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Terrors

Page 42

by Richard A. Lupoff


  What a nice little lady we’ve got here, don’t you think? She looked so appealing up there in the club car, wouldn’t any gentleman travelling alone on a streamliner like the Desert Cannonball be happy to buy her a drink, just for the pleasure of her company. I guess the old saying is right. You know the one I mean. The one about appearances being deceiving.

  Once the others had followed their instructions, Satin Blaine edged toward the casket. She managed to open her gold lamé purse with one hand and drop the keys into it, holding the gun on the others all the while. Then with her free hand she inserted long fingernails beneath the upper half of the divided coffin lid.

  “Looks to me as if poor Mr. Jenkins opened this thing and then dropped the lid back in place when he ran away.”

  It took a great effort by the slim Miss Blaine, but she managed to pry the lid open, then swing it back on its well-balanced hinges. As she did so a cloud of cold, white vapor rose from the casket and pooled around Satin Blaine’s feet.

  “All right. You — Mister Blackie there — I want you to open my valise.” She jerked her head toward the much-traveled suitcase, the one that was all but covered with the stickers from exotic ports of call.

  “Dump my clothes out of there. I’ll enjoy shopping for a new wardrobe anyhow.”

  The face of the cadaver Satin Blaine had exposed was white, its eyebrows frosted like those of the late Oliver Jenkins. The body was dressed in a dark blue suit, white shirt and red necktie.

  Satin Blaine glanced into the coffin. Still holding the .22 automatic on the others, she reached inside the suit jacket, then stepped back with a packet of large-denomination bills wrapped in a paper label. She tossed it across the car. It landed at the conductor’s feet.

  “Put that in the valise.”

  As the railroad man complied she rummaged inside the casket, withdrawing packet after packet of currency and tossing them to the railroad man. As she worked she used them to knock white fuming cakes out of her way. White fuming cakes of dry ice, frozen squares of carbon dioxide, the coldest substance known to man.

  Suddenly she screamed.

  The others jerked involuntarily, staring in amazement at the scene before them.

  With a single spasmodic motion the cadaver had reached up and clutched the hand that had pulled bundle after bundle of money from the coffin.

  “You can’t do that — you’re dead, dead!”

  A horrifying moan rose from the casket.

  Satin Blaine’s arm was pulled toward the blue suit coat of the cadaver.

  “I saw you die. I gave you the conus purpurascens, I put it in your shaving soap, I saw you collapse and die. You can’t be alive. You can’t be alive. You …”

  The arm clutching her wrist drew her down, down, into the casket. As her face came close to that of the cadaver she screamed again and pulled the trigger of the pearl-handled automatic. It fired again and again, the bullets penetrating the body in the coffin.

  Satin Blaine recoiled in a spasm of terror as her warm, lovely face made contact with the cold, white features of the cadaver. She flung herself backwards, her weapon flying from her hand and clattering against the opposite wall of the baggage car.

  Traveler stepped forward and retrieved the weapon.

  The woman collapsed against the bronze casket, one claw-like hand held in the unbreakable grip of the body in the casket. And it was now indeed a body, a dead body, a corpse. Ever since the poison of the Australian sea-cone had done its work, paralyzing Satin Blaine’s Uncle Walter, some spark of life might have flickered faintly in the motionless body.

  The .22-caliber rounds had extinguished that tiny, faint spark. And Satin Blaine had absorbed some of the toxin through her pale, delicate, lovely cheek.

  The Traveler steadied the trembling, fear-struck conductor.

  “It’s all right now, old man. There may even be a reward in it for you. You’d better message ahead to Phoenix and tell them to get in touch with the police in Chicago. The Farmers and Cattlemen’s Bank loot is found.”

  Oh, she was a clever one that Satin Blaine. She’d been to Australia, she’d managed to get ahold of the toxin of the Australian cone shell. These snails are among the deadliest creatures in the world. They appear harmless enough, their shells are even attractive looking. But any tourist who picks one up — well, at least it’s a painless death. Or so I’ve heard.

  Myself, I wouldn’t want to try it. Would you?

