“Man,” he said as he approached the painting, “you would think this thing was wired or something,” he said, reaching toward the frame.
“Don’t!” John said.
Sickles jumped at the loudness of Lonetree’s voice. He turned and looked at the Indian as if he had lost it.
“Cool it, Geronimo, I just—”
“You’ll interfere and block my feelings.”
“Leonard, take a seat,” Kennedy said as he helped John straighten up.
“Look, I’m getting bad vibes from this thing.” George took to a chair next to Lonetree. “Something is coming off of that painting in waves. I didn’t start picking it up until John touched the damn thing.”
Kennedy looked from Cordero to Lonetree, who was looking at the portrait as if he were taking in every nuance of the artist’s brush strokes. The sepia tones of the background, the bright colors of the skin tones, and last of all, the smiling faces of the family.
“What did you feel?” Gabriel asked. He was tempted to go to his own chair to write it down in his notebook, but was unwilling to move in case he broke John’s concentration.
“Something came through the portrait…but it wasn’t the painting itself. It was like—”
“The house is here with us.”
Everyone looked at Cordero who was now leaning his head on his crossed arms on the tabletop.
“He’s right,” John stood, stepping closer to the portrait. “It may not be the portrait itself, but its attachment to the house. It has eyes on us.”
Kennedy patiently listened.
Lonetree touched the old oil paint. He ran a finger over the faces of the small children, and then up to the older features of F.E. Lindemann. The fingers touching the face lingered for a moment and then slowly went down in a zigzag motion toward the beautiful face of Elena. When he finally touched the brush-stroked features, the reaction was quite different from the initial shock he had felt. There had been nothing when he touched the other members of the family, but now John sighed as a feeling of safeness came over him. At the same moment Cordero raised his head and started to shake.
“John…get away from there, I feel…like, hell, just get away until I can sort this out.”
George stood up, knocking his chair over. He was rubbing his hands together, almost as if he wanted nothing more than to tear the skin from the bone. Leonard backed away from the table uneasily.
Lonetree didn’t move. He felt like he was a child again—no, even younger. He felt as though his mother’s hand was caressing his face, while she smiled down at him in his crib.
“Gabe, pull him away from that damn thing. It’s not what it seems. The fucking thing is…is tricking him. He feels safe around it, but it’s taking something from him.” George stepped around the table and approached John, still wringing his hands together. “It’s like the picture is learning from him.”
“You mean like a Vulcan mind-meld or somethin’?”
Cordero started to reach out to touch Lonetree’s arm but he hesitated, and then went back to wringing his hands.
“John?” Kennedy said, stepping closer to Lonetree and the portrait.
John tilted his head and then nodded like he was answering a question only he could hear. “Mama—”
John blinked several times and then he removed his hand. He continued to stare at the portrait for a long time, and then, as if coming from a faraway place, he blinked and looked at Cordero.
“She said that we are all welcome into the Lindemann home. Summer Place has been waiting for all of us.”
“Elena said that to you?” Gabriel asked. He took John by the arm and led him back to the table.
“I think, uh, yes, it had to have been,” Lonetree said as he slowly sat down.
Kennedy looked up at George, who was watching Lonetree with a worried look on his face. Then his eyes went to Gabriel and he slowly shook his head. Gabriel tilted his head, not understanding what Cordero was trying to convey.
“That thing,” he said pointing at the portrait, “does not want us in that house. If it does, it’s because…because—”
“What a bunch of bullshit. You buying this crap, Doc?” Leonard asked. He still stood his ground, far away from the rest of the group.
“Do you feel it?” John asked, sounding more like his old self. Far deeper, far stronger than when he was touching the face of Elena Lindemann.
“What?” Sickles asked looking around the dimly lit room.
“I do,” Kennedy said.
“What?” Leonard asked again, losing the bravado he had been feeling a moment before.
“Get your thermal laser, Leonard,” Gabriel said. He ran his hand back and forth through the air, still looking at the portrait. “Now!”
