The Cat Who Knew A Cardinal

-6-

Dennis Hough - creator of the spectacular barn renovation and darling of the Theatre Club - had let himself into the apple barn Tuesday afternoon, using the hidden key. Then he climbed to the upper balcony, threw a rope over a beam, and jumped from the railing.

Brodie himself responded when Qwilleran made his grisly discovery and called the police. The chief strode into the barn saying, "What did I tell you? What did I tell you? This is the man who killed VanBrook. He couldn't live with himself!"

"You've got it wrong," Qwilleran said. "Let me play you a tape. Dennis arrived at his apartment early Sunday morning, following the party, and checked his answering machine for messages. This is what he heard."

There followed a woman's voice, bitter and vindictive. "Don't come home, Dennis! Not ever! I've filed for divorce. I've found someone who'll be a good daddy for Denny and a real husband for me. Denny doesn't even know you any more. There's nothing you can say or do, so don't call me. Just stay up north and have your jollies."

Qwilleran said, "Do you want to hear it again?"

"No," Brodie said. "How did you get this?"

"I had access to his apartment, just as he had access to this barn. I found the message this afternoon and taped it to disprove your theory. Dennis didn't know he was under suspicion - or even that VanBrook had been killed, probably. He was overwhelmed by his own private tragedy."

Brodie grunted and massaged his chin. "We'll have to notify that woman as next of kin."

"I'll be willing to do it," said Qwilleran, who prided himself on his comforting and understanding manner in notifying the bereaved. He punched a number supplied by directory assistance, and when a woman's voice answered he said in his practiced tone of sincerity and concern, "Is this Mrs. Hough?" The fact that he pronounced it correctly was in his favor.

"Yes?" she replied.

"This is Jim Qwilleran, a friend of your husband, calling from Pickax - "

"I don't want to talk to any friend of that skunk!" she screamed into the phone and banged down the receiver.

Qwilleran winced. "Did you hear that, Andy?"

"Gimme the phone." Brodie punched the same number, and when she answered he said in his official monotone, "This is the police calling. Your husband is dead, Mrs. Hough. Suicide. Request directions for disposition of the: body... Thank you, ma'am."

He turned to Qwilleran. "I won't repeat what she said. The gist of it is - we can do what we please. She wants no part of her husband, dead or alive."

Qwilleran said, "His friends in the Theatre Club will handle everything. I'll call Larry Lanspeak."

"I'll take the tape," Brodie said. "Just keep it quiet. He was never declared a suspect, so there's no need to deny the rumor. Let the public think what they want; we'll continue the investigation."

While the emergency crew and medical examiner went about their work, Qwilleran notified one person about the suicide, and that was Hixie. "You'll hear it on the six o'clock news," he said. "Dennis has taken his life." He waited for her hysterical outburst to subside and then said, "Don't mention the message from his wife to anyone, Hixie. Those are Brodie's orders. When he finds the real killer, Dennis will be cleared."

At six o'clock a brief announcement on WPKX stated: "A building contractor - Dennis Hough, thirty, of St. Louis, Missouri - died suddenly today IN... a Pickax barn... he had recently... remodeled. No details... are... available." The name of the deceased was pronounced Huck. "Died suddenly" was a euphemism for suicide in the north country.

Qwilleran was loathe to imagine the anguish of his friend's private moments preceding his desperate act. He thought: If I had been here, I could have prevented it. Qwilleran's own life had once been in ruins. He knew the shock of a suddenly failed marriage, the pain of rejection, the guilt, the sense of failure, the hopelessness. He skipped dinner, finding the thought of food nauseating, and fed the Siamese in their loft apartment. Koko, who knew something extraordinary had been happening, was determined to escape and investigate, but Qwilleran brought him down with a lunging tackle.

Down on the main level he turned on the answering machine; he wished no idle gossip, no prying questions. Then he shut himself in his studio, away from the sight of those overhead beams, that fireplace cube, and those triangular windows. He tried to lose himself in the pages of a book. As he delved farther and farther into the Backhouse biography, it occurred to him that the life of the mysterious VanBrook would be equally fascinating. The mystery of the man's personality and background, whether resolved or not, would be intensified by his violent death. The search for the killer, sidetracked by false suspicions, would add another dimension of suspense.

There was a violent storm that night. Gale winds from Canada swept across the big lake and joined with heavy rain to lash the rotting apple trees. By morning, the orchard was a wreck, and Trevelyan Trail was a ribbon of mud. Qwilleran called the landscape service, requesting a clean-up crew and truckloads of crushed stone.

