“It was four years ago, which I guess would make it around the same time your mother died. Do you know what always comes first to my mind when I think about it? The guy’s shirt. And the gloves. Thinking about those things gives me the creeps. Because it means he planned it.”
“You might be kind of starting in the middle,” I said.
Mrs. Shoplaw laughed. “Yeah, I suppose I am. The name of your supposed ghost is Linda Gray, and she was from Florence. That’s over South Carolina way. She and her boyfriend—if that’s what he was; the cops checked her background pretty closely and found no trace of him—spent her last night on earth at the Luna Inn, half a mile south of here along the beach. They entered Joyland around eleven o’clock the next day. He bought them day passes, using cash. They rode some rides and then had a late lunch at Rock Lobster, the seafood place down by the concert hall. That was just past one o’clock. As for the time of death, you probably know how they establish it… contents of the stomach and so on…”
“Yeah.” My sandwich was gone, and I turned my attention to the soup. The story wasn’t hurting my appetite any. I was twenty-one, remember, and although I would have told you different, down deep I was convinced I was never going to die. Not even my mother’s death had been able to shake that core belief.
“He fed her, then he took her on the Carolina Spin—a slow ride, you know, easy on the digestion—and then he took her into Horror House. They went in together, but only he came out. About halfway along the course of the ride, which takes about nine minutes, he cut her throat and threw her out beside the monorail track the cars run on. Threw her out like a piece of trash. He must have known there’d be a mess, because he was wearing two shirts, and he’d put on a pair of yellow work-gloves. They found the top shirt—the one that would have caught most of the blood—about a hundred yards farther along from the body. The gloves a little farther along still.”
I could see it: first the body, still warm and pulsing, then the shirt, then the gloves. The killer, meanwhile, sits tight and finishes the ride. Mrs. Shoplaw was right, it was creepy.
“When the ride ended, the son of a bee just got out and walked away. He mopped up the car—that shirt they found was soaking—but he didn’t get quite all of the blood. One of the Helpers spotted some on the seat before the next ride started and cleaned it up. Didn’t think twice about it, either. Blood on amusement park rides isn’t unusual; mostly it’s some kid who gets overexcited and has a nose-gusher. You’ll find out for yourself. Just make sure you wear your own gloves when you do the cleanup, in case of diseases. They have ’em at all the first-aid stations, and there are first-aid stations all over the park.”
“Nobody noticed that he got off the ride without his date?”
“Nope. This was mid-July, the very height of the season, and the place was a swarming madhouse. They didn’t find the body until one o’clock the next morning, long after the park was closed and the Horror House work-lights were turned on. For the graveyard shift, you know. You’ll get your chance to experience that; all the Happy Helper crews get cleanup duty one week a month, and you want to catch up on your sleep ahead of time, because that swing-shift’s a booger.”
“People rode past her until the park closed and didn’t see her?”
“If they did, they thought it was just part of the show. But probably the body went unnoticed. Remember, Horror House is a dark ride. The only one in Joyland, as it happens. Other parks have more.”
A dark ride. That struck a shivery chord, but it wasn’t strong enough to keep me from finishing my soup. “What about a description of him? Maybe from whoever served them at the restaurant?”
“They had better than that. They had pictures. You want to believe the police made sure they got on TV and printed in the newspapers.”
“How did that happen?”
“The Hollywood Girls,” Mrs. Shoplaw said. “There are always half a dozen working the park when it’s going full-blast. There’s never been anything close to a cooch joint at joyland, but old man Easterbrook didn’t spend all those years in rolling carnies for nothing. He knows people like a little dash of sex appeal to go with the rides and the corndogs. There’s one Hollywood Girl on each Helper team. You’ll get yours, and you and the rest of the guys on your team will be expected to keep a big-brotherly eye out in case anyone bothers her. They run around in these short green dresses and green high heels and cutie-pie green hats that always make me think of Robin Hood and his Merry Men. Only they’re the Merry Chicks. They tote Speed Graphic cameras, like the kind you see in old movies, and they take pictures of the rubes.” She paused. “Although I’d advise you against calling the customers that yourself.”
“Already been warned by Mr. Dean,” I said.
“Figures. Anyhow, the Hollywood Girls are told to concentrate on family groups and dating couples who look over twenty-one. Kids younger than that usually aren’t interested in souvenir photos; they’d rather spend their money on food and arcade games. So the deal is, the girls snap first, then approach.” She did a breathy little Marilyn Monroe voice. “ ‘Hello, welcome to Joyland, I’m Karen! If you’d like a copy of the picture I just took, give me your name and check at the Hollywood Photo Booth on Hound Dog Way as you exit the park.’ Like that.
“One of them took a picture of Linda Gray and her boyfriend at the Annie Oakley Shootin’ Gallery, but when she approached, the guy gave her the brushoff. A hard brushoff. She told the cops later that he looked like he would’ve taken her camera and broken it, if he thought he could get away with it. Said his eyes gave her chills. Hard and gray, she said.” Mrs. Shoplaw smiled and shrugged. “Only it turned out he was wearing sunglasses. You know how some girls like to dramatize.”
As a matter of fact, I did. Wendy’s friend Renee could turn a routine trip to the dentist into a horror-movie scenario.
“That was the best picture, but not the only one. The cops went through all the Hollywood Girl snaps from that day and found the Gray girl and her friend in the background of at least four others. In the best of those, they’re standing in line for the Whirly Cups, and he’s got his hand on her keister. Pretty chummy for someone none of her family or friends had ever seen before.”
“Too bad there aren’t closed-circuit TV cameras,” I said. “My lady-friend got a job at Filene’s in Boston this summer, and she says they’ve got a few of those cameras, and are putting in more. To foil shoplifters.”
“A day will come when they have ’em everywhere,” she said. “Just like in that science fiction book about the Thought Police. I don’t look forward to it, either. But they’ll never have them in rides like Horror House. Not even infrared ones that see in the dark.”
“No?”
“Nope. There’s no Tunnel of Love at Joyland, but Horror House is most definitely the Tunnel of Grope. My husband told me once that a day when the graveyard shift cleanup crew didn’t find at least three pairs of panties beside the track was a slow day, indeed.
“But they did have that one great photo of the guy at the shooting gallery. A portrait, almost. It ran in the papers and on TV for a week. Him snuggled up to her hip to hip, showing her how to hold the rifle, the way the guys always do. Everyone in both Carolinas must have seen it. She’s smiling, but he looks dead serious.”