The Cat Who Went Underground

CHAPTER 5.

THE FOURTH OF JULY dawned with the sunshine of a flag-waving holiday, and Qwilleran was in good spirits, despite some soreness following his last bike ride. The east wing with its roof boards in place was beginning to look like a habitation.

“Well, chums, we’re on our way!” he told the Siamese. “You’ll have your own apartment in a few weeks. What would you like for breakfast? Turkey from the deli? Or cocktail shrimp from a can?”

Koko was not present to cast his vote, but Yum Yum was rubbing against Qwilleran’s ankles in anticipation and curling her tail lovingly around his leg, and he knew she preferred turkey. He began to mince slices of white meat.

“What’s that noise?” He set down the knife and looked up. “Did you hear a tapping noise? … There it is again!”

Tap tap tap.

With a sudden drop in his holiday mood he envisioned another leak or mechanical breakdown. “There it goes again!” Possibilities flashed through his mind: the electric pump; the water heater; the refrigerator. It would mean another emergency call to that laughing hyena in Mooseville.

Tap tap tap.

Qwilleran followed the sound. It led him past the mudroom, past the bathroom, and into the guestroom. The tapping had stopped, but Koko was sitting on the windowsill overlooking the building site, and the morning sun made glistening shafts of every whisker, every alert hair over his eyes.

“Did you hear that, Koko?”

The cat turned his head to look at Qwilleran, and at that moment his brown tail slapped the windowsill three times. Tap tap tap.

Qwilleran uttered a sigh of relief. “Okay, Thumper, come and get your breakfast, and please don’t play tricks like that.”

The parade was scheduled to start at two o’clock, and he dressed in what he considered appropriate garb: white pants and open-neck shirt with a blue blazer.

He was sure the judges would be required to wear some absurd badge of office, and he was prepared for the worst. Mildred, when he picked her up at her cottage, was wearing one of her fluttery sundresses in a blue-and-white stripe.

“Keep your fingers crossed,” she said, as she stepped into his car.

“What should I deduce from that cryptic remark?”

“Maybe you didn’t see the parade last year.”

“I did not. I’m not a parade-goer by choice.”

“Well, I went with Sharon and Roger last year, and I was appalled! It was nothing but a candy-grab! Politicians rode in new-model cars, throwing candy to the crowd. Beauty queens rode in convertibles, throwing candy to the crowd. The used-car dealer rode in a three-year-old car with a price tag\ And he was throwing candy to the crowd. There were no floats and no marching bands-just sound trucks blaring pop music, and commercial vehicles advertising the Mooseville video arcade and the Friday night fish fry in North Kennebeck. But worst of all, there was not a single flag in the parade! This was Independence Day, and there was not an American flag to be seen!”

“How did the crowd react to all of this?”

“All that free candy? Are you kidding? They loved it!”

“I’d say you had reason to be disturbed,” Qwilleran said.

“Disturbed! I was furious\ When the holiday weekend was over, I got on my horse and went into battle. You don’t know me, Qwill, when I get mad! That was before the Something started publication, so I couldn’t write an irate letter to the editor, but I wrote to every elected and appointed official, every civic leader, every chamber of commerce, every citizens” group, and every school principal in the county. I spouted off at meetings of the county commissioners and the village councils. I really made myself a public nuisance. You know, Qwill, every veterans” organization and fraternal lodge has a big flag and a color guard. The two high schools and three junior highs have marching bands. Their uniforms don’t fit, and they hit some wrong notes, but they march, and they beat drums, and they blow trumpets. Where were they on Independence Day? That’s what I wanted to know.”

“What happened after your outburst?”

“We’ll soon find out. They appointed a county committee to organize this year’s parade, and-wisely, perhaps-I wasn’t asked to serve. Apparently they laid ambitious plans, but you know what happens when a committee takes charge.

Sometimes nothing!”

The sidewalks in Mooseville were already crowded with parade-goers, and the parking lots were filled. Police had barricaded several blocks of Main Street, detouring traffic, but Qwilleran found a place to park near Glinko’s garage. He and Mildred pushed their way through the crowds to a reviewing stand built in front of the town hall. A committeewoman wearing a tri-color bandoleer guided them to the judges” table, and gave them scorecards and straw boaters with tri-color hatbands. Mildred wore hers straight-on, and Qwilleran said she looked saucy. He tipped his at a rakish angle, and Mildred said he looked dashing, especially with that big moustache.

