The waiter was deferential. Melinda was not only a Goodwinter; she was a doctor. He brought a lighted candle to the table-a red stub in a smoky glass left over from Christmas. He persuaded the kitchen to broil two orders of pickerel without breading, and he found a few robust leaves of spinach to add to the sickly salad greens.

Qwilleran said to Melinda, "I wish you would do me a favor and explain the Goodwinter mystique." "It's simple," she said. "We've been here for five generations. My great-great-grandfather was an engineer and surveyor. His four sons made fortunes in the mines. Most speculators grabbed their money and went to live abroad, so their daughters could marry titles, but the Goodwinters stayed here, always in business or the professions." "Too bad none of them ever opened a good restaurant. Are there any black sheep in the family?" "Occasionally, but they're always persuaded to move to Mexico or change their name." "Change it to Mull, I suppose." Melinda gave him an inquiring glance. "You've heard about the Mulls? That's an unfortunate social problem. They worked in the mines a hundred years ago, and their descendants have lived on public assistance for the last three generations. They lack motivation-drop out of school — can't find jobs." "Where did they emigrate from originally?" "I don't know, but they were miners when the pay was a dollar and a half a day. They worked with candles in their caps and had to buy their own candles from the company store. The miners were exploited by the companies and by the saloons. You can read about it in the public library." "Did any of the Mulls ever break out of the rut?" "The young ones often leave town, and no one ever hears about them again — or cares. There's a lot of poverty and unemployment here. Also a lot of inherited wealth. Have you noticed the cashmeres at Scottie's Men's Store and the rocks at Diamond Jim's Jewelry? Moose County also has more private planes per capita than any other county in the state." "What are they used for?" "Mostly convenience. Commercial airlines have to route passengers in roundabout ways through hub cities. My dad flew his own plane before he became diabetic. Alex Goodwinter has a plane. The Lanspeaks have two — his and hers." Melinda bribed the waiter to find some fresh fruit for dessert, and after coffee Qwilleran said, "Let's go to my place. I'd like to show you my graffiti." Melinda brightened, and she batted her long lashes. "The evening begins to show promise." They drove both cars to the K mansion, and she asked if she might park the silver convertible in the garage. "It would be recognized in the driveway," she explained, "and people would talk." "Melinda, haven't you heard? This is the last quarter of the twentieth century." "Yes, but this is Pickax," she said with raised eyebrows.

"Sorry." When Qwilleran escorted his guest upstairs to the servants' quarters, she walked into the jungle of daisies in a state of bedazzlement. "Ye gods! This is stupendous! Who did it?" "A former housemaid. One of the Mulls. Worked for Amanda before she came here." "Oh; that one! I guess she was a one-woman disaster at the studio. Amanda fired her for pilfering." "After doing these murals she left town," Qwilleran said. "I hope she found a way to use her talent." "It's really fantastic! It's hard to believe it was done by Daisy Mull." "Daisy?" Qwilleran echoed in astonishment. "Did you: say Daisy Mull?" A melody ran through his mind, and he wondered if he should mention it. Previously he had hinted to Melinda about Koko's extrasensory perception, but a piano-playing cat seemed too radical a concept to share even with a broadminded M.D.

"You've never met Koko and Yum Yum," he said. "Let's go over to the house." When he conducted his guest into the amber-toned foyer, she gazed in wonder. "I had no idea the Klingenschoens owned such fabulous things!" "Penelope knew. Didn't she ever tell you?" "Penelope would consider it gossip." "The rosewood-and-ormolu console is Louis XV," Qwilleran mentioned with authority. "The clock is a Burnap. Koko is usually sitting on the staircase to screen arriving visitors, but this is his night off." Melinda commented on everything. The sculptured plaster ceilings looked like icing on a wedding cake. The life-size marble figures of Adam and Eve in the solarium had a posture defect caused by a calcium deficiency, she said. The Staffordshire dogs in the breakfast room were good examples of concomitant convergent strabismus.

"Want to see the service area?" Qwilleran asked. "The cats often hang out in the kitchen." Yum Yum was lounging on her blue cushion on top of the refrigerator, and Melinda stroked her fur adoringly. "Softer than ermine," she said.

Koko was conspicuously absent, however. "He could be upstairs, sleeping in the middle of a ten-thousand-dollar four- poster-bed," Qwilleran said. "He has fine taste. Let's go up and see." While he hunted for the cat, Melinda inspected the suites furnished in French, Biedermeier, Empire, and Chippendale.

Koko was not to be found.

Qwilleran was beginning to show his nervousness. "I don't know where he can be. Let's check the library. He likes to sleep on the bookshelves." He ran downstairs, followed by Melinda, but there was no sign of the cat in any of his favorite places — not behind the biographies, not between the volumes of Shakespeare, not on top of the atlas.

"Then he's got to be in the basement." The English pub had been imported from London, paneling and all, and it was a gloomy subterranean hideaway." They turned on all the lights and searched the bar, the backbar, and the shadows.

No Koko!

Frantically Qwilleran scoured the premises for the missing Koko, with Melinda tagging along and offering encouragement.

"He'll be in one of four places," he told her. "A soft surface, or a warm spot, or a high perch, or inside something." None of these locations produced anything resembling a cat. Calling his name repeatedly, they peered under sofas and beds, behind armoires and bookcases, and into drawers, cupboards, and closets.

Qwilleran dashed about with increasing alarm, looking in the refrigerator, the oven, the washer, the dryer, then the oven again.

"Slow down, Qwill. You're stressing." Melinda put a hand on his arm. "We'll find him. He's around here somewhere.

You know how cats are." "He's got to be in the house… unless… you know, the back door can't be locked. Someone could come in and snatch him. Or he might have eaten something poisonous and crawled away in a comer." Melinda, wandering in aimless search, stepped into the back entry and called, "What's this stairway? Where does it go?" "What stairway? I never noticed any stairway back there." Hidden by the broom closet and closed off by a door that latched poorly, it was the servants' stairs to the second floor- a narrow flight with rubberized treads. Qwilleran bounded to the top, followed by Melinda, and they emerged in a hallway with a series of doors. Two doors stood ajar. One opened into a walk-in linen closet. The second gave access to another flight of ascending stairs, wide but un- finished and dusty. "The attic!" Qwilleran exclaimed. "It was supposed to be a ballroom. Never finished." Flipping wall switches, he scrambled to the top, sneezing. Melinda ventured up the stairs cautiously, shielding her mouth and nose with her hand.

The staircase ended in a large storage room illuminated faintly by fading daylight through evenly spaced windows and by eight low-wattage light bulbs dangling from the ceiling.

Qwilleran called the cat's name, but there was no answer. "If he's up here, how will we find him among all this junk?" The space was littered with boxes, trunks, cast-off furniture, framed pictures, rolls of carpet, and stacks of old National Geographics.

"He could be asleep, or sick, or worse," he said.