Stefan R. Dziemianowicz - Bloody Mary & Other Tales

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Stefan R. Dziemianowicz - Bloody Mary & Other Tales for a Dark Night (Barnes & Noble, 2000)

Tom McKeveny

Introduction

Tall Tales For the Campfire

Campfire Story
Initiation Into Terror
Funhouse of Fear
Body Snatched
Summer of Cropsey

Tales For After Dinner

Doom of the House of Gaskell
Secret Ingredient
Just Desserts

Urban Legends

Brainy Type
Cocoon
Mule
Coat Carrier
Giving Kind
Crazy Sally

Slumber Party Terrors

Don't Turn On the Light!
Final Call
Why the Doctor Went Mad
Ginger Snaps

Short Shivers for Long Car Rides

Stay Away From Wilson Drive!
Backseat Driver
One More
Death Takes Its Toll
Roadside Stop
Hook Ending

Frights For the Christmas Fireside
He Sees You When You're Sleeping
Yule Love Him
O' Christmas Tree
.....In Small Packages
Hearth of Horror

Halloween Horrors

Tricks & Treats
Masquerade
Scarecrow
Sweets To the Sweet
Bloody Mary

Blurb:

There's a killer hiding in your bedroom!
The hitchhiker in your backseat just disappeared!
A venomous snake lives in the lining of your coat!

Urban legends like these are the stuff of nightmares. Bloody Mary and Other Tales for a Dark Night is a connoisseur's collection of thirty-five creepy contemporary tall tales. Drawing on our eeriest modern myths, Stefan Dziemianowicz crafts horror stories that will leave even skeptical readers listening for footsteps behind them and fearful of walking into darkened rooms.

If you have ever given second thought to a wild rumor or listened to incredible experiences reported about friends of friends, you'll find plenty here to unsettle your imagination.
There are stories suitable for every occasion when the the lights are low and superstitions high: the campfire, the Christmas fireside, the Halloween vigil, or the slumber party. They can be enjoyed by the solitary reader or told aloud in the safety of a circle of friends.


The splendid anthologist and pulp historian turns his pen to original horror fiction inspired by urban legends and foaflore. Each story is preceded with a brief synopsis of the popular myth - or otherwise - which inspired it.

Introduction: The author confides that his interest in urban legends has its genesis in the strange and horrific disappearance of his thirteen year old brother, who was simply snatched into thin air as they were about to set off for the baseball game.

A Campfire Story: A century ago, the Daniels party were set upon by Injuns while crossing a vast mountain range. Several of those who fled into the caverns never found their way out. Three college lads decide to take a look. Skeletons, auto-cannibalism, claustrophobia and doom. Looks like it might be a better Saturday than anticipated.

Initiation into Terror: Two hapless pledges are required to brave the long abandoned and reputedly haunted Crawford place to gain acceptance into the fraternity. President Harry has instructed his football star pal to masquerade as a ghost to put the willies up them.

Funhouse of Fear: Twelve-year-old Kevin Clark breaks back into the Funhouse after dark, intent on stealing the model of a dangling corpse to impress his pals. Concealed in shadow, the hunchbacked proprietor watches his every move.

Body Snatched: Arthur Jepson, eminent London physician, depends upon the services of Fladge and Townsend, body-snatchers, to provide him with lovely fresh corpses for dissection in the lecture hall. Tonight's delivery is unsatisfactory; "Did they think he was an idiot? He could tell when a joint stiffened by rigor mortis had been pulversised with a hammer! The corpse was putrifying. It would burst like an overripe grape if he attempted to stick a scalpel in it. He would not pay them a penny for this travesty!" Jespon sends the pair on their way with instructions to bring him a nice juicy cavadar by this evening — or else. How they come by it is their own business. In other local news, Felicia, Jepson's lovely daughter, is just setting out across town to visit a sick aunt ....

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Summer of Cropsey: Catskill Mountains, 1968. Popular Camp Beechside is forced to close when an axeman takes to lopping off the heads of young lovers, skinny-dippers and hapless dawdlers. The camp is built on land John Cropsey was cheated of by property developers and corrupt officials. Defying eviction, the farmer lost his son - and two fingers - in a shootout before escaping into the wilderness where he bled to ghost. Cropsey's ghost picks up the campaign where he left off.

