The Amityville Horror (19 page)

"Kathy! What are you doing! You'll catch your death of cold!" It was her mother, back from the kitchen.

Even after the red welts had completely disappeared, Mrs. Conners didn't want to leave Kathy. When George returned with the children, she argued that the whole family should leave 112 Ocean Avenue. He could stay if he wanted, but she insisted her Kathy and her grandchildren go.

By then, Kathy was asleep upstairs and after the latest episode, George didn't want to awaken her. "Let her sleep a little longer, Ma," he said. "We'll see about coming over later."

His mother-in-law had agreed reluctantly, getting him to promise to call her the minute her daughter awoke. If you don't, George, I'll be back!" she warned him. He called her a cab, and she returned to East Babylon at four in the afternoon.

At the Amityville library, George had been able to secure a temporary borrower's card and take out one book-on witches and demons. Now that his mother-in-law had gone home, he sat alone in the livingroom, deep in the subject of the Devil and his works.

It was after eight in the evening before George finished his borrowed book. During the afternoon, Kathy's mother had prepared spaghetti and meatballs that George set out at suppertime. Danny, Chris and Missy ate while George continued reading. The last time he had looked in on Kathy, she stirred a little and he thought she was about ready to awaken from her much needed rest. Now he was in the kitchen and the three children were in the livingroom watching television.

George had made notes while going through the book, and now he looked at what he had jotted down. On the pad was a list of demons, with names he had never heard of. George tried to pronounce them aloud, and they rolled strangely off his tongue. Then he decided to call Father Mancuso.

The priest was surprised that the Lutzes were still at 112 Ocean Avenue. "I thought you were going to leave the house," he said. "I told you what the Chancellors said to do."

"I know, Father, I know," answered George. "But now I think I know how to lick this thing." He picked up the book from the table. "I've been reading about how these witches and demons work ..."

Good Lord, Father Mancuso thought, I'm dealing with a child, an innocent. Here the man's house is about to explode under him and his family, and he's talking to me about witches....

"... And it says here if you hold an incantation and repeat those demons' names three times, you can call them up," George went on. "There's a ceremony in here that shows you exactly what to do. Iscaron, Madeste!", George began to chant. "Those are the names of the demons, Father ..."

"I know who they are!" Father Mancuso blurted.

"Then there's Isabo! Erz, erz-this one's hard to pronounce. Erzelaide. She has something to do with voodoo. And Eslender!"

"George!" the priest cried. "For God's sake! Don't invoke those names again! Not now! Not ever!"

"Why, Father?" George protested. "It's right here in this book. What's wrong with ..."

The telephone went dead in George's hand. There was an unearthly moan, a loud clicking, and then just the sound of a disconnected line. Did Father Mancuso hang up on me? George wondered. And what's happened to this guy Kekoris?

"Was that my mother?"

George turned and saw Kathy standing in the doorway. No longer in her bathrobe, she had combed her hair and was wearing slacks and a sweater. Her face was slightly flushed.

George shook his head. "How do you feel, honey?" he asked. "Have a good sleep?"

Kathy lifted up her sweater, baring her navel. "It's gone." She stroked herself. "They're not there anymore." She sat down at the table. "Where are the kids?"

"They're watching television," George answered. He took her hands in his. "You want to call your mother now?"

Kathy nodded. She felt strangely relaxed, almost sensual. Ever since she had the sensation of being stared at in her bed, Kathy had been in a languorous mood, as if she had been completely satisfied sexually. It had even carried over into her recent nap, she mused, when she had unconnected visions of making love to someone. It wasn't George....

Kathy dialed her mother's number while George went into the livingroom with the children. He heard a loud clap of thunder. Looking out the windows, he saw the first raindrops strike the panes. Then somewhere in the distance, a flash of lightning hit the darkness and again, a few moments later, came another boom of thunder. George could make out the silhouettes of trees swaying in the rising gusts.

Kathy came into the room. "My mother says it's raining cats and dogs there," she announced. "She wants us to use our van rather than have Jimmy come for us."