Then he showered and shaved in a hurry and fed the cats without ceremony. It was Wednesday, and he hoped to escape before the vigorous Mrs. Fulgrove arrived to dust, vacuum, polish, and deliver her weekly lecture. This week her topics would undoubtedly be murder and suicide, in addition to her usual tirade about the abundance of cat hair. He succeeded in avoiding her and even had time for coffee and a roll at Lois's Luncheonette before reporting to the back door of Amanda's Studio of Interior Design.

He was met by a distraught young woman. "Dad told me about it!" Fran cried. "He wouldn't discuss motive, but everyone says it means that Dennis killed VanBrook."

Irritably Qwilleran said, "What everyone in Pickax says, thinks, feels, knows, or believes is of no concern to me, Fran."

"I know how you must feel about it, Qwill. I'm distressed, too. Dennis and I worked so compatibly on the barn. I'll miss him."

"Larry is arranging the funeral. There'll be a private service in the Dingleberry chapel for a few friends, then burial next to his mother."

Fran asked, "How is Polly reacting?"

"We haven't discussed it," he said.

"Are you two getting along all right?" she asked with concern.

"Why do you want to know?" he asked sharply.

"Well, you know... she wasn't there at the barn Saturday night... and then someone saw you at Tipsy's on Sunday - with another woman, they said."

Qwilleran huffed into his moustache angrily. "Okay, where are the cartons? How many do you have to deliver? Let's get the van loaded!"

On the short drive to Goodwinter Boulevard the designer said, "Hilary's neighbors will have their telescopes out. They'll be sure I'm looting a dead man's house."

"I gather that snooping is a major pastime in Pickax."

"You don't know the half of it! There are two busy-bodies who make it their lifework to spy and pry and spread rumors. But if you meet them on the post office steps, they're so sweet!"

"Who are they?"

"I'll give you a couple of clues," Fran said teasingly. "One wears a plastic rainhat even when the sun is shining, and the other calls everyone Dear Heart."

"Thanks for warning me," Qwilleran said. "Was Hilary a good customer of yours?"

"He didn't buy much, but he liked to come in to the studio and look around and tell us things that we already knew. He considered himself an authority on everything. He bought a lamp once, and we upholstered a chair for him last year, but the screens are the first big order I wrote up. And then this had to happen!"

"I suppose your father got a search warrant and went into the house."

"I don't know," she said coolly.

"Does he know you're delivering merchandise?"

"No, but Dear Heart will see that he finds out. Actually, Qwill, Dad and I haven't been on good terms since I moved into my apartment."

"Too bad. Sorry to hear it." Fran parked in the rear of the house, and they started to unload. The interior was similar to others on Goodwinter Boulevard: large, square rooms with high ceilings, connected by wide arches; heavy woodwork in a dark varnish; a ponderous staircase lavished with carving and turnings; tall, narrow windows. But instead of the usual heirloom furniture and elaborate wallcoverings, the main rooms were white-walled and sparsely furnished with tatami floor matting, low Oriental tables, and floor cushions. There were a few pieces of porcelain, two Japanese scrolls, and a folding screen decorated with galloping fat-rumped horses. The only false note was the use of heavy draperies smothering the windows.

Fran explained, "Hilary was replacing the draperies with shoji screens so he could have light as well as privacy. He was quite secretive about his life- style."

"How could he live like this?" Qwilleran himself required large, comfortable chairs and a place to put his feet up.

"I believe he slept on a futon down here, but he said he had a study upstairs as well as rooms for books and hobbies."

Hobbies! Qwilleran found himself speculating wildly. "Okay if I look around?"

"Sure, go ahead," she said. "I'll be opening the cartons and putting each screen where it belongs. They were all custom-made, you know. We're talking about ten thousand dollars here, and God knows how long we'll have to wait to collect."

Qwilleran walked slowly up the impressive staircase, thinking about the ninety thousand books Compton had mentioned. He wondered if the collection included City of Brotherly Crime. He wondered if the books were catalogued. When he started opening doors, however, his hopes wilted; the books had never been unpacked. He went from room to room and found hundreds of sealed cartons of books - or so they were labeled.

Only one room was organized enough to have bookshelves, and they covered four walls. This was evidently the principal's study, having a desk, lounge chair, reading lamp, and stereo system. As for the volumes on the shelves, they expressed VanBrook's eclectic tastes: Eastern philosophy, Elizabethan drama, architecture, Oriental art, eighteenth- century costume, Cantonese cookery, botany - but nothing on urban crime.

The desktop in this hideaway had an excessive tidiness reflecting the influence of the Japanese style downstairs. A brass paperknife in the shape of a Chinese dragon was placed precisely parallel to the onyx-base pen set. The telephone was squared off with the lefthand edge of the desk, and a brass-bound box (locked) was squared off with the righthand edge. In between, in dead center, was a clean desk blotter on which lay a neat pile of letters. Apparently they had been received and opened on Saturday, at which time they were read and returned to their envelopes.

