The Dark: A Collection (Point Horror) (4 page)

"Over here,
Fellini!" The theater manager bellowed. "You're not supposed to
flirt with girls. Just patrol the lobby."

The fat manager sat
in a folding chair in the front of the lobby. His red-and-white
Hawaiian shirt gapped open halfway down his chest. He was chatting
with the ticket taker.

Harry stalked off,
patrolling the lobby as he'd been ordered to do.

On her way to the
ladies' lounge Bianca spotted the brightly lighted section of the
lobby around the refreshments stand. The girl in the red-and-white
striped cap behind the counter was popping heaping mounds of popcorn,
piling them up into what looked like mountains behind the glass
front.

The overhead lights
were vaguely comforting to Bianca, soothing her nerves. They made her
feel a little more relaxed, more like her old self. She could breathe
more easily here than in the darkened theater.

Bianca couldn't
help but stroll over to the brightly lighted glass counter to examine
the different kinds of candy bars and mints illuminated under lights
of their own. She studied the silver foil wrappers with blue letters
on the peppermint candies, the bright orange wrappers with yellow
letters on the peanut butter cups, and the dark brown wrappers with
the inner silver foils on the Hershey's chocolate almond bars.
There were multi-colored packages of fruity-flavored chewing gum. She
hadn't seen a display like this in a long time — two years, in
fact.

"What do you want?"

Bianca looked up,
startled.

Marianna Haynes stood
there in her white apron and red-and-white striped cap. She had her
hands on her waist, tapping her foot.

"Just looking."

"Hurry up! We're
closing in forty minutes as soon as the last show's over. I want to
clear out. I've been standing here for eight hours. My feet hurt."
.

Bianca had done it
again. She couldn't stop acting so stupid that people despised her.
Marianna obviously held her in utter contempt.

"I guess genteel
folks like you with big bank accounts don't have to worry about
stepping on other people's toes, do you? You don't care if you
make me stand here all night!"

Bianca gaped at the
girl in confusion. Big bank accounts? Bianca wasn't rich! At least
not yet.

"Don't give me
that innocent look!" The girl leered at Bianca. "You've got
that nice, big, juicy trust fund from the Shipleys. That's plenty
rich enough for somebody like me who earns minimum wage and has to
work my guts out for it. I've got to sweat at this job forty hours
a week, mostly nights. It's pretty hot back here with the oven for
the hot dogs, the stove for the coffee, and the popcorn-maker. Pretty
Miss Bianca Winters doesn't have to sweat like that, does she?"

St. Simons was a
small island just off the Georgia coast. Everybody knew everybody
else's business. Bianca couldn't deny that the million dollar
trust fund existed, that she was about to come into it any week. She
didn't like to be reminded of it. She didn't deserve it.

"I'll — I'll
take a pack of the Juicy Fruit gum," she replied apologetically.
She got out her wallet.

Marianna glared at
her knowingly as if she figured that Bianca wouldn't have anything
smaller than a five when the gum cost only twenty-five cents a pack.
She forced Bianca to sweat every second as she counted out the change
into her palm, dollar by dollar, quarter by quarter.

Bianca hurried across
the lobby, trying not to pay attention to that other girl's eyes
boring a hole through her back.

She pushed open the
door to the ladies' lounge with a loud creak. She hurried through
the small sitting area, then opened the second door to the lavatory.
For a panicky instant, she was alone in the dark, except for the
lights from the street outside filtering through the one open window.

She held her breath
as she groped along the wall for the light switch. She breathed a
sigh of relief to see the room flooded with the garish yellow light
from the single bulb overhead. It was enough to keep the darkness
away.

Why didn't the
theater manager leave the light on all the time? Bianca reminded
herself that everyone would be inside the theater for the big,
climactic scene of The Black Widow Strikes Again, which she didn't
care to see.

Bianca plopped her
purse down on the sink. She reached way down inside and felt around
for her pack of Juicy Fruit gum. She fumbled with the wrapper and
popped a stick of gum inside her mouth. The burst of flavor gave her
a shot of adrenaline. Doc had advised her to carry candy or gum in
her purse. He said it was a good source of sudden energy as well as
something to calm her nerves.

