Witching Hour Theatre

by Jonathan Janz

  “But they give me nightmares.”

  Ah, so that’s how it is, Wilson thought, relaxing. Being afraid of a movie implied respect for it; otherwise, it wouldn’t provoke such a powerful emotional response.

  “If you’re frightened, why don’t you have your boyfriend take you?”

  Wilson froze, his pulse quickening. He couldn’t believe his own audacity! He had no idea if Nichole had a boyfriend, and if she did, what if she told the man about Larry’s advances? He was doomed.

  Her eyebrows rose. “My ex-boyfriend doesn’t like scary movies. He says they’re stupid and a waste of money.”

  Larry scowled. “Well, I think he’s stupid and a waste of money.”

  Her lips parted slightly. “You think I had to pay him to go out with me?”

  “If you did, you wasted your money,” he said and joined her in laughter. Her laugh was easy, delightful, without a trace of self-consciousness. If he were ever going to ask her out, he realized, now was the time. His sphincter began to pucker. His chest tightened. He opened his mouth to speak.

  But she surprised him by saying, “So you see, if I wanted to go to a horror film, I’d have no one to sit with.”

  His mouth went dry. “You could sit with me,” he said.

  She was still smiling, but her eyes were serious. “That would be nice.”

  Wilson swallowed, felt himself growing dizzy. He forced a smile. “I better get to know you first, though. Can’t be too careful these days.”

  She hesitated, a blush creeping up her neck. “I’m free tomorrow evening.”

  Larry didn’t trust himself to speak, but he knew he had to.

  In the steadiest voice he could muster, he said, “Tomorrow evening it is.” He stuffed his hands in his pockets so she wouldn’t see them shake. “Would you like to meet here at six?”

  “Not on my night off,” she said and fetched a pen from under the counter. She scribbled on a napkin. “Here’s my address and my phone number. Pick me up at 6:30.”

  And that was it. Larry stood there a moment and marveled at his luck. Despite all his doubts and his debilitating self-consciousness, he’d gotten a date with the girl of his dreams. He could worry about the ramifications later. Pocketing the napkin and picking up his popcorn tub, he told her he’d see her tomorrow night and fled down the hallway.

  His posture a bit straighter, Larry moved down the hallway toward Theater Two. Was it possible his life had just changed? He didn’t want to jinx himself or smother the relationship before it began, but he couldn’t help feeling as though his luck was finally turning.

  She had actually said yes!

  As he passed through the doorway, he surveyed the remaining twelve moviegoers like a minister counting his parishioners.

  One person sat to Wilson’s right, in the shadows of the back row. To his left and also obscured by the darkness was a couple whose age he couldn’t ascertain without staring too closely. Another couple sat near the back on the lefthand side of the theater, and in the middle left, a trio of college-age boys spouted profanities and chucked popcorn at one another.

  Wilson knew the type. The students from the nearby liberal arts college were mostly respectful young people, many of them denizens of Von’s Books. Some, however, hadn’t yet matured, and on several occasions, Witching Hour Theatre had been tainted by their raucous behavior.

  Larry started down the aisle.

  Across from the boys, Wilson spotted a white-haired man in his early sixties with his feet propped up on the chair in front of him. The man shot Larry a hostile look as he passed.

  Nearer the front was a young couple huddled close together. As Wilson passed them, he realized it was the same guy who’d bumped him and spilled his popcorn before the first feature. Still annoyed by the incident but not wanting an altercation, Wilson advanced to his seat in the second row. In front of him, the Goth girl in the black tee shirt sat alone, her companions evidently having grown tired of their horror movie experiment.

  He eased into his seat and was about to make some sort of horror insider’s joke to the Goth girl when the light bled out of the room and the screen proclaimed WINDSWEPT PICTURES PRESENTS A RICHARD K. LUDLOW FILM. The graininess of the picture and the hopping text advertised the film’s age. An overwrought score, replete with melodramatic violins and a buzzing bass synthesizer, flooded over the theater.

  Perfect, Wilson thought, smiling. This looks like a serious shitfest.

