“Scali. The Italian Angel. Winner of this year’s Academy Award. Don’t be coy, Mr. Tunny.”
He scratched at his ear thoughtfully. “I’m afraid you have me, Miss West. We here at Meadow Falls frown highly on the quixotic medium of the motion picture. Perhaps Adam has heard of this wonderous woman, but not I.”
Adam brushed at his hairy chest, trying to avoid my burning stare. “We don’t sanction movies, Honey.”
“What do you sanction?” I demanded, looking beyond at the naked replica of two humans welded together by twisting snakes. “Who’s your missing princess?”
“She is sacred,” Tunny said abruptly. “A flower born not of this Earth. She has no name. Only a fragrance. A fragrance of the hills and the valleys and the snow-capped peaks. She is immortal.”
Tunny wore a bronze medallion about his neck, suspended on a thin chain. He began to tap the shiny piece with the tip of his finger nervously. I guessed he was in his mid-fifties. Maybe less. He had deep crow’s feet at the outer edge of each eye, curving down onto his cheeks.
“Miss West, we were hoping you’d help us,” Tunny said irritatedly, after a moment. “You’re a lovely woman. So blonde and fair. So richly vibrant. You are a princess, also. But you have arsenic in your veins.”
“That’s funny,” I said. “Last night a medical examiner called it tarantula poison.”
Tunny grasped his medallion with both hands. “I sense spiritual interference here. You may go, Miss West. We will forward a check to you for your trouble. Now our association is terminated.”
“Not by a long shot,” I said, yawning suddenly.
Tunny’s medallion trembled in his fingers. I couldn’t seem to take my eyes off it. A relaxed feeling surged through me. Like a velvet hand stroking my back, soothing my aching head. The bronze disk kept flicking, glittering harshly in the temple’s dim light.
“You’re tired, Miss West,” Tunny said softly, eyes piercing into me. “Very sleepy.”
I nodded. “You—you’re so right. I only got an hour or so this morning. And that was through the courtesy of an Adolph Hitler gun factory.”
“Both of you,” Tunny continued, fixing his gaze on Fred. “Relax all your muscles. You are going into a deep sleep. Deeper and deeper. You are falling asleep. Deeper and deeper.”
The medallion twitched and glittered in his fingers.
Fred sagged slowly to the floor, curling an arm under his head, eyes closed.
Tunny’s gaze shifted back to me. “You feel warm in all those clothes, my lovely princess. Remove your sweater and relax. You are sleeping, but your eyes shall remain open.”
I stretched. “It—it is hot in here.”
“Remove your sweater!”
I found myself slipping the garment over my head. The medallion seemed to glow now, burning away the temple and the two naked men and Fred lying on the floor. I stepped out of my skirt.
“That’s much better,” I heard my voice say. It seemed so distant I could barely recognize it as my own. Suddenly I felt as if I were on fire. I squirmed uncomfortably. Then kicked off my shoes.
“You’re doing well, princess,” Tunny’s voice soothed. “The snaps are at the back. Undo them! Don’t confine yourself. Relax. Feel free. Feel the air and the coolness of the mountains on your body. Deliver all your sins up to heaven. Stand straight and tall in this sanctified temple. Be as you were when you were born.”
The medallion rolled in his huge fingers, flicking light in my eyes, soothing me, relaxing me with each new twist.
“You are the princess of all you survey,” the voice droned. “You are beautiful. Remove the last remnants of your past life and step forth free upon this land that is yours to rule.”
The medallion twisted back and forth, back and forth. Suddenly something jammed against it hard. Tunny fell back from the impact. I shook my head. Fred Sims stood before the massive naked man, his cane lodged against Tunny’s chest.
“You dirty bastard!” Fred growled. “I’m going to poke this stick right through you!”
“But—but you were asleep,” Tunny stammered.
“You thought I was asleep,” Fred blared. “That’s where you made your mistake.” He snapped his fingers several times. “Wake up, Honey. Put your clothes on.”
“What?”
I glanced down. My clothing was strewn around the floor. I lifted my arms to my chest. “He hypnotized us,” I said.
