The Midnight Tour bhc-3 Page 4

  “Yeah, but she’s only been married for a couple of years.”

  “She’s how old?”

  Tuck frowned for a moment, then said, “Thirty-six.”

  “Well, that’s not terribly old to be starting a family.”

  “For all I know, she might already be knocked up. And if she’s not, she probably will be by the time they get back from the cruise. I mean, two months together in the South Pacific? I damn near get pregnant just thinking about it.”

  “Have they been trying to have a baby?” Dana asked.

  “Jeez! How would I know? She’s a great gal and everything and we really like each other, but it’s not like being with you. She my dad’s wife. I mean, I can’t just ask her about stuff like that.” Tuck raised her eyebrows. “Do you want any more coffee?”

  “Nope, I’m fine.”

  “Maybe we’d better get going.” She reached across the table for Dana’s cup. “I’ll rinse these out and batten down the hatches. You might want to grab your windbreaker. You never know when the fog’ll come rolling in. It can get pretty nippy.”

  Five minutes later, Dana followed Tuck into the three-car garage. They walked past the eighteen foot cabin cruiser, then past a Mercedes, before climbing into the red Jeep Wrangler.

  “I don’t know how you can stand living in such squalor,” Dana said.

  “It’s tough.” As the automatic door rolled upward, Tuck started the Jeep’s engine. “I’ll probably have to move out if I ever get married.”

  “Don’t get married. No guy would be worth it.”

  “Nobody I know,” Tuck said. Laughing, she backed out of the garage.

  As she turned the Jeep around, Dana gazed at the front of the house. With its many outside stairways, its passageways and balconies, the enormous stucco house looked more like a nice hotel than . like a private home. “It’s really fabulous,” she said.

  “Amazing what you can do with a few million bucks, isn’t it?”

  “I wouldn’t mind living in a place like this.”

  “You are living in a place like this,” Tuck said. “All summer.” She aimed the remote over her shoulder. As the garage door started to close, she put the remote away and headed down the long, narrow driveway.

  The morning air blew Dana’s hair. She took deep breaths. She could smell the woods and the ocean.

  Though the area immediately in front of the house was bright with sunlight, the driveway soon took them into thick woods. There, in shadows as heavy as dusk, the rays of the sun looked like golden pillars slanting down through the trees. Haze drifted like smoke in the gold.

  Dana smiled at Tuck, and shook her head.

  “Not exactly like Los Angeles, is it?” Tuck asked.

  “Not exactly. I can’t believe I’ll be spending the whole summer here.”

  “Neither can I. Man, am I ever glad you could come.”

  “You’re glad!”

  “You bet I am.” Tuck picked up speed on the downhill. She took the curves awfully fast.

  Too fast for Dana’s taste.

  Even with the seatbelt on, Dana felt her body being shoved from side to side as they raced around the bends.

  It’s okay, she told herself. Tuck knows what she’s doing. She’s probably driven in.and out of this place thousands of times.

  Tuck glanced at her and grinned, then faced the front again. Her long, blond hair was streaming behind her in the breeze. “We’re gonna have a great time,” she said.

  “I hope so.”

  If she doesn ’t slam us into a tree.

  “And you know what?” Tuck asked. “I couldn’t have stayed home this summer if you hadn’t agreed to come.”

  “What? What do you mean?”

  “They were all set to drag me along with them on their damn cruise.”

  “Oh, that would’ve been a fate worse than death.” ,

  “I hate cruises. Yuck!”

  “Are you out of your mind?”

  “Have you ever gone on one?”

  “No.”

  “just wait.” Some hair blew across her face. She fingered it out of the way with one hand while she steered around a curve with the other. “It’s like being on a floating prison full of chipper weirdos. But Dad didn’t want me staying here alone. So I’d be out somewhere on the briny sea, right now, if you hadn’t come to stay. I owe you bigtime.”

  Shrugging, Dana said, “I’m sure you could’ve gotten somebody else.”

  “I didn’t want anyone else. You’re my best friend. Besides, you’re the only person Dad would’ve agreed to. It was you or nobody.”

  “How come?”

  “Hell, don’t ask me. He likes you. He trusts you. He thinks you’re a regular Girl Scout.”

