David Morrell - Creepers

"I'm okay, honestly," Vinnie assured them.

"You looked awfully shaken up a minute ago."

"I'm fine." To Balenger, it seemed that Vinnie was determined not to show weakness in front of Cora. "We traveled a long way to get here. We've all been looking forward to this, not to mention the time and money we put in. I won't let you go back because of me."

"But are you able?" Cora asked.

"There's nothing the matter with me," Vinnie insisted.

"Good," Rick said, coming back, zipping his knapsack shut. "I still want to know what's in Carlisle's penthouse and Danata's vault."

"Whose turn next?" Conklin asked. "Cora?"

She looked as if she was trying to avoid the awkward moment but was eager to get it finished.

As she left, Balenger glanced down at an object on the floor. A file folder.

"We found it in the office behind the check-in counter," Rick said. "It had an interesting label so we pulled it out. That's when we heard shouts from the walkie-talkie."

Balenger picked up the file and scanned his flashlight over the label: police reports. "Yeah, that's an attention getter." He flipped through the pages.

"A lot of crimes happen in hotels, mostly theft, but the guests never know about any of it," he said. "Bad for business. Usually, the police keep their investigations discreet. This file starts with the most recent incident and-"

Cora screamed.

Rick was suddenly in motion, charging around the corner, Balenger racing behind him. With Vinnie and the professor next to him, Balenger stared down the corridor. Zigzagging headlamps showed Cora with her back pressed against the wall, her jeans half down. Kleenex was on the floor next to her half-filled bottle. She gaped toward the far end of the corridor.

"Something's down there!" she said.

Rick hurried to get in front of her, blocking any threat. Good man, Balenger thought. In a frenzy, she pulled her jeans up, buckling them, all the while continuing to stare along the corridor.

"See anything?" Conklin asked.

"No," Balenger said, conscious of the gun under his Windbreaker.

"Yes," Vinnie said. "There."

Fierce eyes blazed from the end of the corridor.

Near the floor.

Balenger allowed himself to relax a little. "Another animal."

The converging lights revealed its head glaring around the corner.

"Hell, another albino cat," Rick said.

It bared its teeth, hissing.

"Look how it stands its ground," Vinnie said. "Not afraid of us. Feral. Furious that we're intruding."

"Must weigh twenty pounds," Rick said. "From that banquet of rats downstairs."'

"When I was a kid, I spent summers on my grandmother's farm," Vinnie said. "There were a bunch of feral cats in an abandoned barn down the road. They ate every mouse, rabbit, and groundhog for miles. The birds got smart and stayed away. Finally the cats took to killing chickens. Then they graduated to goats and-"

"Thanks, Vinnie," Conklin said. "I believe we get the idea."

"What happened to the cats?" Balenger asked as the white animal hissed again.

"A farmer left poisoned meat. Didn't work. The cats were too smart to touch it. The guy said he counted at least fifty of them and was glad to jump back in his car and get out of there. A neighbor's wife claimed they made a try for her infant daughter. So, finally, about ten farmers got permission from the game warden or the sheriff or whoever and went out there with guns. I remember the shots lasted all afternoon. My grandmother said she heard they killed over a hundred."

"Vinnie," Cora warned.

"Well, this is just one. Scram!" Rick shouted. He took out his water pistol and sprayed vinegar in the cat's direction.

The liquid didn't come close. Even so, the cat gave a final hiss and disappeared around the corner.

"See, it doesn't like us any better then we like it."

Balenger noticed that during the commotion Cora put the bottle of urine into her knapsack. She shoved the Kleenex into a plastic bag, sealed it, and stuffed that into her knapsack, also.

"Are you okay?" Rick asked.

"Fine." She sounded apologetic. "It surprised me is all."

"Maybe we shouldn't go on."

"Hey, it wasn't anything." Embarrassment made her stand straighter. "We've all had jumpy moments in various buildings. Isn't that some of the point? To get an adrenaline rush. Just because I yell on a roller coaster doesn't mean I don't want to take another ride."

But it seemed to Balenger that she wished they were leaving.

"If that's what you want," Rick said.

He sounded reluctant, also.

"Let's go," Balenger said.

Like the darkness that seemed to thicken, time felt even more compressed. Balenger noticed Vinnie limping slightly. Had he lied about not being injured? Then Balenger realized that Vinnie's awkward motion came from the wet feel of his pants.

They returned to the balcony.

"I don't have the need," the professor said, "but perhaps this is the best time. I don't want to delay us later." He removed his plastic bottle from his knapsack. "We know the first three rooms we checked are safe. I'll use one of those."

"Safe, if you don't count a dead monkey in a suitcase," Cora said.

"The room I had in mind is the one with the Burberry coat."

"Professor," Vinnie said, "one of us should go with you. Just to be extra cautious."

"Being cautious is good," Conklin agreed.

Balenger watched them open the door. They tested the floor, even though it had supported them earlier. Their lights went into the darkness.

Balenger put a hand against the balcony's wall. Satisfied that it was sturdy, he slid down, sitting with his back against it. Even if he wasn't relaxed, the illusion of resting felt good.

Rick and Cora slid down next to him. They looked as exhausted as he felt. Well, that's what adrenaline does to you, he thought. Eventually, it wears you out.

"Might as well use the time." Balenger reached for the file folder he'd dropped when Cora shouted.

POLICE REPORTS.

"Want some reading material?" He gave pages to Rick and Cora, keeping the most recent one for himself.

It was dated August 31, 1968. As the professor had explained, that was the year the hotel stopped receiving guests. Balenger expected that the file would be dominated by reports about thefts, the most common crime in a hotel, but what he read was far more serious.

An inquiry about a missing person. In August, one week after a woman named Iris McKenzie stayed in the Paragon, a police detective arrived, asking questions about her. No one had seen or heard from her after she paid her bill and left the hotel. Someone who worked for the Paragon made detailed handwritten notes about the conversation with the detective.

Iris McKenzie lived in Baltimore, Maryland, Balenger learned. She was thirty-three, single, a copywriter for an advertising firm that collaborated with big agencies in New York. After a summer business trip to Manhattan, she went to Asbury Park and spent a weekend in the Paragon. At least, the phone reservation she made indicated that she intended to stay for a weekend. Arriving Friday evening. Leaving Monday morning. Instead, she checked out on Saturday morning. Balenger had a suspicion that she realized how misinformed she was-that Asbury Park was no longer the place to go for a peaceful weekend getaway.

The person who took notes about the detective's inquiries (the handwriting seemed masculine) indicated that he showed the detective the reservation card and the receipt that Iris McKenzie had signed when she paid her bill and checked out early. The phone charges to her room showed a 9:37 a.m. long-distance call to a number the detective identified as belonging to Iris's sister in Baltimore. The detective indicated that the sister's seventeen-year-old son answered the phone and told Iris that his mother wouldn't be home until dinnertime. Iris told the boy to tell his mother she'd be returning to Baltimore that night. Iris then took a cab to the train station and got a ticket for Baltimore, but she never arrived at her destination.