There was nothing to do but act natural and touristy, but as I rolled up the barricade I couldn't help wondering if Genevieve had stopped because of it, and if so, how she'd known it was there. A tall Mountie with a widebrimmed hat and a yellow cavalry stripe down his pants came up and looked into the Volkswagen with a murmured apology. He straightened up and waved me on, but something was be-ginning to stir inside my head-call it intelligence if you like-and I didn't drive off right away. Instead I put on a j look of busybody curiosity and leaned out the window.
"Are you fellows still looking for those escaped convicts around here?" I asked. "What makes you think they're still hanging around, with all the north woods to escape into? I should think they'd be halfway to Hudson Bay by now."
"One is a local lad, sir," the Mountie said. "We think he may have found somebody to hide him temporarily. At least there's a report that both men were seen in Brandon as late as last night."
"I see," I said. "You mean he's lived around the penitentiary all his life so he knows the routines you're apt to use? That makes it tough, I guess."
"Yes, sir."
I sent the car ahead. The idea that was germinating in my mind was so farfetched that I couldn't take it seriously. Still, something was definitely wrong with Genevieve-she'd behaved oddly both last night and this morning-and until I had a good explanation I couldn't afford to dismiss any possibilities.
I parked the Volkswagen around the next bend, got my binoculars out of the little trunk up front, and returned on foot to a spot among the trees from which I had a view of the roadblock. Presently the blue truck and the silver trailer rolled up to the waiting policeman and stopped obediently. Genevieve was at the wheel of the pickup. I couldn't see anybody in the cab with her.
The tall Mountie who'd inspected me looked in her window and straightened up, satisfied. His partner went back to the trailer and looked inside. Apparently he found nothing amiss, either, for he closed the door and waved Genevieve on. I let her drive past my hiding place without revealing myself, but when I got back to the place where I'd parked my car, she'd pulled off the road behind it. She was sitting in the pickup, hunched over the steering wheel as I'd seen her once before, with her face buried in her hands.
When she became aware of me at the window, she raised her head. She hadn't really been crying, I saw. Her eyes were dry, but they were big and desperate.
I said, in my Clevenger role, "Okay, ma'am, what's going on? Where's the girl? Where's Penny?"
Genevieve just stared at me. Her look was hostile, but it held a hint of speculation, as if she was wondering whether the situation was bad enough to justify taking a gamble on confiding in a creature like me. When she didn't speak at once, I shrugged and went back to the trailer, opened the door cautiously, and climbed inside. It occurred to me that if the woman in the truck should decide to take off, I'd be kidnapped, short of a flying leap to the hard pavement, but I couldn't see what she'd gain by it and neither, apparently, could she. We remained motionless. The trailer was empty. It had a neat, clean look, as if it had just been carefully tidied to hide all traces of the most recent occupant or occupants.
I checked the tiny combination john and shower, and the little plywood closet. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police should have been ashamed of themselves. There were enough teenage clothes around to raise the interesting question of where the owner had got to. I glanced through the various drawers, finding nothing but kitchen stuff, clothes, a wad of comic books and, cached away under the bed, a collection of old playthings that Miss Drilling would probably repudiate now that she was fifteen: everything to keep a kid entertained on a camping trip, from slingshots and water pistols to picture puzzles and pretty little dolls with fancy wardrobes. What I was looking for wasn't exactly clear in my mind, but it seemed a pity to pass up the opportunity.
I made a quick examination of a miniature dresser built into the corner by the bed. Hearing footsteps on the gravel outside, I was just about to shove the last drawer closed when something white caught my eye and I picked it up: a left-handed white kid glove that looked familiar. There was no mate in the drawer. I guess it was what I'd been looking for. I'd recently flushed a similar right-hand glove down a toilet in Brandon. And doubts I might have about its ownership were no longer tenable. It was too big for the kid; it had to belong to the mother.
I dropped the glove back and closed the drawer as Genevieve stepped up to the doorway behind me, causing the trailer to sway on its springs.
"You're hardly likely to find my daughter hiding in there," she said tartly. "If it's Penny you're looking for."
I turned to face her. "Penny," I said, "or a clue to her whereabouts. We detectives are always looking for clues. Where is she, Mrs. Drilling?"
The woman faced me stiffly. "If I told you," she said, "you wouldn't believe me."
"Try me."
"She's out there, somewhere." Genevieve gestured toward the woods visible through the open trailer door. She hesitated briefly, then her words came with a rush: "You're the last man in the world I'd ask for help, but… but I have no choice. If I don't do exactly what they said, they'll kill her. If they even see me talking to you, they'll kill her."
"Who?"
She drew a long breath and said bitterly, "It's absolutely crazy. With… with everything else I've got working against me, I've got to run into a pair of escaped convicts! You can laugh any time, Mr. Clevenger. Laugh, why don't you? It's really very funny, isn't it? Oh, my God!"
It was what I'd begun to suspect, of course, but it wasn't a story a cynical private eye would be likely to buy right off the shelf. I stared at her hard-eyed, therefore, as if offended that she'd try such a silly yarn on me. The funny thing was that finding the glove in her dresser drawer seemed to make me capable of regarding her with greater tolerance than before. Now that I'd tracked down my solitary clue, I could stop thinking like a sleuth. I could remember that murder was really not my business. My job was to gain the confidence of this woman, not put her in the electric chair.
The sunshine striking through the doorway behind her brought out reddish lights in her thick hair. It occurred to me that with the red hair and the freckles and the general conformation of her face and figure-not to mention the maiden name of O'Brien-she was undoubtedly Irish. Well, they're a dark, unpredictable, high-tempered race, I'm told, but for some reason the thought disturbed me. What she was supposed to have done didn't really fit in with my notion of the behavior of a healthy Irish girl of reasonable intelligence and mental stability. Of course, some of the most normal-looking people I've known turned out to be real psychiatric specimens when the pressure came on, and there was no doubt this woman was under heavy pressure.
Still, she looked pretty strong and steady, standing there. She was wearing a dark, full-skirted cotton dress, which was a point in her favor. In my opinion, just about the only valid excuse for feminine pants is a horse or a pair of skis. Her legs were bare and she had on brown sneakers with white rubber soles. She was really a damn goodlooking woman. I couldn't help thinking it was a shame she was probably going to wind up dead or in jail-or in Russia, if that's where they were heading-just because she was a sucker for romance as represented by a slick undercover operator named Ruyter. When I didn't speak, she said, "I told you you wouldn't believe me."
I said, "It's pretty hard to accept, ma'am. Here you are, a lady on the lam, with an escort of at least two U.S. agents and one private op, and you want me to believe that a couple of cons just happened to pick your trailer to hide in? That's a pretty large coincidence."