Fade to Black (14 page)

“Got a light?” the astronaut asked, looking Eric over.

Eric shook his head, trying to keep from smiling. Richie’s brother hadn’t recognized him.

“Thanks anyway, Count,” the astronaut said, turning to ask someone else, running into luck with a Lone Ranger whose six-shooter was in fact a glorified cigarette lighter.

Inside the theatre, the feature playing was
Night of the Living Dead,
the original sixties version high on most lists of all-time shockers.

Eric sat a dozen rows back from the screen in the crowded theatre, surrounded by more fans in outrageous getups. Most of them handed themselves over to stock reactions to the filmed gore, closing their eyes or clinging to their dates at the sight of black and white zombies making their gruesome trek across the countryside in search of consumable human flesh.

Oblivious to the others, Eric sat watching with a calm, engrossed detachment, slowly feeding himself buttered popcorn, kernel by kernel, from the large cup on his lap.

Night of the Living Dead
was followed by
Psycho.
Eric watched Hitchcock’s contribution to the festival with rapt attention. Halfway through, he remembered that he still had a bet going back several months with Richie dealing with this picture. He still had to find concrete proof that Saul Bass, and not Hitchcock, had directed the famous shower sequence. He made a mental note to ask about it the next time he was at Larry Edmunds’. They would have something about it if anyone did. In the meantime, he payed close attention to the shower stabbing, trying to count the separate shots making up the sequence. He lost track at fifty-two.

After the end of
Psycho,
the house lights went up and someone dressed as Inspector Clouseau strode down the main aisle and up to the stage, turning to face the crowd.

“My fellow film boofs,” he said in Peter Seller’s twisted French accent. “As I’m sure you are all aware, our next scheduled feature was to be
The Mayor of Hell
with James Cagney.”

A few chorused whoops went up in the audience, and in his seat, Eric smiled, pleased, although he expected what was coming next.

“Regrettably,” the spokesman continued, “we did not receive the print as anticipated. But, then, it really wasn’t much in the way of a horror film anyway, right?”

The whoops turned into sporadic boos.

“In its place, and I’m sure you will all find it more than an adequate compensation, we are proud to present Nigel Green and Christopher Lee in the 1965 creature classic,
The Face of Fu Manchu!”

Rather than come back through the ranks of the unpacified crowd, the spokesman exited off to the side of the stage as the lights dimmed and the broad beam from the projector flashed the opening credits.

Eric left with the smattering of the already-thinned-out crowd leaving the theatre. Some of them lingered in the lobby, mustering a half-hearted protest for a refund on their admission. But Eric didn’t care about that. Although it would have been nice to have seen
The Mayor of Hell
on the big screen, he had a videotape of the movie in his collection at home.

The images from
Psycho
still lurking fresh in his mind, he went to the corner, ignoring the catcalls from passing motorists. When the light changed, he crossed the street and stalked westward down Vernon Avenue, staying to the shadows of back alleys on his way to Marilyn’s.

CHAPTER •
17

“Dearest Sylvia,” Marilyn wrote. “Only one more month and I celebrate (?) my third year in Los Angeles. How the time flies when you’re not having fun. Well, I shouldn’t make it sound so bad. I’ve had some good times, but nothing like what I expected. You won’t have to tell me you told me so, because I already know it now—being a onetime Miss Melbourne does not mean much in Hollywood. I suppose if I asked around, I wouldn’t be able to go a day without running into another pretty face who was once Miss Something or Other.

“Last week, I thought I had come into my first big break. This obnoxious guy whose been bothering me for just weeks on end stopped by work (which reminds me—Stacey says hi, and she’s still thinking of coming back with me next spring. She wants so much to meet you after all the stories I’ve told her. I’ll have to brief you on them, since I think I may have exaggerated on some of the details!) . . . anyway, this jerk told me he had a job taking pictures for an advertising agency, and that he could get me a job as a model. Stacey warned me it was probably just a come-on, but you know me. Well, to make a long story short, she was right. The thing is, if I knew he really did have the job, I might almost go ahead and sleep with him to have a chance to model. Isn’t that terrible? I never thought I’d hear myself say that, but you have no idea how desperate I’m getting.