There was a muffled quiet in the study. Fran's footsteps could be heard downstairs, and occasionally the ripping of a carton. Casually, with an ear alert to the activity below, Qwilleran examined the mail. There were bills from utility companies, magazine-subscription departments, and an auto-insurance agency. There were no death threats, he was sorry to discover. But one small envelope addressed by hand had a scribble in the upper lefthand corner that piqued his curiosity: F. Stucker, 231 Fourth Street, Lockmaster. After determining that Fran was fully occupied with her screens, he gingerly drew the letter from its envelope and read the following:

Dear Mr. VanBrook - Thanks a lot for the $200. I didn't expect you to pay for my gas. It was nice of you to ask me to be in your play. But I can sure use the money. I had to buy new boots for Robbie. So thanks again. Fiona

"Two hundred bucks!" Qwilleran said softly to the surrounding bookshelves. "That faker was making five hundred on the deal!" Was petty cheating one of his "hobbies"? Qwilleran tried the desk drawers, but they were locked.

Then, as he carefully tucked the note back in its envelope, he heard a humming sound in the insulated silence. He had not heard it before. It seemed to come from the rear of the second floor, and he followed it down the hall. Ahead of him was a rosy light spilling from a doorway. He approached warily and peeked into the room. The humming came from a transformer; the ceiling was covered with a battery of rose-tinted lights, and a timer had just turned them on.

Under the lights were long tables holding trays of plants, greenhouse style, but they were beginning to wilt. Obviously no one had watered them since VanBrook's last day on earth. What were they? Qwilleran was no horticulturist, but he knew this was not Cannabis sativa. There were purple flowers among the greenery. He rubbed a leaf and smelled his fingers; there was no clue. He broke off a sprig and put it in his shirt pocket, thinking he would give Koko a sniff.

"Okay, Quill," Fran called from the foot of the stairs. "I've done all I can do. Let's go."

As they drove away from the house, with the empty cartons loaded in the van, she said, "Well, what did you think of the place?"

"Esoteric, to say the least. If the estate puts his books up for sale, I'd like to know about it. What are the plants he was growing upstairs?"

"I never saw any plants. I was never invited upstairs. When I came to measure for the screens, he gave me a cup of tea, and we sat cross-legged on the floor cushions. I sure hope Amanda can collect for those screens."

"Amanda won't let anyone cheat her, dead or alive."

"Can you stand some good news?" she asked. "Your tapestries have arrived, and we can install them tomorrow - in time for the open house!"

"How do they look?"

"I haven't opened the packages, and the suspense is killing me, but I'll wait till we deliver them."

"Need any help?"

"No, I'll bring Shawn, my installer- more brawn than brain - but what he does, he does well."

"How will you hang them?"

"With carpet tack-strips. Do you mind if we make it around five o'clock?"

Fran always made business calls to Qwilleran's residence in the late afternoon, obligating, him to offer a cocktail, which led to a dinner invitation. How did VanBrook get away with a cup of tea?... Not that Qwilleran objected to dining with his interior designer. She was good company. But Polly disapproved.

Fran dropped him at Scottie's, where he was fitted for a dark blue suit. He was to be a pallbearer at Dennis's funeral, and it occurred to him - too late - that he should have opted for a dark blue suit instead of a dinner jacket for the steeplechase party. He wondered if Scottie would take it back. It irked him to buy two of anything if one would do. Still, he decided not to suggest it. During the fitting, Scottie wanted to talk about the suicide, but Qwilleran turned him off with frowns and curt responses.

His next ,stop was the Moose County Something, and when he walked into Arch Riker's office, the publisher jumped to his feet. "Qwill! Where've you been? I heard it on the air last night and tried to reach you. Why didn't you call back? Today we're running a 'Died Suddenly,' but no one at the police department would talk to us. What happened?"

"I don't know," Qwilleran said. "Does this mean the VanBrook case is wrapped up?"

"No, it doesn't. That's definite."

"What makes you so sure? Are you getting vibrations from Koko?" Riker asked in an attempt at banter.

"The police have evidence to that effect. That's all I can say, and don't ask me how I know. But I'd like to make a suggestion, Arch."

"Let's hear it."

"I think you should run that editorial I suggested: A crime is a crime! Offer a reward of $50,000 for information regarding the shooting. It'll squelch the rumor that Dennis was a suspect, and it may help Brodie. The K Fund will cover it."

"Do we identify the benefactor?"

"No. Keep it anonymous. How soon can you run it?"

"Friday."

"Good. I won't be here. I'm going to Lockmaster for a steeplechase weekend."

"You lucky dog! I hear it's a gas!"