  He munched some fresh popcorn.

  The capital white letters announced an unfamiliar pair of lead actors. Then, in letters so large they barely fit on the screen, the title appeared.

  VEIL OF THE WHITE TEMPTRESS.

  Wilson sipped watery lemonade, thought, What a terrifically hideous title.

  The credits continued as dreary shots of the European countryside established the setting. Wilson didn’t recognize the supporting actors, nor had he heard of the sound designer or the makeup artist. The director of photography, he saw, was none other than the director of the film, Richard K. Ludlow. Ludlow, it also appeared, had been in charge of casting and editing. Wilson was delighted to learn the film had been produced by Richard K. Ludlow, and he was already stifling giggles when the credits announced that the original score, as well, had been composed by Richard K. Ludlow.

  Larry gave in to his laughter and saw that the Goth girl’s shoulders were bobbing as well.

  He cozied into his seat, all of his tension evaporating. It had been a most excellent evening. He’d gotten a date, viewed one of his favorite horror flicks, and now it appeared as though Veil of the White Temptress was going to be just as awful as its title promised. How could life get any better?

  The opening scene took place in a sterile white office in which sat seven or eight people across from a dour man—a lawyer, apparently—whose thick spectacles matched his bushy black sideburns. Someone had died and this was the reading of the will.

  The man and woman sitting across from the lawyer were young and attractive, and judging from the way they sat apart from one another, Larry guessed the pair were brother and sister rather than husband and wife. Soon it became clear they were indeed siblings and their father was the man whose will was being read.

  The lawyer had a thick British accent, and due to the age of the film and the probable cheapness of the sound equipment used to record the dialogue, Wilson was having trouble hearing what the man was saying. To further complicate matters, the trio of college boys behind him were speaking in obnoxious voices and, Wilson saw upon turning around, hassling the couple sitting a few rows in front of them.

  The same guy who’d bumped Wilson before the movies began.

  Wilson had mixed feelings. He knew it was hypocritical of him, but part of him rejoiced to see the guy in the olive green coat get his comeuppance. On the other hand, he did feel for the man. Larry knew how it felt to be ganged up on.

  He heaved a weary sigh. Couldn’t the boys leave the couple alone so they could all enjoy the film? As if in answer, Wilson saw a spiky-haired blond pelt Olive Coat in the head with a Milk Dud. Olive Coat stood and shouted something at the college boys, and one of the boys called Olive Coat a “whiney little bitch.”

  There was a thick silence while all present waited for Olive Coat’s response. Then Olive Coat’s shoulders sagged and he muttered a few words to his companion. The couple gathered their things and wandered defeatedly up the aisle. For a moment Wilson thought there would be a confrontation, but Olive Coat didn’t speak as he and his woman passed the boys.

  The college guys, however, jeered and made obscene gestures as the couple departed.

  Jerks, Larry thought. Now they’d focus on him. He was alone, and that, he knew from experience, made him fair game. His only hope was that the boys would grow bored with the movie and leave.

  Onscreen, the lawyer was announcing that everything Sperling Treadwell had owned would go to his son Evan and his daughter Susan. Wilson decided the name Sperling Treadwell was the wor
st he’d ever heard.

  The attractive young siblings, Evan and Susan Treadwell, embraced, and the scene faded to an aerial shot of an enormous gray castle.

  Wilson took a swig of root beer, interested despite himself. He loved Gothic horror novels, and though this movie was obviously made on a shoestring budget, the vibe was absorbing thus far.

  Evan and Susan rode in a horse-drawn coach toward their new home. The camera lingered on the young people’s faces.

  Wilson cocked an eyebrow. It was difficult to get a handle on the time period of the movie, for though Evan and Susan had haircuts contemporary to the sixties, their clothes were early Victorian. Larry wished Ludlow had invested in a pair of wigs for his two young stars. Seeing Evan Treadwell in his Beatles haircut jolted Wilson out of the nineteenth century.