Sickles jumped as if he had been goosed. He rummaged through his small back bag and came up with a pistol shaped instrument. He turned on its red laser light and started pointing it in all directions.
“74 degrees, 74…74…75,” he said as he pointed it toward the double doors. He swung it toward George and John. “73, 73…74…” Then he pointed it at the portrait. “Jesus Christ! 38 degrees, 37, 36...” He pointed it back at the interior of the meeting room. “Temperature dropping. 35, 35, 31, shit,” he said. His breath had started to particulate into a fog.
“It’s here, Gabriel. Goddamn it, it came into the room with everything Lindemann brought over,” George said. Sickles returned to his black bag and started throwing things out of it, searching for something.
“What is it?” Gabriel asked. Leonard had found the object he was looking for, and now held a black box up and outward toward the center of the room.
“The electromagnetic field is off the freaking chart, Doc. This room should only have an .02, or maybe .03. we’re at .09 and the damn thing’s climbing. There’s enough electricity in this room to start cooking our brains.”
“Does that account for the temp drop?” Kennedy asked, his own breath coming out in a fog.
“I don’t know, it’s as if—”
Suddenly the portrait flew from the easel, barely missing George Cordero. It landed on the conference table and slid to the end, stopping just before it tumbled to the floor. Then the bellman’s cart with the remaining items on it tipped and was literally thrown, sailing only inches from Gabriel’s head. It smashed into the wall.
“Fuck me!” Leonard shouted. He hit the floor, the magnetic resonance counter flying from his hand.
Kennedy looked around as calmly as he could. Then he smiled and looked at Lonetree and Cordero.
“It’s gone,” John said. He stood and helped Leonard to his feet.
“Yes, he’s right, the house has withdrawn. It got what it came for,” George said, wiping his brow. The temperature had already started rising back up.
“Doc, I don’t know if I’m built for this,” Leonard said. He looked around wildly as if expecting something to charge at him.
Gabriel smiled.
“Would it help you to know that whatever was here was afraid of you and your toys, Leonard?”
Sickles pulled his arm free of Gabriel’s grasp and looked around at the disheveled room.
“Yeah?” he said as he finally looked back at Kennedy. “It sure doesn’t seem like it’s afraid of anything.”
“Well,” Kennedy said patting Leonard on the back, “of anyone we’re taking into Summer Place, you’re the one it will fear, because of what you can bring inside to help defeat it.”
Sickles blinked, and then his bravado returned. He stepped away from the professor and strutted back toward the table.
“John, why don’t you take a few of the smaller items to your room tonight and see what you can come up with? The same for you George.”
Both men nodded . It was back to business, and they appreciated it.
“I’ll keep the portrait and everything else in my room tonight. We wouldn’t want anything disappearing on us.”
A knock sounded at the door. When Leonard, who was near
est, pulled it open, a man in a red blazer stood in the doorway, shifting uncomfortably.
“Yes?” Gabriel said as he stepped forward.
“Uh, sir, I’m security. I was sent from the front desk. Are you related to the woman in 523?”
Kennedy frowned with concern. “Ms. Tilden, Jennifer Tilden?”
“Yes, sir. Small woman, red hair?”
“Yes,” Kennedy answered.
“She’s in the Astor Salon and is making quite a scene. She hasn’t become a problem yet, just a little confusing, and rude perhaps to the group of gentlemen she’s sitting with, perhaps—”
Gabriel and the others shot out of the room with the shocked security man turning and following.
It seemed Bobby Lee McKinnon was awake and had forgotten all about the deal.
As the four men hurried from the meeting room, Julie Reilly, Kelly Delaphoy and Jason Sanborn walked through the ornate front doors. They caught sight of Gabriel and the others cutting across the ostentatious lobby at a quick pace and knew immediately that trouble was brewing. Julie exchanged a quick look of concern with Kelly and Jason and then started after the men as they made their way to the lounge.
