The Cat Who Wasn't There Read online

  “Dammit! It means growing a beard again,” said the actor ruefully, rubbing his chin. “First it’s Henry VIII, then Abe Lincoln, and now this. How come I never get a chance to play Peter Pan?” He was a mild-mannered man, difficult to imagine as the murderous Macbeth.

  Carol said, “Qwill, this is Dwight Somers, who’s directing Macbeth. I don’t think you two have met . . . Dwight, Jim Qwilleran is better known as Qwill. You’ve seen his column, ‘Straight from the Qwill Pen,’ in the paper.”

  “I’ve heard a lot about you,” said the man with the neatly clipped beard, “and I enjoy your column. It’s always right on.”

  “Thanks. You’re new in Moose County. Where do you hail from?”

  “Most recently, from Iowa. Should I read that line with pride or apology?”

  “There’s nothing wrong with Iowa that couldn’t be fixed with a few Wisconsin lakes and Pennsylvania mountains,” Qwilleran said encouragingly. He liked Dwight Somers on sight; the man exuded an inner energy characteristic of theatre people. And his compliments did not go unnoticed; Qwilleran was vain about his writing.

  The foursome was joined by the other couple, the Comptons. Lyle was the tall, lanky, saturnine superintendent of schools; Lisa, who worked for Social Services, had dancing eyes and a sense of humor that contrasted with her husband’s dour demeanor. She asked, “Who’s taking care of your cats, Qwill?”

  “Mildred Hanstable. I hope she doesn’t overfeed them. They’re con artists when it comes to food . . . Are you two ready for a happy adventure in the Highlands?”

  With his usual scowl Lyle said, “I’m going to be happy if it kills me!”

  A young man with thinning hair walked into the parlor, a camera slung over his shoulder, and Qwilleran introduced him as the photographer from Lockmaster, John Bushland.

  “Call me Bushy,” he said congenially, stroking his nearly bald head.

  “How come you brought your camera and not your wife, Bushy?”

  “Well, you see, Vicki started a catering service this summer, and she has bookings she can’t cancel. What did you do about the cats, Qwill?”

  “They’re holding the fort in Pickax, with a live-in cook to cater their meals. I hated to leave them. I left some of my old sweaters lying around, so they can sit on them and not feel abandoned.”

  “That’s thoughtful of you,” said Carol Lanspeak, “but I suspect you’ll miss the cats more than they’ll miss you.”

  “You don’t need to tell me that, Carol. I’ve been bluffed and bullied by those two opportunists long enough to know.”

  Gradually the others arrived—the women in skirts and heels, the men in coats and ties. Mr. and Mrs. MacWhannell were a quiet couple, stiffly formal—a tall, portly man and a tiny birdlike woman. Arch Riker and Amanda Goodwinter had obviously had a headstart at a pub. Irma and Polly arrived with a large map of Scotland, which the red-haired waiter hung on the wall. Irma was, indeed, meticulously dressed and groomed, and her statuesque figure had a polished perfection that put the other women at a disadvantage.

  The map was an instant attraction, especially the west coast, fringed with firths, lochs, kyles, and isles. “Caused by glacial movement in the Ice Age,” the leader explained with authority.

  Someone asked, “How big is Scotland?”

  Before Irma could answer, a man’s voice came from the rear of the group—the chesty voice that goes with a portly figure. “The country is 30,414 square miles, smaller than South Carolina.”

  Everyone turned to gaze in speechless wonder at Whannell MacWhannell, accountant.

  In a small, fearful voice his wife asked him, “Do we have to drive over any mountains, Daddy?”

  “Not big ones, Mother,” he assured her.

  Amanda whispered, “Aren’t they a sweet couple? I may throw up!”

  The map brought forth a variety of comments:

  “Look! There’s the famous Loch Lomond!”

  “Hope we see the Loch Ness monster.”

  “Where are the distilleries?”

  The deep voice in the rear said, “There’s a famous railway bridge over the Firth of Forth, with two spans of 1,710 feet each and two of 690 feet. The tracks are 157 feet above the water.”

  Amanda groaned. “Big Mac is going to be the official bore on this trip.”

  Someone said quietly, “Put on your sunglasses, everybody. Here come the Chisholm sisters.”

