"Best macaroni-and-cheese I ever tasted," Qwilleran announced.
"I found some really good cheddar at a little store behind the post office," Mrs. Cobb said. After a moment she added, "I also noticed a sale of ten-speeds at the hardware store." She looked at him hopefully. "Twenty percent off." Qwilleran grunted. "When they make a dogproof bike, I may be interested." Later that afternoon he had another interesting scrap of conversation. The mail-cat trudged into the library to deliver Penelope's thank-you note, about which there lingered a faint but heady suggestion of Fantaisie Feline.
Qwilleran studied the intelligent-looking animal. "What was Steve trying to tell us, Koko? Who killed Tiffany Trotter — and why? And what really happened to Daisy Mull? Are we wasting our time hunting for answers?" The cat sat tall on the desk, swaying slightly as he concentrated his blue gaze on Qwilleran's forehead. Suddenly the man realized that Koko had never experienced the murals in Daisy's apartment. He grabbed him and carried him out to the garage. The sleek body was neither struggling in protest nor limp with acquiescence — just taut with anticipation.
First Koko was allowed to examine the cars, the bicycle, the garden implements. It was always better to let him take his time and follow his own inclinations. Eventually he found the flight of stairs and scampered up to the living quarters. In the freshly painted apartment he craned his neck and sniffed in every direction without any apparent pleasure. Then he wandered down the hall and into the jungle of daisies.
Koko's first reaction was to flatten himself, belly to the floor. All around him were wild, tangled, threatening forms on walls and ceiling. Cats could not distinguish colors, Qwilleran had been told, but they could sense them. When Koko concluded that the place was safe, he started slinking around, inspecting with caution several mysterious spots on the rug, a scratch on the dresser, and a rip in the chair upholstery. As his investigation reassured him, he stretched to his full length before prancing around the room in a dance of exhilaration-as if he could hear music in colors that Qwilleran could appreciate only with his eyes.
Then something unseen alerted the cat. He looked quickly this way and that, ran a few steps, jumped and waved his paw, scurried across the room, turned and leaped through the air, twisting his lithe body into a back somersault.
Remembering Mrs. Cobb's haunted-house theory, Qwilleran shivered involuntarily until he realized the truth. It was almost August, the season of houseflies, and Koko was chasing a tiny flying insect, matching its aerial swooping 'with his own acrobatics. He chased it into the hallway and soon returned, chomping and licking his chops.
"Disgusting!" Qwilleran told him. "Is that all you can find to do?" Koko was excited by the chase and the kill, and he was bent on finding another prey. He jumped onto the bed and stood on his hind legs, extending a paw up the wall. He was a yard long when he stretched to the limit. He pawed the graffiti, trying to reach one set of initials nestled in the pattern of hearts, flowers, and foliage. Then he sprang, and a fly fell down behind the bed. In a split second the cat was after it. Dead or alive, the fly had fallen between the mattress and the wall. Koko reached into the crevice with one slender foreleg and then the other, mumbling to himself in determined gutturals.
Qwilleran watched the struggle for a while before pulling the bed away from the wall. Like a hawk Koko dived into the aperture, and soon there were sounds of moist chomping. "Revolting!" Qwilleran said. "You eat those filthy flies, but you won't eat catfood with added vitamins and minerals. Let's get out of here. We're going home." Koko remained behind the bed. "Chfff! Chfff!" It was that delicate cat-sneeze.
"It's dusty back there! Get out! Let's go!" The cat failed to respond, and Qwilleran felt the old tingling sensation on his upper lip. Once before, Koko had dredged up some telling mementoes from behind a bed. Kneeling on the mattress the man peered down into the shadows. Koko was hunched over something, sniffing it, nuzzling it, poking it with one inquisitive paw.
Qwilleran reached down and retrieved a notebook — a school notebook with tom and ruffled pages. Koko immediately jumped out of his hiding place, yowling and demanding his treasure. Some of the pages had obviously been nibbled by mice.
With the notebook in one hand and the indignant cat in the other, Qwilleran returned to the house and headed for the library. Koko was howling in high dudgeon, and Yum Yum came running from the solarium, shrieking in sympathy. They were followed by Mrs. Cobb. "What's the matter? What's going on here?" "Give them a treat, will you? Get them out of my hair!" "Treat!" she cried, and led the way to the kitchen like the Pied Piper.
Qwilleran closed the library door and settled down to inspect Koko's find. It was the cheapest kind of notebook, with ruled pages, some of them nibbled and all of them stained. It had a definite mousy odor.
"A diary!" he said aloud, as he thumbed through the soiled pages with distaste. He could distinguish dates, but the handwriting was completely illegible. Once upon a time he had known an artist who could make every letter of the alphabet look like a U; Daisy made every letter look like O. The cursive writing was a coil of overlapping circles. The art teacher's comment had been apt; Daisy's calligraphic invention was attractive to the eye but impossible to read.
After his bike ride, he decided, he would phone Mildred Hanstable and ask her to look at (he diary-and translate it if possible. Meanwhile he added it to the growing collection in the desk drawer: the ivory elephant, a gold bracelet, a postal card, and an envelope with a thousand in cash.
Every one of these memorabilia had been found by that phenomenal cat, he recalled. Yet Koko always made his discoveries seem so casual. This time he went through the motions of chasing a fly, pursuing it up the wall, batting it down as it tried to camouflage itself among the initials… What were the initials?
Qwilleran made a dash to the garage and back. Grabbing the little telephone directory, he combed two columns of listings. Only three subscribers had the right initials: Sam Gafner, Scott Gippel, and Senior Goodwinter.
If SG had been the object of Daisy's affection, it would have to be Gafner, he concluded. Scott Gippel was the enormous councilman who required two chairs. Junior's father — with his paper hat and bemused expression — would hardly appeal to a giddy young girl. Gafner, the real estate broker was the most likely candidate. After his bike ride, he decided, he would do some serious research.
It was a beautiful day for biking. Warmed by the sun and caressed by light breezes, Qwilleran headed for his favorite country road. The vegetation, freshly washed, was a vibrant green. Flocks of blackbirds rose from the brush and followed the lone rider, scolding with staccato chirps. Clicks in the sprocket and rear wheel added to the chorus. He remembered Mrs. Cobb's parting words: "Be careful with that broken-down contraption, Mr. Q. You really ought to buy a ten-speed." Everything on Ittibittiwassee Road smelled damp and clean. The sun and breezes had dried the pavement, but the roadside ditch was filled with rainwater. It was a good thirty feet from the pavement to allow for future widening of the road. This would be a major highway when the condominium development was completed. Too bad! He liked the quiet and the loneliness of the road.
Coming up on the right was the site of the old Buckshot Mine, where miners had died in a cave-in in 1913. As he pedaled past the ruins he listened intently for the eerie whistling sound said to emanate from the mineshaft. The abandoned shaft house, a weathered silver, had been drenched with rain.
Qwilleran was studying the ruins with such concentration that he was unaware of a truck approaching from the opposite direction-unaware until its motor roared. He looked ahead in time to see its burst of speed, its sudden swerve into the eastbound lane, a murderous monster bearing down upon him and his rickety bicycle. He yanked the handlebars and plunged down toward the ditch, but his front wheel hit a rock, and he went sailing over the handlebars. For an interminable moment he was airborne…