Gabriel and the others entered the Astor Lounge and came to a sudden stop. Jenny was dressed in what looked like a very expensive evening gown. It was emerald green and glittered brightly in the small spotlights that lined the ceiling. She was sitting and looked to be conversing in soft tones at a table with four older men, all dressed in two thousand dollar suits. The men looked amused by everything Jennifer was telling them. They watched the woman before them with smiles and rapt fascination. Kennedy nudged John Lonetree in the ribs. Standing not three feet behind Jenny were three large men in black blazers; both Gabriel and John both smelled bodyguards. They didn’t look as amused as their employers at what Doctor Tilden was relaying to them.
“What’s going on?” Julie asked. She nudged George Cordero’s arm.
George only shook his head, but Leonard volunteered what he knew.
“Our crazy lady has something to say to these crackers at the table,” he said. Julie looked at him, confused. “I mean the gentlemen she’s speaking to, with the stuffed Armanis.”
The table was only ten feet away, but Gabriel couldn’t hear what was being said. He watched the reaction of the four men and saw that the smiles were fading.
“The rest of you, stay here. John, let’s see what our lady friend has in common with these astute-looking business men.”
Lonetree followed Gabriel to the table. Jennifer stopped talking and looked up at the two men with a dazzling smile. She tilted her head and John could see the her eyes had been enhanced by makeup and she even had a dusting of glitter on her skin. Her appearance was nothing short of angelic as Lonetree smiled down at her.
“Jenny?” Gabe reached down and, with all of his acting skills, took her hand and kissed it, as though he was just stopping by to say hi. “How are you?”
“Gabriel! Funny running into you here, of all places.”
The five piece band on the stage wound down a slow rendition of an elevator muzak classic and then prepared for another.
“And Mr. Lonetree...The first face you look for and the very last you see,” she said. She pulled her fingers lightly from Gabriel’s so that John could take her hand and kiss it awkwardly.
“Ms. Tilden,” Lonetree stumbled.
“Who are your friends, Jenny?” Kennedy asked, taking a step back and looking at the four heavyset men with expensive suits.
Gabriel knew immediately that he was looking at men who usually would not tolerate having their evening interrupted by anyone. The man Jenny had been talking to had designer glasses and his black dyed hair curled under both ears in one of those European haircuts that old men got to make themselves look younger. The man’s three companions were of the same ilk, and Gabriel took an immediate dislike to all of them.
“I can answer that for you, Doctor Kennedy,” Julie Reilly said, stepping up to join them and shrugging out of her leather jacket. She had broken away from the group at the lounge entrance when she recognized the man at the center of Jenny’s attention. “This is Stephan Martin, the CEO of Griffin Records. Of course, when he first started out in the music business in the early sixties as a twenty-one-year-old producer, his name was Steven Markovich, from the Bronx.”
“I’m afraid you have the advantage of me. As well as this lovely young lady,” the fat man said. He nodded toward Jennifer, who smiled demurely and tilted her head to the left. A very worrisome move—Gabriel saw that her eyes remained fixed on Martin, and they weren’t showing the kindness of her smile.
“My name is Julie Reilly. This is Doctor Gabriel Kennedy, police chief John Lonetree of Montana, and this young lady is Professor Jennifer Tilden.”
“Julie Reilly of the UBC Nightly News,” Martin said as flatly as the words could be spoken. He nodded toward one of the bodyguards as an indication that the conversation was drying up.
“Jenny, if you’re finished with these gentlemen, maybe you can join us for a drink,” Gabriel said.
“Mr. Martin and I haven’t finished our conversation yet Gabe,” Jenny said. She smiled even broader than before. “Now, if you and your friends here would fuck off, I’ll say what I have to say to this fat pig bastard.”
That was it; Martin waved the bodyguard over to the table.
Gabriel reacted first by taking Jennifer by the arm and standing her up. She easily shook off Kennedy’s grip and then placed her hands—clad in elbow-length white gloves—on the table.