  The two women who entered the parlor were older than the others in the group, both having white hair. One walked a few steps behind the other. In the lead was a short, stocky woman wearing a dazzling array of jewelry, her bosomy figure displaying it like a jeweler’s velvet tray.

  Carol confided to Qwilleran in a whisper, “It’s all the real thing! You should see her on Saturday night at the country club! She and Zella also collect teddy bears on a large scale.”

  He was no connoisseur of jewelry, but he was impressed by the strands of pearls twisted with chunky gold chains and clasped at the left collarbone with a spray of diamonds. Her sister—taller and thinner and plainer—wore a small gold teddy bear with ruby eyes.

  The pair headed directly toward him, and the bejeweled sister said in a raspy voice, “You’re Mr. Qwilleran! I recognized the moustache from your picture in the paper. We always read your column.” She looked up at him brightly. “I’m Grace Utley, and this is my sister, Zella. We’re Chisholms. You must have heard of the Chisholms. Our grandfather built the Moose County courthouse . . . yes!”

  “How do you do,” he said with a gracious bow. “My mother was a Mackintosh.”

  “We collect teddy bears!” she said, eagerly awaiting a newsman’s reaction to this newsworthy credential.

  “Very interesting,” he said stolidly.

  “Yes . . . We have a button-in-ear Steiff that’s very rare.”

  At that moment he was aware that Melinda Goodwinter was entering the parlor; he caught a whiff of her familiar perfume. As a doctor and a Goodwinter she was being greeted with suitable respect, but her eyes wandered around the room until she spotted Qwilleran. Within seconds she was at his side.

  “Hello, lover,” she said coolly.

  “Melinda, have you met Grace Utley and Zella Chisholm?” he asked. “Ladies, do you know Dr. Melinda Goodwinter?”

  “We do indeed . . . yes!” said Mrs. Utley. “How are you, dear heart? We were distressed to hear about your father. You have our deepest sympathy.”

  The waiter reappeared with his tray of champagne and orange juice, and while the older women were momentarily distracted, Melinda managed to draw Qwilleran aside, saying, “Alone at last! You’re looking great, lover!”

  “How did you like Boston?” he asked, avoiding any lingering eye contact. “It’s good of you to come back and take over your father’s clinic.”

  “Boston served its purpose, but I’m glad to be home. I heard you’ve converted the Klingenschoen barn, and you’re living in it.”

  “For a while, at any rate.”

  “Do you still have the cats?”

  “I provide their bed and board.” Koko, he recalled, had not cared for Melinda, always telling her to go home in his subtle, catly way. Trying to keep the conversation impersonal, Qwilleran asked, “How do you like Moose County’s new newspaper?”

  “Big improvement.” Melinda gulped the rest of her champagne. “Aren’t you the one who’s financing it?”

  “The Klingenschoen Foundation is behind it,” he corrected her. “Arch Riker is editor-and-publisher. Have you met him? He and I are old friends, and we’re sharing accommodations on this tour . . . Arch! Come over here!”

  The publisher caught the significance of the situation and rose to the occasion. “We met at the funeral,” he said when Qwilleran introduced him. “I’m glad you’re taking over your father’s practice, Melinda. We need all the doctors we can get. They keep inventing new diseases. I hope you brought your little black bag on this trip, in case anyone chokes on the porridge or gets bitten by a haggis . .
.”

  Good old Arch! Qwilleran thought. “May I bring you some champagne, Melinda?” he asked. Without waiting for an answer, he slipped away toward the bar and before he could complete his mission, Irma clapped hands for attention, and the group gathered around the map.

  “Welcome to Scotland,” she said. “I hope you will have a joyous time on the Bonnie Scots Tour. We’ll be traveling in Bonnie Prince Charlie country, a region brimming with history and romance.”

  Qwilleran heard a veiled grunt of protest from Lyle Compton.

  “Some of the places we’ll visit,” Irma went on, “are not open to the average tourist, and most of the inns are off the beaten path, but because of my connections we’ll be made welcome. I would like to make one suggestion at this time. For two weeks we’ll be traveling as one big happy family, and it would be friendly to alternate seats in the bus and at the table when we stop for meals. Is that agreed?”

  There was a vague murmur among the group.

