Cat Who Went Up the Creek

Qwilleran said, “I say this is only a gimmick—something to show friends. I say he was after the big stuff, and they were packed in his car when it was stolen—along with a pickax and diving equipment and a wet suit. Diving for gold is a current craze in other parts of the country, I’ve read. And, I’m sure you know, the locals have always talked about several veins of gold under the Black Creek. No doubt he was on the bank of the creek when someone hit him on the head and threw him in the water!”

“This would make a good movie—better than the one I saw tonight for the third time.”

“No doubt he’s been driving his car onto 1124, then down one of the side trails to the creek. Someone knew about it—probably a partner, who knew he was about to leave. Perhaps the partner had come up with Hackett from Down Below.”

“Glad to know the skunk was not one of us,” Andy said, still reluctant to take the story seriously.

“The question is, why did Hackett falsify everything on the inn’s guest register? Because he had found out, somehow, that ‘exploitation of minerals’ in the Black Forest Conservancy is now outlawed. He was trying to make one more haul before the forest rangers started policing the gold fields. . . . Let me refresh your drink, Andy. . . . Try this Roquefort. It’s the real thing.”

The chief left with the shoes wrapped in newspaper and instructions to tell state detectives they had overlooked them during the forensic search. “Tell them the innkeeper turned them over to you—and you suspected something fishy about the left shoe. Leave me out of it! . . . Then they can piece together their own scenario. Personally, I think mine was pretty good!”

chapter ten

Although Qwilleran missed his nightly telephone chats with Polly, he missed her most on weekends. Only two Sundays ago they had breakfasted on black walnut pancakes, driven to the lakeshore for a long walk on the strand, dined memorably at the Boulder House Inn—all the while enjoying long discussions about nothing much.

He remembered her telling how she memorized sonnets to recite aloud while doing boring tasks around the house. She knew twenty by heart: Shakespeare (“When to the sessions of sweet silent thought”) and Wordsworth (“Earth has not anything to show more fair”). She favored sonnets because they were only fourteen lines, and the rhyme scheme made them easy to memorize. Also, she found the rhythm of iambic pentameter comforting. “If Wordsworth were alive today,” she said, “I’d invite him to lunch.”

And he remembered her surprise to learn that only four American presidents have found the moustache appropriate: Theodore Roosevelt, Grover Cleveland, Chester K. Arthur, and William Howard Taft. (Arthur had sideburns that all but overshadowed his moustache.) Four presidents had full beards, including lip whiskers: Ulysses S. Grant, Rutherford B. Hayes, James A. Garfield, and Benjamin Harrison. Since 1913 presidents have been clean-shaven.

Now Polly was . . . where? . . . drinking navy grog with a strange man—although not too strange; they were on first-name terms.

Sunday without Polly was bad enough; Sunday without The New York Times was unthinkable. He phoned the drugstore in Pickax with instructions to save a copy. Meanwhile he put the Siamese through their paces with the battered necktie, groomed them until their fur glistened, and read aloud from a book he found on the shelf above the sofa: Uncle Wiggly’s Story Book. It was copyrighted in 1921 and had the original pen-and-ink sketches and luscious color plates.

He read them the story about a rich cat who rode around in a chauffeured convertible. They listened raptly to the well-bred mewing and purring of the cat, the squeaking of her mousey servants, the yipping of the dogs who chased her up a tree when her car lost a wheel, and the gentlemanly tones of the elderly rabbit in top hat and gloves who came to her rescue.

Then Qwilleran drove to Pickax for his newspaper. On the way back he recognized the pickup ahead of him. He flashed his headlights, passed it and turned off on the shoulder. The truck pulled up behind, and the two drivers jumped out and shook hands. It was Ernie Kemple, retired insurance agent and active volunteer.

“Ernie! I hear you’re riding high!”

“Qwill, you don’t know what I’ve been through!” His booming voice had regained its verve. “D’you have time for a cuppa at the Dismal Diner?”

The Dimsdale Diner deserved its nickname. It was a converted boxcar at a country crossroads, dilapidated inside and out. The coffee was awful. But the weedy parking lot was always full of pickups and vans as farmers and businessmen dropped in for smokes, snacks, laughs, and shared information. There was a large table at one end where they hung out.

Qwilleran and Kemple sat at the counter and had coffee served in a styrofoam cup and a doughnut served on a paper napkin.

The voices at the big table were lusty:

“Skeeters don’t bother me none. It’s those blasted ticks!”