The Cat Who Moved a Mountain

CHAPTER 11

As Qwilleran was leaving Amy's Lunch Bucket she said meekly, "If you want real coffee, you can get it at the bakery up the hill."

"Thanks, Amy. You're a real friend," he said.

"Have you ever seen the waterfall? It's very exciting. The trail starts behind the bakery."

"Are there poison snakes back there?"

"Of course not! There are no poison snakes in the Potatoes, Mr. . . ."

"Qwilleran."

He ambled up the gradual incline on the wooden sidewalk until he scented a yeasty aroma and came upon an isolated building with the remains of a steeple. The weaving studio occupied an abandoned schoolhouse; the bakery occupied an abandoned church. Hanging alongside the door was a barnwood sign shaped like a plump loaf of bread, but he read the lettering twice before he could believe what he saw: THE HALF-BAKED BAKERY. A screened door flapped loosely as he entered.

"Why the screened door?" he asked by way of introduction. "I thought you didn't have flying insects in the Potatoes."

"It's the damned health code," said a man in crumpled whites with a baker's hat sagging over one ear like a deflated balloon. "They make us wear these stupid hats, too."

The same uniform was worn by a woman taking a tray of crusty Italian bread from an oven. Like all the equipment—grinders, mixers, dough tables, scales and whatnot—the oven looked secondhand if not actually antique. At the front of the shop were four wooden student chairs with writing arms, as well as a coffeemaker with instructions: "Help Yourself . . . Pay at Counter . . . Cream in Fridge." Separating the bakery from the snack area was a scarred glass case displaying cookies, muffins, Danish pastries, and pecan rolls, although very little of each. What elevated this humble establishment to the sublime was the heady fragrance of baking bread.

Qwilleran helped himself to coffee and bought an apple Danish from the baker. "If you don't mind my saying so," he said as he pulled out his bill clip, "you picked a helluva name for your bakery."

"Tell you why we did it," the man said. "Everybody told us we were half-baked to open a whole-grain bakery in Potato Cove, but we're doing all right. Overhead's low, and we wholesale to a food market and a couple of restaurants in the valley, so we have a little cash flow we can count on."

"Do you supply the golf club?" Qwilleran asked slyly.

"Hell no! But you see that tray of bread? It's going to an Italian restaurant. They pick it up every day at four o'clock." He looked at Qwilleran's moustache. "Are you the fella that bought Vance's big candlestick?"

"Yes, I'm the proud possessor of fifty pounds of iron." Qwilleran looked around the shop. The unifying note in the bakery was paint; everything paintable had been painted orchid: walls, ceiling, shelving, tables, student chairs, even the floorboards. "Unusual paint job you have here," was Qwilleran's comment.

"Thrift, man! Thrift! Lumpton Hardware advertised a sale of paint, and all those fakes had was pink and blue. It was my wife's idea to mix 'em."

Qwilleran carried his purchase to an orchid student chair and bit into a six-inch square of puffy, chewy pastry heaped with large apple slices in thick and spicy juices. It was still warm.

"I'm forced to tell you," he said, "that this is absolutely the best Danish I've ever eaten in half a century of pastry connoisseurship."

The baker turned to the woman. "Hear that, sugar? Take a bow." To Qwilleran he said, "My wife does the gooey stuff. Wait till you taste the sticky buns! Everything we use is whole grain and fresh. Apples come from Tater orchards—no sprays, no chemicals. We stone-grind our flour right from the wheat berries. Bread's kneaded and shaped by hand. Crackers are rolled the same way."

"That's my job," said his wife. "I like handling dough."

"Bread untouched by human hands may be cheaper, but nobody says it's as good," the baker said. "You're new around here."

"I'm here for the summer. My name's Jim Qwilleran. What's your name?"

"Yates. Yates Penney. That's my wife, Kate. How do you like the Potatoes, Mr. . . . ?"

"Qwilleran. I'm not sure I like what's happening to Big Potato."

"You said it! The inside of Big Potato looks like a mangy cat, and the outside looks like a war zone. City people come up here because they like country living, and then they drag the city along with 'em. The Taters have the right idea; they build themselves a rustic shack and let everything grow wild, the way Nature intended. We're from Akron, but we know how to fit in. Right, sugar?"

Qwilleran said, "What is this waterfall I've heard about?"

"You mean Purgatory?"

"Is that what it's called? I'd like to see it."

The baker turned to his wife. "He wants to go to Purgatory." They communicated silently for a few moments until she nodded, and then he explained, "We don't encourage sightseers because they throw beer cans and food wrappers in the falls, but you don't look like the average tourist."