The rain was coming down much harder now, beating heavily against the windows and outside walls. "From the sound of that," George said, "none of us is going anywhere at the moment."

When she had left her bedroom, Kathy opened the windows about an inch to air out the room. Even if there wasn't much room for water to get in, with the coming storm, she wanted to play it safe. "Danny," she called. "Run up to my room and close the windows tight. Okay?"

George himself ran out to bring Harry inside. In spite of the sheets of icy rain that lashed at him, George could feel the cold spell was breaking up. The rains would wash away the dirty piles of accumulated snow. There was a problem living right on the river though, for such a heavy rainfall could add to the frozen waters and overflow the bulkheads.

George came back inside, with Harry gratefully shaking himself, just in time to hear Danny, still upstairs, cry out in pain. Kathy raced ahead of George up the stairs to their bedroom. Danny stood at a window, the fingers of his right hand trapped under the window. With his left he was trying to push up the heavy wooden frame.

George pushed Kathy aside and ran to the boy who was yelling and trying to pull his fingers free. George tried to slide the window back up, but it refused to budge. He hammered at the frame but instead of releasing itself, the window vibrated, only hurting Danny more. In his frustration, George became furious and started to curse, shouting obscenities at his unseen, unknown enemies.

Suddenly the window came free on its own and shot up a few inches, freeing Danny. He grabbed his fingers in his other hand, cradling them and crying hysterically for his mother.

Kathy took the injured hand in her own. Danny didn't want to open his fist, and she had to shout at him. "Let me see, Danny! Open your fist!"

Averting his eyes, the boy extended his arm. Kathy screamed when she saw what his fingers looked like-all except the thumb were strangely flat. Even more, frightened by his mother's anguished cry, Danny jerked his hand away. George exploded. Running like a madman again from room to room, he screamed invectives, challenging whatever was doing this to his family to come out and fight. There was as much of a storm raging inside 112 Ocean Avenue as outside, as Kathy chased after her husband asking him to call a doctor for Danny.

The rage within George soon spent itself. He suddenly became aware that his little boy was hurt and needed medical attention. He ran to the kitchen telephone and tried to call Kathy's family doctor, John Aiello. But the line was dead. As he later learned, the storm had torn down a telephone pole, locking the Lutzes in their house even more effectively.

"I'll have to drive Danny to the hospital," George shouted. "Put his jacket on!"

The Brunswick Hospital Center is on Broadway in Amityville, no more than a mile from the Lutzes' house. Because of the hurricane-force winds raging through Long Island's South Shore, it took George almost fifteen minutes to get there.

The intern on duty was amazed at the condition of Danny's fingers, which were flattened from the cuticle to the second knuckle. But though they certainly looked crushed beyond repair, they were not broken, with no smashed bones-or cartilage. He bandaged them securely, gave George some children's aspirin for Danny and suggested they return home. There was nothing more he could do.

By then, the young boy was more frightened from the way his fingers looked than from any pain. While George drove home, he held his hand stiffly against his chest, sobbing and moaning. Again it took George close to twenty minutes to drive back to 112 Ocean Avenue. The winds whipped the front door of the house back against the building, and he had trouble trying to close it behind him.

Kathy had put Chris and Missy in her own bed and was waiting in the livingroom. She picked up her eldest and rocked him in her arms. Danny finally cried himself to sleep, exhausted by the gruelling pain and fear. George carried Danny up to their bedroom. Taking off only the boy's shoes, he slid him under the covers next to the other two children. Then he and Kathy sat down in chairs by the windows and watched the rain smash against the panes.

They dozed fitfully all the rest of the night. They had to stay home-it was impossible to try and get to Kathy's mother or to any other place to sleep-but they were alert to any other dangers that might threaten their children or themselves. Toward dawn both fell asleep.

At six-thirty George was awakened by the rain spattering against his face. For an instant he thought he was outdoors-but no, he was still inside in his chair by the window. Jumping up, he saw that every window in the room was wide open, some frames torn away from their jambs. Then he heard the wind and rain coming through in other parts of the house. He rushed out of the bedroom.

