Halfway through a sentence he was interrupted by urgent yowling on the main floor, and he took the shortcut to the kitchen, down the spiral staircase. Koko was standing on the kitchen counter, staring out the window. Qwilleran made a quick check, There were no vehicles in the barnyard, no prowlers on the grounds. “False alarm!” he said to the cat, “You can get arrested for that!”
Just then a small red car came bouncing through the wooded area and pulled up to the kitchen door. Koko knew it was coming, certainly knew who was driving, and probably knew what she was bringing!
“My apologies, old boy.” Qwilleran said. Going out to greet the visitor, he exclaimed, “Celia! What a pleasant surprise!”
“Look in the backseat, Chief. There’s some stuff for your freezer. I was gonna sneak in and leave it in the pirate chest.” A weathered sea chest stood at the back door for package deliveries.
“No one sneaks in when the Inspector General is on duty.”
Celia laughed happily. She always laughed at the mildest quip from “the Chief.” She explained, “I’ve brought you two meals of macaroni and cheese and a two-pound meatloaf. It’s sliced so you can thaw some for a sandwich. I didn’t put much onion in it because you might like to give some to the kitties, and I know they’re particular…. Ooh! You have new bar stools!” she squealed when she went indoors. “We’re so busy! I had to hire a helper. We’re catering a wedding reception Saturday.”
“Will you have time left for volunteer work? You were a real asset.”
“Only one thing teaching adults to read. My first student is a forty-year-old woman who’s tickled to be able to read recipe books. In fact, she’s the one I hired as my helper…. Have you rented my old apartment yet?”
“To the new manager of the Mackintosh Inn. He says he has a strange feeling that some wonderful person lived there before him.”
“Oh, Chief! You’re a big kidder!”
In mid-afternoon Qwilleran walked downtown to Lois’s Luncheonette for a slice of her famous apple pie. Lois Inchpot was a loud, bossy, goodhearted woman who had been feeding downtown shoppers and workers for decades in a dingy backstreet lunchroom. The shabbier it became with the years, the more the customers cherished it; they felt comfortable there.
When Qwilleran arrived, the place was empty, and Lois was in the kitchen, working on dinner. “Whaddaya want?” came a demanding voice through the pass-through window.
“Apple pie and a cuppa!” he shouted back.
“Apple’s all gone! You can have cherry.”
He walked to the pass-through and said, “I’m not enthusiastic about cherry pie.”
“How come? You un-American or something?”
“I did my patriotic bit when I helped choose the queen for the cherry festival.”
Lois shoved a mug of coffee across the shelf and then banged a plate of cherry pie beside it, chanting, “Cherries every day keep the gout away!”
“Is that propaganda for the cherry-growers? Or are you practicing medicine without a license?”
“Eat it!” she ordered. “You’ll love it!”
He had to admit the pie was good not too tart, not too sweet, not too gelatinous, not too soupy. Obviously it had never been in a freezer or a microwave oven. “Not bad!” he declared as he returned his empty plate. “Keep practicing, and someday you’ll get it right.”
“Oh, pish posh!” she said grouchily but with a half smile. She liked Qwilleran.
“Where’s Lenny?”
Her voice softened. “He has classes ‘most all day on Wednesday, and I don’t allow nothin’ to interfere with that boy’s education. He’ll finish school if I hafta scrub floors! Did you know he’s workin’ parttime at the hotel? I mean, the inn? Six to midnight. And he’s captain of the desk clerks,” she said proudly.
“Someday he’ll be chief innkeeper,” Qwilleran predicted, knowing that was what she wanted to hear.
“Lenny says old Mr. Muckety-Muck is here again, registered in the fancy suite on the third floor. You seen him?”
“To whom… are you referring?” Qwilleran asked to tease her.
“Don’t get la-de-da with me! You know who I mean.”
“No, I haven’t seen him. I thought I might catch a glimpse of him here, eating cherry pie.”
”Hah!” she huffed with contempt, banging the lid on a soup kettle for emphasis.
Just then her son burst into the restaurant and threw his textbooks on a table in the rear booth, “Got any pie, Mom?” He helped himself to a mug of coffee. “Hi, Mr. Q! Going to the games this weekend? The inn’s booked solid for Friday and Saturday nights.”
“Do you participate in the athletic events, Lenny?”
“Only the footraces. I leave the hammer-throw and all that to the big guys, but our night clerk tosses the caber. He has the strength for it. I introduced him to you at the party Saturday night. We call him Boze, short for Bozo.” Lenny moved his coffee mug to Qwilleran’s table. “I’m sort of his manager. He needs somebody to prod him, make his decisions, keep him on track, you know.”
“How long have you known him?”
“Since high school. I was managing the football team, and Boze was a great tackle. Not much of a student, though, and he wanted to drop out. So my mom and I took him on as a private crusade. I tutored him, and she fed him and read the riot act. She’s good at both of those!… And he managed to squeak by with a diploma.”
“What were his parents doing all this time?”
“He’s an orphan. Grew up in different foster homes. After graduation he got a job as woodsman with a forestry company, and I worked at the old hotel until it was bombed.”
“What brought Boze out of the woods?” Qwilleran asked.
“A soft job at the hotel, a small scholarship to MCCC, and a berth on the Moose County team for the Highland Games. Boze can toss the caber like nothing you ever saw! It’s not just brute strength, you know. It’s tricky, and he’s mastered the knack.”
“Should I know what a caber is?”
“It’s a pole a tree trunk about twenty feet long and weighing about two hundred pounds. Boze tosses it like a toothpick and tumbles it end-over-end, the way you’re supposed to. If we can beat those Bixby bums Saturday, it’ll give the whole county a big charge. Are you gonna be there?”
“I’ve never attended a Scottish Gathering, but I’ll be there, rooting for you guys. Altogether it’s quite a lively week in the sleepy town of Pickax. Have you met the distinguished guest?”
“No, he checked in while Viyella was on the desk. She says he comes on pretty strong, but his niece is kind of mousy. Not after eleven o’clock when I’m on the desk, though! I guess her uncle’s gone to bed, and she comes down to the lobby in false eyelashes, short-short skirts and lots of lipstick. She likes to hang around the desk and talk about rock bands. I couldn’t care less. I go for country-western. Besides, I have a lot of studying to do, and I can use some quiet time on the desk…. So I follow Mr. Morghan’s rule: Act friendly but don’t get friendly.”
“Lenny!” his mother shouted from the kitchen. “If you’re gonna gab instead of studyin’ your books, get off your rusty dusty and help me with dinner!”
Lenny jumped up and grinned. “Gotta go!”
Thursday, September 10 ‘The early bird gets the worm.’
At six o’clock Qwilleran picked up Polly in Indian Village for the drive to West Middle Hummock, where the Lanspeaks had their country estate. His first words were, “Did you get the ring?”