  “I’ve got him fooled.”

  Tuck smiled at her. “No you don’t. He’s right.”

  “Aw, shucks.”

  “Anyway, I thought you should know. It’s not like I’m doing you all the big favors. You’re doing a major one for me just by being here.”

  “Why don’t you do me a favor and slow down?”

  “This is nothing. You wanta see me really go fast?”

  “That’s all right. Some other time. When I’m not in the car, for instance.”

  “All right, all right.” Tuck eased her foot down on the brake pedal, and the Jeep slowed down.

  “Thank you,” Dana said.

  “You’re always so cautious.”

  “You’re always so reckless. Maybe that’s why your dad didn’t want you to stay by yourself.”

  “I don’t think that’s why.”

  “Was he afraid you might throw wild parties?”

  “Nah. It was the whole idea of me being alone in the house. You know, it’s so enormous and there’s nothing around it but the woods. No neighbors or anything. It can get a little creepy when you’re there by yourself. Anyway, I think Dad had visions of the Manson family or Hannibal Lecter coming for me.”

  “In which case, a lot of good I’d be.”

  “It’s just some sort of mental aberration on Dad’s part. He seems to think I’ll be fine if you’re staying with me. It’s not because you’re such a big, strapping brute, either.”

  “I hope not.”

  “Not that you aren’t.”

  “I see that living in the lap of luxury hasn’t robbed you of your native charm.”

  “Nope. Thank God, huh?”

  “Yeah. It would’ve been a major loss. Anyway, if they’d forced you to go on the cruise with them, what would they have done about Beast House?”

  “Put Clyde in charge,”

  “Who’s Clyde?”

  “Clyde Bennett. You met him yesterday. He’s a charmer. He’s gotta be thrilled to death about me being head honcho this summer.”

  “Does he give you a hard time?” Dana asked.

  “He used to.”

  As they glided around a bend, the two-lane public road came into sight. Tuck slowed the Jeep and came to a complete stop.

  This is where you’ve gotta start being careful,” she explalned. “Some of the people around these parts drive like maniacs.” She eased forward, checking in both directions, then stepped on the gas. “Beast House,” she yelled, “here we come!”

  Chapter Four

  THE STORY ACCORDING TO PATTY

  “Hello again,” Patty said.

  Owen, relieved by the interruption, settled back in his seat and leaned sideways a little to look up the aisle at the guide.

  “Is everyone enjoying the scenery?” she asked. “It’s pretty terrific, isn’t it?”

  Looks good from here, Owen thought.

  Patty was standing casually with the microphone close to her mouth. She held on to a support pole with her other hand. The hand was high, as if she’d raised her arm to ask a question.

  “This section of Pacific Coast Highway can be a little frightening,” Patty said. “But you folks probably enjoy a good scare, or you wouldn’t be on your way to Beast House. Am I right?�
��

  Some of the passengers responded, “Right.” Others chuckled.

  “To put your minds at ease, I can tell you that we haven’t lost a bus over the cliffs in the past three weeks. That trip, I hear, was very exciting for a few seconds. But I miss the guide. She and I were pretty good friends. Her name was Bubbles.”

  “Give me a break,” Monica muttered.

  “Not Sandy?” asked a man in an aisle seat just in front of Patty.

  “Good one,” she told him.

  “How about Rocky?” suggested another passenger.

  “Actually, all three perished. It was a terrible accident. But I’m sure we’ll fare better. Won’t we, Al?” The driver raised his arm and gave a thumbs-up. “He doesn’t let a little thing like cataracts get in his way.” After a short pause, Patty asked, “How many of you have been to Beast House before?”

  Looking around, Owen saw eight or ten of the passengers raise a hand.

  “What’s that, about one out of five? Pretty good. That’s about typical. We get a lot of repeats. There’s something about Beast House that just keeps drawing people back to it. Especially weirdos. No offense.”

  A lot of riders laughed at that one.

  “The house has had a long and colorful history. Mostly, the color has been red. I won’t get into much of that, though. What I want to do, now, is tell you a few things that won’t get covered to any extent on the tour.