She turned on the
water full force. She made sure it was nice and cool, none of that
lukewarm stuff. It was late May. In the late spring in coastal
Georgia it was pretty hot and humid with temperatures in the
nineties. The water in taps turned tepid. It took for ever to get it
cool. Tonight Bianca was willing to wait. Anything so she didn't
have to go back into the darkened theater!

Bianca took her time
washing her face thoroughly and splashing it with the tap water to
rinse it off. Then she turned off the water and dried her face very
hard on the brown paper towels. She rubbed her skin raw and red.

The rubbing woke her
up, invigorated her. It was something she did when she was feeling
low. Doc had suggested it. She supposed ideas like that were why he
was so brilliant and why everybody on the island called him just
"Doc", though Ernie McCollough was his real name.

She powdered herself
with her compact and smeared blusher on to her cheeks. She applied
her mascara and eyeshadow. She put on a new coat of cherry lipstick.
Bianca felt human again. To make sure of it, she sprayed rose cologne
behind her ears and combed her hair vigorously.

She got out two
little turquoise earrings that she'd found in the bottom of her
purse and fastened them to her earlobes. Doc had given them to her
for her last birthday. They made her feel like a new girl.

Doc had promised
she'd have all the boys on the island on her doorstep if she got
out more and gave herself a chance. She smiled at the memory of his
words, knowing that he must have been exaggerating to make her feel
more confident. Her hair was plain brown. Her eyes, too. But it was
nice the way her eyelashes curled upward. Doc had said so. Then lots
of girls must have eyelashes like that and maybe a whole lot nicer
— that nurse, for instance.

She felt a sharp
pang. She hadn't liked it when Doc had told her that she ought to
start dating other guys. She'd protested that she needed only him.
He'd insisted that the doctors at Brunswick Memorial Hospital had
noticed them together around the island at restaurants and beaches,
and had commented unfavorably about it. They'd lectured Doc that if
he expected to complete his residency and become a psychiatrist, he
had to act more professional and keep more of a distance from his
patients. It wasn't supposed to be too ethical to get stuck on
them.

Mostly their
relationship was rather one-sided. Doc advised. She obeyed. She
didn't resent that. Doc was smart, so much smarter than she was. It
seemed only natural.

If he wanted her to
see other guys, she'd do it. She'd do anything for Doc. She
didn't want to ruin his medical career. She wanted him to get a
chance to help others the way he had helped her. Still she had to
confess that she lived only for those moments that Doc forgot about
his professional duties and stole a kiss or two.

Bianca pulled her
T-shirt tight against her body. She put her hands on her waist,
turning from one side to the other examining her figure in the
mirror. Pretty average in every way. Not much in the bust line. Not
much in the hips. She could wear boys' pants, she was so straight
up and down.

She closed her eyes
and wrapped her arms around herself. She remembered what it had been
like those times when she'd been scared and nervous and had gone to
Doc's carrel in the medical school library next to the hospital.
She'd gone to find him, as he'd told her to do if she needed
help.

Once he'd kissed
her right then and there. He'd taken her back into the stacks where
it was dark and nobody ever came. He'd kissed her again and again.
She'd felt so good after that afternoon that she'd forgotten to
be afraid when the lights on the bus had blinked off on the way home.

Bianca could walk
back inside that theater and sit down beside Rick. With these
turquoise earrings on and that memory of Doc kissing her fresh in her
brain, she could do anything. After all, the movie was supposed to
end in less than forty minutes. Marianna had said so. Bianca could
survive forty more minutes in the dark.

Bianca put her
make-up back into her purse. She took her time about it, wasting as
much of the remaining forty minutes of the movie as possible. She
snapped her handbag shut, thinking about how she could persuade Doc
to forget about that nurse with the shapely legs.

Just then the lights
went out.