Doom of the House of Gaskell: From the eighteenth century, when Labon, the rich plantation owner, erupted in festering boils, each first born male heir has died tragically and inexplicably before they reach their majority. Such a rum deal for a family to contend with.

Secret Ingredient: Following a six hour drive through the backwoods in sheeting rain, a famished Jerry O'Neill stops at a greasy spoon for a meal. The place might need a lick of paint but those cats do a tasty, meaty stew!

Just Desserts: Stella's Christmas dinner for the annual family get-together would have been an unqualified success were it not for the stollen. Not even the children can abide seconds. Must be the tin of flour brother sent over from Poland. At least, she thinks it was flour.

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... Elsa's had her brain out; "a parasitic infestation of foreign origin"; organ theft; dead babies make the best drug mules, your pretty face has gone to hell, and a particularly bugged out fashion victim .....

Brainy Type: Back at medical school, Elsa Kincaid half-jokingly promised her star pupil that, on her passing, he can remove her superb brain for study. Convinced that he's dying, Dr. Arthur Stewart claims his due early.

Cocoon: A doctor wants rid of his best friend so he can take up with his wife, with whom he's already having an affair. On the pretext of vaccinating him for a trip abroad, the medic introduces a larvae into the cuckold's eardrum. That's some "best friend." Oscar Cook's Boomerang (yet again) turned up to gaga.

Mule: Mike Lowe abducts babies from families holidaying in South Texas, smuggling them across the border to supply a flourishing black market. Comes the fatal day when he inadvertently targets the infant accompanying a couple of drug smugglers ...

The Giving Kind: Paul Marks picks up a looker in the bar, takes her back to his place .... and wakes up in an iced bath. A message scrawled in lipstick; "Sit as still as you can and call 911." The paramedics are quick to respond, though that isn't necessarily a good thing.

Coat Wearer: Susan Jay buys a winter fur at the department store. How infuriating that, every time she wears her pride and joy, her stockings ladder or her blouse gets torn. How comes her parakeets hate it so? And what's with that bulge in the lining?

Crazy Sally: Her lover's face is so beautiful, she can lie there, dreamily studying it for hours at a time ...

My pick to date would be Summer of Cropsey because it's every Friday the 13th/ My Bloody Valentine/ Slumber Party Massacre & Co. slasher condensed into seven pages.

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Don't Turn On the Light!: ... or you'll see what's scrawled in blood across the bathroom mirror. If you're luck's really out, you'll see where it came from too. Ask Mary Crane, should she ever recover from coming home to the mess the Campus Creeper made of her flatmate ...

Final Call: Just Lucy Clark's horrible luck to be babysitting the Dillon brats the night a dangerous inmate escapes the State Hospital. Then there's that creep, Freddy, who everyone at school reckons has a crush on her, making heavy breathing noises down the telephone and threatening to kill the kids first, then .... At least, she hopes it's Freddy. Best phone the exchange and have the calls traced ...

Why the Doctor Went Mad: To allay his pathological fear of premature burial, George Moore has a private line installed in his mausoleum so he might raise the alarm in event of an emergency. It does him no good whatsoever, and the events of that night leave his wife dead of fright and deprive Dr. James Koppel, seasoned pathologist, of his wits.

Ginger Snaps: Sophie Carlson and family return from a night at the cinema to find the kitchen window open and the dog choking fit to die.

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Stay Away From Wilson Drive!: Janine Winslow, driving home in thick October fog, brakes hard to avoid a little girl in a denim dress stepped out in front of the car, and awaits the dreaded bump - that never comes. The girl, badly shaken if unharmed, knocks on her window. "Please, please, please take me home! I'm scared!" Handing the girl her sweater - how could her parents send her out half dressed? - Janine drives the short distance to the address given by her passenger. By the time they arrive, the girl has vanished into thin air!