“November 21st, 1963. Remember that night, Mr. Martin?”
The man’s face drained of color. He looked up at the small woman and a questioning look crossed his acne-pitted face.
“A night long before you were squirted out of your mother. What of it?” he hissed.
Gabriel eased his hand over and stopped Lonetree from slamming the man’s fat jeweled face into the white lined tablecloth. He looked at John and slightly shook his head.
“It was rainy and cold on the lower east side. My apartment at the time had a hot water heating system and three radiators more musical than my piano. They clanked and vibrated and put out very little warmth. They were singing loudly that night in November. Remember, Stephan?”
“Who the hell are you?” he asked, tossing his napkin onto the tabletop.
“Remember the song?”
“All right, I don’t care to listen to this any longer. This woman is obviously mad.”
“That word isn’t exactly descriptive, nor adequate for the way I am, man,” Jenny said, hissing the words. Her voice became deep and man-like. “Maybe if I sing it for you?”
Gabriel tried to stop her, but she turned and made her way to the front of the lounge, bumping into several men and women who were dancing slowly to the non-descript music being played by the house band. She went directly to the stage and hopped up on it, tearing the expensive dress as she did. She wobbled at first, and then straightened as the lead singer of the band steadied her. The music stopped one instrument at a time. She exchanged a few words with the singer and then placed a gloved hand on his chest and pushed him away.
“That’s it. Call security,” Martin said to the bodyguard next to him.
On the stage, a confident and gorgeous Jennifer Tilden adjusted the microphone stand. At the table the four men, Martin included, turned to see what was happening. Two of the three bodyguards walked past the group still at the salon’s door.
The small lights lining the stage went from gold to light green. Jennifer looked up. Her features had become harsher, but at the same time even more feminine. He had the feeling that for the first time since he had known Jenny and her traumatic state, Bobby Lee McKinnon was actually sharing the stage with her. This show belonged to both of them. For some reason he couldn’t fathom, Kennedy smiled.
“I would like to dedicate this song to a long-time producer friend of mine who gave me a start in the business. He’s
in the back of the room where he can sit in judgment of people, and make deals behind their backs.” She lowered her gaze. “I co-wrote this with a longtime friend of mine you all know as Sonny Bono and Jack Nietzsche in 1962. I played it for this young man in the audience, and he told me it wasn’t good enough.”
Stephan Martin slowly started to rise but John stepped up and placed a hand on his ample shoulder, making the remaining bodyguard take a step forward.
“Why don’t we hear what the lady has to say?” John said into the ear of the record executive.
Jenny raised her face to the lighting above her. Closing her eyes, she started to sing a song that was immediately recognizable. It was always played as an up tempo song by later groups covering it, but Bobby Lee McKinnon had always meant it to be a slow ballad. It had been recorded first by the Searchers, and covered many times afterward even more famous bands.
“I saw her today, I saw her face, It was the face I loved…and I knew, I had to run away and get down on my knees and prayaaay…That they'd go away…But still they begin...Needles and pins…Because of all my pride…The tears I gotta hide…Hey, I thought I was smart…I wanted her…Didn't think I'd do, but now I see…She's worse to him than me…Let her go ahead, take his love instead…And one day she will see…”
The band caught on and the drums rolled and joined in with the slow way Jenny and Bobby Lee sang the old song, Needles and Pins. The rhythm guitar and bass joined in, and even the displaced lead singer started a slow melodic backup to Jenny.
On the floor in front of the stage, every person watching her on stage was enraptured by the slow way the old ballad was sung. Hands tapped out the slow beat on tables. Several men and women rose to their feet and started clapping, as if this beautiful song were a surprise gift from the management at the Waldorf.
John Lonetree slowly removed his hand from Martin’s shoulder and took and involuntary step toward the stage as Jenny started winding down.
The blood had drain from Stephan Martin’s face. He seemed to shrink in his chair and as the bodyguard reached out he angrily shoved his large hand away.
The Supernaturals Page 22