Qwilleran had once written a column about the enthusiastic band of volunteers recruited through all the churches. Some had technical skills; others were simply young people with energy and strong backs. When household emergencies confronted the poor, the aged, or the infirm, this crisis squad was geared to respond on the double.
“Have you ever met Mrs. Coggin?” Polly asked.
“No, but I’ve caught a glimpse of her in her backyard. Not many signs of life around there, except for chickens and dogs.”
“She’s in her nineties, but smart and spunky, they say. I suppose she’s considered eccentric, but the nature of the vandalism was scurrilous!”
As Qwilleran listened, he was stroking his moustache slowly, a gesture meaning his suspicions were being alerted. There might be more to the accusatory epithet than met the eye. His career in journalism had taught him one thing: there’s always a story behind the story.
Polly said, “But I must stop babbling and go to the clubhouse, although I find walking on that treadmill a colossal bore.”
“It’s good for you,” he reminded her. “And salads are good for you, dear! Ŕ bientôt!”
Ŕ bientôt!”
Qwilleran cradled the receiver slowly and fondly. No one else had ever been concerned about his diet; for that matter, had he ever been concerned about anyone’s cardiovascular system? In front of him was a wall of bookshelves covering the fireplace cube and filled with pre-owned volumes from Eddington Smith’s dusty bookshop. The sight of their mellow spines, like the sound of Polly’s mellow voice, always pleased him. He agreed with Francis Bacon: Old friends to trust, old wood to burn, old authors to read.
The titles were arranged in categories, and Koko liked to nestle in snug spaces between Biography and Drama or between History and Fiction. Occasionally he raised his nose to sniff the fish glue used in old bindings. Sometimes he pushed a book off the shelf. It would land on the floor with a thlunk, and he would peer over the edge of the shelf to view his accomplishment. That was Qwilleran’s cue to pick it up and read a few pages aloud, savoring familiar words and thoughts, while the Siamese enjoyed hearing a familiar voice. He had a full, rich voice for reading aloud.
Strangely, the titles the cat dislodged often had prophetic significance, or so it seemed; it could be coincidence. Yet… several hours before the vandals branded the old woman a witch, Koko had shoved The Crucible, an Arthur Miller play, off the shelf. Why would he choose that particular moment to draw attention to a work about the Salem witchcraft trials? Koko never did anything without a motive, and the incident gave Qwilleran an urge to visit Mrs. Coggin.
-2-
As a journalist, Qwilleran was interested in newsworthy characters; as one who had never known his grandparents, he was drawn to octogenarians and nonagenarians. That was reason enough to visit Mrs. Coggin. Another incentive was Koko’s cavalier treatment of The Crucible.
While Qwilleran was feeding the Siamese the next morning, he began to wonder how the aged eccentric would react to a casual visit from a stranger. There was no listing for her in the telephone directory. Just “dropping in” or “stopping by” was customary in the north country but not in Qwilleran’ s book. He still had some city blood in his veins.
Nevertheless, he rationalized. On the roadside across from her house there was a newspaper sleeve as well as a rural mailbox… . All residents over ninety received a free subscription to the Moose County Something… If she read it, she should recognize his moustache. It appeared at the head of his column every Tuesday and Friday and was better known in Moose County than George Washington’s wig on the one-dollar bill… A token of neighborliness, such as muffins from the Scottish bakery, might be in order.
“How does that sound, Koko?” he asked the cat, who was concentrating on his breakfast.
“Yargle,” came the reply as Koko tried to swallow and comment at the same time.
In mid-morning, Qwilleran set out from the barn carrying a baker’s box tied with red plaid ribbon. He said goodbye to the cats, told them where he was going, and estimated when he would return. The more you talk to cats, he believed, the smarter they become. Koko was disturbingly smart. Qwilleran called him a fine fellow and had a great deal of respect for him. Yum Yum was a dainty little female with winning ways and a fondness for laps, the contents of wastebaskets, and small shiny objects she could hide under the rug.
He gave them some parting instructions. “Don’t answer the phone. Don’t pull the plug on the refrigerator. Don’t open the door to poll-takers.”
They looked at him blankly. From the bam a narrow lane led east to the county highway, a matter of a few tenths of a mile. It wound through the bird garden, then a meadow that had once been a blighted apple orchard, then an age-old grove of evergreens and hardwoods. At the end, fronting on Trevelyan Road, was the two-acre plot where Polly had been building a house until health problems forced her to abandon the project. Fortunately, the Klingenschoen Foundation took it off her hands and gave it to the local art community as a center for exhibitions and related activities.
The new Art Center had a residential air, being sided with the stained cedar popular in the north country. As Qwilleran walked past, he found everything shipshape for the official opening - except the driveway and parking lot. These paved areas were crisscrossed with brown mud tracked in from the highway. Trevelyan Road was used chiefly by farmers, and mud from the fields was transferred to the pavement by truck tires and tractor treads, thence to the Art Center premises. Officers of the Arts Council had drawn the condition to the attention of county officials, but what could be done? In farming country, mud
happens! Yet, the new manager of the Art Center had written an irate letter to the newspaper, a move that brought angry replies from the agricultural sector.
Across the road from the handsome new building was a dilapidated farmhouse surrounded by a hundred acres of well-tilled farmland. The house was sadly neglected and would have appeared abandoned but for the chickens pecking around the wheels of a rusty truck in the front yard. As Qwilleran approached, five elderly mongrels limped and waddled from behind the house.
“Good dogs! Good dogs!” he said as he headed for the front stoop. They followed him with benign curiosity, too tired or too old to bark.
Nevertheless, the front door was flung open, and a scrawny woman in strange clothing screeched, “Who be you?”
Qwilleran raised the bakery box and replied in a pleasant voice, “A messenger from the Moose County Something, bringing a present to one of our favorite readers!”
“Laws a’mighty!” she exclaimed. “I declare it be the moustache from the paper! Come on in and have a sup. There be a pot o’ coffee b’ilin’ on the stove.” She spoke in a local patois common among old-timers in the area. Polly was doing research on Old Moose as an almost forgotten dialect. Qwilleran was glad he had brought his tape recorder.
The entrance hall was totally dark. Groping blindly in her wake he found himself in a large, dusty, cluttered kitchen. Besides a pot-bellied stove, pots and pans, and a dry sink with hand pump, there were such furnishings as a narrow cot, a chest of drawers, and a large, old-fashioned Morris chair with tom upholstery. This was where she lived!
She cleared rolled-up newspapers and assorted litter from a wooden table and a scarred wooden chair. “Sit ye down!” she invited as she poured coffee from an enameled tin pot into thick china mugs with chipped handles. It had been boiling on a kerosene heater. The cast-iron stove, not needed in this weather, was piled high with rolled-up newspapers.