It was a glorious Monday morning as Qwill wandered into downtown Pickax. The sun was shining, birds were singing, and all seemed well with the world. Of course things aren't too bad when you are one of the country's richest men, which Qwill was, having inherited a fortune vaster than any he had imagined some years before, and had left his life as a newspaperman Down Below, to come here to Pickax. Described by the locals as 400 miles north of everywhere, Qwill loved the town, and had found someone special in Polly Duncan who ran the library, but Qwill's constant companions were the two Siamese who ruled the converted barn Qwill lived in, but were kind enough to let him share their space. Koko was the leader of the two, and his curiously talented whiskers had helped Qwill solve many a baffling case, while Yum Yum was smaller, more affectionate, and pretty quick with a paw when it came to "borrowing" things that were not hers!
Deciding to grab a bite as he left his home, he wandered over to the garage quarters which were inhabited by Celia Robinson, who often cooked for him.
Qwill could not beleive what happened as he knocked on the door.
"Let me guess, Qwill," said the grandmother, "you're hungry and you need a bit to eat? Right?"
"Well, er, yes."
"Too bad!" she yelled. "For crying out loud, Qwill, you're 57 years old, and you can barely make coffee! I'm sick of bailing you out by feeding you, figure it out or starve, you're well educated, you went to college, you should damn well be able to make macaroni and cheese!" With that, she slammed the door in his face!
"Hmmmph!" thought Qwill, "Very strange."
Nevertheless he continued into town, figuring to grab something perhaps at Amanda's Design Studio. Fran Brodie, who worked there was usually good for a cup of coffee at least.
Wandering in he was suprised to find Fran very busy, and decided to wait until she was off the phone. When she put down the phone, Qwill was stunned to hear her ask him to leave.
"Why?" He wanted to know.
"Because I'm tired of you Qwill, I've flirted with you for the last few years, and you never seem to notice me, you don't even really care about all the interesting things I find for that barn of yours, and the only time you ever want to go out to dinner with me is when you've pissed off Polly, that's why. I'd rather not waste any more of my time with you , so don't let the door hit you in the butt on the way out, and stop coming in here to mooch coffee from me."
"But, Fran, I..."
"Out Qwill, now."
"Unbelievable!" thought Qwill, come to think of it, he seemed to have gotten a cold reception from a few people lately, more than a few, in fact. No one had even complimented him on his moustache lately!
Despite the rough start to his day, he wandered in to the library to see his close companion Polly.
"Good morning, Polly," he started off, "I was wondering if you might like to grab an dinner with me tonight, your choice of restaurants?"
The quiet woman looked up from her desk, and said in a firm voice, "I don't think so."
Shaking his head, Qwill replied "Huh?"
"That would be a no, you DO understand the word don't you? Or perhaps Koko could spell it out for you?"
"Well, I...."
"In fact, Qwill, I will probably be very busy for the next few months, and won't be spending any time at all with you, now if you don't mind, this is a library, and I have to work, unlike some millionaires!"
Qwill turned on his heel and left. In a stunned state of disbelief, he barely noticed that the libraries resident cats, Mac and Katie clawed his slacks, and Mac piddled on his shoes.
The day had started off in an rather ugly way, but it would get worse, much, much worse.
Qwill was baffled by his treatment, but figured it to be a passing thing. After all, the whole town couldn't be mad at him, right? Ah, but he was to find things were much worse than he thought. He stopped in at Edd's Editions, figuring to see if there were any thing new for his book collection. He was surprised to see Edd in animated conversation with a distinguished looking elderly gentleman with an English accent. Edd looked up and said, "Well, here he is! Qwill, this is Mr. Hastings. He's recently moved here with a friend of his from the north of England."
Qwill reached out to shake the ma'ns hand and was surprised by the man's firm handshake. He might be getting on in years, but he was in good shape.
"Ah, YOU are the famous Qwill? Your reputation, such as it is, precedes you. My friend will be delighted to meet you, old boy, that he will."
Qwill was a bit irritated with the man's superior attitude, but decided not to make an issue of it. "Pleased to meet you Mr. Hastings. I hope you enjoy it here in Moose County."
"Oh, I'm sure I will, it should be quite delightful!"
The gentleman promptly turned and walked out.
"Bit of an odd one, eh, Edd?"
"Don't think so at all, Qwill, don't think so at all," replied the bookseller. "Might shake this town up a bit. Now if you'll excuse me, I've got work to do, and no time to waste with millionaires who only buy one or two books at a time." With that Edd gruffly went back to his sorting of new arrivals.
Feeling a bit stung by all of his rude treatment, Qwill next decided to see what his old pal Arch Riker was up to. Boyhood friends, they had met up while Qwill was working on a new assignment Down Under and renewed their friendship. When Qwill helped establish the Moose County Something, his old friend was at the top of Qwill's list to run it. Helping himself to coffee at eh newspaper's offices, Arch greeted him with little of their usual banter, in fact he was quite angry.
"Qwill, I know you're a great writer, but we really have to talk about how little you actually do around here. Two thirds of the time, you have the damn readers writing your column for you with your stupid contests! C'mon, if you can't write anything good, maybe we can get Dave Barry or someone to write for us!"
"Arch, what the hell are you talking about?" replied Qwill with a bit of rising anger.
"You, Qwill, you think because you've got a ton of money, and funded the paper, you can write garbage? It doesn't work that way. If we were back down under, and you were still at the Daily Flux, you would have been fired by now. F. I. R. E. D. As in unemployed. Now if you can't get your act together, we'll find someone who can. And by the way, the coffee is for the people who work here. Not part time hacks. Now leave me alone and let me run my paper."
