Лилиан Браун - The Cat Who Sang For The Birds

“Your enthusiasm is commendable,” he murmured. “Well, I’ve known Phoebe since she was a baby, you see, and I’m terribly proud of her. Our families have known each other for generations. We belong to the same church. I was a bridesmaid at her parents’ wedding.”

She spoke happily, and he wondered if she knew about the Sloans’ current family problem. If so, she was too well-bred to mention it. As for himself, he followed Shakespeare’s advice: Give every man thy ear but few thy voice. Nevertheless, he said slyly, “I suppose Phoebe will be spelling for the drugstore team.”

“No doubt!” she said with the same cheerful conviction that all’s right with the world.

“I’d like to write a column about Phoebe’s specialty but haven’t been able to get a handle on it. Perhaps I should interview collectors and get their individual viewpoints, especially if they organize a fan club with a constructive agenda.”

“Oh, please do, Qwill! You don’t have to mention me. I just want Phoebe to have some nice publicity.”

He left the office carrying two dozen fan letters and reflecting that Sarah Plensdorf was a remarkably kind, selfless woman. She gave generously to good causes and spoke ill of no one. He would have to consult the county historian about the Plensdorf background: Was it shipbuilding, or what?

He was on the way to the lobby to retrieve his Silverlight from an admiring throng when footsteps came running down the hall behind him.

“Qwill! Qwill!” came a woman’s anxious voice. It was Hixie Rice. “Got a minute?” She beckoned him to follow her to the conference room. “Sit down, Qwill.” She closed the door.

“I smell a sinister plot,” he said lightly, then noticed that she looked troubled. Uh-oh, he thought; has another good idea bombed? … She’s jinxed!

“We have a problem,” she blurted. “It’s the spelling bee. I don’t dare tell Arch - not after the Ice Festival fiasco.”

“That was an act of God, Hixie. No one could predict we’d get April weather in February… What’s the hang-up now? I thought you had ten enthusiastic sponsors lined up.”

“We do! We do! And they’ve paid their entry fees up front. It’s their employees who are dragging their feet. They don’t want to stand up and spell in front of an audience. Relatives of employees are eligible, too, but we’ve still got only seven spellers. We need thirty to man ten teams.”

“Do they know they’ll have a practice wordlist to study in advance?”

“They know that, and still we haven’t been able to spark any interest. The Lockmaster Ledger is sponsoring a similar event - they always copy us - and they’re finding the same lack of response. I don’t understand it, Qwill! Adult spelling bees are highly successful Down Below.”

“They draw from a population of millions,” he reminded her. “Also, what works for them doesn’t necessarily work 400 miles north of everywhere.”

“Would you suggest a solution?” she asked without much show of hope.

“I’d need to think about it. Give me a few hours, and I’ll get back to you. And cheer up, Hixie! There’s a solution to every problem.” Qwilleran returned to the lobby, answered questions about his bike, put on his yellow helmet, and pedaled home. Although he claimed to do his best thinking while biking or sitting in an easy chair with his feet up, he had not produced a single useful thought by the time he wheeled the Silverlight into the carriage house.

From there he trudged through the woods to the barn. The kitchen window was open, and he could hear the Siamese yowling through the screen long before he came in view. It was twelve noon and time for their treat. That was the reason for the clamor - not any eagerness for his agreeable presence. That was all right. He was used to playing second fiddle to a bowl of Kabibbles.

Having taken care of their needs, he prepared coffee and carried a mug to the lounge area where he could sit with his feet up and doodle ideas on a legal pad. The Siamese watched, sitting comfortably on their briskets - Yum Yum on the rug, Koko on the coffee table, keeping a book warm.

What the spelling bee needed, Qwilleran told himself, was a new approach entirely: a new name for the event… new terminology… a new format.

“Yow!” came a comment from the coffee table.

“Thank you for the encouragement,” Qwilleran said. “In other words, what we need is a whole new ballgame!”

Kokojumped down to the floor and ran around in circles.

“Ballgame! That’s it! Of course! Why not?” Only then did he realize that the book Koko had been keeping warm was Baseball, An Illustrated History. Had Koko sensed the problem that was on his mind? The idea of a telepathic connection between man and animal was not unthinkable in today’s science. But could a cat - even one with sixty whiskers - go so far as to convey a solution? Not likely. It was simply a coincidence f that the baseball book had been on the coffee table at that time. Even so, stranger things had happened in that household.

As for the baseball theme, it was perfect for Moose County, where folks went berserk over a softball game between scrub teams. How about ten teams of all-star spellers competing in an orthographic pennant race, with the mayor of Pickax pitching out the first word? And how about a World Series in September between the pennant winners of Moose County and Lockmaster? And how about having the Pickax barbershop quartet sing “Take me out to the spell game”?

Qwilleran looked for the issue of the Something that had first announced names of sponsors. The ten teams would need nicknames, and the spellers would need baseball caps in their team colors. And how about T-shirts with the team name on the front and the speller’s number on the back? “You can’t tell the spellers without a scorecard!” Hawkers could sell peanuts and Cracker Jack. He poured another mug of coffee and went to work on the nicknames:

MONEYBAGS… Pickax People’s National Bank NAILHEADS… XYZ Enterprises OILERS… Gippel’s Garage LADDERS… Pickax Boosters CHOWHEADS … Old Stone Mill DAUBERS… The Art Center PILLS… Sloan’s Drug Store MUCKERS… Fanners’ Collective HAMS… Pickax Theatre Club DIGGERS… Dingleberry Funeral Home

Qwilleran phoned the newspaper and read his notes to Hixie, who greeted them with yelps of relief. “We’ll announce it on page one tomorrow!” she said, almost breathless with enthusiasm. “Spellers will clamor to sign up! Everyone in town will be pumped up!”

“The trick will be to move fast while it’s hot,” he advised.

“Next week. We can swing it in ten days.”

“What about uniforms for the spellers?”

“One of the T-shirt shops in Mooseville does custom imprinting. The baseball caps can be ordered air express. Polly will have to scrape up a wordlist in a hurry.”

“You’ll have to sound out the Lockmaster Ledger about the World Series,” he reminded her.

“Oh, they’ll go for it! I know those guys.”

“Another thing, Hixie: instead of emcee, wordmaster, and judge, the officials should be a coach, pitcher, and umpire.”

“Qwill! What can I say?” she cried. “You’re a lifesaver!”

“Okay. You owe me a dinner at the Palomino Paddock.”

Qwilleran hung up with a sense of satisfaction. Next he would have to help Polly with her wordlist: mayonnaise, reminiscence, sherbet, schizophrenia, raisin, complexion, lettuce, exacerbate, vichyssoise. The preponderance of edibles reminded him that he had had no lunch. He made a sandwich and went on listing while he ate it: charismatic, assassination, penicillin, physiological, chaperon, doggerel, precocious, illiteracy.

It was an exciting week for the residents of Moose County. Tuesday’s paper carried the front-page announcement with all the buzzwords: All-Stars, Pennant Race, World Series. “Take me out to the spell game” was the slogan on posters everywhere: in store windows, on the bulletin board at the library, in church fellowship rooms. On street comers and in coffee shops it was the chief topic of conversation. Tickets, run off overnight in the Something printing plant, went on sale at the bank, drugstore, and Old Stone Mill. Sales were so brisk that the venue was changed from the community hall to the high-school auditorium, which had double the capacity.