“The floats,” the committee woman explained, “are to be rated on originality, execution, and message, using the suggested point system.”

The third judge had not arrived. Mildred guessed it would be an announcer from WPKX. Qwilleran thought it might be the superintendent of schools; Lyle Compton was always the most visible official in the county.

“He says it’s part of his job,” Mildred confided, “but I think he’s getting ready to run for the state legislature.”

“My carpenter is going to be in the parade,” Qwilleran said. “It’s some kind of stunt sponsored by the Shipwreck Tavern.”

“I hope the parade won’t be so commercial this year.”

Their conversation was interrupted by the arrival of the third judge, who was creating a commotion as she complained about the steps, fell over the folding chairs, and upset the tripods that held the public-address speakers.

“Who wants to drive thirty miles for a parade?” she grumbled. “It should have been held in the county seat!”

The committeewoman tried to explain. “It was thought that Mooseville is the center of population on a big holiday, Miss Goodwinter. All the tourists are here.”

“Tourists, bah! Why don’t they stay home? Let them go to their own parade and leave some parking spaces for the citizens. I had to walk three blocks!”

It was Amanda Goodwinter, Pickax interior designer, city council member, and former fiancee of Arch Riker. She was wearing her usual colorless, shapeless clothing with a man’s golf hat jammed over her spiky gray hair. “I don’t know why I’m here!” she added grouchily. “I hate parades! And I’m not going to wear that silly straw hat!” She banged the boater down on the table and looked at the scorecard. “Originality, execution, and message? What does that mean? A parade is a parade. Why does it have to have a message?” Scowling and fussing, she settled herself in a folding chair. “Five minutes of this will give me a backache.”

“Good afternoon, Amanda,” said Qwilleran graciously.

“What are you doing here? You’re as big a fool as I am!”

The beat of drums could be heard in the distance, and voices below the reviewing stand drifted up to the judges” table: Excited youngster: “I think they’re coming!”

Police officer: “Back on the curb, sonny.”

Child: “Are they gonna throw candy?”

Mother: “Don’t forget to salute the flag, the way your teacher said.”

Old Man: “The band’s getting ready to play.”

Screaming child: “He took my sucker!”

Another screaming child: “Lift me up! I can’t see!”

With a stirring flourish one of the high school bands swung into “The Stars and Stripes Forever,” the sun glinting on their brass instruments two blocks away. A sheriffs car with flashing rooflights led the way at four miles an hour. Then there was a breathless wait as heads turned and necks craned.

The wait was long enough to solemnity the marching of the color guard-a tall, beefy flag-bearer flanked by two men and two women in uniform, arms swinging and eyes straight ahead. As if on cue a breeze sprang up when they reached the reviewing stand, and the stars and stripes rippled over the heads of the stern-faced marchers.

When the guard of honor had passed and the officials on the reviewing stand had resumed their seats, tears were rolling down Mildred’s face. “This really gets to me,” she said in a choked voice.

“Congratulations!” Qwilleran said. “You won your battle.”

“Not yet. I’m waiting for the candy.”

There was no candy. Before the afternoon was over the onlookers had seen a grand marshal on a proud-stepping horse with nodding plumes and glittering harness brasses; seven color guards from organizations around the county; four student bands, plus Scottish pipers from Lockmaster, sixty miles away; ten floats, two drill teams, three fire trucks sounding their sirens; and fourteen dogs from the St. Bernard Club, pulling their owners on leashes.

Each municipality in Moose County sponsored a float. Pickax honored the men who had worked the mines in the nineteenth century: Moving silently past the viewers was a tableau of grimy miners wearing candles in their hats and carrying pickaxes, coils of rope, and sledgehammers.

Sawdust City, once the hub of the lumbering industry, staged a lumbercamp scene on a flatbed truck-with a cook flipping flapjacks, loggers brawling over a card game, and someone in a bear costume stealing the flapjacks.