  During the traveling scene the siblings provided the back-story of how they came to be estranged from their father and why they hadn’t spoken to him since he’d purchased the castle, Thistlebottom Manor. When Wilson heard the name of the castle, he let loose with a gust of laughter and immediately turned to see if the college boys were going to mock him for it. With a grimace he saw they had relocated across the aisle and were giving the lone man sitting there a hard time.

  Wilson was torn. On one hand, he saw there was nothing he could do. If he confronted the boys they’d turn their meanness on him, and if he complained to the front desk, he might risk dragging Nichole or the kindly old ticket-taker into the fray. It was possible the projectionist working tonight was also a manager, yet even if he were and even if he did throw the boys out, what was to stop them from waiting for Wilson after the show to exact their vengeance?

  Larry thought of the strange way Nichole had gone silent when he’d mentioned the projectionists earlier and wondered why. In any event, there was nothing he could do about the drama unfolding behind him. It was unfortunate, but the white-haired man would have to fend for himself against the bullies.

  Larry turned his attention back to the movie, but the situation nagged at him. He felt a kinship with the guy sitting there alone. He was a good deal older than Larry, but like Larry he was a man who’d probably come to the Starlight tonight to relax and to lose himself in the films. The college boys had no right to take that from him, and if Wilson let it happen, what would stop them from treating him the same way after they were done? Perhaps that was their plan, to methodically rid the theater of patrons until they had the room to themselves. Feeling his pulse speed, Larry glanced at the Goth girl.

  Who was staring back at him. Judging from her expression, she was having the same thoughts as Larry.

  And now a new worry assailed him. The Goth girl was attractive, and perhaps the jerks had caught sight of her during the last intermission. What if the boys were attempting to intimidate everyone into leaving so they could get her alone?

  Wilson remembered the closed tunnel exit. Last year the management, fed up with an influx of teenagers sneaking in the back door from the alley behind the theater, and without the necessary staffing to monitor it, declared the alley exit would be disabled after eleven-thirty on Friday nights. It was a fire hazard, a few had claimed, but there were no more problems with people sneaking in, and little else was said.

  Now, though, there was only one way out of the Starlight, and that was through the main exit, which meant that one way or another the girl would have to pass by the jerks. They would make rude jokes about her piercings, Wilson was sure. They’d call her names.

  Feeling ill, Larry held the girl’s gaze and wished he weren’t such a coward.

  He turned and scoured the dark silhouettes behind him for possible allies. One couple, probably disgusted by the boys’ behavior, had departed.

  That left only nine people: Wilson, the Goth girl, the three college boys, the guy they were pestering, a man and a woman who sat in the back corner, and one more solitary figure who, Wilson thought, had moved up a couple of rows. Larry was certain the figure—he couldn’t make out its gender—had been sitting in the back row earlier. But now the figure was a little bit closer. Maybe this solitary moviegoer was debating whether or not to help the harassed man and was inching forward to intervene.

  “You forgot your lotion,” one of the boys said to the white-haired man. “You’re gonna hurt yourself jacking off.”

  “Naw, he’s too old to get it up,” another one said.

  Cringing, Wilson faced the screen but again sensed the Goth girl’s eyes on him. Her face, dark as it was in the shadowy theater, stirred paternal instincts in Larry. You seem like a good man, her eyes seemed to say. Aren’t you going to help us get rid of those bullies so we can all enjoy the film and have the fun that we came here for?

  She saw into him and through him, and try as he might, he couldn’t look away.

  Well hell, he thought and rose from his seat. He knew he’d hate himself if he just let this happen, and he’d had more than a lifetime’s worth of self-loathing. Getting beaten to a pulp had to be better than feeling like a coward.

  Maybe.

  But as he strode up the aisle to intervene he realized that another man was already there. The fellow looked tall and powerful, his plaid shirt stretched tight by muscled shoulders. The man was speaking loudly to the trio of bullies and Wilson was amazed to see that the boys were apologizing and returning to their original seats.

  Larry continued up the aisle and stood at the man’s side. The stout man saw Wilson’s quizzical look and grinned. He had blond hair trimmed in a crew cut, weathered skin, and an overlarge square jaw.

