Pearl, who had been watching alertly all the while, turned and sat down facing the front again. "Nothing," she said. "You've shaken him."
"I was lucky," Joe observed. "Got every break. Now we will take a few byways for awhile, and then take a look at the map and see where we are. We can get to your mother's by another route. We'll get there late tonight, but at least we've lost the Devil for awhile—if that's who he was."
"Who else would it have been?" asked Pearl.
"Ed Sullivan, trying to sell another Mercury," joked Joe. But deep inside him he didn't feel humorous. Did the Devil have a way of knowing where they were? This first time it was conceivable that he'd caught them leaving the house, and had followed them all the way. But if he hadn't, then he had some other way of knowing, and if that was true, they wouldn't really have ditched him. He'd pick up the trail again, and all his evasive tactics would have been in vain.
"He must have followed us from the house," said Pearl suddenly.
Joe looked at her. "You've been thinking the same thing I have," he said. "I hope that's how he found us!"
"I hope so too," said Pearl.
"Daddy, I'm hungry," said Jimmy from the back seat.
"Okay, son. But you'll have to wait until we find a town. Then we'll stop at a restaurant."