  “Beast House has been a popular tourist trap...attraction...since 1932. For those of you who aren’t whizzes at math, that’s a while ago. The Great Depression was going on. Herbert Hoover was President of the United States. Edward the Eighth sat on the throne of Great Britain. Germany’s comeback kid, Adolph Hitler, was defeated that year in a run-off election for the presidency when a guy by the name of Hindenburg burst his balloon...so to speak.”

  “Oh, the humanity, ” someone threw in.

  “Exactly,” Patty said. “In 1932, the Japanese invaded Shanghai. Al Capone was sent to prison in Atlanta. The Lindbergh baby got himself kidnapped and murdered. Amelia Earhart was still among the unvanished. Gary Cooper starred in A Farewell to Arms and Shirley Temple made her first movie. Not only that, but 1932 marked the birth of Senator Edward Kennedy and Elizabeth Taylor.”

  “There you go,” Owen whispered to Monica. “Liz.”

  “But the real highlight of 1932 was the opening of Beast House. The Victorian style house had already been standing for thirty years, but as a private home. It took Maggie Kutch to turn the place into one of America’s most bizarre and infamous tourist attractions.

  “Beast House had been built in 1902 by Lilly Thorn, widow of Lyle Thorn. Lyle, the leader of the Thorn Gang, was an outlaw known throughout the west during the latter years of the nineteenth century. You name it, he did it. He robbed banks, stage coaches, and trains. He rustled cattle and horses. It’s said that he committed so many murders and rapes that nobody could keep track of them all. The brutal massacres of several entire families in the Arizona territory have been attributed to Lyle Thorn and his gang, but that’s mostly speculation. Some people think the massacres were the work of Apaches. Nobody knows for sure. Nor does anyone know the fate of Lyle Thorn or his gang. Their depredations simply stopped in the early 1890’s. We can only assume that he and his band of cut-throats came to a sudden, violent end.

  “On their way to the end, however, they worked up a ton of bad karma. Lyle must’ve passed it on to his wife and children, and I think it all ended up in Beast House.

  “As I mentioned, his wife’s name was Lilly. They were Lyle and Lilly Thom. But nobody around Malcasa Point ever saw Lyle. He had apparently ‘bought the ranch’ before Lilly and the kids ever showed up in town. The boys were named Sam and Earl. It’s believed that Lyle was their father, but nobody knows for sure.

  “Anyway, Lilly and the two boys arrived in town in early 1902. And they were loaded. Apparently, Lyle’s life of crime had been very lucrative. Before you know it, Lilly had a crew hard at work building her dream house.

  “And they all lived happily ever after in the dream house until August 2, 1903, when the beast came up out of the cellar and ran amok, committing wholesale slaughter on her family. You’ll hear all about that on the tour, though, so I won’t get into it now.

  “For now, we want to skip ahead about twenty-eight years. During most of that time, the Thorn house stood deserted. Nobody wanted to live there because of the killings. But in 1931, the Kutch family bought it and moved in. Maggie Kutch lived in the house with her husband, two little girls, and her baby son. For just about two weeks. Then one rainy night, her entire family was brutally slain by what she described as a ‘raving, white beast.’ Maggie was the only survivor.

  “You might think that Maggie would’ve left town after such a tragedy. But she stayed and built a home for herself directly across the street from the old Victorian. Her new house was a fortress made of brick. And it didn’t have a single window. You’ll see it today. Unfortunately, the tour doesn’t include the Kutch house. Maggie’s daughter still lives there, so it’s off limits.”

  A blonde kid a few rows ahead of Owen raised his hand.

  “Question?” Patty asked.

  “Yeah. If Maggie’s whole family got slaughtered by the beast, how come she still has a daughter?”

  “Good question. What’s your name, friend?”

  “Derek.”

  “Well, Derek, here’s the thing. Maggie gave birth to this daughter after the massacre. This one—her name’s Agnes—was born several years later.”

  “But you said her husband got killed by the beast.”

  “He did. Later on, though, Maggie met someone else. This new man in her life became Agnes’s father.”

  “Oh, I get it. Okay. Thanks.”

