"Tell you tomorrow. I'm in a hurry. Thanks for the information. Wake up your husband and tell him I said goodnight."
He hung up the phone without further civilities and called Celia Robinson. There had been lights in the carriage house when he drove in, and he knew she would be sitting up, reading the latest espionage thriller. In an undercover voice he asked, "Any luck?"
"You were right. I found what you wanted." She spoke in a hushed voice with abstract references. "There wasn't any name on it, but I checked what you mentioned. It's the real McCoy, all right."
"Good going!" he said. "Talk to you later." And now, he wondered, how do we get our hands on it without embarrassing anyone? He sprawled in a lounge chair with his feet on an ottoman and cudgeled his brain. The Siamese sat quietly nearby, sensing that he was doing some concentrated thinking.
Suddenly, in one impulsive move, he swung his feet off the ottoman and went to the telephone desk. He called Hixie Rice at her apartment. There was no answer. He left a message on the machine.
Two minutes later she called back. "Sorry, Qwill. I've been avoiding someone. What's on your mind? How was your dinner date? What did you two talk about?"
"We talked about cats, dogs, baseball, buttons, pasties, and Iris Cobb, and that's why I'm calling you. I need to enlist your cooperation in a small, private, legal, innocuous intrigue."
"That's my specialty," she said. "I want to run an ad in tomorrow's paper, if it isn't too late, but I must not be identified with it in any way. Can you handle that?"
"How big an ad?"
"Whatever it takes to be seen across the room: bold headline, sparse copy, plenty of white space."
"What's the message? Can you give it to me on the phone? I don't think I'm bugged."
He dictated about twenty words.
"Hmmm... interesting!" she said. "Do you expect results?"
"I don't need results," he told her. "This is a bluff. Stay tuned."
16
The cheese-tasting was scheduled for Tuesday evening, and Qwilleran spent much of the day hanging out downtown. The reason was simple. The redoubtable Mrs. Fulgrove was coming to clean the main floor. The amiable Mr. O'Dell would do the floors and vacuum the furniture, but she would dust, scrub, polish, and complain - about public morals, politicians, the younger generation, popular music, and the cat hair, which she considered a Siamese conspiracy to make her work harder. The white-haired Pat O'Dell, on the other hand, usually had something constructive to say in his pleasing Irish brogue.
"Faith, an' it's a foine woman livin' upstairs o'er the garage," he said on this occasion.
"Yes, Mrs. Robinson is a cheerful and energetic soul," Qwilleran agreed.
"Her windows are in need of washin', I'm thinkin', what with so many cars in the parkin' lot and the exhaust leavin' a scum on the glass."
"Make arrangements with her to clean them, Mr. O'Dell, and send the bill to me." Celia had already remarked about the considerate and good-natured maintenance man; she thought she might invite him to dinner some evening and give him a good Irish stew.
So Qwilleran locked the Siamese in their loft apartment and made his getaway before Mrs. Fulgrove loomed on the scene. First, he stopped at the library to see if they had any books on button collecting, in case he should want to write a column on the hobby at some future date. They did. He leafed through one of them and was pleased to find his cat-button pictured and described as a valuable collectible.
Then he went to breakfast at the Scottish Bakery: scones, clotted cream, and currant jam served by a bonnie lassie wearing a plaid apron. The coffee was not bad, either.
Next he visited the health food store, whose bearded proprietor was the husband of the Something's new feature editor. "Welcome to Pickax!" Qwilleran said. "We're always glad to give asylum to defectors from Lockmaster."
"Thank you. We like it here, although the bombing and the murder shook us up, I don't mind telling you."
"It's not a local crime wave, I assure you. It's a spillover from Down Below." Qwilleran patted his moustache with confidence. "Okay if I just browse around?"
He wandered among the vitamin bottles with strange names, trays of muffins with unusual ingredients, meatless sandwiches, and fruit and vegetables without the waxed finish that made them look so good at Toodle's Market. Then there were the snacks. What looked like a chocolate chip cookie had no butter, no sugar, and no chocolate. What looked like a potato chip was made without fat, salt, or potato.
Qwilleran said, "I have a friend who'll be a good customer of yours. Tell me honestly, do your kids eat this stuff?"
"Oh, sure! Our family goes in for alternatives. Our kids were brought up that way, and they think junk food is weird."
From there Qwilleran walked to the police station to inquire about Lenny Inchpot. The witness to the bombing had been found and put on a plane to Duluth, where he would stay with his aunt for a while.
At the Chamber of Commerce across the street, he found them making plans for a Lois Inchpot Day in Pickax, in an effort to lure her back to town and reopen her lunchroom. The mayor would issue a proclamation to that effect, and loyal customers were painting the walls and ceiling, water-stained from the last roof leak.
Then it was time for a bowl of soup at the Spoonery. The day's specials were bouillabaisse, roasted peanut with garlic, sausage and white bean, and chicken with rice and dill. Qwilleran played safe with the bean soup.
After that he visited the Kitchen Boutique to buy a thermometer, basting syringe, and roaster with rack. He was going to roast that blasted bird if it was the last thing he ever did in his life.
Triumphantly, Sharon said, "Mother and I knew you'd break down and start cooking - someday."
"Don't bet on it," he said. "I'm just picking these up for a friend." It was one of the impromptu prevarications that he had developed into an art.
By that time the Tuesday edition of the paper was on the street, and he read his ad. Within a few hours the entire county would be talking about it:
$10,000 REWARD for information leading to the recovery of the late Iris Cobb's personal recipe book, missing since her death.
Confidentiality guaranteed. Write to P.O.
Box 1362, Pickax City.
When Qwilleran returned to the barn, the cleaning crew had gone and there was not a cat hair or mite of dust to be seen. He climbed the ramp to the top level and opened the door to the loft apartment. "Okay, you can come out and start shedding," he said.
In the kitchen he tested the progress of the thawing turkey, and before he could close the door, Koko executed a grand jet‚ over the bar and landed in the refrigerator with the bird.
"Out!" Qwilleran yelled, dragging him from the refrigerator and slamming it shut. The cat howled as if his tail had been caught in the door. "Don't overreact, you slyboots! Cats are supposed to be known for their patience."
Koko went slinking away, licking his wounded feline ego.
Qwilleran dressed for the cheese-tasting in dinner jacket and black tie, with a rare set of black studs in his shirt-front. They were from India, inlaid with silver and gold-a gift from Polly. Appraising himself in the full-length mirror, he had to admit that he looked good in evening clothes.
It was dark when the jitneys started delivering the well-dressed guests, and the exterior lights transformed the barn into an enchanted castle. Indoors, mysterious illumination from hidden sources dramatized the balconies and overhead beams, the white fireplace cube and its soaring white stacks, the contemporary tapestries, and the clean-cut modern furniture. Add to that the glamor of beaded dinner dresses, the courtliness of men in evening wear, and the bonhomie of such an occasion; it had all the ingredients of a magical evening, one never to be forgotten in Pickax, for more reasons than one.