The Cat Who Wasn't There

by Lilian Jackson Braun

  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 letdown 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. “Did you hear about the Scotsman who went to visit a sick friend with a bottle of Scotch in his pocket? It was a dark night, and on the way he tripped and fell on a sharp rock, but he picked himself up and went on his way. Soon he felt a trickle of something running down the outside of his leg. It was too dark to see, but he dabbled his fingers in it and tasted it. ‘Thank God! It’s only blood!’ he said.”

  Later that evening, when Larry and the Chisholm sisters returned from the scene of the crime, he said to Qwilleran, “That woman is impossible, but we got eve
rything taken care of. What did I miss?”

  “Not much. A historic battlefield is all in your head. There’s not much to see.”

  “And the distillery?”

  “Everything was spic-and-span and absolutely sterile. Too bad Amanda wasn’t there for the wee dram . . . Tell me, Larry, how valuable was the stuff stolen from Grace Utley?”

  “According to her, one necklace alone was worth $150,000. Some of the stone-set brooches and bracelets were estate stuff, valued up to $50,000 apiece. It was a nice haul for someone. Do you suppose the theft was impromptu on Bruce’s part . . . or what?”

  Day Nine was devoted to museums and shopping. Mrs. Utley bought clothing and luggage enough to see her back to Pickax. The other women shopped for sweaters and kilts. Even Arch Riker found a cashmere cardigan that he considered a bargain. And then they checked into their last inn before Edinburgh, a stately, ivy-covered mansion on extensive landscaped grounds, furnished with antiques and chintz. The bedrooms were large, with ornate plaster ceilings, lace curtains, and telephones!

  “I’m expecting Junior to phone,” Riker said. He was trying on his new sweater when there was a knock at the door.

  Qwilleran opened it to find a young man with a tea tray. “You’ve got the wrong room. We didn’t order tea,” he said.

  “Compliments of the house, sir.” The waiter marched into the room and set the tray on a lace-covered tea table in front of a stiff little settee. The tray was laden with porcelain cups and saucers, a rosebud-patterned china teapot, a silver milk and sugar service, a plate of shortbread, and dainty embroidered napkins in silver rings.

  “Just what I wanted. More shortbread,” Riker remarked as he sat on the settee and awkwardly poured tea into the eggshell-thin cups. Qwilleran pulled up a small chair opposite.

  At that moment the telephone rang. “That’s Junior!” said the editor, jumping to his feet. “He’s really on the ball!”

  As he started toward the phone, a button of his sweater caught on the lace cloth and dragged it off the table along with the tea, milk, sugar, shortbread, and china. With the tablecover trailing from his sweater button, he answered the phone with the composure of a veteran news editor. Then he turned to Qwilleran. “It’s the desk clerk downstairs. Wants to know if everything’s all right.”

  “Tell him to send up a mop and a shovel,” Qwilleran said.

  It was the final calamity of the Bonnie Scots Tour, but there was one more surprise in store for Qwilleran. The telephone rang in the middle of the night, and he jumped to a sitting position before his eyes were open. He turned on the bedside lamp. It was three o’clock.

  “Something’s happened to the cats—or the barn!” he said to Riker, who showed signs of stirring.

  As he expected, it was an overseas call, and Mildred Hanstable was on the line. “Hope I didn’t take you away from your dinner, Qwill.”

  “Dinner! It’s three o’clock in the morning!”

  “Oh, forgive me!” she cried in chagrin. “I deducted five hours instead of adding. I’m so sorry!”

  “Is anything wrong? Are the cats all right?”

  “They’re fine. We’ve just had a little snack.”

  “When is Irma’s funeral? How are the Hasselriches taking it? Have you heard?”

  “That’s why I’m calling, Qwill. The funeral’s been postponed—for family reasons, it said in the paper. Actually, the body hasn’t arrived yet.”

  “Hasn’t arrived! It left here with Melinda four days ago!”

  “Yes, Melinda is home. She said the body was flown cargo . . . but it’s lost.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Roger was at the funeral home, asking why there were so many flowers and no body, and the Dingleberry brothers told him it had gone astray.”

  “Is there any trace of it?”

  “Oh, yes. It arrived from Scotland and went to Chicago all right, but then it was shipped to Moose Jaw in Canada, instead of the Moose County Airport.”

  “Is that where it is now?”

  “No, it’s been traced to Denver, and they think it’s on the way back to Chicago, by way of Atlanta.”

  Qwilleran groaned. “This is absurd, Mildred. Does Junior know what’s happened?”

  “Roger told him, but it’s being suppressed to keep from upsetting Irma’s parents.”

  “Hold the line,” Qwilleran told her. Turning to Riker, he said, “Irma’s body hasn’t arrived. It’s being shipped all over North America. Junior is withholding the news.”

  The two men stared at each other, both thinking what a headline it would make. All their training and experience and instincts as newsmen told them to go for the headline, but Pickax was a small town, and the Moose County Something was a small-town newspaper, and attitudes were different.

  Riker nodded assent.

