The Dream of the Broken Horses by William Bayer Page B

rollers, holes in the floor through which air sporadically shot up. The air would hiss right up your pants leg or blow up a girl's skirt. There were strange sounds and funny mirrors that made you look fat, thin, or just plain grotesque. There was one point where you turned a corner and this huge black spider came rushing at you from the dark. Everything was set up to make you scream.
    "I imagine Barbara and Tom meeting there one hot summer afternoon. Stumbling through the Fun House would have aroused her. She'd grab hold of Tom's arm, squeeze his bicep, scream out in fright. Then they'd double over with laughter, clench, and kiss. It was dark as hell inside. No one would see them. Even if someone did, no one would care. Teenage couples went through there all the time. It was a rite of passage to take a girl in there, get excited, then fool around in the dark. What a thing for Barbara Fulraine—country club tennis champ, symphony box-holder, wearer of Harry Winston jewels and Saint-Laurent gowns—to be groped in the Fun House by her earnest, attractive, secret lover, so adoring of her, so stricken, so madly in her thrall. How could they resist one another after an hour spent like that? They would emerge holding hands, wondering where they could go to be alone. There was only one choice: the Flamingo Court across the road, so convenient and anonymous, with a reputation as a 'hot sheets' motel. She'd have reveled in the humbleness of it, the notion that no matter how privileged, highly placed in the social order, she had her needs, was flesh and blood, carnal and horny as any lubricious teenage girl finally giving in to the panted entreaties of her boyfriend."
    "Whew!" Pam says. We're parked now in the Flamingo lot. She turns to me. "Was it really like that?"
    "Maybe. I think so. Sure. A wild, passionate adventure. Think about it. She comes out here to make love with Tom Jessup after spending an hour or so at midday in Jack Cody's bed. She's a fastidious woman. She showers in between. Then, again ready for abandon, she drives here telling herself that no matter the elegant mask she shows the world, she's a reckless virago in pursuit of her pleasures. Consider how much fun it would be for her to feel she was leading a secret double life! And remember, too, she had the added luxury of being able to study her excitement with her new, brilliant, respectful psychoanalyst. In effect she becomes the center of her own universe. And so privileged, so very privileged ... for she is always perfectly groomed, beautifully dressed, driving the finest make of car, living in a luxurious home amidst splendid things where she's waited upon by loyal servants. She's loved, admired, perhaps best of all from her point of view, wildly envied by her rivals. With all that, how could she not feel she was living at some rarefied peak level of human experience? And yet . . . still . . . she would tell her devoted analyst how devastatingly miserable she was, riven by guilt for allowing her infant daughter to be kidnapped and believing in her heart of hearts that at best she's a self-indulgent fake, at worst a fancy whore."
    We sit still in the car. To break the silence, I point out the window of room 201 where the killings took place.
    "If the blinds were open," Pam observes, "someone sitting down here could see inside."
    "Only at night. Anyhow, I'm sure they kept the blinds closed while they made love. Or partially closed so the shadows would stripe their bodies."
    "Still, from here the shooter could see them arrive, park, go up to the room. Then he could sit here and make his plan, wait for the right moment when no one was coming or going so he wouldn't be seen. Maybe wait till the pool area cleared, then coolly get out, walk across the courtyard, mount the stairs, smash his way into the room."
    "He didn't have to smash his way in. They left the door unlocked. All he had to do was fling it open and fire."
    "The gun—how did he hide