The Door to December

even one she didn't like — was capable of these things and that the academic community was no more noble than the human race at large. But she was a realist who could face up to unpleasant truths, a rare creature both in and out of academia, and she would tell him everything. She just needed to do it at her own pace.
     Still facing the twilight, she said, 'None of those first four girls was promiscuous, Dan. Good kids from good families, here to obtain an education, not to escape parental authority and get some kicks. In fact, two of the four were virgins before they fell under Hoffritz's spell. And none was ever involved in sado-masochistic relationships before Hoffritz, and certainly not after. They were repulsed by the memories of what they had let him do to them.'
     She fell silent again.
     He decided that she wanted him to ask a question now, and he said, 'Well, if they didn't like it, why did they do it?'
     'The answer to that is a bit complex.'
     'I can handle it. I'm a bit complex myself.'
     She turned from the window and smiled, but only briefly. What she had to tell him obviated amusement. 'We discovered that each of those four girls had been voluntarily involved in undisclosed behavior-modification experiments with Hoffritz. Those experiments included posthypnotic suggestion and a variety of ego-suppressing drugs.'
     'Why would they want to get involved with something like that?'
     'To please a professor, to get a good grade. Or maybe because it actually interested them. Students are sometimes interested in the things they study, even these days, even the low-caliber students we've been getting lately. And Hoffritz did have a certain charm, which was more effective with some people than others.'
     'Not with you.'
     'When he turned on the charm, I found him even more slimy than usual. Anyway, he was teaching these girls, and he charmed them, and you mustn't forget that he was well published and well known in his field. He had earned a certain respect.'
     'And it was after these experiments started that each girl found herself sexually involved with him.'
     'Yes.'
     'So you think he used hypnosis, drugs, subconscious programming, to ... well, to convert them?'
     'To program their psychological matrices to include promiscuity and masochism. Yes. That's exactly what I think.'
    * * *
    Melanie's shrill scream filled the house.
     Shouting her daughter's name, Laura hurried behind Earl Benton, down the hall. Revolver in hand, the bodyguard entered the child's room ahead of Laura and snapped on the light.
     Melanie was alone. The menace that had elicited her screams was one that only she could see.
     Dressed in white socks and the pair of white cotton underpants that she had been wearing during her nap, the child was crouched in a corner, hands held in front of her to ward off an invisible enemy, shrieking so fiercely that she must have been hurting her throat. She looked so fragile, so pitifully vulnerable.
     Laura was briefly overwhelmed with loathing for Dylan. She almost sagged, almost went limp, almost crumpled under the weight of her anger.
     Earl holstered his gun. He reached out to Melanie, but she struck his hands and scrambled away from him, along the baseboard.
     'Melanie, honey, stop! It's all right,' Laura said.
     The girl didn't heed her mother. She reached the next corner, sat down, drew her legs up, fisted her small hands, and held them up defensively. She was no longer screaming, but she made a strange, rhythmic, panicky sound: 'Uh ... uh ... uh ... uh ... uh ...'
     Crouching in front of her, Earl said, 'It's okay, kid.'
     'Uh ... uh ... uh ... uh ...'
     'It's okay now. It really is. It's okay, Melanie. I'll take care of you.'
     'The d-d-door,' Melanie said. 'The door. Don't let it open!'
     'It's shut,' Laura said, hurrying to her, kneeling by her. 'The door is shut and locked, honey.'
     'Keep it shut !'
     'Don't you remember, baby? There's a big, new, heavy lock on the door,' Laura said. 'Don't you remember?'
     Earl glanced at Laura, obviously puzzled.
     'The door is shut,' Laura continued. 'Locked. Sealed. Nailed shut. Nobody can open it, honey. Nobody.'
     Fat tears welled in the child's eyes, spilled down her cheeks.
     'I'll take care of