Cat Who Saw Red

by Lilian Jackson Braun

  “Sounds good,” Qwilleran said, “but I may have to take some of it home in a doggie bag. I’m on a diet.”

  “What for a first course? Vichyssoise? Herring in sour cream?”

  “Better make it a half-grapefruit.”

  Qwilleran started to light his pipe, and Sorrel pushed an amber glass ashtray toward him, after examining it for blemishes. “Know how we clean ashtrays here?” he said. “With wet tea bags. It’s the best way . . . Excuse me a moment.”

  A couple had entered the empty dining room, looking bewildered, as if they had come on the wrong night.

  “You don’t have a reservation?” Sorrel asked them with a frown. He hesitated. He consulted a ledger. He did some crossing out and some writing in. Finally—with a convincing show of magnanimity and a buttery smile for the lady—he consented to give them a table, seating them in a large front window in full view of passing traffic. He explained to them that the regular crowd was late because of the ball game, as he removed from their table a gold tent-card that said “Reserved.”

  When the grapefruit was served, Sorrel watched Qwilleran spoon it out of the rind. “You unhappy about something?” he asked the newsman.

  Qwilleran gave him a questioning frown.

  “I can tell by the way you eat your grapefruit. You’re going around it counterclockwise. Did you ever watch people eat grapefruit? The happy ones eat clockwise.”

  “Curious theory.”

  “Do you secretly wiggle your toes inside your shoes when you eat something good?”

  “I don’t know, and I’m not sure I want to know.”

  “I can tell a lot about people by watching them eat—how they break their rolls, spoon their soup, cut their meat—even the way they chew.”

  “How do you size up the motley crew at Maus Haus?” Qwilleran asked.

  “Interesting bunch. Hixie—she’s got a lot of ginger, but she’s getting panicky. She wants to get married in the worst way. Rosemary—she looks like a perfect lady, but don’t be too sure. William—there’s something weasely about that boy. He’s not on the up-and-up. I can tell by the way he holds his fork. How do you size him up?”

  “He’s okay. Strikes me as an amusing kid, with a lot of healthy curiosity.”

  “Maybe I shouldn’t tell you this,” Sorrel confided, “because I don’t want to stir up trouble, but I saw him letting himself into your apartment last night around eight o’clock, and he was looking kind of sneaky. Did you authorize him to go into your apartment?”

  “How did you happen to see him?” Qwilleran wanted to know. “I thought you worked every night.”

  “Well, we had an accident in the kitchen, and some cocktail sauce got splashed on my shirt. I rushed home to change . . . Excuse me.”

  The restaurateur jumped up to seat a party of four, obviously tourists, while Qwilleran said to himself, Wouldn’t a fastidious guy like Sorrel keep an extra shirt on hand at his place of business?

  When the lamb was served, looking like the Rock of Gibraltar, Qwilleran remarked, “Do you know Joy Graham has left her husband?”

  “No! When did that happen?”

  “Early yesterday morning.”

  “Is she getting a divorce?”

  “I don’t know. She left no explanation, according to Dan. Just disappeared.”

  “I’m not surprised,” Sorrel said. “I wouldn’t blame her for unloading that ape. She’s got a lot on the ball.” His eyes glowed with appreciation. “I’m not strongly in favor of marriage myself. There are better ways to live. People marry, divorce, marry, divorce. It’s not respectable.”

  “Did you ever watch her work with clay?”

  “Me? No, sir! I’ve never set foot in that pottery. I took one look at all the dust and mud, and I knew that wasn’t for me.” His expression changed from one of distaste to one of approval. “So the little cabbage got the hell out, did she? Good for her!”

  “It mystifies me why she’d depart in the middle of the night—in a violent rainstorm,” Qwilleran said.

  “Sure you don’t want a baked potato with sour cream and chives?” his host urged.

  “Thanks, no . . . And another mystery,” Qwilleran went on, “is what happened to her cat. He was a neutered longhair, and they don’t go roaming the courtryside in search of adventure; they sit around like sofa pillows. Do you have any ideas about what happened to that cat?”

  Sorrel turned the color of borscht, and the veins in his temples seemed ready to burst.