"I take that as a compliment. Is the trail well-marked? I'd like a quiet, leisurely walk without getting lost."

"It's quiet, all right," said Kate. "Nobody goes back there on a Tuesday afternoon. Only on weekends."

"You can't get lost either," Yates assured him. "Just follow the creek upstream. It's about half a mile, but all uphill."

"That's okay. I've been practicing. Where did Purgatory get its name?"

"Some old-time Taters named it, I think. It's not an Indian name, I know that. Anyway, the water drops off a high cliff and down into a bottomless pit, and the mist rises like steam. Quite a sight!"

"Good! I'll take a little ramble. I have some time to kill while Vance works on my car."

"What's wrong with it?"

"Nothing serious. Mountain-itis, I guess you'd call it. While I'm standing here I'd like to pay for some Danish and sticky buns. I can. pick them up when I finish with the falls."

"We close at four," Kate warned him.

"If it's only half a mile, I'll be back well before that," Qwilleran said.

"Take care!"

"Don't fall in," the baker said with a grin.

Behind the bakery Qwilleran could hear the creek before he could see it. Swollen by heavy rain, the waters were rushing tumultuously over boulders in the creek bed. An irregular path on the edge of the stream had been worn down by generations of Taters and perhaps by Indians before them, who made the pilgrimage without benefit of handrails, curbs, steps, or warning signs. This was raw nature, and the footing was muddy and treacherous. Sharp rocks and wayward roots protruded from the walkway, camouflaged by pine needles and oak leaves that were wet and slippery. Tufts of coarse wet grasses grew over the edge, dripping and ready to chute an unwary wanderer into the stream.

After a few stumbles Qwilleran realized the impossibility of ogling the rushing stream and walking at the same rime. Only by alternating a few careful steps with a few motionless moments could he appreciate the wild beauty. Brilliant green ferns abounded, thriving in the damp shadows. Every cleft rock had its trickle of water trying to find the creek and soaking the ground en route. Then there were the wild flowers—clumps of them in yellow, white, pink, blue, and red, growing among the wild grasses or in the crevices of rotting logs or across the face of rock outcroppings. Hundred-foot pine trees rising like the vaulted ceiling of a cathedral filtered the sun's rays through their sparse upper branches. Moose County could never produce a show like this!

The course of the creek angled sharply and sometimes plunged out of sight, only to reappear with added force. Qwilleran was following it upstream, of course, and its exuberance increased—in noise and in turbulence. When the waters were not splashing wildly over boulders, they were cascading smoothly over rock ledges in a series of naturally terraced waterfalls. And Qwilleran, when not picking his way along the precarious path, was clicking his camera. Take it easy, he told himself, or you'll run out of film.

The higher he climbed, the more dramatic the views and the louder the thunder of water, until he groped his way around the last projecting cliff and found himself in a rock-walled atrium. There it was! Purgatory! An immense column of water, four times higher than its width, poured over a lofty cliff with unimaginable force and deafening roar—tons of water dropping straight down into a black hole in the rock from which rose clouds of vapor.

Qwilleran caught his breath. To be alone in the woods with this mighty dynamo gave him an eerie sensation, as if he were a supplicant consulting an oracle in a rock-walled temple, somewhere in the distant past. Perhaps Native Americans had worshipped their spirits here. Perhaps, he thought for one giddy moment, this was where he would find the answers. Overwhelmed by the experience, he had forgotten the questions.

Then the hypnotic moment passed, and he was a summer vacationer with a camera. Climbing carefully over the surrounding boulders he found numerous photogenic angles and clicked the shutter recklessly until he realized he had only one picture left. For the final shot he wanted to try a profile of the cascade entering the cauldron of billowing steam.

The path had ended, but he edged around the perimeter of the atrium until he found the right angle. Studying the view-finder critically for his final shot, he made one impulsive move—a step backward.

Immediately his feet shot out from under him and— sprawled on his back—he started to slide slowly but inexorably toward the abyss. Twisting his body in panic, he clutched at wet rocks and grabbed handfuls of shallow-rooted weeds. Nothing stopped his slide down the muddy slope. His bellowing shouts were drowned by the pounding waters . . . and now he was enveloped in fog . . . and now he was slipping into the black hole. He grabbed for the rim, but it crumbled. Grasping wildly at the nearly vertical walls of the chasm, he managed to slow his descent and find a ledge for his toe. It bore his weight. It was a wisp of hope.

