"Agent Davenport," he drawled. He spoke slowly, with the same whispery voice that Ignace had described. Lucas tried to penetrate it: husky, a middle tenor; Gould it be a woman? "That was you that chased me through that crick, wasn't it?" Lucas was astonished. The question froze him, and he asked, inanely, "Where are you?"
"Out here in the woods where I always am. Miz Peterson is still okay. Well, she wouldn't say that, I guess. I had me a little pussy before dinner. And after dinner. And for dessert. She's right here. You want to talk to her?"
Not a woman. A woman wouldn't talk like that-unless she were very, very manipulative. "Listen, man, you really need, our help…" Lucas felt absolutely stupid as he said it.
"Nah, I'm doing okay. I thought you had me there for a minute, those first two cops, and then you. When I got loose I heard them talk-ing about you on my scanner, said you almost wrecked your truck in that crick. I wondered what happened to you. I hit that sonbitch just right, I guess. Never saw it-nothing but luck." "Listen, Mr. Pope…"
"Didn't call me no Mr. Pope when you had my ass in St. John's. But listen, don't you want to talk to Miz Peterson? She was in the back the whole time. Here… Miz Peterson. This is the law. Talk to him…"
There was the sound of flesh against flesh, as though somebody had been slapped, the tenor, "Talk to him, bitch," and then a dry, ragged woman's voice, "Help me…"
"That's good enough," Pope said in his whisper. "We gotta go." And then: "Well, it's been fun, but I gotta say good-bye, Agent Davenport."
"You gotta…"
Click.
LUCAS WAS SCREAMING at the co-op center, and they came back: "The cell's in Owatonna. It's Peterson's. He got around you and went straight south."
"Get the goddamned people moving around there, get them moving…"
"They're moving now, everything we've got."
Five hours later, Lucas was on a dirt road west of Owatonna when he got a call from the Blue Earth County Sheriff's Department. There were a couple of clicks and he was patched through: "Lucas, this is Gene Nordwall, I'm down south of Mankato, little west of Good Thunder."
"Gene, you heard?"
"Yeah. We found her," he said.
"You found her?" Lucas asked. "She's alive?"