Hotter Blood: More Tales of Erotic Horror

shoulder-length blond hair, of which Scott was inordinately proud, but had never pressed the issue, perhaps because Scott was willing to accept such low wages.

Scott had long since stopped paying much attention to the movies, almost all of which he had seen several times before, preferring to spend the time lost in one daydream or another, usually involving the dispensation of large sums of cash or the resolution of dramatic political crises for which only Scott Barkin had the necessary personal qualities. Infrequently, there were sexual overtones, but carnal acts or nudity made him uncomfortable, on the screen or off it.

Which is probably why he noticed the girl in the torn dress during Godzilla versus the Smog Monster.

It was the third of three Godzilla movies that night, and Scott was anxious for it to end so that he could rewind the film, check to be certain the theater was empty, and lock up for the night. The smog monster had just taken to the air on its latest rampage when the camera shifted to a crowd shot, the usual aggregation of frightened figures running for whatever ineffective shelter they could find. At the forefront of the crowd, a slender Japanese woman fell to the ground, her blouse slipping from one shoulder. As she struggled to rise, someone stepped on the hem of her dress, which tore all the way to her waistline, briefly revealing a swath of white thigh before she was swallowed up by the crowd.

Scott only noticed it because even that small hint of sexuality seemed anachronistic in a Japanese monster movie of the 1970s.

A week or two later, while the original King Kong was passing across the screen, Scott was startled by the giant ape's rather revealing exploration of Fay Wray's clothing, at one point exposing a clearly naked breast for a split second. He vaguely recalled reading that some censored footage from the original print had been restored, so he just shook his head and chuckled.

It was the torrid love scene between Anne Francis and Leslie Nielsen in Forbidden Planet that finally led him to suspect that something was wrong. It was part of a double feature, opening with the classic The Thing. Margaret Sheridan had seemed somewhat lightly clad for a posting in Antarctica, and she displayed a rather fuller figure than Scott remembered, but otherwise there had been no note of incongruity in that film. But when Nielsen and Francis began clutching at one another in evident passion during the next show, Scott knew something was up.

'What the hell?' He rose from his chair and moved forward, peering out through the small window at the screen shimmering below. Nielsen had one hand closed quite obviously over a breast, while his free hand worked at the fastenings of her blouse. The ultimate revelation was only put off when Dr. Morbius, portrayed by Walter Pidgeon, put in an untimely appearance.

When the theater had emptied some time later, Scott stood staring at the coiled film. There had been no discernible reaction from the audience; could he have imagined the entire sequence?

'Hey, can I go now?'

Startled, Scott turned to see Candy standing nonchalantly in the projection-room doorway.

'Yeah, I suppose so. Everything all set downstairs?'

She nodded, chewing gum energetically. 'Of course. I'll deposit the box office take on my way home. You okay? You look kind of funny?'

'Me? I'm fine. See you tomorrow.' He was aware that he sounded distracted, but he couldn't help it. Absentmindedly, he followed her downstairs to the lobby.

'Okay, sure. See you.' She watched him another second, then turned and left.

That's when he noticed the kid with the thick-rimmed glasses standing at one side of the lobby.

'Excuse me, mister.' The kid stepped out of the shadows. Scott judged him to be barely into his teens. 'Was that some special cut of Forbidden Planet or something?'

So he hadn't imagined it! But he didn't want to give anything away to this kid. Not until he had a chance to think. Scott kept his expression neutral. 'What do you mean? It looked fine to me.'

The boy seemed confused. 'Some of that stuff wasn't in the original film. I thought maybe it was a restored version, like they did with King Kong, you know.'

Scott shrugged. 'I don't know, kid; I just show 'em. Sometimes we get the old ones spliced together wrong. Come on, let's go. I have to lock up.'

Later that night, somewhere deep in his brain, Scott conceived the idea that this odd variant of the original film might be valuable, but try as he might, he could think of no way to take advantage of the situation. It would have to be sent back to the distributor in the morning; even if he had the facilities to copy it first, he had no idea how to make use of his discovery. The thought that he was missing a chance to make money, possibly quite a lot of money, was disturbing.

The very next weekend, Scott realized he had misjudged the situation.

It was a triple feature this time, starting with Gene Barry in The War of the Worlds. Scott paid little attention until the final moments, then moved his seat to a better vantage point. Next up was Silent Running, one of the few movies he still enjoyed watching, primarily because of the cleverly conceived robot characters. He had heard somewhere that they had actually hired amputees to play the parts, standing on their hands inside the confining costumes, and he never tired of trying to imagine how each shot had been constructed.

Within minutes, Scott realized that something was wrong. He knew without question that the crew member named Wolf was not a tall, slender redheaded female. At least, not until now. He was so stunned that he never even noticed later when, during the fight scene between Raquel Welch and Martine Beswicke in One Million Years B.C., the former's furry bra was completely removed.

He waited impatiently for the last disheveled couple to fix their clothing and leave the auditorium, then descended to the lobby and helped Candy finish her cleaning up. She looked at him suspiciously — he had never offered any kind of assistance before — but made no comment.

'Walk me to the bank?' There had been two muggings in downtown Managansett that week, and Candy had expressed concern about her own safety.

'Sorry.' He shook his head. 'I've still got things to do before I leave.'

She bit her lip. 'I can wait, I guess. I'd feel better if I had some company while I'm carrying all that money.'

Scott made an impatient noise. 'It's not even a hundred dollars, Candy, for Christ's sake.'

'The muggers don't know that!'

He shifted his weight from one foot to the other. 'Look, just leave it for me. I'll make the deposit myself on my way home, all right?'

She looked dubious. 'I don't know. I'm really supposed to do that myself.'

'Then do it and stop whining at me!' he exploded. 'I'm not paid to be your bodyguard or your nursemaid.'

Candy's eyes widened and her mouth opened as though she were about to respond in kind. But then her features twisted angrily and she snatched up the deposit bag, whirled, and stormed out of the theater.

Scott carefully remounted the film on the projector and restarted it, convinced that his fortune was made. The credits played through and the story began.

Wolf was once again a young actor named Cliff Potts.

That evening, lying awake in bed, Scott Barkin reviewed the possibilities. There had been an opportunity for someone to switch copies while he was downstairs arguing with Candy, but that seemed highly improbable. He might be going crazy, have hallucinated the entire thing, but he dismissed that immediately because clearly that kid had seen the same thing he had in Forbidden Planet. The only other alternatives that occurred to him were that… somehow… the images from the film were being altered before they reached the screen, or that there was a way to make more than one person hallucinate the same way. He had no idea how this could e achieved, but perhaps some brilliant but reclusive inventor had developed such a device and was testing it secretly. Certainly Managansett, Rhode Island, was pretty remote, intellectually if not physically. The entire town seemed to lag a decade or more behind the rest of the world.

There still might be some way he could take advantage of the situation, but to do so, he would have to identify the source of the alterations. Tomorrow was comedy night, Arsenic and Old Lace and A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. He was familiar with both movies