  “What did you say to them?” Wilson whispered.

  The man’s grin broadened. “That I’m a cop.”

  Wilson studied the man’s seamed forehead. “Are you?”

  In answer, the man held up his badge.

  Larry exhaled. “I’m glad you were here. I don’t know what I would have said to them, but it probably wouldn’t have done any good.”

  “You never know,” the cop said. “At least you cared enough to try.”

  Larry shook his head. “It’s sad, you know? I mean, kids will be kids and all that, but—”

  “Kids,” the policeman cut him off, “can be pricks, too.”

  And with that, he lumbered back to his seat. Wilson had thought the cop was the solitary figure in the back of the theater, but now he saw the man turn the opposite way and move down the aisle to a woman Larry assumed was his wife.

  When Larry returned to his seat, the girl in the black shirt gave him an approving smile and turned back to the movie.

  Feeling good he’d at least made an effort to put a stop to the bullying, Larry took a sip of his watery root beer and watched Evan and Susan climb out of the carriage. Seeing the castle from their perspective, the place was a lot larger than he’d had at first thought. There was no way Richard K. Ludlow could have built such an impressive set on the meager budget with which he had obviously worked, and that meant the castle was real. Larry resolved to research the movie tomorrow to see if he could discover the name of the castle.

  Evan and Susan Treadwell, with their sixties haircuts and their Victorian garb, were met by a butler whose gauntness and haunted eyes gave him the aspect of a terminal cancer patient. Wilson wondered if there would be a dedication to him on the credits, as there usually were for people who worked on a film but died before the movie was released.

  The butler led them on an extended tour of the castle. Though the footage was grainy and the camerawork shoddy, the eerie setting cast a spectral mood. With its winding stone staircase, rising towers, and dimly lit catacombs, the place was fit for a Shakespearean tragedy. Wilson contemplated whether it had been used for exactly that purpose by a more competent director.

  The combination of the Gothic castle and the cadaverous butler was actually managing to suck Wilson in, and all things considered, he was of the opinion that his video guide had been a bit harsh on Veil of the White Temptress. No, it wasn’t a masterpiece, but giving it only one star seemed u
ngenerous.

  Lit with the flickering candle in his skeletal fingers, the butler told the siblings the legend of Thistlebottom Manor. Wilson smiled again at the castle’s ridiculous name but was soon lost in the butler’s recitation of how Abner Thistlebottom had murdered his family and how the place had remained empty until Evan and Susan’s father Sperling Treadwell had purchased it. Sperling and his new bride had been haunted by the ghost of Abner Thistlebottom’s murdered daughter Cassandra.

  It was Cassandra, the butler explained, who had visited Sperling Treadwell in the night, a beguiling succubus who wore a sheer nightgown and a white veil.

  Wilson nodded, pleased to have the film’s title explained. Remembering his unopened candy, he scratched at the cellophane for a few moments, opened the box, and with a rush of pleasure, he popped a couple of Dots into his mouth. The squishy gel of his favorite candy sent warm tingles up and down his spine.

  Larry leaned forward and listened. He found he had to slow his chewing to hear all of the old butler’s hushed details, for Richard K. Ludlow insisted on plaguing the scene with inappropriately loud music. Despite the slow cadence of the butler’s voice, the violins shrieking in the background would have been better suited for a violent death scene.

  “Cassandra possessed your father entirely, children,” said the butler to Evan and Susan Treadwell in his impenetrable English accent.

  “But how can the dead possess the living?” asked Evan. The actor playing Evan Treadwell, Wilson decided, had the dramatic range of a coat rack.

  “The ghost of Cassandra, clad in a lurid white gown,” the butler continued, “would come to your father after his new bride had fallen asleep. In the wee hours of the morning she would appear in her flowing white gown, its diaphanous fabric revealing the supple body beneath.”

  “Did you ever see Cassandra?” Susan asked him.

  A dark smile spread across the butler’s face.

  “Just once,” he answered.

  “And what did you see?” asked Evan.