Demon Child

grounds. Malmont was certain Cora would eventually gladly sell the land at the slightest suggestion that it would solve her problems. And but for you, that prediction would have held true.”
        “But how did you use the dog to kill Symington?” Richard asked, curious but also stalling for time. “You were not in the stables.”
        “True enough. But when I learned Symington was here, I knew you had found something interesting about the horse's corpse. I went up to the cave where I was keeping Brutus and brought him around to the main gate where Malmont was waiting as instructed. I had called him, told him Symington was coming here. He had gone to Symington's house on some pretense and managed to come away with the man's hat. I let Brutus take the scent and spent some time instructing him so that he would know he was to kill the owner. Then I left him with Malmont. He wouldn't obey the doctor, but he knows him too well to attack him or openly disobey him. After that, I returned to the house and established an alibi. Malmont waited until Symington had been in the stables some fifteen minutes, then popped in to visit. He found that Symington had found dog hairs while combing Hollycross' stall and that he might be able to build the species from laboratory analysis. He went outside and let Brutus out of his car. Brutus did the rest and came back to the car. Later, I collected him from the good doctor.”
        “Very neat.”
        “Thank you.”
        Jenny felt as if she were losing her mind. Things like this did not happen in a sane world. People were not put into such horrible positions by people as devious and cunning as Walter Hobarth. She must be imagining all of it. At the same time, she knew that she wasn't imagining a second of it, that-unfortunately -such things did happen to people and happened to them all the time. Wasn't Leona Brighton dead? Weren't her parents dead as well? Wasn't that enough proof of the world's brutality?
        “Were you responsible for-for Freya's condition?” she asked him. She hoped he would say no, that he would not compound his already heinous crimes by admitting to the ruthless use of a child to obtain whatever it was that he was after.
        But he said yes.
        “Yes. Though that was Malmont's side of the game.”
        “But how could you insure her coma at the proper time?” Richard wanted to know.
        “Malmont diagnosed a vitamin deficiency in the child,” Hobarth said. “He prescribed packets of vitamins which he supplied. Each vitamin was nestled in a plastic slot in a card that held thirty, and each day was marked below the pill. Certain tablets contained a strong sedative. The only times the system did not work was when, rarely, Harold or Anna forgot to give Freya the pill. Always, they gave it to her the next morning-thus her mid-morning comas that broke the usual pattern.”
        “That's cruel!” Jenny said.
        Hobarth laughed. “The stakes are too high, in all this, to allow sentiment to intrude, my dear.”
        “Where is Freya now?” Jenny asked.
        “It's a shame we had to go to such extravagant lengths,” Hobarth said. “But we needed to have her disappear, so that Cora would finally be pushed to the point of selling. As I treated her for her nervous condition, I used post-hypnotic suggestions to insure that she would favor selling the house and grounds. But when she saw how strongly you disliked the idea of selling the homestead, Richard, she shook off some of the demand those post-hypnotic suggestions made on her. She must love you a great deal. Only strong emotion could have helped her stave off the desires I helped nourish in her.”
        “And Freya?” Richard asked.
        “I had reached the point, in our daily sessions, where I could instantly hypnotize her. I went to her room, shortly before six, found her alone, spoke the triggering words, and put her in a trance. It took her out of the house, unseen, to my car. She is with Dr. Malmont. He knows the phrase that will bring her around, and he will use it just as he reaches the house. He'll tell everyone he found her outside the main gate, delirious. For good measure, he has a small bottle of blood, rabbit's blood, which he'll smear her with.”
        “You're mad!” Jenny shouted.
        Hobarth frowned for the first time. “Mad? I fail to see that. I have an important goal to reach, a sensible goal. If my means of attaining it are