THE CAT WHO SAW STARS_

The editor swiveled in his chair and poured a mugful. “Did you see our story on the backpacker, Qwill? A teacher in Sawdust City called and laid us out for quoting the fisherman verbatim instead of correcting his grammar. What we printed is exactly how he said it. Jill had it all on tape.”

“Pay no attention. She’s a crank,” Qwilleran said. “There’s nothing wrong with a little local color to relieve the monotony of good English.”

“I’m with you,” Junior said. “Then a guy called and complained because Hawley’s wife was quoted as speaking better than her husband. He called it gender bias.”

“I’ve met them both! That’s the way they speak, for Pete’s sake! I’m glad I don’t have your job, Junior.”

“The Sawdust City woman wants us to start running a column on correct speech instead of wasting so much space on sports.’ I quote.”

“No one would read it.”

“It would have to be chatty, like Ann Landers… Well, anyway, what are you doing for the Fourth?”

“Leaving for a month’s vacation at the beach.”

“Are you taking the cats?”

“Of course! The beach is Cat Heaven! The screened porch is their Cloud Nine! I go up there for peace and quiet. They go for sounds and sights: squawking gulls, peeping sandpipers, cawing crows, chipping chipmunks! And everything moves: birds, butterflies, grasshoppers, waving beach grass, splashing waves…”

“Sounds like fun,” Junior said. “And what will you be doing?”

“Reading, loafing1 biking, walking on the beach…”

“Can you file your copy from up there?”

“What?”

“Does anyone have a fax machine you can use?”

“You forget I’m going on vacation. I haven’t had one since God-knows-when.”

“But you know the readers have fits if your column doesn’t run… And you boast you can write it with one hand tied behind your back.”

“Well… only because it’s your birthday.”

“Did you read Jill’s piece about the new restaurant up there?”

“Yes, and I’m looking forward to checking it out. The new summer theater, too.”

“Friday is opening night,” Junior said. “How’d you like to review the play for us?” He caught Qwilleran’s dour glance. “I know it’s your vacation, but you’re a writer, and writers write - the way other people breathe. How about it, Qwill? You can review a play blindfolded.”

“Well… I’ll think about it.”

Before leaving the building, Qwilleran stopped in the publisher’s office. He and Arch Riker had been lifelong friends and fellow journalists Down Below. Both had adapted to country living, but Arch had gone so far as to marry a local woman. Now his naturally florid face glowed with midlife contentment, and his paunchy midriff was getting paunchier. Mildred Riker was food writer for the paper.

Qwilleran asked, “Have you two moved to your beach house?”

“Sure have! It’s a longer commute but worth it. There’s something about the lake air that’s invigorating.”

And intoxicating, Qwilleran thought; the locals are all a little balmy, and the summer people soon get that way. He said, “I’m packing up the cats and moving up there myself this afternoon. Polly will be gone all month, you know.”

Riker had his Mildred, and Qwilleran had his Polly Duncan. She was the director of the Pickax Public Library, and the possibility of their marriage was widely discussed in the community. Both preferred their individual lifestyles, however, and let it be known that their cats were incompatible.

Riker said, “Why don’t you come and have dinner with us tonight? The Comptons will be there, and Mildred is doing her famous coddled pork chops.”

“What time?”

“About seven… What do you think about the Fishport mystery? Have you heard the rumor about the Hawleys?”

“Yes, and I won’t dignify it with a comment.” “Personally,” Riker said, “I think it’s all a publicity stunt trumped up by the chamber of commerce to promote tourism.”

Qwilleran could never leave downtown without stopping at the used bookstore. He collected pre-owned classics as others in his financial bracket collected Van Goghs. Currently he was interested in Mark Twain. Coming from bright sunlight into the gloomy shop, he saw dimly. There was movement on a tabletop; that was Winston, the dust-colored longhair, flicking his tail over the biographies. There were sounds in the back room and the aroma of frying bacon; that was Eddington Smith preparing his lunch.

A bell had tinkled on the door, and the old gray bookseller came out eagerly to meet a customer. “Mr. Q! I’ve found three more for you, all with good bindings: Connecticut Yankee, A Horse’s Tale, and Jumping Frog. Mark Twain lectured up here once, my father told me, so his books were popular. Two or three show up in every estate liquidation.”

“Well, keep your eyes peeled for the titles I want, Ed. I’m going on vacation for a few weeks.”

“Do you have plenty to read? I know you like Thomas Hardy, and I just found a leatherbound edition of Far from the Madding Crowd. My father used that expression often, and I never knew that he got it from Thomas Hardy.”

“Or Thomas Gray,” Qwilleran corrected him. “Gray said it first - in Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard.”