Breathless and wordless, they hurried along the dirt lane leading to the highway. In the van Qwilleran phoned 911 and backed the vehicle out to the shoulder of Chipmunk Road. They waited, with headlights beamed on the shafthouse. Lenny sat quietly, shivering.
“Need a sweater?” Qwilleran asked. “There’s one on the back seat…. When the police come, let me do the talking.”
One by one the emergency vehicles appeared: the sheriff’s patrol car, an ambulance, the Pickax police, the rescue squad. Qwilleran’s presence lent credibility and seriousness to the incident. Not only did he have a press card; he was Mr. Q. As he reported it, they had been driving past and saw flickers of light in the tower barely visible in the chinks between the weathered boards. They drove into the lane for a closer look, heard gunshots, and backed out in a hurry.
Leaving the scene and heading back to Pickax, he said to his passenger, “Do you want to be dropped at Lois’s house? How will you reach your truck in the morning? Is there anything I can do? Let me give you some money for gas, Better not give Lois any of the details.”
Lenny was in a fog. He just wanted to go home. He had lost a brother. He felt guilty His intentions had been good. He should have stayed in Duluth. He should have left everything to fate. He was jinxed.
Qwilleran listened sympathetically, murmuring remonstrance, encouragement, condolences whatever was needed.
Seventeen
Tuesday, September 22 ‘Can a leopard change his spots?’
AFTER THE LATE-HOURS episode at the Big B mine, Qwilleran wanted to sleep late, but the Siamese had other ideas. They howled outside his door at twenty-minute intervals and were suspiciously quiet in between. When he shuffled down the ramp to investigate. he found that someone had pried open a kitchen drawer… and someone had removed the twenty-one previous pages torn from Culvert’s calendar… and someone had distributed them throughout the main floor. He presumed it to be a collaboration what he called their Mungojerrie-Rumpelteazer act and he collected the litter of paper with grudging admiration. They knew how to capture a person’s attention!
During the morning he avoided news bulletins on WPKX, preferring to wait for the two o’clock edition of the Moose County Something. Meanwhile, he delivered a vanload of books and personal belongings to his condo Unit Four at The Willows. A moving van from Boston was unloading at Unit Two, and the Jaguar was parked under the visitors’ carport.
On the way back to town it occurred to him that now might be a good time to present Polly with a gift he had special-ordered and was saving for Sweetest Day. Now he reasoned, however, that his move back to Indian Village had a celebratory aspect, and in midday he walked into her office with a gift-wrapped package.
She was having a vegetarian lunch at her desk, “Have some celery straws,” she invited slyly, knowing he despised them. Then she saw the small box in gilt paper and ribbons, “For me? What’s the occasion, Qwill?”
“It’s Tuesday,” he said with characteristic calm.
After fumbling excitedly with the wrappings, she uncovered an octagonal bottle of French perfume encased in gold filligree. She was stunned! She tripped over her words had never seen such a beautiful bottle had never dreamed she’d have such a famous scent to spray on her skin.
Both of them were remembering an evening last month, between sunset and dark, when twilight descended on the world like a blue mist and brought a magical silence l’heure bleue.
“Glad you like it,” Qwilleran said. He grabbed a handful of celery straws.
Pickax commercial establishments and government agencies no longer observed the quaint custom of shutting down for lunch between twelve and one, but it was still wise to avoid that hour for making transactions. Qwilleran went home to give the cats their midday treat and to start cleaning out the refrigerator for his own lunch. Celia’s catered specialties that he had been stockpiling in the freezer would be transported to winter quarters in dry ice.
He had a list of individuals to notify about his move. It was only a gesture to the bank manager, postmaster, garage owner, bookseller, and so forth. The truth was that everyone in town knew where Mr. Q was living at any given time, but it was a compliment to be on his list.
Foremost was the chief of police. His department always kept an eye on the barn when Qwilleran was not in residence.
“Andy, tonight’s your last chance to drop in for a nightcap,” Qwilleran said to the disgruntled officer sitting at the computer. Brodie was always irked and impatient when confronted with the contraption that he loathed.
“Be there at ten o’clock,” the chief said brusquely. “Can’t stay long.”
At two o’clock the Moose County Something reached the newsstands with the headline: