Zombies

by Otto Penzler

  I started toward the lighted building, hurrying, breaking into a headlong run, feeling that icy menace of some sort followed me from the beach, eager to fasten cold fingers in the back of my neck.

  But before I reached the door it opened.

  I saw a familiar figure there . . . the figure of icy Neptune, entering the place again—for another victim?

  I raced harder. The door slammed ahead of me. When I got to it I tried to swing it open, but it wouldn’t budge. I kicked. I yelled. I screamed, but nothing happened. The laughter of guests came from inside, and the moaning of saxophones.

  Then, all at once, those sounds stopped.

  The door opened in my face. A monstrous figure, looking horrible against the light to one who came out of the dark, fairly rolled over me, like a two-footed Juggernaut. Neptune again, carrying a woman in his arms.

  The woman was screaming. I saw, in the brief moment before the door closed and night possessed the world again, that the woman was Leslie Franks. She’d lost a philandering father on the Cyclonic, I remembered.

  I grabbed for her. A hand that might have been a giant’s hand, coated with ice, drove into my face. It drove sanity from me. I felt myself sinking into utter blankness. I felt the ground under my back. I had been perspiring with my exertions, and knew that I would freeze in a matter of minutes if I didn’t keep moving.

  But I couldn’t make a move, because my muscles seemed to be paralyzed. Nor could I shout. But I fought with all my will to regain complete consciousness before I froze.

  When I finally staggered erect, my feet were numb, my fingers were numb. Even my brain seemed numb.

  I looked wildly around, but could see no one, anywhere, though far out, at the edge of the ice, I thought I saw a black shadow, going into the sea, bearing a victim—a victim that flung white arms wide, to meet the white arms of the sea, then to vanish. I heard an elfin scream come down the wind, and knew that Leslie Franks was gone, too. That made three.

  I banged at the door, and this time managed to open it.

  I stepped through. All eyes in the place were on me, filled with stark horror. Gasps of relief went up when I was recognized. I looked wildly around for Bette and Lola Garrick, and saw neither one.

  Something had to be done about all this. I lifted my right hand, a gesture which must have reminded them all, as it reminded me, of the outstretched, commanding arm of Neptune, bidding his victims come to him, crawling, almost, like whipped curs, to die.

  “Something is horribly wrong.” My voice sounded like the cawing of a crow. “Hedda Murtin is dead. I saw her. Then she was carried away. I didn’t see her go. Something just got her. Peter Fraym went into the sea, to find her. And now, you all saw another one go: Leslie Franks. . . .”

  They just stared at me, unbelieving. I could see they didn’t believe. Lola Garrick still wasn’t around anywhere, but a man came out of the men’s cloak room, and cried out:

  “What is there to worry about, you fools? Lola is pulling a gag, that’s all. I don’t know what sort of a story this newspaper reporter is trying to cook up to make nasty headlines for his tabloid, but don’t fall for his guff. . . .”

  They began to laugh again. For a moment I had my doubts. Maybe I was all wrong. Bette’s fear, the whistling of the wind around the derelict, all had caused my imagination to work overtime, perhaps. Anyway, I’d give Lola the benefit of the doubt, because I wanted to. I couldn’t believe that three people were dead, at the hands of a monster that went into the sea, and then came out again at will.

  But where was Bette?

  I had to find her. I raced for the rear part of the clubhouse, where there was a women’s waiting room, and other rooms used for purposes about which I knew nothing. I knew Bette was probably in one of them, gathering items for the story she must write.

  I hammered on one door, beyond which I heard rustling, and whispers.

  The rustling and whispers did not stop, but none paid heed to my hammering. I called Bette’s name, over and over again:

  “Bette! Bette!”

  THE WALLS OF the room threw the name back in my face with the force of a blow. And then a hand on my shoulder spun me around. I looked into the sneering face of the man who had just told the crowd that all this was a gag of Lola’s, to entertain them.

  “Women have rooms of their own to get away from men, especially men without manners,” he said. “Beat it. Nobody would stand for you going in there!”

  I swung at him. I was frothing at the mouth with terror for Bette, and with anger at this upstart whom I did not know. He drew his head back. I scarcely noticed the movement, so easy and casual was it. But I missed him clean, almost as though my fist had passed right through him. In the next instant I was down on the floor.

  His hand, palm foremost, had shot into my face, almost snapping my head from my shoulders. He stepped over me and was gone. Dizzy, sick, I crawled to my feet, eager to go on with the fight, to smash down this man who dared interfere in my search for Bette.

  If anybody had noticed it, none gave a sign. But, down against the floor, I had heard words, coming under the crack in the door—words in Bette’s sweet voice:

  “Yes, I had a friend on the Cyclonic. I might have married him, if he had come back. . . .”

  And cold chills raced up and down my spine as I stared at the heavy panels of that door. It wasn’t that I was jealous of a man who had been part of Bette’s life before my own advent . . . but that her words definitely stamped her as being as one with the others here, who had lost friends or relatives on the Cyclonic.

  One by one, those friends were horribly dying.

  Bette was automatically in line, and her turn might be next.

  As though in answer to this thought another voice came through the panels of the door I had been forbidden to pass:

  “You are next! Make merry for us, for we die!”

  It was the voice of Neptune.

  The scream that answered it was Bette’s.

  I stepped back, hurled myself at the forbidden door.

  CHAPTER THREE

  ICEBOX HORROR

  Sometimes pictures flash across the human mind faster than any words could possibly paint them. Such pictures came to me as I flung myself at that door, beyond which I was positive that ghastly things were happening: the entrance of Neptune to the clubhouse; the death of Hedda Murtin and of Peter Fraym; the vanishing of Leslie Franks; the white armed spume reaching up from the far edge of the ice for its victims. It all ran together in a complete, horribly detailed picture before my shoulder even touched that door.

  Beyond it I was sure that Bette struggled in the arms of whatever kind of man it was who had spirited Leslie Franks away, after knocking me down in the snow at the clubhouse door.

  The door wasn’t locked. It was almost as though a grim listener beyond it had timed everything to the split second. I had tried the door and had not been able to open it. Now, as my shoulder struck it, it gave inward with a bang that shook the clubhouse, and I sprawled on the floor on my face.

  The door slammed shut again, as though dragged back by a spring, shaking the clubhouse with its reverberation.

  I rolled over on my back.

  Neptune stood before the window, with Bette in his arms. His face was split in a grin. The window was open, and snow came curling into the room. My eyes took in the hanging cloaks of the women, each of which seemed to be hiding some additional horror. I tried to get to my feet.

  Neptune shot out his right foot, driving me back. I grabbed for it and missed. I mouthed threats, prayers, oaths. Bette seemed to be unconscious. Her arms flung wide—the creature carried her with an arm about her middle, so that she hung like an empty sack. But though I couldn’t see her face, I was sure it was Bette.

  The apparition—whatever it was—went through the window. I got to my feet and rushed after him—but it was no use. Neptune was gone. I hurled myself through the window, raced after a shadow that seemed to be fleet as the wind, out onto the
ice for the second time that night.

  And ended my chase hopeless, helpless.

  The ice, or the night, or the snow, or the sea, or all of them together, had swallowed Neptune and Bette Carver. . . .

  “Alex! Alex!” the call came to my ears from the window from which I had vaulted, and the voice was Bette’s voice! My brain spun. I was crazy, that was plain—but I could not mistake Bette’s voice. I raced back, my panting breath rasping from my lungs so harshly I could taste my own blood.

  I went back through the window, and Bette met me. Her hair was all mussed up. She wore someone’s ermine coat which scarcely covered her. Below it her legs were bare, as were her feet. The V in the throat showed an entrancing expanse of lovely skin. Bette blushed.

  “There’s nothing on underneath, Alex,” she whispered. “I’ll explain. It’s wild, impossible, but here it is: I came in here. The lights went out, and a woman grabbed me. She whispered, so I didn’t recognize her voice. She said that I, like all the others who had friends or relatives on the Cyclonic, would die tonight, that the spirit of the storm would slay me—would come and take me away. Well, Alex, I’m not the sort to take that kind of thing without a comeback. I conked the dame. I couldn’t stand her chuckling laughter. I conked her, like I said, and put my clothes on her. I didn’t have time to put hers on myself, before the Neptune monster came and grabbed up the girl he thought was me. Then you came. . . .”

