“No way. She’d laugh in my face. It’s better to let her think I’ve got the hots for you. That’s something she can understand.”
“It kind of messes up your relationship though, doesn’t it?”
“That relationship is on the down-slope anyway,” Chris said.
Audrey came back to the table and sat down, her spirits unimproved. Karyn felt oddly guilty, as though she and Chris really did have a secret love affair going.
Audrey lifted the coffee cup to her lips, then set it down in the saucer with a thump. “I’ve had all this crap I can take,” she announced.
Chris spoke up in a tone of artificial gaiety. “I’ve got an idea. Audrey, we still have that bottle of tequila that we bought at the airport. Why don’t the three of us stop by for a nightcap or two?”
“Karyn’s probably tired,” Audrey said quickly. “Remember, she was up early this morning.”
It was time, Karyn decided, to score a few points for the visiting team. “As a matter of fact, I’m not tired at all,” she said, turning on a brilliant smile. “It sounds like great fun. Chris and I can talk over old times. And, you and I, Audrey, can get to know each other better.”
“Terrific,” said Audrey.
“Fine,” Chris said. “Then it’s all settled.”
He called for the check and signed it. They got up from the table and walked out through the archway. Passing the desk. Chris stopped.
“I just happened to think, how many glasses do we have in the room?”
“I’m sure I don’t know,” Audrey said.
“If I remember right, there were only two. Big water glasses.” He stepped over to the desk and spoke to the manager. “Could we have some small glasses sent out to Number 7?”
Señor Davila carefully avoided looking at the two women. “Of course, Señor Halloran,” he said with a professional smile. “The girl will bring them out to you.”
“And send along some limes and salt,” Chris added. To the women he said, “I’ll show you how to drink tequila Tijuana style.”
“Whoopee,” said Audrey flatly.
They left the building together and walked the short distance down the path to the first cabana, the one where Chris and Audrey stayed. Chris unlocked the door and they went in. The room looked the same as Karyn’s, and had been neatly tidied up by the maid. Karyn tried not to make a point of looking at the bed, though it dominated the room. Audrey walked by it deliberately and ran her hand across the spread.
Chris waved the two women to the wicker settee and pulled up the chair for himself. He carried a small table over and set it between them. From a drawer he produced a bottle of tequila. He opened the bottle and sniffed at it.
“This will be good for what ails us,” he said lamely.
Audrey and Karyn looked at him without expression.
A knock on the door saved him from having to make further small talk. Blanca, the pretty young maid, came in carrying a glass bowl of fresh lime wedges and three double shot glasses along with a saltshaker.
“Now maybe the party will pick up,” Chris said, forcing a laugh. He handed a bill to Blanca, who slipped it prettily down the front of her blouse.
“Gracias, Señor,” she said, with a coquettish lowering of the eyelids. With a bare flicker of a glance at Audrey and Karyn she went out and closed the door.
* * *
Once outside, Blanca stopped and pulled the bill from its warm valley between her breasts. Five dollars, American. This was a night of good omen. And with the blonde Americian lady busy with her friends in Number 7, it could be a beautiful night.
She hurried to a utility shed at the rear of the hotel where Roberto was busy repairing a broken chair. He looked up from his work and smiled at her.
“Can you do that later?” she said, her eyes flashing with mischief.
“Why? Now that I have started, I may as well finish the job.”
“Maybe you would change your mind if I told you a secret,” she said, moving close to him.
“A secret about me?”
“About us.” She sat beside him on the wooden bench and ran a hand along the flank of his tight black trousers.
“Ay, girl, when you do that I have no secrets,” he said.
Blanca looked down at the bulge in his pants and smiled. She brushed it with her fingertips. “Are you saving that for someone?”
“What a question, shameless girl. Take care that I do not lay you down right here where Señor Davila would surly find us.”
“Would you like to make love to me now?” the girl said.
“Very much. But we have no bed. To go to your room or mine is too dangerous, and on the beach one gets sand in unmentionable places.”
“We do not have to go to the beach tonight. One of the cabanas is waiting for us.”
“How is that possible? No one checked out of the hotel today.”
“The Señora from California who arrived yesterday spends the evening with her friends in Number 7. Her cabana is at the far end, and there is no one there.”
“She might return.”
“Not for at least an hour. Maybe more. They have a bottle of good tequila and a bowl of limes, and the Lord knows what games in mind to keep them busy.”
“Even so, she will know we have been there.”
Blanca clucked her tongue impatiently. “She will know nothing. I will put fresh linen on the bed and leave the room spotless. All these objections! I think you do not really want to make love to me.”
Roberto’s eyes flashed. He jumped to his feet and seized Bianca’s wrist, pulling her up after him. “Come along. I’ll show you if I want to make love or not.”
Pulling the girl behind him, he ran out of the shed, up along the side of the main building, and down the path until they came, laughing and breathing hard, to Cabana Number 12.