It was too early for Qwilleran to go home; Mrs. Fulgrove would still be there, furiously mopping and cleaning and polishing. He went instead to the library - to tell Polly about his plans for the weekend. He had neither seen her nor talked with her for two days, not since the unexplained phone call that made her cheeks redden and her eyes sparkle.

In the vestibule of the library the daily quotation was: The evil that men do Lives after them; the good is oft interred with their bones. The greetings from the clerks were appropriately solemn. As he headed for the stairs to the mezzanine, one of them called out, "She's not in, Mr. Q."

"She's having her hair done," the other explained.

"I'm just going up to read the papers," he said.

On the table in the reading room was a copy of the Lockmaster Logger, a publication established during lumbering days, more than a century before. Circulation: 11,500. Editor: Kipling MacDiarmid.

The first page of the Logger was devoted to steeplechase news: Five races with a combined purse of $75,000, preceded by the Trial of Hounds, the parade of carriages, and a concert by the Lockmaster High School band. A few parking spaces overlooking the course were still available for $100, but that would admit as many persons as could fit into the vehicle. There were sidebars listing the horses, owners, trainers, and riders who would participate in the event, and there were instructive features on what to wear to the races and what to pack in the picnic basket.

When Qwilleran heard Polly's sensible library shoes on the stairs, he put down his newspaper, and their eyes met. She was looking well-groomed but not as girlishly radiant as she had been on the day following the long brunch at the Palomino Paddock.

She walked immediately to his table. "Qwill, I'm so sorry about Dennis," she said softly. "You must be grieving."

"A lot of people are grieving, Polly."

"I suppose we can assume that Dennis... that the VanBrook case is closed now," she said, sitting down at the table.

"I don't assume anything, but I know that Moose County has lost a good builder and a talented actor."

"To some persons in Pickax the principal was such a villain that Dennis is now a candidate for a folk hero... Is that the Lockmaster Logger you're reading? What do you think of it?" Her face lighted up when she spoke the name of the town.

"It's more conservative than the Something in makeup, but it has a friendly slant. I hear Lockmaster is a friendly town. Did you find it friendly?" He gazed at her pointedly as he repeated the word.

Polly's eyes wavered for a fraction of a second. "I found everyone very cordial and hospitable." Then she added brightly, "Would you like to do something exciting this weekend? Would you like to go birdwatching in the wetlands near Purple Point?"

This was Qwilleran's moment. "I'd like to, but I'll be horse watching in Lockmaster. That's what I came to tell you. The Bushlands have invited me for the races. I'll be gone for three days."

"Oh, really?" she said with half- concealed disappointment. "You never told me you were interested in horses."

"Chiefly I'm interested in horse people. I may find some stuff for the 'Qwill Pen' column."

"Shall I feed Koko and Yum Yum while you're away?"

"Their royal highnesses are invited to go along - and have their portraits taken by a master photographer."

"How grand!" she said archly. "When do you leave?"

"Friday. After the funeral."

"Why don't you come over for dinner tomorrow night? I could prepare chicken divan."

"I wish I could, but Fran is hanging the new tapestries at five o'clock, and I don't know how long the operation will take or how many problems we'll encounter."

Polly straightened her shoulders and drew a deep breath as she always did when confronted by her personal demon: Jealousy. She stood up. "Then I'll see you when you return."

Qwilleran walked slowly back to the apple barn. The events of the morning had fired his determination to write a biography of the Mystery Man of Moose County. It would require prodigious research. First he would want to see Lyle Compton's file on the late principal. Teachers and parents in Pickax and Lockmaster would be glad to cooperate. VanBrook's attorney would no doubt grant an interview, and there would be Fiona Stucker, of course, whose connection with VanBrook might be a story in itself. The colleges that granted the man's degrees and the Equity records in New York would have to be researched. Qwilleran relished the challenge. He had a propensity for snooping and a talent for drawing information from shy, or reluctant subjects.

He recalled the letter from Fiona Stucker. If VanBrook would chisel a few hundred dollars from the Theatre Club, he might have a history of other misdeeds, great or small: a fling at embezzlement, a witty financial fraud, some successful tax evasion. He had the nerve and the brains to carry off such schemes. The smuggling of Oriental treasures would appeal to him, both intellectually and esthetically. What was in those hundreds of cartons on the second floor of his strangely furnished house?

As Qwilleran approached the barn he could hear the cats' yowling welcome, and that brought to mind another question: On the night of the party, when Koko stared so intently at VanBrook's head, was the cat sensing a questionable operator? A felonious mentality? Farfetched as the idea might seem, it was not beyond the capabilities of that remarkable animal.

On the other hand, Qwilleran had to admit, Koko might have been staring at hair that he recognized as false.