Every room he went into was in the same condition, window panes broken, the doors on the second and third floors smashed open-even though every one had been locked and bolted! All the Lutzes had slept through what must have been a terrible racket.

22 January 11 -The Lutzes had lived at 112 Ocean Avenue for twenty-five days. That Sunday was one of the worst.

In the morning, they discovered that the battering rain and wind of the night before had left the house a complete mess. Rainwater had stained the walls, curtains, furniture, and rugs, from the first floor to the third floor. Ten of the windows had broken panes and several had their locks bent completely out of shape, making it impossible to shut them tightly. The locks to the doors of the sewing room and playroom were twisted and forced out of their metal frames; these couldn't be closed at all. If the family had any intention of leaving for safer quarters, that idea had to be shelved in order to get the house back in shape and secured.

In the kitchen, some of the cabinets were soaked and warped. Paint was chipped on the comers of almost every cabinet. Kathy hadn't really thought about those problems yet; she had her hands full mopping up almost an inch of muddy water that had accumulated on her tile flooring. She hoped she could dry the floor before the tiles peeled loose from their cement backing.

Danny and Chris had two large rolls of paper towels and were going from room to room wiping down the walls. When they had to reach beyond their arms' length, they used a little kitchen stepladder. Missy trailed along with the boys, picking up the wet towels they discarded and throwing them into a large plastic garbage bag.

George took down every set of curtains and drapes in the house. Some could be machine-washed, and those he carried downstairs to the basement laundry. The others that would have to be dry-cleaned were put in a pile in the dining room, the driest room in the house.

The Lutzes were strangely silent while they worked that morning and afternoon. This newest disaster had only made them more determined to survive in 112 Ocean Avenue. Nobody said it, but George, Kathy, Danny, Chris, and Missy Lutz were now ready to battle any force, natural or unnatural.

Even Harry was putting on a show of toughness. The half-breed malamute was on his lead in his compound, stalking back and forth through the mud, his tail high, teeth bared. The growls and snarls that came from deep within his heavy chest were signs that the dog would tear to shreds the first person or thing he didn't recognize. Every once in a while, Harry would stop his pacing, stare at the boathouse and let out a wolf-like howl that sent shivers down the spine of everyone who lived on Ocean Avenue.

When George finished with the sodden curtains, he began to work on the windows. First he cut heavy plastic sheets to cover the broken panes and sealed them to the window frames with white adhesive tape. It wasn't a pretty sight from the inside or out, but at least it kept out the steadily falling drizzle.

George bad guessed right. The temperature had risen with the storm, and it was above freezing. A lot of damage had been done to the trees and bushes along Ocean Avenue, and looking up South Ireland Place, George could see that it too had its share of broken branches lying in the street. He did note, however, that the neighbors on either side of his house had no broken windows or any other exterior damages. Only me, George thought. Terrific!

The locks on the windows and doors were a more difficult matter. George didn't have the hardware to replace the catches on the windows, so he used a pair of pliers to twist off the smashed pieces of metal. Then he hammered heavy nails into the edges of the wooden frames and challenged his unseen foes: "Let me see you pull those out, you sons of bitches!" The locks to the sewing room and playroom doors be removed completely. In the cellar he found some one inch pine boards that were perfect for his needs. The doors opened outward into the hallway, so George nailed the boards diagonally across both. For whatever might have remained in the two mysterious rooms, there was no longer a way out.

George Kekoris finally telephoned, saying he'd like to come out and spend a night. There was only one problem-since Kekoris had no equipment with him, the Psychical Research Institute would have to consider the visit an informal one. He would have to draw conclusions without the rigorous controls required for scientific evaluation.

George said that didn't matter; he just wanted confirmation that all the weird events in their house weren't the product of his or Kathy's imagination. Kekoris asked George whether any sensitives had been there, but George didn't understand what he meant by that term. The field investigator said they would go into that when he came to visit.