Then came the Mooseville entry-a flatbed crowded with sportsmen and outdoor-lovers; fishermen with rods and reels, boaters with binoculars and lifejackets, golfers with their clubs, and campers grilling hot dogs. Presiding over them all was the reigning queen of the annual Fishhook Festival, her formal ballgown fashioned of camouflage fabric and her crown of deer antlers.

“Confused! Cluttered!” Amanda growled. “No organization!”

“But it’s graphic,” Mildred said.

“It projects a message,” Qwilleran added.

“It’s a mess!” Amanda insisted.

The lakeside town of Brrr, so named because it was the coldest spot in the county during the winter months, presented a plastic snow scene with a papier-mache igloo and papier-mache polar bear. Lounging in the synthetic snowdrifts were male and female sunbathers in bikinis. Judging by the whistles, this float was the popular favorite.

“No taste!” Amanda objected. “But what do you expect of that godforsaken town?”

Even the dreary little village of Chipmunk managed to enter a float. Known as the moonshine capital of the county during Prohibition, and notorious for the lethal nature of its white lightning, Chipmunk had resurrected a homemade still and displayed it on a flatbed draped in black. The visual punch line was the scattering of bodies on the truck, lifeless or comatose.

“Now that one shows some wit!” Amanda said, “and if you want a message, that says it all.”

The judges agreed, and first prize went to the much-maligned village of Chipmunk.

Relegated to the end of the two-hour parade were the commercial exhibits with their advertising slogans. A tow truck pulling a wrecked car was sponsored by Buster’s Collision Service, “Where We Meet by Accident.”

The Pickax Auto Repair and Radiator Shop advertised “A Good Place to Take a Leak.”

Then a solitary man walked down the middle of Main Street, leading a donkey.

There was laughter from the crowd.

“Can’t see what it says!” Amanda complained.

Qwilleran read her the lettering on the animal’s saddle blanket. “Get Your Donkey over to the Shipwreck Tavern.”

Amanda snorted.

The last flatbed in the parade was sponsored by Trevelyan Plumbing and Heating-an arrangement of oldfashioned bathroom fixtures, with Grandpa Trevelyan sitting in the footed bathtub smoking a corncob pipe. The banner read, “If It Wasn’t for Your Plumber, You’d Have No Place to Go.”

The parade was over. The watchers swarmed across the parade route. Only then did Qwilleran realize that Clem Cot-tie had not marched. The man leading the donkey was the regular daytime bartender from the Shipwreck Tavern.

“Fabulous parade!” Mildred said. “They didn’t throw a single piece of candy! And I love those Scottish pipers! Don’t they have wonderful legs? You’d look good in kilts, Qwill.”

“They did a good job of pacing the units,” he said. “No long waits and no pileup and no overlapping bands.”

“Whole thing was too long,” Amanda groused.

Mildred said, “Mighty Lou made the grandest grand marshal I’ve ever seen. He has all those expensive leather clothes with silver nailheads, you know, and that was his own horse. Wasn’t it a beauty?”

Qwilleran and Mildred raced the crowds to the Fish Tank and had an early dinner.

It was a new restaurant in an old waterfront warehouse on the fishing wharves, and the old timbers creaked with the movement of the lake. They ordered , the Fish Tank’s famous clam chowder and broiled whitefish-from a waiter named Harvey who had once been in Mildred’s art class.

“How’s everything at the Top o” the Dunes?” Qwilleran asked her.

“Well, the animal-rescue people picked up Captain Phlogg’s dog right away…

And Doc and Dottie are buying a boat, which they’ll berth at the marina in Brrr … And the Urbanks (don’t repeat this) are splitting up, I happen to know.

They got along fine until they retired, but that’s the way it goes. Frankly, I don’t know how Sue could stand him all these years.”

“How about your next-door neighbor?”

“Russell? I’ve tried to be neighborly, but she doesn’t respond. She’s a strange one.”

“I’ve seen her on the beach, feeding the gulls,” Qwilleran said. “She talks to them.”

“She’s lonely. Why don’t you talk to her, Qwill? You’re always so sympathetic, and she might warm up to an older man.”

“Sorry, Mildred. I’ve had enough complications with younger women. Even my plumber is getting a little too friendly.”

“In what way?”

“She’s started wearing lipstick and washing her hair. I recognize the early warning signals.”