  “He went out with that other woman, whoever she was,” I said hoarsely, “and the sea got them—at least got the woman. I’d have gone into the sea after you, if you hadn’t yelled in time. I was mad, desperate. Bette—what in God’s name is happening here?”

  “Well, the lights came on just as Neptune came in, stayed on while you were here, and I spent a lot of time in the dark. But while I was scrabbling around, trying to figure what it was all about, I ran into something. I put my hand on a human face, that seemed to be frozen. The body’s here somewhere, Alex, among these cloaks, or behind them.”

  That was a queer twist, and no mistake. I could see no sense in it, but I had to find out things.

  Bette buttoned the cloak around her, and we got busy. I made sure that there were no hidden panels or closets on the right side of the room, and Bette and I began swiftly, feverishly, to take down all the cloaks on the coat racks, and pile them against the right wall. As we did so the music of the band kept coming from the dancing floor, and the shrill, hysterical laughter of the dancers, some of whom were destined, certainly, to die before morning.

  We cleared four racks of cloaks, moving the racks against the pile of them when we had finished. I was beginning to think Bette had been imagining things, when we reached the wall behind the racks. There was a square door, newly formed. I stared at Bette. She looked at me, and her face would never be whiter. There were wooden buttons holding the door in place.

  “That’s it!” said Bette hoarsely. “That door was open, and I pushed my hand into it, and touched a cold, dead face! It was open because I was supposed to be pushed into it. . . .”

  I FLIPPED THE fastenings, pulled out the door, looked into the black aperture beyond. It was an icebox. The inside of it was thick with frost. Its bottom was covered with chipped ice. There was plenty of room still unused in it. But that which was used, was used in ghastly fashion.

  Lying almost under my eyes was Hedda Murtin! Lying beside her was Peter Fraym, whom I had last seen plunging into the sea beyond the ice. Lying next to Peter, on the other side, was Leslie Franks. The three dead ones were all accounted for. No mistaking the fact that they were dead. They had been dead when they were put in here.

  And there was room for every one of the merrymakers in this ghastly clubhouse. But why were relatives of the victims of the Cyclonic being chosen? I had madness to deal with, I knew that. But even a madman has some sort of motive for what he does. And where did Lola Garrick fit into the horror?

  “There’s just one thing to do, Bette,” I whispered. “We’ve got to get the other guests together, tell them what has happened, call the police and stop this horror.”

  She agreed. We went to the door. It was locked—tightly. No icebox door could have been more secure. And the window was useless. If we went out that way, we wouldn’t be able to get back through the outer door, not with what we knew now. The person who had trapped us here would attend to that. We might, of course, jump from the window and save ourselves. But I couldn’t think of that, and knew Bette wouldn’t hear of it. We couldn’t leave and let those others—even though they were strangers—die as the first three had died.

  We banged on the door. Nobody outside paid us the slightest attention! That was queer, for I, beyond these same panels, had heard voices in this room. Our banging and clattering should be heard, even above the wild laughter, and the macabre music of the band. But nobody came to answer.

  I whirled to look at Bette. Something had to be done. We had to find the way to do it. Bette glanced back at the door of that grisly ice chest. She gave a choked scream, for now that door was closed!

  My heart almost stopped beating, but I forced myself to go to the door, open it again, and peer in. Neither Bette nor I could be sure that we hadn’t automatically closed that door ourselves, to hide the cold faces of the dead. That’s the only explanation I have now, after all this time, for not even a ghost could have come in by the window—the only other mode of ingress—and shut that door without our hearing him.

  We looked into the box, and horror was piled upon horror. The box had, now, a fourth occupant.

  That occupant was Lola Garrick, garbed in the clothing which had been Bette’s!

  I stared at Bette.