  “What’s the matter?” Qwilleran asked in alarm. “Are you all right?”

  The restaurateur mopped his brow with a gold napkin and lowered his voice. “I thought for a minute you were riding me—about that ugly story that’s going around town.” He gave the newsman a wary glance. “You haven’t heard?”

  Qwilleran shook his head.

  “I’m being persecuted. A lot of dirty rumors are drifting around, and I don’t mind telling you they’re hurting my business. This place should be three-quarters full on Thursday night. Look at it! Six customers!”

  “What kind of rumors?”

  Sorrel winced. “That I use cat meat in the twelve-ounce chopped sirloin—and all that kind of rot. I could tell you worse, only it would spoil your dinner. Why don’t they say I’ve got a gambling den in the back room? Why don’t they say I keep girls upstairs? That I could take! But they’re getting me where it hurts. Me! The guy who’s known for keeping the cleanest kitchen in the city!”

  “Any idea who could be circulating these rumors?” Qwilleran asked. “What would their motive be?”

  Sorrel shrugged. “I don’t know. Nobody seems to know. But it looks like a plot—especially after what happened Tuesday night.”

  “What happened?”

  “My kitchen caught fire in the middle of the night. The police called me, and I came back downtown. It had to be arson. I don’t leave grease around. I don’t use any inflammable cleaners . . . Let me tell you: If anything happened to this place I’d crack up! I love this restaurant! The drapes cost forty dollars a yard. The carpet was custom-woven. Where did you ever see a carpet with a lamb chop design?”

  Qwilleran had to admit the floor-covering was unusual. “Does anyone have a grudge against you—personally?”

  “Me? I’ve got a million friends. Ask anybody. I couldn’t think of an enemy if you paid me.”

  “How about your employees? Have you fired anyone who might be out for revenge?”

  “No, I’ve always treated my people right, and they like me. Ask any one of them. Ask Charlie.” The waiter was bringing the coffee. “Charlie, do I treat you right? Tell this man—he’s from the newspaper. Do I treat everyone right?”

  “Yes, sir,” said Charlie in a flat voice.

  Qwilleran declined Sorrel’s offer of a dessert from the cart, which offered rum cream pie, banana Bavarian, pecan caramel custard, strawberry shortcake, and chocolate mousse, and he left the restaurant with the rest of his lamb wrapped in aluminum foil. He crossed River Road to hail a westbound taxi, but a bus came along and he climbed aboard.

  It was one of the slow evening buses, and the leisurely speed and the drone of the engine were conducive to meditation . . . Why were women attracted to men with shiny bald heads? Max Sorrel was obviously attractive to the opposite sex. Had he incurred the enmity of a jealous rival? A jealous husband? . . . Had there been something between Joy and Max? If Dan resented it, would he have the wit to conduct a successful smear campaign against the Golden Lamb Chop? . . . Max had seemed surprised to learn of Joy’s disappearance, but he was a good actor. He might have been lying . . . And how about the departure of Max’s convertible at three in the morning? The restaurant fire would account for that—if the story of the fire happened to be true. Qwilleran made a mental note to verify it . . . As for William’s surreptitious visit to Number Six, Qwilleran was not unduly concerned. The key rack in the kitchen was readily accessible, and the houseboy had probably wanted to see the cats. William had a healthy curio
sity—a virtue, from a newsman’s point of view. He also had brash nerve and a glib tongue and an easygoing personality. Qwilleran and Riker had been the same way when they were in their twenties, before their exuberance was curbed by disappointments and compromises and the old newsman’s realization that there is never anything really new.

  Wrapped in his thoughts, Qwilleran rode a mile beyond Maus Haus and had to wait for another slow bus traveling in the opposite direction.

  When he finally arrived home, he found some changes in the Great Hall. The long dining table and the high-backed chairs had been moved aside, and the area was dotted with pedestals of various heights. In the center of the room a few railroad ties had been arranged on the floor to form a large square, and Dan Graham was down on hands and knees filling the square with pebbles. Alone in the vast hall, pushing the pebbles this way and that as if their placement mattered profoundly, he made a sad picture of insignificance, Qwilleran thought.

  “How’s it going, Mr. Graham?” he asked.