Wounded by his oldest friends words, Qwill quickly left.
"What the hell is going on?" he wondered. "Arch, Polly, Fran, Ed and Celia, all THAT rude to me? And who was that guy that Ed introduced to me? He seemed pretty snide, almost laughing at me."
He fumed all the way to the police station, where he went in to see Chief Brodie. A serious man, but one who always seemed to understand Qwill, he was even pretty understanding of Koko's unusual talents. He was told that Brodie was giving a tour to some friends of his from out of town, but would see him in a few minutes. The Chief walked in to the office with two pleasant looking young men.
"Qwill, I'd like you to meet Frank and Joe, they're friends of a cousin of mine. Boys, this is Qwill."
"Nice to meet you," said Qwill, shaking their hands. "You staying long here?"
"Ah, no," said Frank (or was it Joe?), "it really shouldn't be that long, not at all."
"I think we should be fine in just a couple of days," said Joe with a laugh.
With that strange announcement, they left the office.
"Who can figure kids these days?" said Qwill, shaking his head.
"You'd be surprised at what some of them are up to. Really amazing, what some of them do."
"What are they visiting for?"
"Looking up some distant relations apparently. Something about a bad apple in the family they needed to find out about."
"Hmm...no shortage of those these days, even here!"
The Chiefs answering smile was...almost vicious, "No, no shortage at all."
After leaving Brodie's office Qwill continued through downtown. He stopped in at Lanspeak's Department Store to say hello to the family who were good friends of his, as well as being active in the community theatre, which was housed in Qwill's former mansion. Their daughter Diane was also the local town doctor. Larry gruffly said hello to Qwill but he was surprised to see Diane in the store.
"Hello, Diane, give up your practice and gone into retail?"
Her reply was delivered in a snide voice.
"No, Qwill, doing anything besides trying to preside over your local little fiefdom?"
"Well, no, just wandering around town a bit, that's all." Qwill was stung by yet another rude reply from someone he considered a friend. This was getting out of hand, but he couldn't really figure out what was going on.
An elderly gentleman came out of the dressing room and spoke quietly with Diane, looking over at Qwill several times during the conversation.
"I suppose so," said Diane in a louder voice.
"Qwill, this is my mentor from medical school, Dr. John, that's what I've always called him, he's a good friend of mine, and a very skilled doctor."
"Pleased to meet you, Doctor."
"The same to you, sir, the same to you." he replied in a hearty English accent.
Qwill was trying to add up the strange occurences and ventured to ask a question.
"Are you the friend of Mr. Hastings who just moved here?"
"Hastings?" he replied with delight, "is he here as well? No, no, we're aquaintances more than friends, he's from up north and I'm from London. Fancy that, Hastings made the trip, too, well, well."
With that sentence, he promptly spun around and proceeded to leave with Diane. Qwill could hear him muttering something about "Damnably silly looking bloke..."
Leaving the store in a huff, Qwill proceeded to head home.
"I suppose maybe it's just one of those days, what else could it be?"
Muttering to himself, he wandered a little too close to the street and had to jump to miss being hit by a speeding convertible! Tumbling to the ground, he rolled as far away from the street as he could, and all he could hear was the screeching of the brakes.
"Say, are you all right?"
Qwill looked up to see the driver, an attractive young lady with titian blonde hair, and replied,"I'm all right, but you might want to be a bit more careful around here. You almost killed me!"
"Terribly sorry, but I was looking for the Pickax Hotel, can you tell me where it is?" "Yes, just continue down this street and it's on the left!" Qwill didn't mean to be rude, but he was still smarting from rolling in the gravel at the side of the road, and his patience was nearing it's end with the way he had been treated lately! Plus with all of these strangers, Pickax was starting to resembe Grand Central Station! He continued to walk towards home, but failed to notice the drive of the convertible looking back at him, and comparing him to a photograph she held in her hand. Had he been closer to her, he might have heard her say in a very soft voice, "Need to be more careful? That should have been my line, Mr. Moustache! WE shall see, we shall see."
Reaching home, he headed inside to be greeted by his feline friends. The way his day had been going, he half expected to be bitten by them both, but no, he was greeted with affection by Yum Yum, and Koko yowled with hunger in his familiar and demanding way. "You furry tyrant!" said Qwill with affection, "Let's get you two something to eat, and see what I can microwave up, I'm starving as well!" Puttering about the kitchen, Qwill fixed a meal for his two housemates, and microwaved a cheeseburger for himself. "Hmm...not as good as Celia's cooking, but it will have to do!
After finishing his meal, Qwill noticed that his computer had been turned on, and a website had been loaded. While not very computer savvy, Qwill had gotten one at repeated urgings from Polly and had reluctantly joined the computer age. Qwill looked at the site and shook his head. "Koko, you been playing on this again?" Koko had quickly learned how to push the power button with his nose, and had made a game of it. Koko, having been fed, assumed his usual routine of ignoring Qwill. "Not going to fess up, eh? Hmmm...now Koko, WHY were you looking at a bookstore's webpage? What could you possibly want there?" Switching the power off, he decided to maybe see if he could get a little writing done, but found his thoughts being distracted by the sudden influx of strangers in town, true they were all friends and relatives of people here it seemed, but why all of a sudden so many people here? it just didn't make sense. Little did Qwill know, the day was going to end up in a nightmare.
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