“He tried,” Fred countered, snatching the medallion from Tunny’s chest. “Two more seconds and you would have been downright naked.”
Adam Jason grabbed Fred’s cane and hurled him backward, but I stopped the reporter before he fell. I leveled my revolver and said, “You never should have done that, Adam. I liked you up until now. This cuts it.”
“You don’t understand, Honey,” Adam said. “Mr. Tunny was trying to help you.”
“Sure, help me into a pine box.” I held the gun on the two men. “Where’s Angela Scali?”
“We—we don’t know,” Adam returned.
“Then you do admit the Italian Angel is your sacred princess?”
“Yes,” Tunny said, biting his lips. “But we have no idea what happened to Angela. She vanished last night. I sent Adam out looking for her.”
“And he found her,” I said, trying to cover myself with my free hand. “He kicked in my kitchen door and hauled her out by the hair, didn’t you. Adam?”
“No!”
“I suppose you didn’t leave my office, either.”
“I had to, Honey. I walked back to that bridge, got my car and returned to Meadow Falls.”
“Why?”
“I couldn’t find Angela. I had to report to Mr. Tunny.”
“You’re lying, Adam. Somehow Angela’s mixed up with Rip Spensor’s murder, isn’t she? You and Tunny knew that. That’s why you went after her.”
Adam straightened angrily. “No, Honey. You’ve got this all wrong.”
“She was under a hypnotic spell,” I said. “She confessed rationally that she knew nothing about Meadow Falls.”
“She was lying,” Tunny broke. “Angela came here under her own power. She pleaded with me to take her into the organization. To keep her name anonymous.”
“You can do better than that,” I said.
Adam’s eyes narrowed, flicking for an instant at Fred. “Mr. Tunny’s telling you the truth, Honey. Both Angela Scali and Rip Spensor were unhappy people. We tried to help them.”
“Sure you did. The same way you tried to help me a few minutes ago. Have you got the whole congregation in a hypnotic trance?”
Thor Tunny staggered slightly. “Don’t be ridiculous!”
Suddenly Mark Storm burst through the temple doors. He had several other deputies with him and, from the looks on their faces, I could tell something terrible had happened. The lieutenant’s mouth was twisted angrily and his tie hung in two gnarled ribbons down the front of his shirt.
He swore when he saw me. “Honey, I should have known you’d go native. Get your clothes on!”
“What are you doing here, Lieutenant? You said Tunny was clean.”
“He’s clean, all right,” Mark blared. “We’ve found the Italian Angel.”
“Where?”
“Hanging from a tree, down near the falls. She’s about as clean as he is. There’s blood all over her.”
SIX
High along the mountain a ribbon of water tumbled crazily over a rocky slope, slithered through brush and low-hanging trees, finally pitching itself into a small stream that cut back of Tunny’s camp. Angela Scali dangled, a thick cord knotted around her throat, from a branch above the stream. The rush of water splattered on her slim legs, dripping off onto a mossy bank that was red from Angela’s blood.
She twisted and swayed in the breeze, arms hanging at her sides, hair swirling about her bronzed face. At times the branch would drop her to within arm’s reach of someone standing on the mossy bank, then a gust of wind would thrust her skyward, leg
s jerking like a toy doll, blood oozing from the many wounds. Her killer had done a thorough job. She had been knifed at least a dozen times in the abdomen and chest.
After cutting the body down, Mark joined me at the top of a ravine. Sweat streamed from beneath his hat and he wiped at it clumsily with a handkerchief.
“This is as bad as the steam roller,” he said.
I grimaced, staring around at the mute, dead-eyed Sun Souls who stood on the hillside above the stream. “Who found her?”
“We don’t know. I was at the San Berdoo office when an anonymous tip came in. We couldn’t trace it.”
“Man or woman?”
“Too muffled to tell.” He groaned. “Is this going to make headlines! Fred nearly went berserk.”
Wind ruffled my hair. “So I noticed. He cried, he was so excited. You’ve got blood on your suit.”
Mark dabbed at some dark spots on his coat. “You can imagine what her murderer looked like after he strung her up. I’ve never seen so much blood.”