  “Day One starts tomorrow morning at seven o’clock when we meet in the hotel coffee shop for breakfast. Your bags should be packed and outside the door of your room not later than six-thirty. I suggest you request wake-up calls for five-thirty to give you ample time.”

  Five-thirty! Qwilleran huffed into his moustache.

  Irma concluded her speech to polite applause, and Qwilleran grabbed Riker’s arm. “Round up Amanda and Polly, and let’s go to dinner,” he said. “I’ve found a good Indian restaurant. I’ll meet you in a taxi in front of the hotel.” He made a quick escape.

  The restaurant, in true Anglo-Indian style, had white tile floors, tinkling fountains, hanging brass lamps, an assertive aroma of curry, and a background of raga music played on the sarod, tabla, and tamboura. The plucked strings, rhythmic percussion, and hypnotic drone of the instruments provided a soothing background for conversation.

  Polly was looking handsome in her blue batwing cape, but Amanda—no matter how carefully she tried to dress—always looked as if she had just washed the car or cleaned the basement. Riker, with his bent sense of humor, thought it was part of her attraction.

  “What would it take,” she grumbled, “to get them to turn off the music and the fountains?”

  “Quiet, Amanda,” he said with amusement suffusing his ruddy face. “When in Glasgow, do as the Glaswegians do.”

  Qwilleran suggested ordering samosas with the drinks, saying they were meat-filled pastries. Then he recommended mulligatawny soup and a main course of tandoori murghi and pulao, with a side order of dal. “All spicy dishes, I don’t need to tell you,” he warned.

  “Why, this is nothing but roast chicken with rice and lentils,” Amanda announced when the entrée was served.

  Riker nudged her. “Just enjoy it, and don’t editorialize.” As conversation focused on the forthcoming tour, he remarked, “Compton really knows his Scottish history. He gave a talk at the Boosters Club last month.”

  “I hope he won’t be too argumentative,” Polly said with concern. “Irma accepts the romantic version of Scots history, but Lyle is a militant revisionist.”

  “I like the idea of having a historian on board,” Riker said. “Not to mention a professional photographer and a physician.”

  “Don’t you think Melinda is looking rather world-weary?” Polly asked. “Her eyes look strange.”

  “She’s stopped wearing green contacts and three sets of false eyelashes,” said her cousin Amanda with tart authority.

  “Will someone explain the Chisholm sisters?” Qwilleran asked.

  Amanda had the whole story. The Chisholms and the Utleys represented “old money” in Moose County, the former having rebuilt most of Pickax following the fire of 1869. The Utleys, as owners of fisheries, were several rungs down the social ladder but grew rich on trout and whitefish. Grace’s late husband invested the family fortune cleverly and, it was rumored, illegally, returning from mysterious business trips with lavish gifts of jewelry for his wife.

  Amanda grumbled, “You could buy a fifty-foot yacht with what she’s wearing around her neck, but she’s slow in paying her decorating bills . . . Yes!” she added mockingly.

  Over a dessert of gajar halva, which Amanda insisted was nothing but carrot pudding, the conversation turned to Charles Rennie Mackintosh.

  “He wore flowing silk ties and had a prominent moustache,” Qwilleran reported, preening his own, “and he liked cats.”

  “How do you know?”

  “There was one small clue in the Mackintosh house, which has been reconstructed by the university. The designer and his wife lived there in the early 1900s, and he had the guts to transform a Victorian townhouse into light, airy living spaces! In the drawing room everything is white—walls, carpet, fireplace, furniture, everything—except for two gray cushions on the hearth, for their two Persian cats.”

  “How charming!” Polly said. “Irma attended the art school he designed.”

  “I think his most daring innovation was a narrow chair with an extremely high back. He liked to use a grid pattern in wallpaper and furniture—also a small oval shape said to represent the eye of a peacock feather.”

  Amanda said, “Peacock feathers are bad luck. I wouldn’t have one in the house!”

  Too bad about that, Qwilleran thought. He had bought several silver brooches based on the Mackintosh peacock feather, to take home as gifts.

  The evening ended early; Day One would start at five-thirty.