  As for Uncle Walter — poor, dear Uncle Walter — do you think he really believed in vampires? I mean the human variety of vampires. Maybe he did. Maybe he was trying to become one. What was the famous line from Peter Pan? Oh yes. Do you believe in fairies? If you believe, clap your hands! Well, dear friends. Do you believe in vampires?

  As for that bat — there are plenty of bats in the desert. They’re not really vampires. They live on insects. They’re very useful little creatures, don’t you know.

  Afterword

  When I was eleven years old I came across a paperback anthology called The Avon Ghost Reader. Its cover painting as much as its title attracted me. Even after sixty years I recall that wonderful mélange of Gothic themes: a haunted mansion, a grave marker, a clutching, claw-like hand, a bat flitting across the face of the moon.

  I truly enjoyed every story in the book, most of all a frightening tale called “The Dunwich Horror,” by Howard Phillips Lovecraft. In all the years since then, in all the novels and short stories I have written, Lovecraft has been one of my major influences and sources of inspiration. Certainly he is a presence in many if not all the stories in Terrors.

  The first three stories in this book are deeply connected. “The Crimson Wizard” is undeniably autobiographical; any reader who recognizes a very young Richard Lupoff in Arlie Felton is not at all deceived. And if the young, very sick Arlie Felton had lived to fulfill his childhood ambition, “The Crimson Wizard and the Jewels of Lemuria” and “The Golden Saint Meets the Scorpion Queen” are just such divertissements as he would have written for the pulp magazines he loved.

  “The Whisperers” is one of the older stories in this book. The Millbrook Hi-Life office is based on the high school newspaper office where I cut my journalistic teeth long ago, and the music scene reflects the cultural milieu in San Francisco as I experienced it in the early 1970s. When this story was first published my friend Tom Whitmore complained that I had placed the toll gates at the wrong end of the Golden Gate Bridge. He was absolutely right. In reprinting the story in Terrors I was tempted to correct the error, but instead decided to retain it in the interests of historical inaccuracy.

  “At Vega’s Taquería” has tragic overtones. It’s based on a real Mexican restaurant in Oakland, California. Bartender Rudy Valdez is based on Rudy Rubalcava who formerly tended bar in that establishment. Rudy was a gentle, friendly, generous person. He catered equally to off-duty cops from the police headquarters — courthouse — city jail just across the street, and the constant stream of freshly released hookers who came in for a late night or early morning pick-me-up. I wrote the story as a surprise gift for Rudy, but he was brutally and senselessly murdered before it ever saw print.

  As I mentioned, “The Dunwich Horror” was the first Lovecraft story I ever encountered. It had a profound influence on me when I read it the first time. I had smuggled my copy of The Avon Ghost Reader into church on a Sunday morning, hidden it inside my hymnal, and read Lovecraft’s tale with delectable shudders while the preacher roared warnings of hellfire. Many years later I reread the story and was again impressed with its powerful resonance. “The Doom that Came to Dunwich” is my own little Dunwich tale.

  Lovecraft himself is the protagonist of “The Horror South of Red Hook.” It was one of a series of parodies that I wrote using the byline of “Ova Hamlet.” The Olde Gentleman is sometimes regarded as a dour and unsmiling New Englander, but when I researched my novel about him and interviewed surviving members of his circle, they insisted that he had a dry sense of humor and
a real appreciation of parody. I like to think that he would have got a chuckle out of this story.

  We know that Howard Lovecraft was fond of the Sherlock Holmes stories, and I have shared his enthusiasm since I was a small child and my older brother took me with him (under protest and at our parents’ insistence) to a screening of the Basil Rathbone – Nigel Bruce Hound of the Baskervilles. The movie scared the daylights out of me, but I loved it anyway, and was delighted when anthologist John Pelan invited me to concoct a story in which the Great Detective encounters Lovecraftian Eldritch Horror. I must confess that the villainy in my story is based more on the “Magickal” cult founded by Aleister Crowley than it is on the Cthulhu Mythos. Still, “The Adventure of the Voorish Sign” works pretty well, I think, and many readers have expressed their approval of the effort.

  Mike Ashley, one of my favorite editors, invited me to write a “new” Jules Verne adventure for a volume he was editing. This gave me a chance to develop an intriguing alternate history and led to “The Secret of the Sahara.” I’ve concocted a number of alternate histories now taking as branch-points a failed assassination attempt on Julius Caesar, a pre-emptive strike by Theodore Roosevelt to head off the First World War and the Soviet Revolution, and now the one in my “Verne” story. These are always great fun for the author, and if that person does a good job, they should be equally enjoyable for the reader.

  The tradition of South Seas adventure stories stretches back at least to Joseph Conrad — if not farther. Everyone from W. Somerset Maugham to Carl Jacobi to the underrated and unjustly forgotten John Russell has contributed to this very special genre, but Seamus “Splash” Shanahan, hero of “Treasure of the Red Robe Men,” was created in the image a Lance O’Casey, a comic book figure whose adventures I enjoyed so very long ago. The Red Robe Men, however, were quite real. If you’d like to learn more about them, an Internet search or a visit to your local library should prove most rewarding. Regarding my story, a special note of thanks is due to James Lowder.

  “The Devil’s Hop Yard” and “Documents in the Case of Elizabeth Akeley” both return to Lovecraft’s demon-haunted New England landscape, although I should mention that the San Diego setting and the cult headquartered in that city are both rooted in reality.

  “Lights! Camera!! Shub-Niggurath!!!” has a convoluted history. Originally written for Rigel Science Fiction, a fine magazine (now regrettably defunct) once edited by the talented Eric Vinicoff, it appeared instead in much altered and expanded form as my novel The Forever City. Robert M. Price later anthologized the original version, which is also the version found in Terrors.

  “The Turret” was written for Scott David Aniolowski’s anthology Made in Goatswood, a celebration of the Lovecraftian writer Ramsey Campbell. It takes place in the Severn Valley, a place I have never visited but would someday love to see. I hope I have not unduly maligned the upstanding citizens of that part of England. I think it’s unseemly when authors praise their own works, but I hope you will forgive me if I quote the highly regarded mystery writer Jane Langton’s comments on “The Turret.” She called it “splendid, wild, wonderful, zany, absolutely crazy.”

  “The Heyworth Fragment” is another story from early in my career. I was working as an industrial filmmaker when I wrote it. Ejler Jakobsson tried to buy it for Galaxy magazine, but he drove me nuts with demands for revisions. Every time I produced a version that I thought he would accept he would tell me how much he loved the story — now more than ever — but that it needed still more changes. Finally I gave up on Galaxy. Ted White, then editing Amazing Stories, rescued the story from oblivion.

  “Streamliner” was written at the request of Jim Harmon, one of my oldest and dearest friends in the literary community. Jim is a world authority on classic radio shows. He edits a series of anthologies rooted in their special universe, called It’s that Time Again. Fellow fans of 1940s and 50s audio drama will surely recognize the two Men in Black who feature in this story.

  If you’ve enjoyed this book and would like to read more great SF, you’ll find literally thousands of classic Science Fiction & Fantasy titles through the SF Gateway.

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  www.sfgateway.com

  Also by Richard A. Lupoff

  Buck Rogers (as by Addison E. Steele)

  Buck Rogers in the 25th Century (1978)

  The Man on Beta (1979)

  Twin Planet

  Circumpolar! (1984)

  Countersolar! (1987)

  Sun’s End

  Sun’s End (1976)

  Galaxy’s End (1988)

  Philip José Farmer’s The Dungeon

  Philip José Farmer’s The Dungeon #1: The Black Tower (1988)

  Philip José Farmer’s The Dungeon #6: The Final Battle (1990)

  Hobart Lindsay and Marvia Plum

  The Comic Book Killer (1988)

  The Classic Car Killer (1992)

  The Bessie Blue Killer (1994)

  The Sepia Siren Killer (1994)

  The Cover Girl Killer (1995)

  The Silver Chariot Killer (1996)

  The Radio Red Killer (1997)

  One Murder at a Time (2001)

  The Emerald Cat (2010)

  Chase and Delacroix

  Quintet: The Cases of Chase and Delacroix (2008)

  The Laddie in the Lake (2008)

  Other Novels

  The Case of the Doctor who Had No Business, or The Adventure of the Second Anonymous Narrator (1966)

  One Million Centuries (1981)

  Sacred Locomotive Files (1971)

  Into the Aether (1974)

  The Triune Man (1976)

  Fool’s Hill (1978) (aka The Crack in the Sky)

  Sandworld (1976)

  Lisa Kane: A Novel of Werewolves (2011) (aka Lisa Kane: A Novel of the Supernatural)

  Sword of the Demon (1977)

  Space War Blues (1978)

  The Return of Skull-Face (1977)

  The Digital Watch of Philip K. Dick (1986)

  Lovecraft’s Book (1985)

  The Forever City (1987)

  Marblehead: A Novel of H. P. Lovecraft (2009)

  Non-Fiction

  Edgar Rice Burroughs: Master of Adventure (1975)

  Barsoom: Edgar Rice Burroughs and the Martian Vision (1976)

  Writer at Large (1998)

  Acknowledgements

  The Crimson Wizard – First published in Strange Tales, volume 4 number l, 2003, edited by Robert M. Price

  The Crimson Wizard and the Jewels of Lemuria – First appeared in All-Star Zeppelin Adventure Stories, 2004, edited by David Moles & Jay lake

  The Golden Saint Meets the Scorpion Queen – First publication in Terrors, 2005

  The Whisperers – First appeared in Fantastic Stories, February 1977, edited by Ted White

  At Vega’s Taquería – First appeared in Amazing Stories, September 1990, edited by Patrick Lucien Price; also Claremont Tales, 2001

  The Doom that Came to Dunwich – First published in Before…12:01…and After, 1996; also Return to Lovecraft Country, edited by Scott David Aniolowski, 1997

  The Horror South of Red Hook – First published in Fantastic Stories, February 1972, edited by Ted White; also The Ova Hamlet Papers, 1979

  The Adventure of the Voorish Sign – First published in Shadows Over Baker Street, 2003, edited by Michael Reaves and John Pelan

  The Secret of the Sahara – First published in The Mammoth Book of New Jules Verne Adventures, 2005, edited by Mike Ashley and Eric Brown

  Treasure of the Red Robe Men – First publication in Terrors, 2005

  The Devil’s Hop Yard – First published in Chrysalis 2, 1978, edited by Roy Torgeson; also The Dunwich Cycle, 1995, edited by Robert M. Price; also Claremont Tales II, 2002

  Documents in the Case of Elizabeth Akeley – First published in The Mag
azine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, March 1982, edited by Edward L. Ferman; also The Hastur Cycle, 1993, edited by Robert M. Price; also Claremont Tales, 2001

  Lights! Camera!! Shub-Niggurath!!! – First published in The New Lovecraft Circle, 1996, edited by Robert M. Price

  The Turret – First published in Made in Goatswood, 1996, edited by Scott David Aniolowski; also Claremont Tales II, 2002

  The Heyworth Fragment – First published in Amazing Stories, January 1972, edited by Ted White; also Claremont Tales II, 2002

  Streamliner – First publication in Terrors, 2005; also in It’s That Time Again 3, 2005, edited by Jim Harmon

  Richard A Lupoff (1935 - )

  Richard Allen Lupoff was born in New York in 1935. In common with many of his contemporaries, he entered science fiction as a fan – indeed, his fanzine Xero featured a stellar list of contributors including James Blish, Lin Carter, Avram Davidson, L. Sprague de Camp, Harlan Ellison and Frederik Pohl, and won a Hugo Award for best amateur publication. He is the author of some two dozen novels and over one hundred short stories across the fields of SF, mystery, humour, and satire, as well as a great deal of genre-related non-fiction. He has edited numerous SF and Fantasy anthologies and is an expert on the writing of Edgar Rice Burroughs.

  For more information see http://sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/lupoff_richard_a

  Copyright

  A Gollancz eBook

  Copyright © Richard A. Lupoff 2005

  All rights reserved.

  The right of Richard A. Lupoff to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

 

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