“Need a wheelchair?” he asked.
“No thanks, dear. The cane is just to command special attention.”
“You’re a sly one! Did you have your ankle X-rayed?”
“Yes. It’s not serious.”
“Where’s my friend Walter?”
“I sent him back to Ohio,” she said in a matter-of-fact way, leading Qwilleran to wonder, Could she have invented him? . . . No, she’s not devious enough or creative enough to play such a trick. . . . but it would have been a clever one!
When her luggage was stowed in the van and they were on the road to her Indian Village condo, she said, “I’ve missed Brutus and Catta so much! I wonder if they’ve missed me?”
“I know they have,” Qwilleran said. “I could tell by their look of disappointment when I unlocked your door and went in to cheer them up.”
“I can hardly wait to see them! . . . How was your stay at the Nutcracker?”
“Interesting. There were two murders, a suicide and a heart attack—all guests from Down Below, staying in the rustic cabins along the creek.”
Warily, as if suspecting a hoax, she said, “Tell me about it.”
“Well, first there was a male guest purporting to be a sales representative who was actually a gold prospector operating illegally in the Black Forest Conservancy. He was murdered presumably for his forty-thousand-dollar car and a trunkful of gold nuggets. . . . Next, there was an accomplished photographer shooting pictures of wildlife in the creek and in the woods. He was murdered presumably because another gold prospector thought his illegal activity was being photographed. . . . The photographer’s young wife had a heart attack and is hospitalized. . . . Do you follow me?”
“I follow you,” Polly said, “but I can’t believe it!”
“Now, another guest, posing as a sport fisherman but thought to be another gold prospector, is suspected of both murders and has taken off with his truck and all personal belongings, abandoning the woman and child who have been traveling with him for reasons open to speculation. She was a sad case, apparently homeless and addicted, and she jumped off the Old Stone Bridge this morning, leaving a suicide note in the pocket of her son’s T-shirt.”
“Oh, Qwill!” she protested, “this sounds more like fiction than real life!”
“The next chapter is in the typewriter,” he replied.
He avoided mentioning Koko’s uncanny role in the drama. Polly had a practical turn of mind that squelched the idea of a cat with supranormal gifts. The fact that Koko had sixty whiskers and her beloved Brutus had only the usual forty-eight must have rankled in her maternal subconscious. Qwilleran had learned not to brag about his pets.
On arrival at her home Polly rushed indoors, and when Qwilleran carried in her luggage, he found her kneeling on the hearth rug and slavering over her two excited pets.
“I’ll phone you after you’ve settled in,” he said, “and we’ll make plans for tomorrow.”
alt="[image]"/>Qwilleran’s Siamese were not excited to see him, having seen him every day for several years. He fed them, thawed macaroni and cheese for himself, and then finished unpacking. When he carried a carton of writing materials to the studio on the first balcony, Koko followed, purring throatily as if he knew it contained those flat yellow boxes. There were also file folders, books, copy paper and soft lead pencils, but as soon as the yellow boxes were stacked on the desk, Koko moved in to huddle on them cozily—keeping them warm, so to speak.
“Don’t get any ideas!” Qwilleran warned, and the cat squeezed his eyes as he did when planning a nefarious misdemeanor. “How about going out to talk to the crows?” Without waiting for an answer, he transported them to the screened gazebo.
Then he sorted the photos, looking for shots worthy of the art book: the great owl in flight, the two squirrels in conference, busy beavers, smart raccoons, a doe and her fawn drinking from the creek, and more. Only two had been damaged by Koko’s slobbering, and Bushy could make new prints.
One was the skunk shot that Doyle had found comic. Here was a creature of the wild having an afternoon nap on a piece of mechanical equipment. It looked like the seat of a tractor. Perhaps the sun had warmed the metal. Perhaps the elevation gave the animal a feeling of security.
Qwilleran amused himself by composing a cutline for the photo: “If you’re a skunk, you’ll never be satisfied with anything else after you’ve had a nap in the seat of a forklift.”
“Forklift!” he said aloud. “What’s a forklift doing in the Black Forest? He looked at the squirrel photo, and then he knew. He grabbed the phone and called the Brodie residence; they would be watching their regular Saturday-night movie on the VCR.
“Andy! When the flick’s finished, drive over to the barn for a nightcap and a new slant on the Nutcracker case.” No more needed to be said. The Brodies lived only five minutes away.
Quickly Qwilleran brought the cats in from the gazebo . . . set out Scotch and chicken liver paté on the snack bar . . . put the moustache cup on the work bar for Brodie’s amusement.
“What’s that ugly thing?” were the chief’s first words.
“A moustache cup. A hundred years old and very valuable. It was a gift.”
Brodie grunted and sat down, pouring himself a Scotch without delay.
The Siamese immediately came forward to sniff his shoes and rub against his legs.
“They’re giving me the business again,” he said. “What are they up to?”
“It’s your animal magnetism, Andy. . . . What film did you watch tonight?”
“Something called Driving Miss Daisy. It was her choice. Last Saturday night we saw a good one about a submarine. What’s this in the bowl? Peanut butter?”
“It’s chicken liver spread from Toodle’s deli counter. You’ll like it. Spread some on a cracker.”
At that moment there was a shattering crash. The moustache cup had disappeared from the end of the work bar, and the culprits were peering over the edge of the bar and pondering the disaster on the quarry tile floor.
Brodie laughed until he choked. “That cat’s smarter than I thought he was!”
Qwilleran said, “Wait till you see Koko’s choice of the two most interesting photos in Underhill’s collection.”
Brodie looked at the squirrels. “Those are tree stumps in the background! Looks as if a whole grove has been cut down! Where was this taken?”
“In the Black Forest Conservancy, where timbering is illegal. Those stumps represent a million dollars’ worth of black walnut.”
“How do you know?”
“I borrowed a book from Doc Abernethy. . . . Andy, we have tree pirates in the Conservancy!”
“I’ve heard of tree rustlers—”
“Same thing.” Qwilleran looked at Koko and remembered the cat’s fascination with Hannah’s video. A rollicking band of pirates we!
Qwilleran went on. “The suspect, I believe, is an experienced woodsman. He was up here a few weeks ago and talked to Jake Olsen about hiring young huskies for a logging movie. Actually, he was probably mapping the territory and locating the best black walnuts. He would bring his own crew. A furniture-moving van was seen in the vicinity. We can guess that it brought up the chain saws and forklift . . . and the lumberjacks . . . and maybe camouflage tents. Then it hauled ten-foot logs Down Below. To expedite the robbery, they might dump them in a holding warehouse in a nearby county and return for another load. For what it’s worth, the van had a Wisconsin tag and DIAMOND COMPANY logo.”
Qwilleran glanced at Koko and thought about the Trollope novel they had been reading. He said, “Shortly after Underhill was shot, the suspect drove his truck up to Cabin Two and cleared out his gear, and Koko looked out the window and growled. That cat knows when people are up to no good.”