“Did you read your horoscope this morning?”

“You know I don’t buy that nonsense, Mildred.”

“Well, for your information, the Morning Rampage said your charisma will make you very popular with the opposite sex, and romance is just around the corner.”

Qwilleran huffed into his moustache. “I’d be happier if they’d give practical advice, such as “Don’t order fish in a restaurant today; you could choke to death.” My whitefish is full of bones.”

“Send it back!” Mildred said. “Don’t eat it! Mine is filleted to perfection.”

Qwilleran summoned the waiter and voiced his complaint.

“All fish has bones,” the waiter said.

“But not all waiters have brains,” Mildred snapped. “Harvey, take that plate out to the kitchen and bring Mr. Qwilleran a decent filet of whitefish-and no excuses!’”

The waiter scuttled away with the plate.

Qwilleran asked, “How long does your authority over these kids continue? Harvey is at least twenty-five. Is there a statute of limitations?”

“Anyone who goes through my classes gets me for life,” she stated flatly.

“There must be advantages and disadvantages in knowing everyone. How long do I have to live in Moose County before I know the entire population?”

“It’s too late for you, Qwill. You have to be born here, grow up here, and teach school for a couple of decades.”

There was a flurry of activity at the entrance as the parade’s grand marshal entered and was seated at a table by himself, still glittering with silver nailheads.

“I wonder why he’s alone,” Qwilleran said.

“He’s a loner,” said Mildred.

But the waiter, serving the fresh plate of whitefish, said with a wicked grin, “Because they won’t let his horse in.”

Mildred reached across the table and rapped his knuckles with the handle of her table knife. “That was uncalled for, Harvey. Don’t expect a tip!” To Qwilleran she added, “Mighty Lou is one of our town characters-colorful and harmless. If you were thinking of writing a column about him, don’t! Let sleeping dogs lie.”

“I was considering a column on family reunions. Are they closed sessions, or could a reporter barge in?”

“They’d be thrilled to have someone from the newspaper! They really would!”

“What do they do at these affairs?”

“They have a business meeting and elect officers for the coming year, but mostly they just visit and eat and “play games.”

“There was an announcement in the paper that the Wimsey family is having a reunion this Sunday on someone’s farm.”

“They’re the largest family in the county, next to the Goodwinters,” Mildred said. “Do you know Cecil Huggins at the hardware store? He’s related to the Wimseys by marriage. Just tell Cecil you’d like to cover the reunion. And when you get there, look up Emma Wimsey. She’s real old but still sharp, and she has the most wonderful cat story to tell! When she told me, I got shivers!”

When the waiter brought the dessert menu he said, “I’m sorry if I made a boo-boo, Mrs. Hanstable. It just slipped out.”

“Your apology does you credit, Harvey. You’re back in my good graces.” To Qwilleran she said, “Why don’t we go home for dessert? I could build a parfait with homemade orange ice and fresh raspberries.”

They set out for the Dune Club, but not until Qwilleran had ordered a freshly boiled lobster tail to take home to the cats. On the way, Mildred made a critical appraisal of his posture at the wheel. “Do you have a stiff neck or something, Qwill?”

“Just some soreness in my shoulders-from biking, I suppose. I’m using a different set of muscles, or else I jarred something loose when I bounced over an exposed tree root.”

“Take off your shirt,” she ordered when they arrived at her yellow cottage. “I have a wonderful Swiss oil that Sharon got for me, and I’ll give you a rub.”

As she rubbed in all the right places, his thoughts flew across the Atlantic to Polly Duncan. In England the Fourth of July would be only “4 July,” and Polly would have worked all day at the library, stopping for tea and seedcake at four o’clock. Perhaps she went to an early theater performance after work and then had fish-and-chips with a new friend. (What kind of new friend? he wondered.) And now she would be home in her flat, watching the telly and drinking cocoa-and writing him another postcard.

“Now you can put your shirt on,” Mildred said. “The oil won’t stain. It’s wonderful stuff.”