  “Slow,” said the potter. “It’s not much fun doing the setup alone.” He stood up and massaged his back, while viewing the pebbles critically. “My best pieces will be displayed on pedestals in this square. I’m gonna surprise this city, you can betcha boots.”

  “How soon are we going to see the new pots?”

  “Maybe Monday or Tuesday. I’ve got some sweet patooties cooling in the kiln right now. Did you talk to anybody at the paper?”

  “Everything is under control. Don’t worry about it,” Qwilleran said, although he had forgotten to tell Riker about anything but Joy’s disappearance. “Any news from your wife?”

  “Nope. Not a word. But it wouldn’t surprise me if she came back in time for the hoopla on Wednesday. We sent out three hundred invitations last week. Should be a swell party. I’m shooting the works—bubble water, horses’ duvvers, the right stuff, if you know what I mean. The critics better come, that’s all I’ve got to say . . . Here, let me show you something.” Graham reached around to his hip pocket and once more brought forth the yellowed clipping about his past glories.

  When Qwilleran went upstairs to Number Six, he found the cats waiting for him, with anticipation in the cock of their ears.

  “Koko, where is that guy getting the money to buy champagne for three hundred guests,” Qwilleran asked him.

  The cat’s eyes were like large black cherries in the lamplight—expressionless, yet holding all the answers to all the questions ever asked.

  Qwilleran arranged his coat over the back of a chair and whipped off his tie. Yum Yum watched the tie with bright, hopeful eyes. He usually switched it through the air for her to jump at and catch, but tonight he was too preoccupied to play. Instead he sat in the big chair, put on his glasses, and opened the packet of clippings from the Fluxion library.

  Robert Maus had not exaggerated. Every five years the Fluxion had resurrected the story of the mysterious deaths at the pottery, most likely to embarrass the Morning Rampage. The rival newspaper was still financed by the Penniman family. It had been old Hugh Penniman who built the strange art center and hobnobbed with its arty residents.

  The stories, written in the old-fashioned Sunday supplement style, related how “a handsome young sculptor” by the name of Mortimer Mellon had fallen in love with “the lovely Helen Maude Hake,” a lady potter. She, alas, happened to be the “protégée” of Hugh Penniman, “the well-known philanthropist.” Following a “wild party” at the pottery, the body of the “lovelorn sculptor” was found in the river, and a verdict of accidental death was pronounced by the coroner. Not satisfied with the disposition of the case, reporters from the Fluxion attempted to interview other artists at the pottery, but the “slovenly Bohemians” showed “an insolent lack of cooperation.” Soon afterward the episode came to “its final tragic end” when “the lovely Helen” took her own life, following Mortimer “to a watery grave.” She left a suicide note that was never made public.

  Just as Qwilleran finished reading, he heard a thud at the opposite end of the room, and he turned to see a book with a red cover lying open and facedown on the floor. With a softer thump Koko landed on the floor beside it and started nosing it across the slippery tile floor.

  “Bad cat!” Qwilleran scolded. It was a library book—an old one, none too solid in the spine. “The librarian will have you shot! Bad cat!” Qwilleran repeated.

  As he scowled his displeasure, he saw Koko slowly arch his back and flatten his ears. The cat’s brown tail stiffened, and he began to step around the book in a strange long-legged dance. He circled the book once, twice, three times, and Qwilleran felt a chill in the pit of his stomach. Once before, in an icy courtyard, he had seen Koko perform that ritual. Once before, the cat had walked around and around and around, and the thing he circled was a body.

  Now it was a book he was circling—an old red book titled The Ancient Art of Potting. The silence was broken only by the mournful sound of a boat whistle on the river.

  NINE

  Before going to bed Thursday night Qwilleran telephoned the Fluxion’s night man at police headquarters and asked him to check for unidentified bodies dragged from the river in the last forty-eight hours.

  Kendall called back with the information. “There was one,” he said. “Male. Caucasian. About sixty years old. Is that your boy?”

  Qwilleran slept fitfully that night, and between his restless moments he dreamed about seaweed—great curtains of seaweed undulating with the motion of the waves. Then it became a head of green hair swirling in dirty brown water.