Were the theater
staff locking up? Maybe it was much later than Bianca imagined, and
the movie was over. After all, Marianna had been desperate to get out
of the place. Nobody wanted to work a minute longer than they had to.
Perhaps Rick had left without Bianca, thinking that she'd run out
of the theater and had gone home by herself. It was her own fault.
She'd taken too long about coming back. Probably even Doc was gone.

When the slow,
methodical, heavy footsteps started toward her, her stomach sank.
This wasn't any casual visitor to the ladies' lounge. This person
knew that she was here and knew what he was about.

Suddenly she heard
them again — the footsteps on that night two years ago. They echoed
through her mind — slow, heavy, and loud. They had sounded like
this, right above her head.

Bianca's hands
spasmed. She dropped her handbag. Thoughts of the off-duty policemen
inside the theater flashed through her head. There was no way she
could call them now.

"Clumsy of you,
wasn't it?" a falsetto whisper hissed. It didn't sound like
anybody's real voice. She couldn't tell whether it was male or
female, old or young, someone from Georgia or elsewhere.

The person was so
close he was almost touching her. He stooped down and retrieved her
purse. He shoved it into her hands.

"I was watching you
inside the theater. Your face was like an open book for anybody to
read."

She didn't say a
word. She was too scared.

"You were so
pathetic. So obvious. When you watched that murder on the screen you
remembered me, didn't you?

He had come back.
This had been her worst nightmare over the past two years, wondering
when the murderer of Mrs. Ingersoll would show up, knowing he could
do so at any time. Bianca's knees knocked together.

"Maybe you didn't
remember much. Just a hint, a clue. The bad thing is that you're
starting to remember. One thing will lead to another, won't it,
especially since it's almost two years to the day of the killing?"

He was walking around
her in a circle, sizing her up as if he could see in the dark and she
couldn't. The darkness pressed around her, crushing down on her
shoulders until they hurt.

"No — no, I don't
remember a thing. Honestly I don't," she pleaded. "I was afraid
of the dark back there. That's what you saw."

Pretty soon her legs
would collapse. She would fall to the floor. The darkness swirled
around her. It was getting hard to breathe.

A cold finger brushed
against her neck. She cringed and moved away, trying not to cry out.
That hand! There had been hands like that on that night two years
ago. . . But no! She didn't want to remember.

A dark laugh escaped
the murderer's lips, a laugh so distorted that it didn't sound
human.

"I didn't plan to
murder Mrs. Ingersoll, you know. She was a big, fat tub of a woman
who didn't know how to mind her own business and got in the way.
Now you're getting in my way. So guess what could happen to you?"

She groaned.

"I'm up for
murder one if anybody catches me. One more victim would hardly make
much difference, would it? The jury would find me just as guilty
either way."

Dear Lord! How much
longer could this go on? If he was going to kill her, why didn't he
do so and get it over with? Why this prolonged torture?

Those huge monster
hands tightened about her windpipe. They were pressing down until her
breath came in short, little gasps.

"You'll do
anything to save your life, won't you?" he purred.

She nodded her head
vigorously. "Yes!"

"Nobody can catch
me as long as you keep your trap shut. Right?"

She nodded.

"You won't rat
about me cornering you in the rest room tonight, not even to those
policemen in the audience? It'll be between you and me. Deal?"

She moaned.

"Remember, if one
little hint gets out to those policemen, I'll know where it had to
come from."

She repressed a sob.

"Then I'll have
to waste you. Got it?"

She sniffled.

"It won't be
pretty. I had to rush when I killed Mrs. Ingersoll. I won't have to
rush with you. I can take my time and enjoy every moment of your
slow, lingering death."

They suddenly seemed
so familiar — the hands, the voice, the darkness, the struggling.
She kept on thinking, Deja vu.

The assailant shoved
her into one of the bathroom stalls and shut the door behind her.
"Now don't you dare leave there, or I'll know."

She didn't dare to
make a sound.

She heard the heavy
footsteps retreating. He didn't flick on the light. She was left in
the pitch blackness.

She cowered in the
stall, hardly daring to move. The darkness reached out with little
hands and grasped her neck where the killer's fingers had been. She
gasped. Her chest was tight. It hurt bad.