  “Well, thank you, Mildred,” said Qwilleran. “Is everything else okay? How about the cats?”

  “One of them has been chewing holes in your old sweaters and throwing up.”

  “That’s probably Koko. He hasn’t done that for years! He’s lonely.”

  “I’m terribly sorry I disturbed you, Qwill.”

  “That’s all right. I’m glad you called. I’ll be home soon—perhaps sooner than I planned.”

  SIX

  ON THE MORNING of Day Ten the members of the Bonnie Scots Tour placed their luggage in the corridor at seven-thirty instead of six-thirty, having voted unanimously to amend Irma’s orders and start sleeping an extra hour. Qwilleran walked down the hall to Polly’s room and knocked on the door. “May I come in?” he asked.

  “Good morning, dear. I was about to plug in the tea-maker. Would you like a cup?”

  “No, thanks. I simply want you to know I’m leaving the tour as soon as we reach Edinburgh.”

  “Has something happened at home?” she asked anxiously.

  “No. I simply have a strong desire to get back to Pickax, that’s all.” He fingered his moustache significantly. “I’m changing my flight.”

  “Would you like company, Qwill?”

  “Don’t you want to see Edinburgh? It’s a magnificent city. I’ve had many newspaper assignments there.”

  “Frankly, my heart isn’t in this tour since Irma died, and it may seem foolish, but . . . I’m lonesome for Bootsie.”

  “Give me your ticket and I’ll phone the airline,” he said.

  In changing their flights, he also upgraded their reservations to first class. Even though he was reluctant to spend money on transportation, he needed the extra space for his long legs and wide shoulders, and—after ten days of small talk with the heterogeneous Bonnie Scots family—he wanted privacy for a sustained conversation with Polly.

  Twenty-four hours later they had said goodbye to their traveling companions and were airborne—Qwilleran stretching his legs luxuriously, Polly sipping champagne, and both of them enjoying the pampering of VIPs.

  “I wonder if Bootsie has missed me,” Polly said. “I’ve never left him for more than a weekend. My sister-in-law takes good care of him, but there isn’t the rapport that he has with me.”

  “Mildred says Koko’s been chewing my sweaters. That means he’s lonely, even though she’s feeding him haute cuisine and perverting him with dubious diversions, like tarot cards.”

  The champagne bottle made the rounds again, and delectable hors d’oeuvres were served, prompting Polly to say, “Do you realize we were never offered any haggis in Scotland?”

  “We never heard any bagpipes, either,” he added.

  “Or saw anyone dancing the hornpipe.”

  “In fact, we never really met any Scots. We were always with our own group, a little bit of Moose County on foreign soil.”

  This was followed by a regretful silence until Polly said, “On the credit side, I survived the trip without bronchitis, although I decided not to take my vitamin C. The capsules were too large and hard to swallow.”

  “Your bronchitis in England last year was all psychological, b
ecause I wasn’t with you.”

  “What a sweep of vanity comes this way!” she said, quoting Shakespeare with glee.

  “A little vanity is a good thing,” he retorted.

  “That’s a questionable aphorism, if I ever heard one! Who said that?” she demanded.

  “I did.”

  Polly lapsed into a sentimental reverie induced by the champagne. At length she said, “I’ve missed you, darling. We haven’t had any time to ourselves on this trip.”

  “I’ve missed you, too, Polly.”

  “I feel so sad about Irma, and I couldn’t even attend her funeral. She was probably buried two days ago.”

  “I don’t think so,” Qwilleran said slowly and soberly. “There’s been a complication.”

  “What do you mean?” Polly snapped out of her brooding mood, then gasped as he reported the bizarre odyssey of Irma’s casket. “Well,” she said after a while, “I have something surprising to report, too.”

  “Let’s hear it.”

  Polly hesitated, as if pondering where to begin. “Well . . . when I turned over Irma’s briefcase to Larry, I withheld one small personal file and put it in my luggage, thinking to give it to her parents. Then Bruce disappeared, and no one knew his last name, so I searched this file without finding a clue. But there was one letter that I think you should see.” She rummaged in her carry-on bag and extracted a document envelope tied with tape. In it was a folded sheet of notepaper that she handed to Qwilleran. “Read this.”

  Dear Irma,

  Thank you from the bottom of my heart! Bruce will do a good job for you. He’s an excellent driver, no mistake. He’s had an awful time finding work since he got out, but he’s promised to stay clean now. Do give him a proper talking to. He’ll listen to you. I know you two meant a lot to each other when we were young. My brother is a good sort really, and I expect he’s quite learned his lesson. Bless you! Don’t forget to ring me when you reach Edinburgh.

  For auld lang syne,

  Katie

  Qwilleran read the note twice. So that was the way it was! he thought. Irma and Bruce were—what? Youthful sweethearts? Former lovers? And Bruce had been in prison—for what? Larceny? A narcotics violation? Irma apparently knew about his record. Did she hire him in spite of it? Or because of it? Qwilleran’s cynicism was close to the surface where Irma was concerned. There was more to this story, he suspected.