  “Thank you for asking, Derek. Now...” Patty frowned. “Let’s see, we’d just gotten Maggie moved into the brick house. Nobody quite knew what she was up to...why she would want to live there, right across the road from the house where the beast had murdered her family. That place was abandoned, boarded up. Some of the town-folk thought it should be torn down or burnt. At that time, they called it Massacre House. They said it was a blight on the good name of the town.

  “But it remained standing, and pretty soon, large, mysterious crates began to arrive. The crates were carried up the porch stairs and into Massacre House. Can anyone tell me what was in them? Lab equipment for godless experiments? Or maybe...”

  Derek raised his hand. Before Patty could call on him or anyone else, he blurted, “I know what they had in them! Wax dummies of the dead guys!”

  “That’s right. Wax dummies of dead guys and gals. At the time, however, nobody had any idea what might be in the crates. They didn’t get their answer until the summer of 1932. First, a ticket booth went up. Then a few signs. A sign at the top of the ticket book read, BEAST HOUSE. Another sign gave the times and prices of the tours. Back in those days, a tour cost only twenty-five cents. That’s a far cry from what they’ll be charging you people today. But a quarter meant something back in 1932. A lot of things did.

  “Maggie put up one other sign before she opened Beast House to the public. My favorite. It was painted in red letters on an old wooden door. Unfortunately, it disappeared years and years ago. But you can see photos of it in Janice Crogan’s Beast House Museum on Front Street. It goes like this. BEAST HOUSE! THE LEGENDARY, HISTORICAL SITE OF GHASTLY, MONSTROUS MURDERS! NOT ONE, BUT MANY! SEE WITH YOUR OWN EYES THE ACTUAL SCENES OF BRUTAL, BLOODY BUTCHERIES WHERE THEY HAPPENED! FEAST YOUR EYES ON AUTHENTIC REPRODUCTIONS OF THE BEAST’S RAVAGED VICTIMS—AS THEY WERE FOUND, IN THEIR ACTUAL DEATH GARMENTS. HEAR THE TRUE TALES OF THE BEAST AS TOLD BY ITS ONLY KNOWN SURVIVOR, MAGGIE KUTCH, PROPRIETOR OF BEAST HOUSE AND YOUR PERSONAL GUIDE.’

  Patty grinned and said, “Love it. Plenty of the townfolks didn’t, though. They tried to stop Maggie from opening the house, but she wasn’t someone easily stopped and the first tour of Beast House took place, as scheduled
, on July 1, 1932.

  “Only a few people showed up for it. They were mostly locals. Some were the very people who’d protested against the place. Apparently, they were eager to see just how bad it really was. According to newspaper accounts, what they found was worse than they’d expected. The good folks were shocked and outraged. Several fainted. Others ran from the house, shrieking.

  “Now that they’d seen the tour, they considered it an offense against human decency, God, motherhood, and good taste. One published report called it ‘An obscene display of vulgar savagery unfit for the eyes of civilized human beings.’ An editorial went this way: ”Has our community now sunk into such a mire of depravity as to find entertainment in the lewd and gory depiction of scantily clad murder victims such as can be found in every corner of the blasphemy known as Beast House? For shame!’” Grinning and shaking her head, Patty said, ”I like that, ’For shame!’”

  “Those people hated Beast House. They kept trying to shut it down. They couldn’t manage that, but the town did pass an ordinance prohibiting children under the age of sixteen from going in.

  “As the weeks went by, though, a funny thing happened. Local merchants began to notice they had more money in their cash registers at the end of the day. Pretty soon, it dawned on them that the extra cash had come from the pockets of strartgers. There seemed to be a regular flow of visitors coming into town. They spent money at the gas station, the cafe, the ice cream parlor, the pharmacy, the grocery store. You name the business, and out-of-towners were spending money there. And what was behind this influx of visitors?”

  “BEAST HOUSE!” a girl shouted, beating Derek to the punch.

  Derek frowned over his shoulder at her.

  “That’s right!” Patty said. “Beast House! People were coming to Malcasa Point from nearby towns and farms, even all the way from Marin County, San Francisco and the East Bay, just to take the Beast House tour. But they didn’t only take the tour; they were spending their money all over town. Suddenly, nobody had a bad word to say about Beast House and nobody wanted to shut it down anymore. Also, the restriction against kids was removed. Everyone was allowed to take the tour, regardless of age.