Blanca used her passkey to let them in. She peeled the spread, blanket, and top sheet back from the bed and folded them neatly in the chair, bending low as she did so to let the skirt ride up in back over her plump brown thighs.
She turned to face Roberto, but he had her in his arms before she could speak. His mouth found hers, and his hands raced over her body, rubbing, caressing, squeezing. After a minute they pulled apart just long enough to fumble out of their clothes and let them drop to the floor. Together they fell across the bed. Blanca opened her legs to him. With the exuberance and impatience of youth, he entered her.
* * *
At the edge of the clearing, behind the Palacio del Mar, a huge tan wolf arose from the ground where a moment before a man had writhed silently. The wolf stretched and shook, feeling the exhilarating play of its muscles. Then, leaving the pile of clothes where Roy Beatty had dropped them, the wolf moved silently through the heavy tropical growth behind the row of cabanas.
The last one in this row was the one he wanted. The windows showed no light. She would be inside asleep. Or maybe not asleep. Awake, perhaps, and staring into the darkness, fearing what she must know was somewhere outside. Soon there would be no more fear for Karyn. No more anything. The faint spark of humanity still alive in the wolf brain rebelled at the thought of the coming kill, but the dominant animal part burned with excitement.
A few yards from the cabana the wolf stopped. He raised his muzzle and tested the scent that had brought him up short. The scent of sex. Humans in rut. The wolf cocked his great head and heard the rhythmic slap-slap of naked bodies, one against the other. Belly pounding against belly as the man drove his organ into the woman.
Animal rage blazed behind the eyes of the wolf, rage fired by the memory of human jealousy. The long, sinewy legs stretched out into a loping run as the wolf closed on the cabana.
From inside came the muffled squeals and grunts of humans engaged in sex. The wolf’s heart pounded in his broad chest. He would catch them together. The one-time wife and one-time friend.
With a full-throated growl, the wolf sprang from the ground and hit the window with outstretched forepa
ws. He took screen, frame, and glass in with him and hit the floor in a shower of splinters.
Before the two in the bed had time to react, the wolf was upon them.
Not Karyn! Nor Chris either! Strangers. A dreadful mistake, but too late, too late. The taste of blood was in the wolf’s throat, and no power on earth could stop him now. In less than a minute the bed was a sopping crimson mess. Bits of flesh and hair and bone littered the floor. The wolf ripped, chewed, and swallowed, gulping the hot raw meat.
The beast growled softly as it fed, looking warily toward the window. Soon there were shouts from the main hotel building and the sound of doors opening in the other cabanas down the line. It was time to be gone.
The wolf thumped from the sodden bed to the floor. In a single graceful bound, he was back out the window and running in long fluid strides toward the forest. He was safely into the thick undergrowth by the time the first people reached the cabana.
21
The atmosphere in Cabana Number 7 was thick with cigarette smoke and hostility. Two of the three tequila glasses sat on the table half full.
Audrey Vance raised the third to her lips and drained it. She set it back down on the table, tipping it over as she did so.
“Lucky it wasn’t full,” she said. She righted the glass and poured more tequila.
“You ought to try it with lime and salt,” Chris said.
“Fuck lime and salt.” Audrey sniffed at the liquor, then held her glass out toward Chris. “Here’s lookin’ up your cucaracha.”
Chris sipped at his own glass, this time forgetting the lime himself. Karyn coughed uncomfortably and lit another cigarette.
She could not remember a more unpleasant evening. She appreciated what Chris was doing for her, and she knew she was probably safer here than in her own room, but the strain of the three way relationship was wearing her down. She looked at her watch and saw that it was a little after midnight. A long, long time remained until dawn. The hell with this, she decided abruptly. She would go back to her own room, lock herself in, and at least would not have to put up with Audrey any more tonight.
Then there was a crash of glass, followed by screaming.
Chris stopped talking in the middle of a sentence and sat motionless for a moment. Audrey started violently, spilling tequila down the front of her blouse. Karyn stared at the darkened window. Although the screams were directionless, she was deadly certain that they came from Number 12.
“Jesus!” Audrey said. She stood up, ignoring the spilled drink. “What the hell was that?”
Chris got up and walked to the door. He opened it and stood there listening. The screams had stopped now, and there was the sound of other doors opening and questioning voices. People began running from the main building along the path that led past the cabanas. Chris started out the door.
“Don’t go out there,” Karyn said.
He looked back at her briefly. “I’ve got to see what happened.”
“Then I’m coming with you,” Karyn said.
“You’re not going to leave me here alone,” Audrey said. She walked unsteadily over and stood next to Chris, clutching his arm possessively.
For a moment Chris hesitated. They could hear voices shouting from down at the end of the row of cabanas. “All right,” he said, “We’ll all go. But don’t get separated.”
The three of them stepped out and joined the people running from the main building. There was no outside lighting along the path, and the only illumination came from the open doors of the other cabanas and several flashlights. At Number 12 the running people came to an abrupt stop. The door stood open. A man reached cautiously inside and snapped on the lights.