  When the telephones jangled in certain hotel rooms at that hour, disgruntled travelers from Moose County got out of bed and stumbled about their rooms, making tea with their tea-makers. They dressed, packed, put their luggage out in the hall, and reported for breakfast at seven o’clock. No one was really hungry, and they were dismayed by the array of oatmeal, eggs, meat, fish, fruit, pancakes, scones, currant buns, oatcakes, bannocks, jams, marmalade, and more.

  “No waffles?” Amanda was heard to complain.

  Irma assured them that a full Scottish breakfast would be included with all their overnights. “So take advantage of it,” she advised. “For lunch we’ll just have a bowl of soup in a pub.”

  Amanda’s grim expression brightened.

  At eight o’clock the minibus was waiting in front of the hotel, with the luggage partly loaded in the baggage bins underneath. A red-haired man in a chauffeur’s cap was speaking angrily to Irma in a tongue that appeared to be Gaelic, the gist of his argument being that there was too much luggage to fit in the bins. A reassessment of the load indicated that Grace Utley, ignoring the limit on personal luggage, was traveling with three alligator bags plus an alligator carry-on. To make matters worse, she was half an hour late, a fact resented by passengers who had been up since five-thirty.

  “There’s one on every tour,” said Carol Lanspeak philosophically.

  Space was found in the passenger compartment for the surplus cases at the expense of rider comfort, and the culprit finally arrived, saying a blithe good-morning to everyone. She was wearing, with her sweater and slacks, some ropes of twisted gold from which dangled a fringe of gold and enamel baubles.

  The driver, a sullen man of about forty, was introduced as Bruce, and the bus pulled away from the hotel with Irma sitting on a cramped jumpseat at the front. Using a microphone, she described points of interest as they drove out of the city and into the countryside, while the passengers looked dutifully to right and to left until their necks ached. “In the distance is Ben Nevis, Britain’s highest mountain,” she would say, and Big Mac’s voice would come from the back of the bus: “Elevation 4,406 feet.” By the time they stopped for their bowl of soup, they were stunned into silence by the abundance of scenery and commentary.

  After lunch, their leader clapped hands for attention. “We shall soon be in Bonnie Prince Charlie country,” she told them. “For six months the handsome young prince was trapped like a fox pursued by hounds. After the defeat at Culloden he fled for his life, sometimes betrayed by treacherous friends and sometimes harbored b
y unexpected supporters attracted by his charisma.”

  “Charisma? Bunk!” Lyle Compton muttered to Qwilleran. “It was all politics!”

  “With a price on his head,” Irma went on, “he was trying desperately to escape to France. He slept in the bracken by day and traveled by night, stumbling across moors and through glens. Weary, tattered, and obviously defeated, he kept up his good spirits. After all, he was a prince, and the lovely Flora Macdonald fell in love with him and risked her life to smuggle him out of enemy territory.”

  Lyle spoke up, his voice crisp with exasperation. “Irma, you’ve been reading romantic novels and watching old movies! Charles was a liar, an alcoholic, and a fool! He made all kinds of tactical mistakes and had a talent for trusting the wrong aides and taking the advice of idiots. Flora Macdonald had no use for him, but she was pressured into the plot to rescue him—” He stopped abruptly and threw a sharp glance at his wife as if she had kicked him under the table.

  Irma’s face flushed and her eyes flashed, and Polly rushed in to fill the awkward silence. “What was the date of Culloden?” she asked, although she knew.

  “April 16, 1746,” Irma said, and big Mac rattled off some statistics.

  Later, Amanda said to Qwilleran, “Lyle had better watch his step. She’s already shot one man.”

  On that day, and the next, and the next, Irma herded the group through fishing villages, among ruins, aboard ferries, around rocky islands, across moors covered with purple heather, past granite quarries and peat bogs.

  “Where are the people? Where are the farmhouses?” Carol complained. “All we see is sheep!” Flocks of them grazed on the hillsides or crossed the road in front of the bus.

  Compton snorted and said to Qwilleran, “I could tell you what happened to the people, but Irma wouldn’t like it, and my wife would give me hell again.”

  At each rest stop the driver assisted women passengers off the bus in solemn silence, then wandered away for a cigarette while the travelers used the facilities and explored the gift shops. Qwilleran bought a tie in the Mackintosh tartan; Larry bought a staghorn cane that he said he might use in the play; Dwight Somers bought a tin whistle.