Лилиан Браун - The Cat Who Wasn't There

The Bonnie Scots group entered through massive oak doors, iron strapped and green with mold, and walked into a lobby hung with hunting trophies. An ancient leather-bound journal recorded the names of sporting notables who had bagged 86 grouse and 33 pheasant on a certain weekend in 1838. Larry picked up the room keys and distributed them.

"Hey, look! We have locks on our doors!" he announced.

"We're back in the civilized world!" Then, while the other men unloaded the bus, he telephoned the previous inn to inquire about the missing driver. There was still no clue to his defection. When the luggage was marshaled in the center of the lobby, Bushy announced, "Grab your own bags, folks, and if you can't lug 'em upstairs yourself, we'll help you." Piece by piece the luggage was identified and removed.

"Where's mine?" Mrs. Utley demanded.

"You left it on the bus!" A quick check proved that the baggage bin was empty. Qwilleran said, "Are you sure you placed it outside your room this morning, Mrs. Utley?" "My sister took care of it while I was in the shower! Where is she?

Somebody go and get her! Bring her down here!" The shy Zella, acting as if under arrest and stammering in self-defense, insisted she had put the bags in the hall along with her own suitcase. Hers had arrived safely.

"I always packed for Grace while she was dressing," she explained in a tremulous voice.

"I brought up the jewel cases from the safe and packed them. Then I stayed in the hall with the luggage until it was picked up." "And Bruce picked it up?" Qwilleran asked.

"I saw him." He exchanged knowing glances with Bushy, who was now official baggage handler as well as official photographer.

"They've been stolen!" Mrs. Utley screamed.

"That man! That driver! He stole them! That's why he ran off!

Somebody picked him up in a car! I saw them speed away from the inn!" Other members of the group, hearing the commotion, came down to the lobby, and the hysterical Mrs. Utley was assisted to her room.

"Does anyone have a tranquilizer for the poor woman?" Carol asked.

"At least she has her carry-on bag, so she can brush her teeth," said Lisa, "and I imagine she's well covered with insurance." "Where did Irma hire that guy?" Compton kept saying. Larry phoned the previous inn, describing the missing luggage, and after a search the innkeeper called back to say that no alligator bags could be found anywhere. Larry also phoned the constable in the fishing village and learned that a report of the missing articles would have to be filed in person. Larry said, "We'll hire a car and drive tomorrow. I'll go back there with Grace." "That's really noble of you," said Lisa.

Qwilleran asked Bushy, "Do you think you may have taken a picture of Bruce?" "No, he'd never let me shoot him--always turned his back. I thought he was camera-shy, but now I'm beginning to wonder..." The Chisholm sisters had a tray sent up to their room, while the others gathered in the dining room for a five-course dinner of smoked salmon, lentil soup, brown trout, venison, and a dessert flavored with Scotch whiskey--or whisky, as it said on the menu card.

Afterward they assembled in the lounge, where hot coals were glowing in the fireplace, and the Lanspeaks organized an impromptu revue to bolster morale. Carol and Lisa harmonized "Annie Laurie" and Larry read Robert Burns's poem "To a Mouse," with a passable Scots accent.

Then Dwight played "The Muckin' o' Georgie's Byre" on the tin whistle, one of the Scottish tunes in the booklet that came with his purchase.

"It didn't take you long to become a virtuoso," Polly remarked.

"I've been playing since I was a kid," Dwight explained.

"I won second place in an amateur contest when I was ten." "Amanda says a tin whistle sounds like a sick locomotive," said Riker.

"It's weird, all right. I'm thinking of using it in Macbeth whenever the witches are on stage." Lisa asked, "Are any of you fellows going to buy kilts? We're scheduled to visit a woolen mill tomorrow." "Not I, ," said Qwilleran promptly, although secretly he thought he would look good in one.

"I think men look sexy in kilts... but they've got to have sturdy, good-looking legs," she added with a telling look at her lanky husband.

Bushy said, "I heard a good story from the innkeeper this morning.

There was this newspaper woman from the states, attending some Highland games over here. Men were swinging battle axes and tossing the caber, which is something like a telephone pole, and half the male spectators were wearing kilts.

This was her chance, she thought, to get an honest answer to the old question: Is it true they don't wear anything underneath? So she went up to a congenial-looking Scot with red hair, who wore his kilt with a swagger.

"Excuse me, sir," she said.

"I'm from an American newspaper. Would you mind if I asked a bold question? Is it true that--ah-nothing is worn under your kilt?" He answered without hesitation.

"Yes, indeed, ma'am, it's true. Everything is in perfect working order."" Lyle grunted, and his wife giggled. He said, "When the English Redcoats ridiculed the Scots for fighting in "short skirts" during the Rebellion, they didn't know the reason for the national costume. It was for walking through a dense growth of heather. When the English soldiers tried it in full uniform, they bogged down." Larry said, "Tomorrow we visit the battlefield at Culloden. Why don't you brief us, Lyle?" "How much do you want to know? It was one of the bloodiest military mistakes ever made!" "Go ahead," everyone insisted.

"Well... Prince Charlie wanted to put his father back on the throne, and the English marched north to put down the uprising. They had 9,000 well-equipped, well-trained professional soldiers in scarlet coats.

They had competent officers in powdered wigs, as well as a full complement of cannon, muskets, horses, and supply wagons. The Rebels were 5,000 hastily assembled, poorly commanded Scots with broadswords, daggers, and axes." Qwilleran had turned on his recorder.

"It wasn't just Scots against the English. There were Highlanders against Lowlanders, Rebels against Loyalists, clans against clans, brothers against brothers.

"When the Rebels fought at Culloden, several mistakes had already been made by their commanders. They chose a battlefield that gave the advantage to the enemy; their food had run out; they had marched their troops all night in a maneuver that didn't work; the men were exhausted from hunger and lack of sleep; even their horses had died of starvation.

"Then the battle started, and they received no order to advance but stood in ranks while the enemy cannon mowed them down.

Desperate at the delay, some of the clans broke through in rage, blinded by smoke, screaming and leaping over the rows of their dead.

Then the cannon changed to grapeshot, and there was more slaughter.

Still they attacked like hungry wolves. The muskets fired at them point blank, and they rushed in and hacked at the bayonets with swords.

Some discarded their weapons and threw stones like savages.

When the battle was lost, the survivors fled in panic, only to be chased down by the dragoons and butchered." Lyle stopped, and no one spoke.

"Well, you asked for it," he said. Dwight put another shovelful of coal in the grate. Then members of the group started drifting away, saying they'd step outside for a breath of air, or they'd go up to bed, or they needed a drink.

It rained on Day Eight when they visited the battlefield at Culloden, and they found it depressing. It still rained when they visited a distillery, and even the wee dram served at the conclusion of the guided tour failed to cheer them. The Bonnie Scots Tour was winding down fast. Polly blamed it on the loss of their leader. Qwilleran thought it was a let-down after the enchantment of the Western Isles and Highlands. On the bus, Bushy grabbed the microphone and tried to elevate the general mood with stories that fell flat.