“Takes the actors a while to change, get their makeup off?”
“I’d guess.”
“So if we hurry, we might have a shot at catching Ellsworth before he leaves the Loghouse Theatre.”
“A shot,” Schanno agreed. “A long one.” He glanced at Meloux. “Unless we get lucky.”
FORTY-ONE
By the time we piled into the dinghy and began to row back to Trinky Pollard’s sailboat, the wind and rain had let up a bit. While Schanno and I pulled on the oars, Meloux used the flashlight to signal. Pollard was waiting for us as we drew alongside. When we were aboard, she tied the dinghy to a stanchion at the stern.
“So?” She turned to us expectantly.
“How quickly can you get us back to Thunder Bay?”
“Is someone after you?”
“Other way around, Trinky. There’s a man we need to get to. We know where he might be, but unless we get there fast, we could lose him.”
“Then let’s pull that anchor up and get under way.”
She used the engine to take us back. It was faster, she explained, than lifting the sails and tacking against the wind. The dinghy trailed behind at the end of its line. As we rode the black swells of the bay, I filled her in on what we’d discovered on Manitou Island.
“A stand-in? Why? And why so eccentric?”
“If Ellsworth really is our man and we can get to him, maybe we’ll have the answers.”
“In the meantime,” Pollard said, “why don’t you three go below and get out of the rain. I don’t have dry clothes to offer, but I’ve got a bottle of Glenlivet in the cupboard. It’ll brace you some, warm your innards anyway. I’ll let you know when we’re inside the marina breakwater. You can give me a hand docking.”
Schanno shook his big, wet head. “It doesn’t sit right with me, you up here alone.”
“I’m alone at this wheel most of the time,” she told him. “There’s nothing for you to do.”
“Keep you company at least.”
She seemed pleased. “If that’s what you want. But you two”-she nodded at Meloux and me-“no reason both of you need to stay out in the weather.”
I went below with the old Mide. I found the Scotch and offered it to Meloux, who declined. I decided against it, too. The water was rough, and although I hadn’t experienced any seasickness on the way over, I didn’t want to take any chances. We still had a lot ahead of us on the far side of the bay.
The swells knocked us about. Outside I couldn’t see anything but the black night and black rain and the white spray that hit the window. Meloux seemed oblivious to the pounding the sailboat was taking. Silent and as near to brooding as I’d ever seen him, he stared at his hands, folded in his lap.
Even though Wellington’s absence from Manitou Island was not my fault, I still felt as if I’d let Henry down. I’d given him false hope, led him to believe we’d find his son there. What we found were simply more questions. There might have been something hopeful in the fact that the madman I’d seen earlier probably wasn’t Henry Wellington but someone pretending to be him. But what did that say about the real Wellington, that he was willing to allow such an unattractive portrayal? He probably was nuts, though not necessarily in the way people believed.
Schanno opened the cabin door and stepped in. “We’re rounding the breakwater.”
“You were good company for Trinky?” I asked.
“Remarkable woman,” he said. “She’s thinking of sailing down the Saint Lawrence and the East Coast to the Caribbean next year.”
“Alone?”
“That’s what’s been holding her back. She’d like a mate.”
“Speaking nautically?”
Schanno gave me a sour look. “Topside now,” he said.
The breakwater had done its job, and the lake surface was relatively smooth as we entered the marina and docked. We tied up and hauled in the dinghy.
“I’ll deflate it later,” Pollard said. “Let’s get you to the Loghouse Theatre.”
“You know where it is?”
“In Thunder Bay, I know where everything is.”
“Lucky for us,” Schanno said and gave her a goofy, big-toothed grin.
We took my Bronco. Pollard sat up front with me and navigated. The Loghouse Theatre was in the old Fort William section of town. It took us fifteen minutes to get there. When we arrived, the parking lot was almost empty.
“Too late?” Schanno said.
“Lights are still on in the lobby. Let’s give it a try.”
The doors were locked, but we could see two kids inside, early twenties. The young man wore an old- fashioned white shirt with a black string tie, and his hair was slicked down and parted in the middle. The young woman wore a calico dress and had long gold curls with bangs. They were straightening up the lobby. I knocked on the glass of the front door.
The woman turned toward us and I saw her mouth the word closed.
“Please,” I called. “It’s important.”
Her chest heaved with a theatrically tired sigh, but she came to the door. The young man went on with his work.
“I’m sorry, folks,” she said as soon as she unlocked and opened up. “The performance is finished. We’re done for the night.”
She was pretty and heavily made up. Her golden Shirley Temple curls were a wig, I could see. One of the actors, I guessed.
“We’ve come a long way,” I told her. “We’d like to see Preston Ellsworth. Please. Even just for a minute.”
“You’re fans?” She sounded surprised.
“Yes. Fans. His biggest,” I said. “Even if we’re too late for the performance, could we at least get an autograph?”
“You want Preston Ellsworth’s autograph?” She glanced at the young man, who studiously avoided looking at her. “Well, okay, I’ll tell him,” she said. “Wait here.”
The kid with the slicked-down hair grabbed a Bissell sweeper and began to push it back and forth over the carpet with a crisp zip of the brushes inside. I turned away from the door where the young woman had gone. I wanted my back to Ellsworth when he walked in so I could surprise him and see the look on his face when he recognized me.
“Here we are,” said a cheery voice a minute later. “I understand you’ve come a long way.”
It didn’t sound like the same man who’d spoken to me at the mansion, but I supposed a good actor ought to be able to disguise his voice. I turned to him.
He was fiftyish, with a thin handsome face and pleasant gray eyes. He’d thrown on a tan sport coat over his white T-shirt and he wore jeans. His face was still heavily made up for performance. He appeared fit, not at all like the sickly madman in the white robe who’d screamed bloody murder when I’d approached him in the mansion. I’d thought the similarities would be obvious, but he looked so different. If he recognized me, he hid it well.
“Yes,” I said. “From the States.”
“Is that so?” He took in our wet clothes. “Did you swim here?” He smiled at his joke, showing beautiful, capped teeth. The teeth of the man on Manitou Island had been like moldy cheese. “Where in the States?”
“Minnesota,” I said. “But then, you already knew that.”
He looked puzzled, but still pleasant. “I did?” He shrugged it off. “Gloria said you were fans. Is that right?”
“Of one performance in particular,” I said. “I think you know which one.”