He clung to his perch and tried to think. Spread-eagled against the face of the rock he ran bleeding hands over its surface in search of a projection. Behind him the shaft of water was thundering, and he was drenched like a drowning man. Something flashed into his mind then: mountain climbers in Switzerland . . . scaling the flat face of a peak . . . with infinite patience. Patience! he told himself. The mist stung his face and blinded him, but he fought his panic. Running his hands painstakingly over the flat surface in search of crevices, testing craggy ledges for strength, he inched upward. Time lost its meaning. He spent an eternity clinging and creeping, never knowing how much farther he had to climb. Patience! When the darkness lessened he knew he was approaching the rim, although he was still enveloped in mist.

Eventually one exploring hand felt level ground. It was the rim of the pit, but the trial by mud was not over. He had to hoist himself out of the hole, and one misstep or one miscalculation could send him plunging back into the depths. The terrain above him was slimy, but it was blessedly horizontal. After several tries he found something growing from a crevice, something tough and fibrous that he could grab as he clambered out. Facedown in the mud he crawled and squirmed out of the mist and away from the pit until he felt safe enough to collapse and hug the earth. No matter that he was muddied from head to foot, his clothing in shreds, his hands and knees bloodied, his watch smashed, his camera lost; he was on terra firma.

Only then did he pay attention to a shooting pain in his ankle. It had been torturing him throughout the ordeal, but the life-or-death struggle had superseded all else. When he turned over and tried to sit up, he yelped with pain and shock; his ankle was swollen as big as a grapefruit. Rashly he tried to stand up and fell back with a cry of anguish. For a moment he lay flat on the ground and considered the problem. A little rest, he thought, would reduce the swelling.

He was wrong. His ankle continued to throb relentlessly, responding to every move with agonizing spasms. How do I get out of here? he asked himself. At the bakery they had said no one went to the waterfall on a Tuesday afternoon. Having great lung power, he tried a shout for help, but it was drowned out by the roar of the falls. Suppose he had to stay in the woods all night! Beechum had predicted more rain. The nights turned cold in the mountains, and his lightweight clothing was wet and tattered.

With a burst of determination he proposed to drag himself along the trail, an inch at a time if necessary. Fortunately it was all downhill; unfortunately the path was studded with sharp rocks, and his hands, elbows, and knees were already lacerated. Even so, he squirmed downhill a few yards, trying to save his ankle, but the pain was non-stop and the swelling had reached the size of a melon. Defeated, he dragged himself to a boulder and leaned against it in a sitting position.

For a while he sat there thinking, or trying to think. Vance would wonder why he hadn't called for his car; Yates would wonder why he hadn't picked up his baked goods.

Now that he had inched his way out of the atrium, the crashing noise of Purgatory was somewhat muffled. "HELP!" he shouted, his voice echoing in the rocky ravine. There was no answering cry. The sky, glimpsed between the lofty treetops, was now overcast. The rain was coming. If he had to spend the night in the woods, wearing cold, wet clothing and lying on the drenched ground, covering himself with wet leaves like a woodland animal, he would be ready for an oxygen tent in the morning . . . that is, if anyone found him in the morning. They might not find him until the weekend.

"HELP!"

Then a chilling thought occurred to him. The Taters may have intended him to disappear in the Purgatory abyss. If so, they could have only one motive; they suspected his purpose in visiting their precious mountain. They may have mistaken him for a federal agent. What were they growing in the hidden coves and hollows? What was stockpiled in those caves? Beechum's banter about bears and bats and poisonous snakes may have been something more than mountain humor.

"HELP!"

Did he hear a reply, or was it an echo?

He tried again. "HELP!"

"Hallo," came a distant cry.

"HELP!"

"Coming! Coming!" The voices were getting closer. "Hold on!" Soon he could see movement in the woods, screened by the underbrush, then heads bobbing along the trail. Two men were coming up the slope, and they broke into a run when he waved an arm in a wide arc.

"For God's sake! What happened?" the baker shouted, seeing the tattered, mud-caked figure leaning against a boulder. "What happened to your ankle?"

"You look like you been through a cement mixer!'rthe blacksmith said.

"I sprained my ankle, and I was trying to drag myself back to the cove," Qwilleran said shortly. He was in no mood to describe his ordeal or confess to the careless misstep that sent him sliding ignominiously into the pit.

They hoisted him to a standing position, with his weight on his right foot, and made a human crutch, unmindful of the mud being smeared on their own clothes. Then slowly they started down the precarious slope to Potato Cove. Qwilleran was in too much pain to talk, and his rescuers were aware of it.

At the end of the trail a group of concerned Taters waited with comments and advice:

"Never see'd nobody in such a mess!" said one.

"Better hose him down, Yates." That was the baker's wife.

"Give 'im a slug o' corn,-Vance. Looks like he needs it."