I walked to the edge of the ravine and watched them photograph Angela and wrap her in a rubber sheet. It reminded me of a scene from one of her movies, but I knew she couldn’t step out of the sheet and walk away if the director shouted, “Cut!” They carried her to an ambulance parked near the mountain stream. Her dark hair trailed down from one corner of the sheet.
Mark came up behind me and said, “We must be dealing with a maniac. He made a pin cushion out of her. She was probably dead long before he hung her up.”
I nodded. “If he’s a nudist you’re not going to find any blood-stained clothes, unless he wore shoes.”
“No indications down there whether he did or didn’t. Too much moss along the bank.”
Thor Tunny joined us, stroking his thick red-dyed hair. “I’m sorry. This is extremely gruesome.”
My head snapped around, eyes flashing. “Angela Scali’s dead, Mr. Tunny. Maybe I would have wound up in the same rubber sheet if Fred hadn’t stayed awake.”
“My dear Miss West,” he protested, “my hypnotic trance was only an act. It was not meant to injure you in any way.”
“You got me out of my clothes, Mr. Tunny,” I said. “What were you trying for, bingo?”
Even Mark Storm seemed dwarfed beside the towering hulk of the nude cult leader. The deputy swung around in front of the other man and said, “Tunny, you’re in serious trouble. You realize that, don’t you?”
“A murder on my property is serious,” Tunny said. “I refuse to admit anything else, though, until I converse with my lawyer.”
“What about this hypnotic trance business?” Mark demanded.
“Well?”
“Do you keep your members under a spell?”
A sarcastic smile spread on Tunny’s mouth. “Don’t be asinine. We use hypnosis in some of our teachings. That’s all.”
“Don’t let him con you, Mark,” I said. “These people make Barney Google look sick. They walk around like zombies.”
Tunny laughed. “Miss West, you are obviously the victim of too many late late movies. You’re free to question any of my congregation. That light you see in their eyes is the light of love and tranquility.”
“I’ll bet,” I said. “Do you have a daughter named Toy?”
“Yes.”
“Where is she?”
“I have no idea,” Tunny answered. “She doesn’t follow our doctrines too closely. Once a week she goes into town.”
“Without clothes?”
“Of course not!”
Sunlight seared our faces, burning across the green hills, reflected off the quiet stream and tumbling waterfall. Beyond Tunny, high along a ridge where a fire trail swathed a dark path through the trees, I noticed a solitary cabin.
Shielding my eyes, I gestured toward the mountain-top. “Who lives up there?”
“No one,” Tunny said. “It’s been vacant for years. Used to house forest ranger equipment for fire fighting, but it was abandoned when we built here in Meadow Falls.”
Dark clouds began to pile up behind the ridge, moving swiftly across the blue sky.
“Looks like we’re in for a thunder storm,” Mark said, examining the sky. “Come on, Tunny, deputies from the San Berdoo office want to ask you a few questions.”
Just as they turned their backs something glinted in one of the cabin windows, as if a mirror had been held to catch the sun’s rays. I blinked, then glanced at Mark. His gaze was on the cult leader as they started down toward the camp. The light flashed again. Someone was signaling!
“Hey, Lieutenant,” I said.
“Later, Honey,” Mark returned, not looking around.
They disappeared into a grove of trees, the deputy jogging behind Tunny, hat jammed low on his big head.
Thunder split hard above the mountains and the valley. The ambulance was gone now. So were the Sun Souls and the other deputies. I stood alone above the quiet stream, my eyes pinned on the cabin.
When a third flash came, I started up the side of the mountain. Luckily I’d worn flats. There was no trail to follow and I stumbled several times in thick brush. I kept glancing back toward camp in case someone tried to return the signal, but nothing glittered except the glass dome of Tunny’s modern temple. During the arduous journey I tried to mesh together my thoughts on Angela Scali’s death. She’d been taken from my apartment around five A.M. Sheriff’s deputies found her body about noon. Seven hours. During that time somebody had kicked in my back door and spirited Angela to Meadow Falls. Then she had been lured to a spot near the falls where she was stabbed and hung. Had it been the same person in both instances? If so, why had he waited? Why didn’t he murder her in my apartment? Why travel over a hundred miles to commit such a grisly crime? There must have been two people. One the intruder. The other the murderer. The first could have returned her safely to Meadow Falls, then left her. The second might have been waiting, enticed her to the mountain stream, and used the knife.
