Лилиан Браун - The Cat Who Wasn't There

"I'm not allowed to sign the death certificate over here," Melinda said.

"A local doctor will have to do that. I'll notify Irma's parents and make whatever arrangements are necessary." Qwilleran offered to call the Hasselriches, since he knew the father well.

"Thanks, but I feel I should do it. I can explain exactly what happened." "We're certainly grateful that you're here, Melinda. Is there anything we can do for you--anything at all?" "You might talk it over among you rvs and decide how to handle the rest of the tour. I'll fly back with the body. There'll be some red tape before they release it, the constable said, but they don't anticipate any problem... So, if you'll excuse me, I'll go up and get dressed.

You can stay here and talk." When Amanda arrived from the other bedroom wing and heard the news, she said, "I move to cancel the tour and fly home. Anybody second it? Let's cut our losses." Polly spoke up with conviction.

"Irma would want us to continue, I'm sure." "But do we know what to do and where to go?" Lisa asked.

"Everything is in her briefcase-itinerary, confirmations, maps, and so forth. I'm sure we can follow her plan to the letter. Since we have an extra day here, we'll have time to work it out." Riker said, "What time is it in Pickax? I want to call Junior and get him started on the obituary. It'll take some digging, because she was a very private person--would never let us do a feature on her volunteer work." Guests from the other wing straggled into the parlor, and Bushy said, "Why so glum, kids? Did somebody die around here?" At the breakfast table the members of the Bonnie Scots Tour halfheartedly discussed their options for the day: Go shopping in the village... Watch the fishing boats come in... Take the ferry to one of the islands... Loll around the inn. Larry said he would wander in the hills and study his lines for the play. Amanda thought she would go back to bed. The MacWhannells announced they were leaving the tour and would hire a car to drive to Edinburgh. They gave no reasons for cutting out, and no one bothered to ask why.

After breakfast, Qwilleran and the school superintendent strolled down the winding road to the village below.

"Don't forget, Lyle.

What goes down must come up," Qwilleran warned.

"We have to climb this hill again." Compton said, "I hope I didn't contribute to Irma's stress by blowing off steam about Scottish history and challenging her statements. Lisa said I should have kept my big mouth shut, but--dammit--Irma drove me up the wall with her sentimental claptrap about the romantic Jacobite Rebellion and her beloved Prince Charlie." "Don't worry. She was a tough one. She didn't earn the name of Sergeant for nothing. They say she ran the volunteer crew at the Senior Facility like an army battalion." They stopped awhile to admire the view: the patchwork of rooftops down below, the curve of the harbor crowded with boats, the islands beyond, floating placidly in a silver sea. Behind them the hills rose like Alpine meadows, dotted with sheep and the ruins of stone buildings.

"Lyle, you promised to tell me how the sheep took over the Highlands," Qwilleran said.

"Don't blame the sheep. Have you heard about the Highland Clearances?" "Only superficially. Okay if I tape this?" "Go ahead... Well, you know," he began, "when the Rebellion failed, the clan system was deliberately destroyed, and Highlanders were forbidden by law to wear kilts or play bagpipes.

Instead of clan chieftains they now had rich landlords renting small bits of land to crofters, who shared their one-room huts with the livestock. Then, with the growing demand for meat, the big landowners found it easier and more profitable to raise sheep than to collect rents from poor crofters. Also, sheep could make money for investors in Edinburgh and London." "Agribusiness, eighteenthcentury style," Qwilleran remarked.

"Exactly! To be fair, though, I should say that not all the landlords were villains; some of the old families tried their best to help their people, but overpopulation and old-fashioned farming methods combined to keep the crofters in a state of near-starvation." "What happened to them when the sheep took over?" "They were driven off the land and forbidden to hunt, fish, or graze livestock. Their pitiful crofts were burned before their eyes." "Where did they go?" "They were sent to live in destitution in big-city slums or in poor coastal villages. Many were transported to North America, and that's another story! They were exploited by ship owners and sent to sea in leaky tubs overcrowded and without sufficient food and water... I shouldn't be telling you this; it shoots up my blood pressure." The two men wandered around the waterfront and watched the fishing boats coming in, surrounded by screaming seagulls. Crewmen in yellow slickers were slinging prawn traps onto the wharf, laughing and joking.

Facing the docks were freshly painted, steep-roofed cottages huddled in a row, with flowers around the doorsteps and seagulls on the chimney pots. Some of the cottage windows had cut-off curtains that allowed cats to sit on the window-sills. Lyle said, "The Scots today are nice people--sociable, hospitable, and slyly witty--but they have a bloody history of cutting throats and pouring molten lead on their enemies.

" They lunched at a pub before returning to the inn. There they learned that Melinda had checked out and was on her way to Glasgow in a hired car, leaving a message: "Don't feel bad about my giving up the rest of the tour. This is my responsibility as Irma's friend and physician." Lisa reported to Qwilleran, "Polly and I packed Irma's belongings to ship home. Polly's all broken up. She's in her room, saying she doesn't want to be disturbed by anyone." "I guess that means me," he said. For him the death of their leader was an excuse to phone Mildred Hanstable and inquire about the Siamese.

They were often on his mind, although he refrained from talking about them to anyone except Polly. Grace Utley showed pictures of her teddy bears to anyone who sat next to her on the bus.

Nevertheless, Qwilleran often looked at his watch, deducted five hours, and visualized the cats having their breakfast or taking an afternoon nap in a certain patch of sun on the rug. He wondered how they were hitting it off with Mildred. He wondered if they were getting fat on her cooking. He wondered if they missed him. When he telephoned Pickax, it was eight o'clock in the morning, their time, and Mildred had heard the news of Irma's death on the radio.

"They didn't give any details on the air," she said.

"There'll be more in the paper when it comes out, I hope." "It was a heart attack. She'd been under a lot of stress. Conducting a tour is a big job for an amateur guide--with a bunch of Moose County individualists in tow.

The obituary will probably be in today's paper. Please save it for me... How are the cats behaving?" "We get along just fine! Yum Yum is adorable. When I'm quilting she sits on the frame and watches the needle go in and out. Koko helps me read the tarot cards." "If the Siamese were humans," Qwilleran explained, "Yum Yum would win prizes at the county fair, and Koko would discover a cure for the common cold... Is he there? Put him on." Mildred could be heard talking to the cats. There was a faint yowl, then some coaxing, and then a louder response.

"Hello, Koko!" Qwilleran shouted.

"How's everything? Are you taking care of Yum Yum?" It took the cat a while to understand that the voice he knew so well was coming out of the instrument held to his ear, but then he wanted to do all the talking, delivering a series of ear-splitting yowls and even biting the receiver. Wincing, Qwilleran shouted, "That's enough! Take him away!" There were sounds of scuffling and arguing, and then Mildred returned to the line.

"There's one unusual thing I'd like to report, " she said.