“Speaking of which, I’ve been reading a lot in the papers about how the film industry in Australia is starting to blossom. It is really true? I swear, if it turns out that I’ve spent all this time here when my best chances were back home, I don’t even think I could laugh at the joke of it.

“Is Yolanda still living there? She would know about it. Or . . . oh, I don’t even want to know about him. Oh, yes I do. Tell me, Sylvia, what’s with Cliff? Only tell me if it’s something terrible! That bastard! I’d give anything, anything in the world to get a big part. Can you imagine the expression on his face if he ever went into a theatre and saw my face all over the screen? Oh, I tell you, there’s times when thinking of that moment is the only thing that keeps me going.

“Well, Sylly, I still want to write to the rest of the gang. I wrote to Irving and B.G. last night, but that still leaves me with a half dozen to go. Of course, I’m only telling everyone else how much fun it is to live in Los Angeles so they’ll turn green with envy. Don’t tell them otherwise, or I’ll be very angry with you.

“I hope you’re all well and do write back soon.

“Love, Marilyn.

“
P.S.
—No tan again this year! I think before I come back, I’m going to take a bath in Quick Tan. Better to look orange than pale, right?”

Marilyn set down her pen and flexed her wrist, leaning back in her chair. She poured the rest of the champagne into her plastic glass. It had gone flat, and there were no bubbles, but she drank it down anyway. She picked up the letter and read it over. When she finished, she shook her head to herself and crumpled up the letter, tossing it across the room, where it fell short of the trash can.

She got up from the desk, realizing she was tipsy. She was wearing nothing but a pink bathrobe, and she looked at herself in the mirror, striking a cheesecake pose. She giggled, taking a step backward and falling playfully to the floor.

“Drunk again,” she squealed.

She slowly, unsteadily climbed back to her feet and over in front of the mirror.

“Okay, Marilyn,” she told herself in a lower voice, “let’s try your screen test one more time. Now, remember, you’re trying to seduce Burt Reynolds . . .”

She looked back into the mirror, lowering her eyelids as she raised her arms and crossed them in front of her, peeling the bathrobe so that it slipped away from her shoulder, baring her flesh down to the gentle slope of her breasts. She stopped, holding the robe in place.

She clucked her tongue at the mirror, scolding, “Now, now, Burt. This is a PG movie. No more for you.”

She giggled again, holding herself tight and closing her eyes.

Hearing a noise outside in the yard, Marilyn looked at her window. It was opened partially, and a breeze rustled the curtains.

Venice was teeming with stray pets, and it was not uncommon to hear an occasional alley cat purring its way through the yard or a dog lifting a leg against the vine-covered fence in front. Marilyn dismissed the sound and staggered happily into the bathroom, slipping out of the bathrobe and into the shower.

Eric stepped out of the cover of a swollen juniper and slowly stole across the lawn toward the front porch, waiting for the breeze to part the curtains in Marilyn’s bedroom. He couldn’t see her now, but he could hear the shower running.

At last, he thought. He’d been waiting for close to an hour.

The front door was locked, as he had expected. He backed quietly down the steps and started around to the side of the house.

A car pulled up in front of the house and idled. Stacey hopped out and ran through the gate and up the front walk.

Eric huddled in the shadows by the side of the house, his cape pulled sinisterly across his chest and the lower part of his face so that only his eyes peered out above. Stacey let herself in and left the door open. Eric could hear her calling out, “Hey, Marilyn. I nabbed one. We’re on our way to his place down in Manhattan Beach, so I probably won’t be back tonight.”

“Is it the same one as last night?” Marilyn shouted back from the shower.

“Heck no! Variety is the vice of life, you know?”

“Well, come in, let me have a look at him.”

“Can’t. There’s no parking spaces out front, and, besides, we’re in a hurry. I’ll see you at work tomorrow, okay?”

“Okay,” Marilyn called out. “Have fun.”

“I plan to,” Stacey said, running back out of the house to the waiting car.

Eric remained in the shadows only until the car drove off to the corner and turned. He had to hurry now. He quickly stole around to the front and rechecked the front door.

It was unlocked.

