Cat Who Went Up the Creek

“In what is now the Black Forest Conservancy—and off limits to prospectors. But in those days, you could cut down trees, camp out, shoot deer in season and rabbits all year round. It was called the Black Forest because of the black bears that made their habitat there, but the only one I ever saw is the stuffed specimen at the Black Bear Café. Nowadays, if you were dumb enough to shoot a bear, they’d shoot you and stuff you.”

“The pasties were served, and Qwilleran asked him more questions. “How did you know where to dig for gold?”

“Everyone knew. There was an old belief that three veins of gold ran under the Black Creek, and every generation got excited about it. Then, when no one struck it rich, it would die down until another old codger starting telling stories.”

Forks were not served, and the pasties required two hands and one’s full attention.

Then Qwilleran said, “Should I know about the brawl at the Hotel Booze?”

“It isn’t all rough stuff,” Thornton said. “There’s laughing, kidding around, singing, jigging, and a lot of boasting. Roger MacGillivray has done a pile of research and is coaching them on the slang of the period.”

“Is there a script?”

“It’s all ad lib, but each team has been doing its act over and over again.”

“Do guns figure in the show?”

“It wasn’t a gun culture. Fisticuffs! In the lumber camps, fighting and drinking were forbidden. The bosses preserved law and order with their fists. However, in the sawdust towns the saloonkeeper would be likely to have a gun for business reasons.”

“Do you know some of the lingo?” Qwilleran asked.

Thornton did. That man knew everything. “We’ve given our members a glossary of slang terms that were common in those days. I’ve brought you a copy.”

Qwilleran glanced at it. If a man was “sluiced,” he was killed. If he had “smallpox,” he’d been in a fight and had been stomped by caulks—the steel pins loggers wore on their boots to keep from slipping off logs. If a lumberjack was “gonna get m’teeth fixed,” he was going to visit a prostitute. There were other expressions, too, all equally colorful.

Thornton said, “When you see the show, bear in mind that lumberjacks in 1860 were young men in their teens and early twenties. One camp had a cook who was only twelve years old. . . . And they lived dangerously. They were killed by falling trees, drowned while riding logs down a rushing stream, and maimed by runaway saw blades in the mills. Undertakers couldn’t make the pine boxes fast enough!”

“Is that why they drank themselves silly on Saturday night?” Qwilleran asked.

“And learned to take death lightly. My great-grandfather cut names and epitaphs on gravestones at two bits a word. If the victim had no money in his pocket, his buddies chipped in to buy him a headstone with the kind of raffish epitaph he would have liked.

“This will explain the finale of the reenactment when you see it. Some of the audience will be disturbed.”

“What is the finale?”

“Wait and see,” Thornton said.

alt="[image]"/>Before leaving the parking lot of the Nasty Pasty, Qwilleran phoned his attorney’s office. G. Allen Barter was his representative in all matters pertaining to the Klingenschoen Foundation, sparing him trips to Chicago, board meetings and routine decisions. The two men were in complete accord about the goals and policies of the K Fund.

Qwilleran said, “I suppose you have Saturdays off, unlike us overworked columnists.”

“I thought you were on vacation, Qwill. When I read your column today, I assumed the squirrels had written it for you!”

“Don’t be too surprised. They’re smarter than you think.”

“Do you have something in mind for Saturday?” Barter asked.

“Yes. Lunch at the Nutcracker Inn. They have the best Reuben sandwich this side of the Hudson River.”

“Good! Do I dare inquire of your ulterior motive?”

“I’d like some information on the Black Forest Conservancy.”

“Shall I bring the files?”

“Only those between your ears, Bart.”

Before leaving for the opera Friday night, Qwilleran played the video that Hannah had lent him. He was familiar with the plot, characters and songs, but it refreshed his memory. Koko was duly impressed, yowling—in either pleasure or pain—at the rousing opening number: Oh it is a glorious thing to be a pirate king! Yum Yum expressed her boredom by sitting with her back to the screen and twitching her ears.

No opening night on Broadway could surpass in excitement the event that took place in the auditorium of the Mooseland high school. Everyone dressed for a very special occasion, a few in long dresses and dinner jackets. The lobby was conversational bedlam, since everyone knew someone in the cast: relative, friend, neighbor, coworker, customer, patient or parishioner.

The parking lot was jammed, and Qwilleran used his press card in order to park with the dignitaries and handicapped. The lobby was teeming with showgoers too excited to go to their seats. Qwilleran pushed through the crowd, nodding and saluting.