  “But for quick thinking, sweetheart,” I said, “and mountains of courage, you would be there instead of Lola. She meant for you to be there! She was hoist on her own petard. Nor does that end the horrors, for someone who also knew, had to put her there. A monster still roams the beach, and we’ve got to find him. Understand? Can you stand the cold for a little while? Are you afraid to go out into the dark for just a few minutes?”

  She shook her head. I needn’t, really, have asked.

  WE WENT OUT through that ghastly window which, but for Bette’s courage, might have been her exit from life. And even in the midst of the horror, Bette was enough of a woman to whisper to me:

  “Even if he hadn’t been lost on the Cyclonic, it would have been nobody but you, from the first moment I saw you.”

  Maybe she was sincere about it; women are peculiar creatures. Maybe she said it to buck me up, after the manner of brave women. Certainly, after her whisper, I could have moved mountains for her sake. I could have throttled tigers for her approval.

  Most of my fear left me. No, it didn’t leave me, never would, but I was somehow able to rise above it.

  Bette and I went to that outer door where I had run into catastrophe before.

  I thought we would have trouble getting in, but we didn’t. I simply opened the door and led Bette in. I was afraid to release my grip on her wrist, lest the horror in the night whisk her away from me.

  The merrymakers now were people from another world. It didn’t take half a dozen questions for me to find out several things: every person here was afraid to go out into the dark. The telephone lines were all down or otherwise out of order, so that none could be advised of the horror here. The whole crowd was hopeless, helpless, like people on a sinking ship who know there can be no rescue, and only death can answer their cries.

  And they made merry because they could not make decisions. They had started making merry to Lola’s command, and did not seem to be able to stop. They were automatons, lacking only the ice and death to make them fit subjects for that box where the four already dead were resting.

  “Who’s missing,” I cried, “besides Hedda, Leslie, Peter and Lola?”

  Bette had to answer that for me. She did it by looking over the white faces, then checking her list, a swift, almost automatic appraisal.

 
“Burton Trask and Clara Holland, his fiancée.”

  I looked back at the crowd again, which was swaying, unconscious that they swayed, to the music.

  “How did they go?” I demanded.

  “He came and took Clara. Burton followed. None came back.”

  “I know where to find them,” I said grimly.

  And then I did something that must have shocked everybody. I walked up to Drew Kedick, who stood with his right arm about the waist of Greta Harms, and knocked him flat with a blow to the mouth.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  “IN THE NAME OF SCIENCE!”

  Thank God, the blow had the desired effect, at least in part. There was a quick, questioning mutter from the other men. The orchestra stopped in the middle of a tune, and rose to its feet as one man.

  Four men left their dancing partners to charge me. I stepped into them, fighting the best I knew how, talking as I fought:

  “I had to do something to wake you people up. You all act as though you were hypnotized, just because of some strange goings-on, because of the night, the storm, and the occasion. The whole thing is macabre, unnatural, and it’s had my goat as much as yours. But listen. . . .”

  They drew back a little.

  I stopped, panting, to tell them what I had seen and experienced outside. Drawing a breath, I ended with this:

  “It isn’t believable, yet all we have to do to see that every word is true, is to go into the women’s cloak room, and look into the box behind where the cloak racks stood. There were four dead people in there when Bette Carver and I had a look. By this time there are six. I don’t know why they’re there, any more than you do. I’m completely certain that there’s no supernatural reason. There’s a mad one, perhaps, but one that is understandable and reasonable. But of this I am sure: unless we men do something about it, every person here will be dead before morning!”

  One of the men finally managed to speak up.

  “What is your suggestion?”

  “Outside,” I said, taking a deep breath, “is a man. We’ve all seen him in the fabled costume of Neptune, but he’s a human being—a madman, perhaps—but a human being none the less. A crank, maybe, drawn here by the fact that this party has already had some publicity in papers in Jersey and New York. By sheer showmanship which has paralyzed us all, he has managed to destroy six of our number. He’ll get the others if we don’t come alive and use our heads. This party, save as a stunt, has no real connection with the ill-fated Cyclonic. There is no bridge between the living and the dead.