There was a gasp from the onlookers, and the crowd took an involuntary step backward. Audrey turned away from Chris and began to retch.
Through the open doorway Karyn caught a glimpse of the bed. Her bed. She saw what appeared to be a pile of bare human limbs on top of it. Everything was splashed a bright, wet crimson. She looked away as Chris gripped her shoulder.
Señor Davila, the hotel manager, rushed up with his thin, pale legs bare under a flannel nightshirt. He began trying simultaneously to calm the guests in English and give orders to the staff in Spanish. The only word Karyn picked out was ‘polícia.’ Slowly the people began to move back away from the cabana as Davila selected a pair of unhappy kitchen helpers to guard the door.
Half an hour later Karyn, Chris, Audrey, and most of the other guests were gathered in the lobby of the main building. The initial shock had given way to a sort of desperate camaraderie, as with people who have shared, and survived, a disaster. On orders from Señor Davila hot coffee was being dispensed from the kitchen, and the bar, hastily reopened, was doing a booming business.
The clatter of conversation among the guests eased off as two blue and white cars with the markings of the Mazatlán police wheeled up to the front of the hotel with sirens braying.
A short, neat man in a business suit marched in at the head of several uniformed policemen. He directed the officers to their tasks, then talked quietly with Señor Davila while the guests watched with interest. After a minute he stepped to the archway between the lobby and dining room and held up a hand for attention.
“Good evening. I am Sgt. Fulgencio Vasquez of the Mazatlán Police. As you know, there has been a serious tragedy here tonight. Two employees of this hotel have been killed.” He paused for a moment while the guests took in this information. “Temporary, I will use the office of Señor Davila, the manager, to do interviews. I will ask that any of you who have knowledge of this crime remain and give your name to my officer. The rest of you may return to your rooms. Please do not leave the hotel before speaking to me. Thank you for the cooperation.”
There was a general stirring around among the guests. No one seemed anxious to leave.
Karyn and Chris exchanged a look. Their eyes asked, Shall we tell? and immediately answered, Take care.
There were few volunteers from among the guests to supply information, but most of them stayed around in the lobby and the bar to see what was going to happen. There was a good deal of drinking and nervous laughter as people found their quiet vacation had become an adventure.
A blue city ambulance pulled up outside, and the guests crowded out on the veranda to watch. The bodies of the two victims, strapped onto litters and covered with plastic sheets, were brought up and loaded into the back. The ambulance drove out with lights flashing and siren wailing unnecessarily.
Karyn, Chris, and Audrey, sat on a wood and leather sofa on one side of the lobby and watched the others jostle for a look at the departing ambulance.
“They act like it’s a holiday of some kind,” Karyn said.
“It’s a touch of hysteria,” Chris said. “What they’re saying inside is, ‘Thank God it happened to somebody else and not me.’”
Karyn shivered. Chris reached over and squeezed her hand.
“I’ve got a fucking headache that won’t quit,” Audrey said.
“Do you want to go back to the room?” Chris asked.
“Not by myself, I don’t.”
“I’ll go see if I can get you some aspirin.”
Chris started to rise, but sat back down when he saw Sergeant Vasquez coming toward them across the lobby. The policeman stopped before the sofa and nodded politely. He focused his attention on Karyn.
“Mrs. Richter?”
“Yes?”
“I am told it was your cabana that this unfortunate tragedy took place.”
“Yes, it was.”
“Will you be good enough to come into the I office?”
Karyn looked questioningly at Chris.
He said, “Is it all right if I come along, Sergeant? I’m a friend of Mrs. Richter.”
Vasquez’s cool brown eyes took in the two of them. “A friend, you say?”
“That’s right. We knew each other back in the States.”
“Don’t mind me,” Audrey said. “I’m just p
assing though.”
Vasquez gave her a chilly smile. To Chris he said, “I have no objection if you wish to come.”
Chris tuned to Audrey. “This shouldn’t take too long.”
“What the hell, take all the time you want,” Audrey said. “I’ll be in the bar.”
Chris patted her knee and smiled. She turned away. He shrugged and joined Karyn and Sergeant Vasquez as they crossed the lobby to enter the small office tucked in behind the registration desk.
Vasquez put them into hard-backed chairs facing him as he sat behind a small desk. He offered his pack of Mexican cigarettes and took one for himself when they both declined. He inhaled deeply, then leaned forward across the desk and fixed them with a steady brown gaze.
“The two of you were together this evening?”
“That’s right,” Chris answered. “Miss Vance was with us.”
“Ah, yes, the young lady in the lobby.”
Chris nodded.
Vasquez regarded him for a moment without expression, then he turned to Karyn. “Mrs. Richter, do you know of anyone who might want to kill you?”
“Me?”
“The young people were murdered in your room. The lights were out. It is possible that the killer was after you and did not see his mistake until it was too late.”
“I just arrived in Mazatlán,” Karyn said carefully. “I don’t know anyone here, except Mr. Halloran.”
The Howling Trilogy Page 30