“I see. Well, Janet, you’ve done a great deal and I appreciate it very much.” I hesitated a second. “Do me one favor, though—if you hear anything suspicious, call me from home. Could you do that much?”

“I suppose,” she said doubtfully. “Although I don’t really know what I would hear.”

“Probably nothing. Just on the chance that you do,” I said patiently. We hung up and I massaged my sore left shoulder. Somewhere among the hundreds of books that lined Lotty’s walls must be an atlas. I started in the living room and worked my way along. I found a pre-World War II map of Austria, a 1941 Guide to the London Underground, and an old U.S. atlas. None of them showed anyplace along the Great Lakes called Thunder Bay. That was a big help.

Finally I called a travel agent and asked if there were any flights between Chicago and Thunder Bay. Air Canada had one flight a day, leaving Toronto at 6:20, arriving at 10:12 P.M. I’d have to take a 3:15 flight to Toronto.

“How far away is that, anyway?” I demanded. That was seven hours of travel. The travel agent didn’t know. Where was Thunder Bay? In Ontario. The agent didn’t know any more than that but agreed to make a reservation on the next day’s flight for me. Two hundred fifteen dollars to spend seven hours in an airplane—they ought to pay me. I charged it to my American Express account, tickets to be picked up tomorrow at O’Hare.

I looked for Thunder Bay on the Canadian side of the Great Lakes but still couldn’t find it. I guessed I’d know when I got there.

The rest of the day I spent in a whirlpool at the Irving Park Y, the poor person’s health club. I pay ninety dollars a year to use the pool and the Nautilus room. The only other people who go there are earnest youths intent on building perfect biceps or catching a game of basketball—no racquetball courts, no bars, no disco lights, and no hot pink warm-up outfits with designer labels.

Chapter 15

The Frozen North

The ticket agent at Air Canada told me Thunder Bay was Canada’s westernmost port on Lake Superior. I asked him why it hadn’t shown up on my map and he shrugged indifferently. One of the flight attendants was more helpful. On the way to Toronto she explained that the town used to be called Port Arthur; the name had been changed about ten years ago. I made a mental note to buy Lotty a modern atlas as a hostess present.