The sky darkened. Thunder rumbled again, breaking over the mountains in fitful angry spasms. Rain began to pelt down and wind rose up from the valley below, blowing hair in my eyes, lifting my skirt.
Finally, I reached a grove of trees about fifty yards from the cabin. Huge drops slashed between branches, drenching me to the skin. I suddenly realized I was taking a desperate chance. Angela’s killer might have climbed the mountain and secreted himself in the cabin. The signal puzzled me, though. Who could have been waiting for it, and why?
I removed my .22 revolver and crept toward the cabin slowly in the gathering darkness. The journey up the mountain had taken more than an hour and my legs ached, my heart pounded. The rain fell heavily on the trees and the mountaintop and the dark cabin. Wind whistled fiercely over the ridge. Thunder jolted.
The cabin was larger than it had appeared from below. A shutter on one of the windows banged. So did the front door. I approached cautiously in a half-crouch, gun leveled.
A few feet from the door I flattened against a wall and tried to catch my breath. A trail led away from the cabin down the other side of the mountaintop. It was possible that whoever signaled had already left via that path. The drenching rain made me think otherwise. The cabin was at least a shelter until the downpour ceased. I was soaked and trembling as I crept nearer. The door banged back and forth in the wind.
I timed the door’s swing, shielding my eyes. It swung out, wavered and then thudded back loudly. I planned to stop it as it wavered, step inside and catch the signaler off-guard.
The door banged again. Opened and wavered. I stepped forward into the opening, but suddenly its pattern changed. The panel closed against me. Hard, I nearly lost my revolver, stumbled and fell inside the cabin as the door’s weight jammed against me.
“Is that you, Toy?” a voice demanded.
I straightened, pushing myself up, trying to distinguish shapes inside the shadowed cabin. I saw an old table and a chair, two or three boxes stacked in one corner. Rain beat against a single window on t
he far side. In front of this was the outline of a man, standing, his shoulders hunched.
“Don’t move,” I said. “I’ve got a gun.”
“What?”
Water streamed down from my wet hair, half-blinding me. “Turn toward the window, hands above your head, legs apart.”
He whirled, framed in the faded light of the window, and lifted his arms. “I—I don’t get this,” he stammered. “You’re a woman, aren’t you?”
“So I’ve been told. Palms flat on the wall! Quickly!”
He followed my orders, head slouched between his shoulders, legs apart. He was well built and tall. That much I could see. He practically blotted out the window. I advanced slowly until my free hand was on his back.
“You’re wet,” he said.
“It’s raining. Or didn’t you notice.”
“I didn’t notice you coming up the mountain. What trail did you take?”
He wore a bright yellow letterman’s sweater. I searched in the pockets. They were empty. His pants contained a wallet and a ring of keys.
“That tickles,” he said, as I drew my hand out of one of the pockets.
“Turn around!” I directed curtly. “Slow.”
Again he followed my instructions without hesitation. In the faint glare of the window I saw a grinning, broad mouth, a deep dimple in his right cheek, sandy blond hair that slanted carelessly on his forehead, intense brown eyes. He was somewhere in his twenties, husky, handsome and cocky as hell.
“Hey, you—you’re pretty,” he said, arms still raised. He had started to say something else, then changed his mind. I had a feeling he knew me. I ran my revolver snout against his shirt pockets. They, too, were empty.
Then I stepped back, wiping my face with the back of my hand. “Okay,” I said. “Where’s the knife?”
“What knife? You crazy or something?”
“No, but I’m looking for somebody who is. What’s your name?”
“Spensor. Ray Spensor.”
“Rip’s cousin?”
“That’s right. Who are you?”
“I think you already know.”
He shook his head, eyes riveted on my soaking wet sweater. “Marilyn Monroe?”
Honey West: A Kiss for a Killer Page 5