Demon Child

like countless thousands of shot pellets.
        The wind was warm and made her perspire under the heavy raincoat. It curled the water under her collar, dampened the neck of her blouse.
        She ran along the macadamed drive, wondering if she could get to the limestone sinkholes quickly enough-and, incidentally, wondering just what she could do when she did get there. She didn't have a gun, and she knew she couldn't use one even if her pockets were full of them. All she could do was hope to reach the sinkholes before Walter. With two of them there, Richard would have a much slimmer chance of pulling anything and getting away with it.
        The stables loomed ahead, to the left.
        Lightning shattered the velvet blackness.
        The rain refracted, for a split second, the unearthly brilliance.
        She shivered, but kept moving. Leona Brighton would not have condoned cowardly behavior.
         Be careful, Jenny. Be careful… the dead voices seemed to be telling her.
        She reached the stables a moment later and ran through the open arch into the musty, dry interior where a single electric bulb burned in the center of the narrow aisle. She was breathing very hard, and she took a moment to rest and wipe the beaded rain from her face.
        The place smelled of hay and grain, sweet and pleasant, especially on such a night as this.
        First, she went to the rifle case next to the second stall on the right, opened the plyboard door. There wasn't a gun there. There were no bullets in the drawer beneath it.
        Perhaps Walter had taken the weapon, though she doubted that. If he already had a pistol of his own, that would be sufficient. He had only asked Harold about guns in order to know whether Richard was armed. And Richard more than likely was…
        The two stallions were gone. Only Tulip was still in the barn. She swung her pretty head over the halfdoor of her stall and looked beseechingly at Jenny, as if she too wanted to go on this late-night excursion which occupied everyone else so suddenly. Or, conversely, perhaps that pleading expression meant that she did not want to be ridden in such foul weather. Whatever it meant, Jenny did not waste any more time in saddling the mare and slipping the reins and bit on her.
        Tulip snuffled.
        A deafening boom of thunder swept in from outside.
        Tulip whinnied and danced slightly onto her hind feet
        Jenny patted her shoulder and spoke softly, reassuringly. Tulip slowly calmed, and Jenny mounted her, took the reins, and urged the horse down the aisle and out the door of the stables.
        The horse started at the heavy rain which pummeled them, but came under the rein fairly easily. Jenny sat low, bent along the mare's neck, all but hugging her so that she could whisper reassurances if the thunder should again frighten the animal.
        And they were off.
        Tulip sensed her master's fear. She maintained a stiff, awkward gallop which was tainted with reluctance. Jenny might know where she was going, but she had no idea what she might find when she got there…

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    16
        
        Since Walter had ridden over the Brucker estate only once and had not explored it in detail on horseback as Jenny had, he would take the route to the limestone caves which he would remember having taken with the others during the previous Tuesday's wolf hunt. It was the longest way about. She felt that she had a very good chance of heading him off by as much as five minutes-even considering the several minutes he had gained on her by his earlier departure from the stables.
        She whipped the reins lightly, continually, spurring the horse on. She slapped at Tulip's sides and encouraged her mount to run faster.
        She did not worry about her nails. Not at all.
        Fortunately, the route she had in mind was not sprinkled with trees as was so much of the Brucker land. If it had been, she could not have maintained this furious pace. The clouds obscured the summer moon and placed the land under a heavy blanket of darkness that was all but impenetrable. She could see only a hundred or a hundred-and-fifty feet ahead. That gave her too little safety margin if a willow should loom up in their path.
        Tulip whuffed and snorted.
        Jenny snapped the reins again.
        She was almost two-thirds of the way to the sinkholes, certain of reaching them before Walter, when the sky split open