Once Upon a Halloween by Richard Laymon Page B

everything, she was Eleanor, not Shannon."
        Tony looked confused. "So where's Shannon?"
        "And Laura?" asked Charles.
        "The other two took them somewhere. I think to the graveyard. They're supposed to be sacrificed. Some sorta cult thing. A ritual, Connie, too, if she didn't get away."
        Tony scowled down at him. "You've gotta be shitting us."
        "A sacrifice?" Charles asked.
        "A midnight sacrifice," Hunter said. "Eleanor told me about it, I had her as my prisoner before you guys showed up. I was gonna take her over to the graveyard and try to make a trade... her for Connie and Laura and Shannon. But now she's gone. Thanks to you," Hunter added, looking at Tony. "Should've listened to me in the first place and we could've caught her."
        Tony glanced at Charles. "Do you buy all this stuff?"
        "I don't know."
        Hunter muttered, "Sherlock Holmes, my butt."
        "Shut up," Tony said.
        "You kissed her. Haven't you ever kissed Shannon before? Couldn't you tell the difference?"
        He hesitated. "I guess it might've been a little different, but..."
        "And didn't you notice she didn't have any clothes on under the sheet?"
        "Yeah, I noticed."
        "What, did you think Shannon was gonna go out with you in nothing but a sheet? To a party or whatever it was supposed to be?"
        He shrugged. "Maybe. I did think it was kind of funny she had the sheet on. I mean, we'd talked it over. I was supposed to be Holmes and she was supposed to be a hard-boiled private eye. I asked her about it, remember?"
        "I remember," Charles said.
        "What I really thought, I guess, was she'd put the sheet on to be funny. You know, like it wasn't really supposed to be her costume."
        "You didn't happen to notice she didn't have Shannon's voice?"
        Again, Tony shrugged.
        "Forget Holmes," Hunter muttered. "You should've dressed like Clousseau."
        Charles said, " I thought she sounded odd."
        "And you with just one ear," said Hunter.
        "Knock it off," Tony snapped.
        Looking at him, Charles said, "I think he's telling the truth about the gal not being Shannon."
        "It's the truth, all right." Still sprawled backward against the stairs, Hunter touched the wound on his chest. "This is where Eleanor stuck me with her sword." He patted the knife sheathed at his hip. "This is her knife." From the look on Tony's face, he hadn't even noticed Hunter had a knife. "The other two with her, they were a guy named Bryce and a woman named Simone. Bryce had a big old knife and Simone had a hatchet. They're the ones who took Laura and Shannon. Go look in the living room. You can see where they had the fight."
        While Tony remained standing over Hunter, Charles walked into the living room. "Yeah," he said. "Things are pretty messed up in here."
        "I was upstairs when the fight happened," Hunter said. "But I know how it turned out. They tied up Laura and Shannon with some rope they brought along. Eleanor stayed behind to take care of me. She told 'em to go on ahead without her."
        "So they took Shannon and Laura away and left you two here," Tony said.
        "That's right."
        "So how do we know you're not in on it?"
        Before Hunter could think of an answer, Charles came out of the living room carrying Shannon's fedora. "Found this," he told Tony.
        Tony looked at the hat and seemed to go slack.
        "She was in her private eye costume," Hunter said. "The ghost thing was just Eleanor. Shannon was dressed like she'd said she'd be... the hat..."
        Staring at the hat with blank eyes, Tony asked in a dull voice, "Was there blood?"
        "I didn't see any," Charles said.
        "I think they want people alive for their ceremony," Hunter explained. "So I don't think they did anything... you know, like fatal... to Shannon or Laura. Or Connie," he added, and was