After the parfait Qwilleran admitted that he felt better, outwardly and inwardly, but he declined to stay longer, saying that he had to feed the cats before they started chewing the table leg. On the way back to the cabin he reflected on Mildred’s charitable nature and her spunk. Singlehanded she had turned the Fourth of July celebration around-from a travesty to a spectacular success. The firm way she handled the whitefish situation; her concern for the lonely girl next door; her initiative in raising money for Buddy Yarrow’s family; everything she did was admirable. And she was a superb cook! He could forgive her silliness about horoscopes and UFOs.

When Qwilleran let himself into the cabin, the rug over the trapdoor was askew as usual. He straightened it automatically and greeted the Siamese, who knew he was carrying something edible, aquatic, and expensive.

“How was your day?” he asked them. “Any excitement? Any phone calls?”

Yum Yum rubbed against his ankles, and Koko pranced in figure eights while he diced the lobster meat. After the feast all three of them went to the lakeside porch, where Koko emulated an Egyptian sculpture and Yum Yum languished in her seductive Cleopatra pose. Stealthily Qwilleran went indoors for his camera, but as soon as he returned, Yum Yum crossed her eyes and scratched her ear, and Koko assumed a grotesque position to wash a spot on his belly that appeared to be perfectly clean.

It was still daylight, and somewhere along the shore the gulls were squawking again. Qwilleran went down the wooden steps and walked toward the clamor. Scores of soaring wings were wheeling over Seagull Point. Moving in slowly, he photographed the performance without disturbing the woman who was feeding them.

Then he sat on a boulder until she tossed the last morsel of food.

“Good show!” he applauded. “Fantastic aerial ballet. I snapped some pictures.”

“Oh,” said Russell, walking hesitantly toward him.

“Pull up a rock and sit down.” He indicated a boulder a few feet from his own seat, and Russell sat down dutifully. “Did you go to the parade today?”

“I don’t like crowds,” she said sadly, addressing the lake.

“You missed an exceptional spectacle.” He picked up a stone and flung it into the water. “Are you enjoying your vacation?”

She nodded without enthusiasm.

“I hope you’ve been to the museum.”

“It was interesting,” she said.

Clenching his teeth, he waited for an inspiration …The subject of food, he remembered, was a foolproof ice-breaker in difficult social situations. He said, “Have you discovered any good restaurants in town?”

After a pause she said, “I never go to restaurants.”

“Do you prefer to cook?”

“I don’t eat much.”

That explained her pencil-thin figure and perhaps her low-energy level. He found a few flat stones and skipped them across the surface of the lake. Then he tried a desperate quip. “Read any good books lately?”

“Nothing special,” she said.

“There’s a small library in Mooseville, and also a woman who operates a paperback book exchange, in case you run out of reading material.”

There was no comment from the other rock, and he skipped a few more stones.

“How do you like the Dunfield cottage?”

Russell squirmed on the rock. “I don’t know.”

“What’s the trouble?”

“I feel uncomfortable.” She appeared to shrink.

“If anything worries you,” he said, “feel free to talk it over with your neighbor, Mildred Hanstable. She’s a kind and understanding woman. And if you need help of any kind, call Mildred or me.”

“You’re a nice man,” said Russell suddenly.

“Well, thank you!” he said. “But you really don’t know me. I turn down the corners of pages in books. I sometimes split an infinitive. And once I wore brown shoes with a black suit.”

She almost smiled, but not quite. Waving a hand toward the log cabin, she said, “You’re building something.”

“I’m building an addition. Walk over and look at it some day. All our neighbors are interested in the process.”

Russell stood up. “I have to go before it gets dark.”

Without further civilities she walked toward the east, and Qwilleran ambled into the setting sun, wondering about this reticent young woman who never really looked at him. Obviously no one had told her the history of the Dunfield cottage, and yet she felt uncomfortable there. In a way she was like Koko; she could sense a sinister influence.

Back at the cabin Qwilleran detected mischief. Yum Yum was darting insanely about the living room while Koko looked on with magisterial calm from the top of the moosehead. Yum Yum seemed to have something small and gray in her mouth.

“Drop it!” Qwilleran shouted, and this was her cue to take flight. Around and around the cabin she flew with the thing in her mouth, while Qwilleran pursued with the grace of a Neanderthal, using all his wits to intercept her and being outwitted at every pass. Tired at last, she hopped on the dining table and dropped the dead mouse in his typewriter.

“Thank you!” he said. “Thank you very much!”