Лилиан Браун - The Cat Who Came To Breakfast

THE CAT WHO CAME TO BREAKFAST

by Lilian Jackson Braun

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1994

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Dedicated to Earl Bettinger, the husband who ...

CHAPTER 1

It was a weekend in June—glorious weather for boating. A small cabin cruiser with Double-Six freshly painted on the sternboard chugged across the lake at a cautious speed. Stowed on the aft deck were suitcases, cartons, a turkey roaster without handles, and a small wire-mesh cage with a jacket thrown over the top.

"They're quiet!" the pilot yelled above the motor noise.

The passenger, a man with a large moustache, shouted back, "They like the vibration!"

"Yeah. They can smell the lake, too!"

"How long does it take to cross?"

"The ferry makes it in thirty minutes! I'm going slow so they don't get seasick!"

The passenger lifted a sleeve of the jacket for a surreptitious peek. "They seem to be okay!"

Pointing across the water to a thin black line on the horizon, the pilot announced loudly. "That's our destination! . . . Breakfast Island, ahoy!"

"YOW!" came a piercing baritone from the cage.

"That's Koko!" the passenger yelled. "He knows what "breakfast" means!"

"N-n-NOW!" came a shrill soprano echo.

"That's Yum Yum! They're both hungry!"

The cabin cruiser picked up speed. For all of them it was a voyage to another world.

Breakfast Island, several miles from the Moose County mainland, was not on the navigation chart. The pear-shaped blip of land—broad at the south end and elongated at the northern tip—had been named Pear Island by nineteenth-century cartographers. Less printable names were invented by lake captains who lost ships and cargo on the treacherous rocks at the stem end of the pear.

The southern shore was more hospitable. For many years, fishermen from the mainland, rowing out at dawn to try their luck, would beach their dinghies on the sand and fry up some of their catch for breakfast. No one knew exactly when or how Breakfast Island earned its affectionate nickname, but it was a long time before the economic blessing known as tourism.

Moose County itself, 400 miles north of everywhere, had recently been discovered as a vacation paradise; its popularity was developing gradually by word of mouth. Breakfast Island, on the other hand, blossomed suddenly—the result of a seed planted by a real-estate entrepreneur, nurtured by a financial institution, and watered by the careful hand of national publicity.

Two days before the voyage of the Double-Six, the flowering of Breakfast Island was the subject of debate on the mainland, where two couples were having dinner at the Old Stone Mill.

"Let's drink a toast to the new Pear Island resort," said Arch Riker, publisher of the local newspaper. "Best thing that ever happened to Moose County!"

"I can hardly wait to see it," said Polly Duncan, head of the Pickax Public Library.

Mildred Riker suggested, "Let's all four of us go over for a weekend and stay at a bed-and-breakfast!"

The fourth member of the party sat in moody silence, tamping his luxuriant moustache.

"How about it, Qwill?" asked Riker. "Will you drink to that?"

"No!" said Jim Qwilleran. "I don't like what they've done to Breakfast Island; I see no reason for changing its name; and I have no desire to go there!"

"Well!" said Polly in surprise.

"Really!" said Mildred in protest.

The two men were old friends—journalists from. "Down Below," as Moose County natives called the population centers of the United States. Now Riker was realizing his dream of publishing a country newspaper, and Qwilleran, having inherited money, was living a comfortable bachelor life in Pickax City (population 3,000) and writing a column for the Moose County Something. Despite the droop of his pepper-and-salt moustache and the melancholy look in his heavy-lidded eyes, he had found middle-aged contentment here. He walked and biked and filled his lungs with country air. He met new people and confronted new challenges. He had a fulfilling friendship with Polly Duncan. He lived in a spectacular converted apple barn. And he shared the routine of everyday living with two Siamese cats.

"Let me tell you," he went on to his dinner partners, "why I'm opposed to the Pear Island resort. When I first came up here from Down Below, some boaters took me out to the island, and we tied up at an old wooden pier. The silence was absolute, except for the scream of a gull or the splash of a fish jumping out of the water. God! It was peaceful! No cars, no paved roads, no telephone poles, no people, and only a few nondescript shacks on the edge of the forest!" He paused and noted the effect he was having on his listeners. "What is on that lonely shore now? A three-story hotel, a marina with fifty boat slips, a pizza parlor, a T-shirt studio, and two fudge shops!"

"How do you know?" Riker challenged him. "You haven't even been over there to see the resort, let alone count the fudge shops."

"I read the publicity releases. That was enough to turn me off."

"If you had attended the press preview, you'd have a proper perspective." Riker had the ruddy face and paunchy figure of an editor who had attended too many press previews.

"If I ate their free lunch," Qwilleran shot back, "they'd expect all kinds of puffery in my column . . . No, it was enough, Arch, that you gave them the lead story on page one, three pictures inside, and an editorial!"

The publisher's new wife, Mildred, spoke up. "Qwill, I went to the preview with Arch and thought XYZ Enterprises did a very tasteful job with the hotel. It's rustic and blends in nicely. There's a shopping strip on either side of the hotel—also rustic—and the signage is standardized and not at all junky." This was high praise coming from someone who taught art in the public schools. "I must admit, though, that you can smell fudge all over the island."

"And horses," said her husband. "It's a heady combination, let me tell you! Since motor vehicles are prohibited, visitors hire carriages or hail horse cabs or rent bicycles or walk."

"Can you picture -the traffic jam when that little island is cluttered with hordes of bicycles and strollers and sightseeing carriages?" Qwilleran asked with a hint of belligerence.

Polly Duncan laid a hand softly on his arm. "Qwill, dear, should we attribute your negative attitude to guilt? If so, banish the thought!"

Qwilleran winced. There was some painful truth in her well-intended statement. It was his own money that had financed, to a great degree, the development of the island. Having inherited the enormous Klingenschoen fortune based in Moose County, he had established the Klingenschoen Foundation to distribute megamillions for the betterment of the community, thus relieving himself of responsibility. A host of changes had resulted, some of which he questioned. Nevertheless, he adhered to his policy of hands-off.

Polly continued, with sincere enthusiasm. "Think how much the K Foundation has done for the schools, health care, and literacy! If it weren't for Klingenschoen backing, we wouldn't have a good newspaper and plans for a community college!"

Riker said, "The Pear Island Hotel alone will provide three hundred jobs, many of them much-needed summer work for young people. We pointed that out on our editorial page. Also, the influx of tourists will pour millions into the local economy over a period of time. At the press preview, I met the editor of the Lockmaster Ledger, and he told me that Lockmaster County is green with envy. They say we have an offshore goldmine. One has to admire XYZ for undertaking such a herculean project. Everything had to be shipped over on barges: building materials, heavy equipment, furniture! Talk about giving yourself a few problems!"

The man with a prominent moustache huffed into it with annoyance.

"Why fight it, Qwill? Isn't the K Foundation a philanthropic institution? Isn't it mandated to do what's best for the community?"