Janice calls at the house - to be berated for her twisted behaviour by an angry couple who lost their daughter five years ago to the night when she was knocked down by a car.
The following morning Janine returns to Wilson Drive to look for her sweater ....

Backseat Driver: Sandy Parker is pursued for several miles by an intimidating, shouty meathead in a flash red Camaro until, much to her relief, he's forced off the road. She doesn't feel so great now that she has every reason to believe he was trying to do her a good turn.

One More: In her recurring dream, Sharon is dressed as a Gothic heroine in flimsy gown fleeing a black horse-drawn carriage. The coach eventually overtakes her. The passengers, all of them damned, beat on the windows. The cowled skeleton driver advises her there is no need to run as "there's room for one more inside."

Sharon recalls the premonition when about to board a crowded bus home from work and the conductor mouths she phrase she knows so well. She wisely opts for walking. The ensuing transport disaster makes the following day's headline. But still her ordeal is not yet at an end.

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Death Takes Its Toll: Medical students play a ghastly prank on James Myers as he mans the toll gate on Halloween night.

Roadside Stop: Edna Chase books a room for mother and herself at a gloomy motel before heading to a store for provisions. On her return, room 13 has vanished - as has her mother! The old timer who booked them in couldn't possibly have done so. He killed himself ten years ago after murdering a female guest.

Hook Ending: Standard treatment of the enduring 'don't park in Lover's lane when there's an escaped hook-handed psycho on the loose' legend. In this version, it's Terry and Lisa are the canoodling couple who got lucky.

He Sees You When You're Sleeping: Four-year-old Timothy, mum, Elizabeth, and an escaped lunatic in a Santa Claus costume, re-enact Tales from the Crypt classic ... And All Through the House during a power cut.

Yule Love Him: Sandy, 30, retrieves a green and red holiday dress she's not worn for nine years from a box of Christmas decorations. It's been stowed away ever since the acrimonious parting with her first love, Carl, now, alas, long dead. Still pinned to the bodice, a spring of mistletoe, so placed to bind her lover's affections forever. A ring on the doorbell. Who can it be at this time of the night? And what's causing that ghastly smell?

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O' Christmas Tree: Breaking with local tradition, Jeff Tyler cuts down a tree in Martindale Forest to decorate for the festive season. Such practice is frowned upon, as the forest takes it's name from a notorious New England witch-finder who secretly burnt a man at the stake on Christmas Day.

.....In Small Packages: A parcel is misdelivered to the Beaumont's house in early December. Taking if for a Christmas present, Pete placed it under the tree. By the time they get to open it, the parcel is stinking the house out something scandalous.

Hearth of Horror: Ted Lang's Christmas eve is disturbed by what he at first takes to be an oversized rodent scratching from inside the brickwork. It's only when a skeleton is recovered from the chimney that the culprit is revealed; the unquiet spirit of an infant Victorian chimney sweep walled up alive.

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Finally for Bloody Mary and Other Tales .... A thing of fits and starts, I guess, with a fair few of the vignettes perhaps too slight to impact. Personal picks, Stay Away From Wilson Drive!, Summer of Cropsey, Scarecrow, He Sees You When You're Sleeping, Yule Love Him and ...Small Packages, though, as ever, my hits might be the next reader's misses, and vice versa.

Tricks & Treats: Mark Hanson, one of the parents designated child-watching duties on Halloween night, spots a boy in skeleton costume stood alone in a vacant lot. Mark checks to see if he's lost. The little kid shows him what's inside his goodie bag.

Masquerade: Al Blackwood regrets hiring an authentic nineteenth century mourning suit for this year's Halloween party. The costume smells as though it's been subjected to extreme mothballing. Not long into the evening, Al comes over unwell.

Scarecrow: Mitch and Jean Kelly move home to an upper-middle class district in the last week of October. on Halloween night, the children shun the Kelly's house - the only one with the traditional jack o'lantern on show. The neighbours favour doll-sized scarecrows. Come midnight, the newcomers find out why.

Sweets for the Sweet: Esther Charles prepares gooey treats for the nasty children who torment her on the street and call her wicked names.

Bloody Mary: A Halloween dare sparks a teenage massacre.