Cat Who Went Up the Creek

The tape recorder was set up on the snack table, and the following interview was later transcribed:

What prompted you to write a romantic family history instead of a genealogical chart?

I couldn’t see myself trekking to county courthouses around the country and searching for births and deaths and marriages. But I loved the stories my great-aunt told about our family, going back to about 1800. When she died, she left a trunkful of old personal correspondence that none of the cousins wanted, so my mother took it and stashed it away in the attic.

Then one day my husband and I were driving through the Ohio countryside, and we came to an intersection where a farm was being cleared for a strip mall. The sign said there would be a full-service gas station, two fast food places, a laundromat and a video store. The outbuildings were already knocked down, and they were working on the farmhouse itself—a large, plain two-story colonial. The front door had been removed, and the sash had disappeared from the windows. It had a ghostly look. But something caused me to shout “Stop! Stop!” I wasn’t yelling at the wreckers; I was telling my husband to stop the car.

We parked on the shoulder, and I saw a heartrending sight. A dump truck was backed up to the end of the building, and another was standing by. They had put a chute in an upstairs window and were throwing personal belongings into the dump truck: clothing, hats, shoes, underwear, stockings, cosmetics, hair brushes, framed photos, books, towels, bedding, lamps, a small radio, and then . . . a cardboard hatbox! Its cover fell off, and hundreds of letters flew out. The breeze scattered them all over the muddy lot.

I’d been controlling my horror and tears, but I broke down when I saw those letters in the mud. Doyle thought I was crazy. I didn’t know who had lived there, worn those clothes, read those books, saved those letters, but I cried my eyes out!

That’s when I took over my great-aunt’s trunkful of correspondence. I’m reading and cataloguing every one: date, names and addresses of senders and recipients, and type of content.

Organizing all this material into a cohesive history sounds like a huge undertaking.

It’s a challenge. First I’m absorbing all the events and emotions. Then I’ll decide whether to make it the story of a real family . . . or fictionalize it.

But first . . . I’m overwhelmed with the joys and sorrows, successes and failures, pioneer struggles to make a life, and crushing disasters. Those people even found humor in everyday life: an uncle being chased by a bull; a cousin marooned in a tree all night; an aunt ruining the stew when the preacher was coming to dinner.

Do you find the handwriting legible?

More so than my own! Penmanship was important in those days. They dipped a pen in ink and wrote slowly and carefully. Also, letters were formal and sometimes poetic.

When I get home, I’ll photocopy a couple of letters, Qwill, and send them to you.

After the tape recorder had been turned off, and Wendy had been complimented on a well-told tale, she said, “I phoned my mother in Cleveland last night while Doyle was at the art center. She knows about my compulsion to worry, and she approved your strategy to divert Doyle’s attention from forays into the woods. But when he returns from Chicago—then what? She suggested that we leave here this weekend and spend a few days at the Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island—a kind of second honeymoon, and a kind of second wedding present from her and Dad.”

“A splendid idea,” Qwilleran said, “although we’ll miss you both.”

alt="[image]"/>He took his Tuesday copy to the inn to be faxed before the noon deadline, and Lori gave him another picture postcard. It was another view of Sturbridge Village.

Dear Qwill—Love this place. Bought lots of things to ship home. Mona having reaction to allergy medication. If she flies home, I’ll turn in our rental car and travel with Walter.

Love from Polly

Interesting development, he thought. Not once had she said, “Wish you were here.”

“Everything okay?” Lori asked.

“Everything’s fine.”

“We’re losing the Underhills.”

“Too bad. Nice couple.”

“Why can’t we have more Underhills and fewer Truffles?”

In the foyer, a new exhibit was being set up in the display case. Susan Exbridge, the antiques dealer, was officiating. It was an assortment of wood carvings, bowls, metal sculptures of animals and what looked like instruments of torture. A sign in the case described it as THE NUTCRACKER INN’S COLLECTION OF NUTCRACKERS.

“Qwill darling!” Susan exclaimed in her histrionic manner. “How do you like it?”

“They must have had a lot of nuts in those days.”

“Nuts were a staple food of early American settlers,” she said.

“I thought they just bashed them between a rock and a hard place.”