When he phoned the farm, a young voice answered, and he said, “This is Jim Qwilleran. Is your father there?”
“Yep, he’s here.”
There was a pause.
“May I speak to him?”
“Okay… DAD!”
The farmer came to the phone, and Qwilleran said, “First I want to tell you how sorry I am about the tragedy in your family.”
“It was hard to take,” Rollo said. “The family was planning a cruise to Alaska. Had their tickets and everything. It happened just like that!” Rollo snapped his fingers. “How’re things with you?”
“I have some information to share. How busy are you?”
“Just finished supper.”
“If I walk down to my mailbox, would you care to meet me there?”
“Sure. Say when.”
“Give me fifteen minutes, Rollo.”
Before starting out, Qwilleran fed the cats, realizing that Koko’s yowl had been about food and not about Rollo.
The farmer was waiting on the shoulder of the road. He kicked the post supporting Maude’s dilapidated mailbox. “How long does this baby have to stay there? I could use the post on the farm.”
“It would improve the neighborhood if you disposed of that eyesore - and the newspaper sleeve, too.”
“She never got much mail,” Rollo said. “I used to check it every day and take her newspaper to her. She got it free. Who knows if she read it? She rolled the papers up tight, tied ‘em with twine, and soaked ‘em in water. When they dried out, she used ‘em for firewood.”
“Speaking of newspapers, did you see today’s front page?”
“Haven’t had time to look at it yet.”
“Well, four acres of Maude’s land, up at the intersection of Cemetery and Trevelyan, has been sold to the city for six thousand an acre.”
Rollo banged the old mailbox with his fist. “I knew that Northern Land Improvement bunch was out to gyp her!”
“There’s no such firm. The purchaser was Chester Ramsbottom.”
“It figgers! Any time you smell a dunghill, you know he’s gone in the dairy business.”
Qwilleran said, “There’s a rumor that Ramsbottom is also going to lease twelve acres to the county for a workyard.”
“Nobody ever said a word to Boyd and me about any of this, and we’d paid rent for the second quarter. That really bums me!”
“I’m seeing the attorney as soon as he gets back from Chicago. I’ll ask him what recourse you have.”
The farmer had turned away and was gazing across the burned field, now smothered in weeds. Finally he said, “Do you know the fire chief?”
“I knew Bruce Scott, but I’ve never met the new one.”
“When someone’s killed in a fire, you know, the chief has to report it to the state fire marshal, whether it’s arson or not. We’re pretty sure, Boyd and me, that the new guy didn’t report the Coggin fire. At least there wasn’t any follow-up, as far as we know. We thought it was off-base, but we didn’t challenge his decision - didn’t want to get in bad with the new chief.”
Qwilleran said, “I know what you’re getting at. Coming right after the vandalism, it looked to me as if it might be arson. That’s another bug I’ll put in the attorney’s ear. What’s the name of the new chief?”
“Gumboldt. Roy Gumboldt.”
“Do you think he could be in cahoots with Ramsbottom?”
“Hell! He’s Chet’s brother-in-law!” Then, before Qwilleran could react, he said calmly, “I’ll go get some tools and dig up these two babies. The mailbox is set in concrete. I planted it for Maude twenty years ago.”
-16-
Wednesday was the day of the big game, and an electric charge jolted the placid community 400 miles north of everywhere. Banners were strung between the light poles on Main Street. Pennant Race posters plastered the central business district, and the department store displayed the silver pennant that would be the winners’ trophy.Betting was going on all over: private bets on street comers and office pools in every place of business. Even Qwilleran’s Siamese sensed something momentous in the offing and prowled restlessly.
He himself, having a journalist’s compulsion to be in the middle of the excitement, went early to breakfast at Lois’s Luncheonette. The place was crowded. Two cooks were whirling around the kitchen, and Lois herself was taking orders, serving the ham and eggs, pouring coffee, and making change at the cash register. She was one of the celebrities being given pinch-speller status; the mayor had recently proclaimed a Lois Inchpot Day in recognition of her thirty years of feeding hungry Pickaxians.
The other pinch-spellers, besides Amanda Goodwinter, would be Dr. Prelligate, president of MCCC; Foxy Fred, the popular auctioneer; Grandma Toodle, matriarch of the grocery dominion; and Mr. O’Dell, high-school custodian for forty years before his retirement.
Qwilleran asked Lois, “Are you prepared to go up and spell in a pinch?”
“No! No sir! No way! Nothin’ could get me up on that stage to spell! Do you know my boy Lenny is spellin’ for the Nailheads?”
“If the Nailheads win, do we all get free coffee?”
“Absolutely!”
Next, Qwilleran went to the newspaper to watch them making up the front page with a banner story on the spell game and a photo strip on the pickets and card-burners at the library. The headline read: “A Hot Time at the Library.”
After picking up groceries for Polly and transferring them to her car, he went into the building to see if she had returned from the conference. The august premises were unnaturally quiet.
“She’s back,” said one of the clerks, gesturing toward the glass-enclosed office on the mezzanine.
“You missed the excitement” were his first words to Polly. “What was your reaction when you heard about it?”
“My assistant phoned me in Lockmaster, and I confess I was rather amused. Apparently it turned into somewhat of a farce. But there’s a serious side to it. Half of our volunteers have now resigned, and that’s a great loss. They contribute thousands of work-hours every year.”
Did you mention the situation at the conference?”
“Yes, and their attitude was: What do you expect of Moose County? The other libraries adjusted to automation without any trouble… Well, I’m not going to worry about it until tomorrow, after the spell game frenzy has simmered down.”
“Are you going to the game?”
“Of course! Indian Village has chartered a bus for the event. So many of our residents are spelling or otherwise involved!”
“By the way, two of Phoebe’s butterflies have made their debut and are trying their wings.”
“Don’t free them till I’ve seen them, Qwill.”
Driving home through the evergreen woods, he had a brief surge of euphoria that mystified him, and he stroked his moustache. It was a hunch that something was about to turn out well. The Siamese were jumping around in the kitchen window in boisterous fashion as he approached the barn. Before unlocking the door, he automatically checked the sea chest for deliveries. Strangely, the lid was ajar, propped open by a small stone. When he raised it, he quickly lowered it again and backed away. Everyone in Pickax was bomb-conscious following the hotel incident of the previous year. Were the cats warning him?
On second thought he had another cautious look at the contents of the chest. He saw a sizable cardboard carton tied with rope, and there were crayoned words on one flap. As he tried to decipher the message, he heard a faint murmur from inside the box. It sounded like a mewing cat! It sounded, in fact, like two cats! The message on the box flap, he figured out, read: Please find us a good home.