After placing the report in Captain Bigelow’s IN basket, Collins crossed the hall to the main office. Sergeant Easley was on the phone checking out those automobiles at road’s-end whose owners’ names he had been able to read from the registration certificates. The list of license numbers provided by the rangers had been sent to the Highway Patrol and would presently be returned with notations regarding car and ownership. Even as Collins looked over the information Easley had assembled, the list came back now including not only license registration but make and year of the vehicle and the owner’s name and address.
Collins pressed two clerks into service. “We’re looking for a man who made a pack-trip into the mountains back of Cedar Grove. He probably arrived in one of these cars, and we want to find out which.” Then he returned to his own cubbyhole and tried to sort out the facts of the case.
There were a number of possibilities to consider. The crime might be the work of a psychopath. If this could be demonstrated, any details involving Earl Genneman’s friends and enemies were probably irrelevant.
Collins made a note: Escapees — mental institutions. The words made him grimace with disgust. He was going to have to do better than that for Captain Bigelow.
He jotted down another note: Inquire from Phelps regarding other recent traffic over Copper Creek Trail. Inquire if anyone has seen evidence of psycho in area. He thought a few minutes and added: Inquire at grocery store in area as to prospectors. So much for the madman.
The next possibility was the lone camper. He might also be a lunatic, but the important thing was that he had almost certainly set out up Copper Creek Trail on the heels of the Genneman party. What was more, he must be represented by one of the automobiles now being checked by Easley and the two clerks — a line of investigation which was far and away the most likely to yield results. Of course, there was always the possibility that the murderer had entered the park at some other point, made the long hike to Lomax Falls, and set an ambush for Earl Genneman. But such nicety of planning seemed incredible. The madman hypothesis, as it were, made more sense.
What of a shotgun trap, actuated by a trip-wire or some such device? The prime objection to such highjinks was its lack of selectivity: the first person to trip the wire would be killed. So again Collins was brought face to face with a madman. Also, a shotgun trap must necessarily leave behind the shotgun. The survivors of Genneman’s party had found no weapon. (Unless they were in collusion? But, considering the disparate personalities of the group, Collins brushed the possibility aside.)
The man who had followed Earl Genneman and his party up the traiclass="underline" he must be considered the killer until proved otherwise. And Collins drew a decisive line across the paper.
What could be said of this unknown man?
There was a set of basic alternatives: either he had intended to kill Earl Genneman, or he had intended to kill someone else. On the assumption that he meant to kill someone else — that Genneman’s death was a mistake — then the man who was supposed to have been killed must be identified. Collins made a note: Check on parties using Copper Creek Trail on Friday, Saturday, Sunday, especially for men resembling Genneman.
On the more likely assumption that the murderer made no mistake, that he had meant to kill Genneman — what then?
First: the murderer must have had detailed knowledge of Genneman’s itinerary... Collins checked himself. No, it was perfectly possible that the murderer had merely followed the Genneman party to Persimmon Lake and in the very early morning had gone ahead to wait in ambush. In which case the murderer need only have known generally that Genneman was planning a pack-trip, with perhaps his time of departure.
Collins grumbled a curse. No aspect of the case allowed an unqualified yes or no.
There was another angle to be considered. According to all accounts, Genneman had not acted the part of a man who expected an attack on his life. He had shown no great interest in the news that a man was following the party.
But here lay another paradox: if the lone camper had planned to murder Genneman, why had he camped openly only two hundred yards away? Had something occurred during the night to drive him to desperation?
Collins leaned back in his chair. The first point of business was to identify the camper. He was back to that.
To put the frosting on Collins’ cake, Captain Bigelow appeared in the doorway, frowning down at the report. “I don’t understand this, Omar. It doesn’t add up.”
“How do you mean?” asked Collins. This was the usual gambit.
Bigelow merely shook his big, commanding head thoughtfully, as if he were seeing several steps beyond Collins’ limited view of the case.
Collins waited patiently. Presently Bigelow asked, “Are you taking this loony theory seriously?”
“Right now we’re concentrating on the man who followed the party up the trail.”
“That’s about the way I’d play it,” said Bigelow, “even though it may turn out to be a false alarm-some guy out for a tramp in the hills.”
“We’ll know when we find him. What about some help, Captain? There’s going to be lots of legwork on this case.”
“Use Sullivan and Kerner for now. If you need more help, yell. We’ll want to crack this one. A madman scare, real or not — it’s all the same to the newspapers — could keep a lot of tourists away from the mountains this summer.”
“We’ll give it our best,” said Collins respectfully.
“Good boy.” The captain returned to his office.
Collins looked at his notes, then at the clock. He went back to the main office and told Easley that Bigelow was putting more men on the case. “Make sure they know what they’re doing. I’ll be out the rest of the afternoon.” He looked down at the list on the sergeant’s desk, already marked with Easley’s private symbols. “Anything turn up yet?”
“Nothing much. There’s this LKK-3220 — a ’62 Dodge registered to Nathan Wingate, Redondo Beach. According to the list, the car came through General Grant Gate on Wednesday. Wingate says he’s never visited Kings Canyon in his life. The car hasn’t been stolen, borrowed or bought.”
“The ranger might have got a number or letter wrong.”
“Could be,” said Easley, and Collins thought he heard something of the tone he himself used with Bigelow.
“If anyone wants me, I’m in San Jose.”
From Fresno to San Jose is something more than a hundred miles. Collins arrived about two o’clock. At a service station he telephoned the Genneman residence. Mrs. Genneman was at home and would speak to him.
Collins asked directions from the attendant, and ten minutes later he turned into the Genneman driveway. It wound a hundred and fifty feet through lawns and trees, past a swimming pool, then made a loop under a porte-cochere. Genneman had liked bigness about him, and his house was no exception: a huge rambling structure of beige stucco and dark timber with a red tile roof, in the style known as Early California or Mission. If house and grounds were a criterion, Genneman had been a wealthy man indeed.
A Filipino houseboy in white jacket and black trousers ushered Collins into a great beamed living room, where Opal Genneman presently appeared: a tall woman of pleasant good looks. She seemed drained of emotion. She was perhaps forty years old, with dark hair and dark eyes; she wore a tweed skirt with a black sweater, and no jewelry other than her wedding ring.
Collins introduced himself and uttered the usual condolences; Mrs. Genneman nodded mechanically and led him to a sofa. “I’ll be glad to talk to you, Inspector, but you’ll have to forgive me if I sound vague; I feel so detached, rootless... I hardly know what to think. It’s strange being without Earl. He was such a strong, vital man.” Her eyes began to glisten.