  When he awoke in the morning he had a feeling that his bones had turned to jelly. He dressed wearily, ignoring the cats, and they seemed to sense that he was preoccupied; they kept out of his way. It was when he started downstairs for a steadying cup of coffee that he walked into the situation that stiffened his spirit. He met Robert Maus on the stairs.

  The attorney stopped and faced him squarely, and the newsman saw that the black eye had faded to a banana-peel yellow. Maus gave the impression that he was about to say something momentous, and after a few long seconds it came out: “Mr. Qwilleran, do you, by any chance, have a moment of your valuable time to spare?”

  “I guess so.”

  They went to Maus’s apartment, a comfortable place done in English antiques and broccoli-green leather, with much polished brass and steel.

  The attorney bowed and motioned Qwilleran to a Bank of England chair. “The matter I have to discuss,” he said, “concerns Mrs. Graham. I find it somewhat, shall I say, painful to approach you in this manner, and you must not, under any circumstance, consider this an accusation or even a reproach. However . . . a matter has been brought to my attention, signifying that a word with you at this time would not be amiss—in consideration of the apprehensions I entertain concerning what I humbly describe as . . . the respectability of this establishment.”

  “What the devil is the problem?” Qwilleran demanded.

  The attorney raised a protesting hand. “Nothing that could be termed—in any real and active sense—a problem, I assure you, but rather a situation that has been brought to my cognizance . . . and in apprising you of the fact I am seeking neither confirmation nor denial . . . my only interest being to maintain good relationships . . .”

  “Okay, what’s this all about?” Qwilleran snapped. “Let’s have it!”

  Maus paused as if counting to ten and then stated slowly and carefully, “Mr. Graham, whom you have met . . . is under the impression . . . that his wife received considerable financial aid from you . . . to make her departure possible. I am not, I repeat—”

  Qwilleran jumped to his feet and walked impatiently across the Oriental rug. “How did I know she was going to run off? She was going to get a divorce. You know that as well as I do. And one of your legal buddies had his hand out for more than she could afford. And if Dan has a complaint, why doesn’t he come and see me about it?”

  Maus lowered the pitch of his voice and spoke apolo
getically. “He fears—whether with or without cause, I do not know—that a confrontation might, shall we say, impair his chances of favorable comment in the . . . publication you represent.”

  “Or—to put it more honestly—he’s hoping his accusation will make me feel so guilty that I’ll knock myself out to get a picture of his pots on the front page. It’s not the first time I’ve run up against that simpleminded strategy. It’s a stupid move, and I may get mad enough to forget the free publicity entirely. You can tell him that!”

  Maus raised both hands. “Let us preserve our equanimity, at all costs, and bear in mind that my only motive intervening is to prevent any taint of . . . scandal.”

  “You’re apt to have something worse than scandal on your hands!” Qwilleran roared as he stormed out of the apartment.

  He was still irritable when he arrived at the Fluxion to pick up his paycheck and open his mail. He went through his mail hopefully each day, and his pulse still skipped a beat every time the telephone jangled, although instinct told him there would be no word from Joy.

  In the feature department he said to Riker, “Come on down to the coffee shop. I’ve got a few things to tell you.”

  “Before I forget it,” the feature editor said, “would you attend a press luncheon this noon and write a few inches for tomorrow’s paper? They’re introducing a new product.”

  “What kind of product?”

  “A new dog food.”

  “Dog food! Isn’t that stretching my responsibilities as gourmet reporter?”

  “Well, you haven’t done anything else to earn your paycheck this week—not that I can see . . . Come on. What’s on your mind?”

  The Fluxion coffee shop was in the basement, and at midmorning it was the noisiest and therefore the most private conference room in the building. Newspaper deadlines being what they were, the compositors were having their dinner, the pressmen were having their lunch, the advertising representatives were having breakfast, and the clerical workers were having their first coffee break. The concrete-walled room shook with the roar of nearby presses; customers were shouting at one another; counter girls yelled orders; cooks barked replies; busboys slammed dishes; and a radio was bleating without an audience for the reason that it could not possibly be heard. The resulting din made the coffee shop highly desirable for confidential conversations; only mouth-to-ear shouts were audible.