"Somebody send for Maw Beechum! She's got healin' hands."

Qwilleran's rescuers stripped off his rags behind the bakery and turned the hose on the caked blood and dirt, the icy water from a local well acting like a local anesthetic. Then, draped in a couple of bakery towels, he was assisted into a backroom and placed on a cot among cartons of wheatberries and yeast. Kate, serving hot coffee and another Danish, explained that Mrs. Beechum had gone home to get some of her homemade medicines.

When the silent woman arrived, she went to work with downcast eyes, making an icepack for the ankle and tearing up an old sheet for bandages. Then she poured antiseptic from a jelly jar onto the wounds and larded them with ointment.

Yates said, "With that stuff you'll never get an infection, that's for sure. When you feel up to it, we'll fix you up with pants and a coat and drive you home. You can say goodbye to those shoes, too. What size do you take? . . . Hey, Vance, get some sandals from the leather shop, size twelve." He appraised the bandaging. "Man, you look like a mummy!"

The wrappings on Qwilleran's hands, elbows, and knees restricted his movement considerably, but the ankle torture was somewhat relieved after the icepack and tight bandaging. He wanted to thank Mrs. Beechum, but she had slipped away from the bakery without so much as a nod in his direction, leaving him a jar of liniment.

Kate said, "You should use ice again tonight and keep your foot up, Mr. ..."

"Qwilleran."

Yates buckled on the sandals, and Wesley brought him a carved walking stick, which looked more like a cudgel. "I don't know how to thank you people," he said.

"We aim to be good neighbors," said Kate.

The three men drove away, Yates driving Qwilleran in his newly repaired car, and Vance following in his pickup. Qwilleran was abnormally quiet, still dazed by his experience. He felt that his precipitous slide into the black hole had never happened. Yet, if it were true and if he had not survived, would anyone ever know his fate? What would have happened to Koko and Yum Yum, penned up in a house that no one had reason to visit?

The baker respected his silence for a while but threw curious glances at him repeatedly. Finally he said, "What really happened at Purgatory, man?"

Qwilleran was jolted out of his reverie. "What do you mean?"

"You don't wind up in that condition just by twisting your ankle."

"I told you I was trying to drag myself back to the cove. The path was muddy and full of sharp rocks."

"You were soaking wet from head to foot."

"There's a lot of mist at the falls. You should know that."

Yates grunted, and no more was said for a few minutes. When they reached Hawk's Nest Drive, he tried again. "See anybody in the woods?"

"No. It was just as your wife said: no one around on Tuesday. This is Tuesday, isn't it? I feel as if I've been on that trail a week!"

"Did you hear anything unusual?"

"Not with the water roaring! I couldn't hear myself think!"

"See anything strange?"

"What are you getting at?" Qwilleran said with slight annoyance. "I saw the creek, boulders, fallen trees, mud, large and small waterfalls, flowers, more mud . . ."

"Okay, okay, I'll shut up. You had a rough time."

"Sorry if I barked at you. I'm feeling edgy."

"You should be! You've been through hell!"

At Tiptop his rescuers helped him up the twenty-five steps, and the sight of Qwilleran dressed in baker's whites and supported by two strangers sent the Siamese flying upstairs, where they watched from a safe elevation. He offered the men a beer and was glad when they declined; he needed a period of rest in which to find himself again. There were moments when he was still in the abyss, clinging to a slippery wall of rock.

"I'll bring up your baked goods," Yates said. "Anything more we can do? Be glad to do it."

"There's a burl bowl in the trunk of my car that you could bring up. And again, I don't know how to thank you fellas."

When they had gone and Qwilleran had dropped on the gray velvet sofa with his ankle elevated on one of Sabri-na's pillows, the Siamese walked questioningly into the room.

"You'll have to bear with me awhile," he told them. "You almost lost your chief cook."

They huddled close to his body, playing the nursing role instinctive with cats, and made no demands, although it was past their normal dinnertime. At intervals Koko ran his nose over the white uniform and grimaced as if he smelled something rotten.

When the telephone rang, Qwilleran was undecided whether to answer, but it persisted until he grabbed his walking staff and moved to the foyer with halting steps.

"I thought you were going to drop in this afternoon," said Colin Carmichael.

"I dropped into a waterfall instead," Qwilleran said, recovering some of his spirit.

"Where?"

"At Potato Cove. I'm lucky I got out alive."

"Are you all right?"

"Except for a sprained ankle. Do you happen to have an elastic bandage?"

"I could pick one up at the drug store easily enough and run it up the mountain in no time. Anything else you need?"

"Perhaps one of those cold compresses that can be chilled in the freezer."

"No problem. Be right there."

"The front door's unlocked, Colin. Just walk in."

Having maneuvered successfully to the foyer, Qwilleran hobbled to the kitchen to feed the cats. They were used to dodging his long strides and found his new slow-motion toddle with a stick perplexing. He was back on the sofa when the editor arrived.

Carmichael frowned at the ankle. "That's quite a balloon you've got there. Is it painful?"

"Not as bad as it was. Excuse my attire; the baker at the cove had to lend me some clean clothes. Go out to the kitchen, Colin. There's a bar in the pantry. Help yourself, and you can bring me a ginger ale from the fridge. You might also throw the compress in the freezer."

The editor lingered. "I hated to call you about the Tater thing, Qwill. Don't hold it against me."

"Forget it. I'm not here to get involved in local politics or prejudices."

"What happened to your hands?"

"I tried to save myself and grabbed some unfriendly rocks. The bandages make them look worse than they are."

When they settled down with their drinks, Carmichael glanced around the living room. "This is a lot of house for one guy."

"It was the only place that would rent to cats. I have two Siamese," Qwilleran said.

"Where are they?"

"In hiding. They avoid veterinarians and editors."

"Our star columnist is going around with a red face since her interview with you. It seems you asked all the questions, and she did all the talking. She's too embarrassed to call you again."

"Let's leave it that way, Colin. Tell her I'm on a secret mission and don't want her to blow my cover. Tell her anything. Tell her I'm opening a health spa for men only, with retired burlesque strippers as masseuses."

"There's some speculation anyway—as to your identity, and your reason for being here, and why you're willing to pay such high rent."

"I'm beginning to wonder about the rent myself."

"Well, tell me how you sprained your ankle, Qwill."

Qwilleran related the episode in cool, journalistic style without histrionics, underplaying his descent into the pit and his heroic struggle to climb to safety. In concluding he said, "Let me tell you one thing: I wouldn't be sitting here tonight if it weren't for some of those Taters . . . Your glass is empty, Colin. Go and help yourself."

"Not this time, thanks. My family's expecting me home for dinner. We're having a backyard barbecue for my little girl's birthday . . . But tell me what you wanted to discuss in my office."

"It's only a wild notion. How would you react to a biography of Hawkinfield? I've thought of writing one, but it would require a lot of research."

"That's a great idea!" said the editor. "You can count on our complete cooperation. We can line up interviews for you. Everyone will be glad to talk."

"It's only in the thinking stage," Qwilleran said. "I might open with the murder trial, then flashback to J.J.'s regime at the Gazette, his civic leadership, the loss of his family, and his violent end."

Carmichael was pounding the arm of his chair. "That would make a damn good movie, too, Qwill! You've got me all fired up! After this news a backyard barbecue is going to seem like small potatoes."

"I'll need to get a transcript of the trial, of course, and there are considerations I'll want to discuss with an attorney. Would you recommend Hugh Lumpton?"

"Well," said the editor, "he's a great golfer. Drives a $40,000 car. Always has a lot of women around him. But—"

"That doesn't tell me what I need to know, does it?"

"Just between you and me, Qwill, I wouldn't even hire him to write my will—not that I have any firsthand experience, you understand. It's just what I pick up at the club and at the chamber. You'd be better off going to one of the lawyers next door to the post office . . . Well, see here, is there anything I can do for you before I leave? Anything I can send you from the valley?"

"Not a thing, thanks. I appreciate the items from the drugstore. And tell your daughter that Koko and Yum Yum said happy birthday."

"Great! She'll flip! She loves cats, especially ones that talk."

After Carmichael had left, Qwilleran undertook a slow trek to the kitchen in search of food for himself, but he was intercepted by Koko, who was rolling and squirming on the floor in front of the Fitzwallow huntboard. Whatever his motive, the performance was a subtle reminder to Qwilleran that he had forgotten to mail Sabrina's letter to Sherry Hawkinfield. It was still in the drawer of the cabinet, fang marks and all. He looked at the address and then called directory assistance for a telephone number in Maryland: a shop called Not New But Nice. He had to repeat it twice to make himself understood.

When he punched the number, a recording device answered, but he was prepared; it was early evening, and he presumed the shop would be closed. In his most ingratiating voice he left a message that was purposely ambiguous:

"Ms. Hawkinfield, please call this number in Spudsboro regarding a valuable painting by Forest Beechum that belongs to you ..."

Qwilleran turned to Koko. "Do you think that will get results? The key word is valuable."

"Yow!" said Koko, hopping on and off the huntboard in excitement.