A smile came across Eric’s black lips. His hand reached for the doorknob and slowly turned it. He reached in with his slender fingers, made up white with clear, tapered nails, and held the door silent as he let himself into the house.

Marilyn hummed to herself in the shower, adjusting the spray so that the water came at her like hot needles, stinging yet refreshing. That Stacey, she thought. Her and her trips to Chippendales. Marilyn thought Stacey was out of her mind for hanging out at a place like that. And yet . . . Stacey always seemed to be so level-headed in everything else, always smiling and ready with a joke. Maybe there was some good in it after all. One of these days, if she was in the right mood, Marilyn decided she just might . . . no, never, she thought.

She picked up the soap and rubbed it vigorously between her hands until thick suds were foaming out through her fingers and spilling down her legs. She set the soap back in its tray and lathered her limbs in long, sensual strokes.

Burt. Robert. Steve. Dustin. John. Marlon. They all wanted her, took the stage at Chippendales and performed for her alone . . .

Her back was turned to the bathroom doorway, and she didn’t see the vague outline of black and white move in closer to the steam-layered plastic of the shower curtain.

Eric leaned forward, peering at the curtain, trying to make out the details of the obscured flesh writhing sensually inside the shower. He couldn’t make out anything, though.

He knew he couldn’t wait indefinitely without her realizing his presence. He let one set of pale fingers reach for the part in the shower curtain while the others slipped silently beneath his cape.

When she heard the curtain being yanked aside, Marilyn turned around, almost losing her balance. A scream lunged out from her throat as she shrank back at the sight of the costumed vampire.

His arm moved in a sweeping motion toward her.

Reflexively, she threw her arms out to ward off the anticipated blow. She struck his hands, and something clattered onto the tiles of the stall floor.

Eyes closed, she continued to scream.

Nothing happened.

Clinging to the shower curtain for support, Marilyn doubled over. The shrieking subsided to a hysterical sobbing.

At her feet lay an antique silver fountain pen, bleeding its black ink into a swirling whirlpool that washed down the drain.

Eric fled out the front door, pausing only long enough to make sure no one’s attention had been attracted his way by Marilyn’s screaming. He circled around the house and left through the back gate into the alley. Walking hastily, he put a few blocks between him and the house, encountering on the way only a pair of twelve year olds smoking joints on the sly behind their parents’ garage.

It hadn’t turned out the way he planned, again. She was supposed to have been frightened speechless long enough for him to show it was only a pen. Then he was going to ask for her autograph, innocently, before revealing himself. Teach her a lesson, put them back on an equal footing. But once she’d struck him and started screaming, he’d been scared as witless as she had.

He lit a cigarette and smoked it slowly as he walked toward the beach. He wasn’t in the mood to go home. Not just yet. He had to think things over. Things were so confusing since Aunt Stella died. He’d been having nightmares every night, and he found himself remembering the good times he’d had with her, few that they were . . . like his senior play,
Rally ’Round the Flag, Boys.
He’d had only a bit part as one of the town hoods, but she’d stayed up with him, helping him practice his twelve lines, coaxing him along when he wanted to play the role like James Dean, with a leather jacket (the one he still owned) and greased-back hair. She’d even thought of a slogan for him to write on the coat. “The Male Must Go Through.” The school’s drama instructor had nixed the coat, and Aunt Stella had made one of her rare appearances outside of the house, having one of the neighbors drive her to school so she could give the instructor a piece of her mind, even if it were to no avail . . . and back even further, when he was first becoming interested in movies and she had thought it was a harmless hobby, Aunt Stella had used to let him stay up past his bedtime to watch the nine o’clock movies on television if they rated four stars in the
TV Guide.
He had made popcorn and poured over it a mixture of butter and brown sugar so that it would be sticky and delicious. That had been before Aunt Stella had started on health foods.

He tried to push the memories back into the perspective of her later, unforgivable actions, but the good times only stood out more, like a metal that gleamed brighter the more one tried to rub it away.

Reaching the beach, he walked along Ocean Front Walk, passing the closed shops and the huddled couples on park benches. He could hear them whispering to one another and figured they were talking about him, just because he was in costume. If he had walked by as Eric Binford, he might just as well have been The Invisible Man, he thought bitterly.