Lilian Jackson Braun - Cat 17 Who Blew The Whistle

Chorus: "I want to go out whittlin'," They'd often heard him say, And he'd earned his chance to do it Now that he was old and gray. With the whistle screamin' "wildcat!" They whittled down the line, All knowin' what would happen To engine No.9. As the fiery, sweatin' monster Plunged down the steepest grade, The final order came to jump And every man obeyed. But Ozzie at the throttle Said he'd go down with the hog As it sank with hiss in', scaldin' steam In the muck o' Black Creek bog.

Chorus: "I want to go out whittlin'," Said good old Ozzie Penn, And the hoghead got his wish Because he'll never drive again.

Derek's listeners applauded and wanted to know if he'd written it himself. He glanced at Qwilleran, who nodded.

"Yep," said the folksinger in an offhand way.

Elizabeth said, with her eyes shining, "He's so talented!"

Meanwhile, Yum Yum watched the festivities from the balcony, tantalized by the aroma of pizza drifting up from the main floor. Koko, always more adventurous, mingled with the guests, accepting compliments and slices of pepperoni. He was within earshot when Qwilleran commended Jennifer for her portrayal of Hermia.

"Yow!" he said.

"See? Koko agrees with me. I believe his favorite character in all of Shakespeare is Hermia."

"Yow!" Koko repeated with added emphasis.

Qwilleran pondered the incident when the guests had left. The Siamese were enjoying a private afterglow-of-the-afterglow under the kitchen table, nibbling sausage and cheese and fastidiously avoiding the bits of mushroom and green pepper. Qwilleran, watching them, suddenly said, "Hermia!"

Koko looked up from his plate and made the usual comment.

Qwilleran thought, There's more to Hermia than meets the ear! During the summer the cat had exhibited many quirks, which were now abandoned. As soon as the mystery of Floyd's disappearance was solved, Koko stopped staring out the foyer window in the direction of the two-car garage slab. At the same time he stopped his everlasting digging in Qwilleran's elbow and lost interest in the Panama Canal. After the crimes of Edward Penn Trevelyan and James Henry Ducker were exposed, he no longer stole black pens or sat on the fireplace cube with the decoys.

Was it coincidence that he had pursued these activities so assiduously? Was it ordinary feline fickleness when he stopped? Qwilleran knew otherwise. Koko had a gift of intuition and prescience that was not given to mere humans - or even to the average cat - and he had an unconventional way of communicating. It amused Qwilleran to paraphrase Shakespeare: There are more things in Koko's head, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

When the Siamese had finished their gourmet treat and washed up, the three of them ambled into the library for a read.

"What'll it be?" Qwilleran asked. He had asked that question several weeks before, and Koko's choice was Swiss Family Robinson. And what happened? Celia Robinson moved to Pickax, and the Trevelyan women flew to Switzerland. Coincidence? "Sure," Qwilleran said with derision.

Now Koko sniffed the bookshelf devoted to drama and nudged the copy of Androcles and the Lion.

"We had that book a few weeks ago," Qwilleran reminded him. "Try again."

This time the cat's choice was a slender paperback, Fran Brodie's playscript of the Lion in Winter.

In a flash of revelation Qwilleran remembered the young woman in the Pickax People's Bank: Letitia Penn, who turned out to be Letitia Trevelyan... and who had a friend named Lionella. Later it developed that the one name was shortened to Tish and the other to Nella.

That was the answer! That remarkable cat knew from the beginning that the Lumbertown fraud was masterminded by Nella a.k.a. Li onella! Now Qwilleran understood Koko and the lions, but what about Hermia? There was something about this H word that triggered Koko's brain cells and was supposed to trigger Qwilleran's. Yet, he was stymied - until he thought about the dictionary. His unabridged dictionary always stimulated the associative process.

As he climbed the ramp to consult its erudite pages, the Siamese followed with vertical tails. On this occasion he had a reason for allowing them into his sanctum. One of them immediately inspected the typewriter and left a few cat hairs among the type bars; the other lost no time in knocking a gold pen off the desk.

Looking up the definition of Hermia, Qwilleran found what he already knew: Hermia was a lady in love with Lysander in A Midsummer Night's Dream. There were other proper nouns, however, that might have a similar sound to a cat's ear, and he read them aloud: "Hermo... Hermione... Hermitage... Hermes." Nothing attracted Koko's attention until he reached "Hermaphrodite."

The sound of the word brought an alarming response that started as an ear-splitting falsetto and ended in a menacing growl.