “Yeah, I guess I am.”

“Well, there's something sinister about that movie, something downright evil. I was convinced of that way back in '57. If I was to tell you that there was a curse on that movie, even if you didn't know about the corpses, you'd believe it, right?”

“I think I would,” Clint replied.

“Well, so would a lot of our readers. I think this story is huge. As far as the curse goes, I've suspected it for years. When Buzzy Haller died, I knew. I just knew. Landis Woodley is a very bitter man. I guess you found that out. Buzzy Haller was his best friend, his only friend. Buzzy was the last one to die. They all shared a secret. A terrible secret.”

Clint blinked. “Are you saying that Landis Woodley is behind it?”

Roberta didn't answer right away. She let Clint ponder the situation before speaking.

“Landis is a very unhappy man. His career is over, he has nothing left except that crumbling house, and he's the only one who knows what's happening. I'm sure he's kept track over the years. I'm not saying he killed them … I'm not sure what I'm saying. All I can tell you is, I think he knows the truth, and I think he's hiding something.”

The office was still. It was a weekday afternoon. The staff only came in three days a week to do the layout and sell the advertising. The rest of the time they worked at home. Roberta preferred it that way. She liked it quiet. It allowed her to think. In this age of computers, fax machines, and fiber-optic telephone communication, her people could work at home all they wanted. That left her with a quiet office most of the time, until a deadline loomed.

Clint broke the silence.

“Shit. You knew all that?”

Roberta nodded.

“But you still let me go out and dig like a gopher?”

She smiled, tapped her pencil on her desk again, and pointed it at Clint. “You're my best writer. I think this story will be the biggest thing the magazine's ever done, I want a first-rate job, an honest job.”

“But, if you knew all along …”

“I detest Landis Woodley,” Roberta said sharply. “I think he's scum, and I could never be objective about this story, even though I've been sitting on it for years. I've been waiting for someone like you to come along and pick up the pieces. Me write the story? No, Clint, this one's yours. I want it done right.”

“I wonder if we'll ever find out the truth,” Clint wondered aloud. “It's been a long time.”

“Yeah. Either way, we'll know soon.”

“Why?” Clint asked.

Roberta's expression turned hard. It was a practiced move. Her face clouded over like a stormy sky. “Didn't you learn
anything
?”

“Well, I—”

“All the murders, deaths, whatever you want to call them, occurred in October–November. Look at the calendar. It's the end of November now.”

“So?”

“So, Landis is the last one left.”

Clint closed his eyes. “Oh, I see. If it is a curse, and he's the last one, maybe it'll come for him, but if he's behind it, maybe nothing will happen. Sounds like the plot of one of his movies.”

“And now, Landis Woodley is the last one. Are you sure you want to go back now?”

Clint smiled and nodded. “Are you kiddin'? I love this kind of stuff. It's cool, it's scary, and that's my bag.” He glanced at his watch. “I gotta get workin'. I'll let you know, okay?”

She threw a folder that had been on her desk into his lap.

“Newspaper photocopies. Nineteen-fifty-seven. Read 'em.”

He stood up and smiled.

“Be careful,” she reminded him.

He went back to the desk that she let him use in the office and began to scan the photocopies of newspapers for October–November 1957.

He found the first mention of Landis Woodley for November 1, 1957. It was an account of his Halloween party in the gossip column. There had been some noise complaints, parking problems, a few angry neighbors, that kind of thing. It must have been quite a bash, he thought. There was a published guest list. He scanned it, jotting down the names.

Reading on, he came across a curious article. A few days after the party, Devila, the horror show hostess, blew her brains out on TV. He remembered the name. She had been a guest of Woodley's. Coincidence? Clint was beginning to suspect that there were no coincidences. He dug farther.

Twenty minutes later he came across an account of the disappearance of Albert Beaumond, the celebrated Satanist. Thora Beaumond was quoted as saying her father was still alive somewhere, probably suffering from amnesia.

He went back to the guest list.

Albert Beaumond was Devila's date at the party! More coincidences?

Clint decided to find Thora Beaumond and talk to her.

Former Lieutenant, now retired
Captain Garth Prease, found Clint first. As soon as Prease got word that someone was sniffing around looking for the former Thora Beaumond, now Mrs. Thora Beaumond-Prease, he left his home and came down to confront the stranger. He was surprised to find a man as young as Clint.

“Sir, I need some information about Albert Beaumond.”

“That's ancient history,” Garth said brusquely. “I don't see—”

“I'm a journalist. I'm working on a story about Landis Woodley.”

“Woodley? That old rummy film guy?”

“Yes, sir. You see, Albert Beaumond was Devila's date for the Halloween party he gave in 1957. As you may recall, she committed suicide a few days later, at about the same time Albert disappeared.”

Garth scratched his chin and looked around. “Let's go in my office,” he said softly.

As soon as the door closed he turned and said, “It's taken me years to bury this Albert Beaumond thing, and I don't want you dredging it up and upsetting my wife.”

“Your wife? You married Beaumond's daughter?”

Garth nodded. “Yes, I … she needed help, we grew close, I married her a year later. I don't see what any of this has to do with Landis Woodley.”

“I'm looking for a possible connection between Woodley's party, Devila's suicide, and Beaumond's disappearance.”

Garth went behind the desk and sat down, motioning for Clint to do the same. “That was a long time ago. Devila was a freak, Albert Beaumond was a Satanist. They were like two peas in a pod. Thora was lucky to get out when she did.”

Clint made a note of that and continued. “I read about Mr. Beaumond in the newspapers. He was quite a controversial person.”

“He was a devil worshiper, for God's sake!”

Clint pulled out his pad and began to write.

“You never found him?”

“No.”

“Not even a clue?”

Garth eyed Clint suspiciously. His upper face narrowed, producing a squint that locked his eyes in shadow. “Who did you say you were with?”

“Bachman Publications,” Clint replied, using the name of
Monster Magazine
's parent company because it sounded a hell of a lot better.