sitting in the Volkswagen parked beside the wet campground road, not far from the silver trailer in space twenty-three, I had plenty of time to review the conversation, memorize the description of Hans Ruyter I'd been given, and work out the final details of the story I was about to spring on the Drilling duo, mother and daughter.  Then I saw the kid coming through the rain.  She was about what I'd expected from the advance publicity.  The bare knees were perhaps not quite as knobby as I'd feared they would be, but to make up for it the brown hair was rolled up on those big cylindrical curlers that have practically replaced hats for street wear.  I suppose it's stuffy and oldfashioned of me to feel that a girl with her hair pinned up belongs at home, but as far as I'm concerned, she can even stay out of the living room if there's company in the house.

The headful of parallel cylinders made Penelope Drilling look like a topheavy little robot ready to tune in on messages from outer space.  Covering the electronic receiving apparatus was a kind of nightcap of transparent plastic to keep the rain off, rigged to tie under the chin.  There was a tiny kid face with big stary eyes behind hornrimmed glasses.  The mouth, clumsily lipsticked, looked a little strained from closing over the metal that would eventually give her nice straight teeth, just as the stuff on her head would eventually give her nice curly hair.  Atom bombs or no, she obviously had a lot of faith in the future, this kid.  She was willing to forever look like hell today so she could look swell tomorrow.

She was wearing a rather short yellow raincoat and yellow rubber boots.  She'd been over to the camp laundry - I'd seen her go before I moved into position - and she had a bundle of clothes in her arms.  She came splashing along the road at a coltish run, hurrying to get out of the rain, and pulled up, startled, when I stepped out of the Volks in front of her.

"Miss Drilling?" I said.

She eyed me suspiciously and asked, "What do you want?"  She started to sidle around me so she'd have a straight run for the trailer if I tried to bite her.

I said, "If you're Penelope Drilling, I have a message for you."

"I can't talk to you," she said, with a glance toward the trailer.  Then she asked quickly, "A message?  Who's it from?''

"Your father."

"Daddy?  What does he -"

"Penny!"

That was a woman's voice, from the trailer door.  I suppose I should have felt very clever.  I'd carefully picked a spot where Mrs. Drilling could see me accosting her daughter if she just glanced out the window.  She'd reacted as I'd hoped, but I felt kind of disgusted with the whole business.  Why hadn't the damn woman left her child out of it, if she had to go playing secret games with secret men and secret documents?  And come to that, why hadn't I figured out an approach that didn't involve telling lies to a fifteen-year-old kid?  I had no messages for her from anybody.

The girl gave me a glance and a kind of shrug.  She ran off, hugging her armload of laundry.  I hurried after her and got there as, having shooed her daughter inside, Genevieve Drilling was struggling to close the double door of the trailer they put the screen door inside so it won't get beat up while driving, and it occasionally makes for a little awkwardness.

"Mrs. Drilling?" I said.

She started to open the screen to retrieve the outer door, which had failed to catch, but thought better of it.  "All right," she said wearily.  "All right, what do you want?  As if I didn't know!"

"May I come in?"

"I see no reason why you should."