by Ann Yost
Elli was silent for a moment as she downshifted to gain better control of her vehicle.
“The trouble is,” she said, “there isn’t anyone else. It had to be Arvo or Reid. Unless it was Matti Murso.”
I pictured the gangly youth with the engaging grin.
“It couldn’t have been Matti, either,” I protested.
“You know,” my cousin said, throwing me a half-smile, “you are way too softhearted to be the police chief.”
“Acting, temporary,” I corrected her. “Thank goodness Pops will be home this week.”
The SUV hit a patch of black ice. Elli gripped the steering wheel hard as we hydroplaned, and landed facing the wrong way. By the time Elli had steered us out of danger, we’d lost interest in discussing the cases. We were just glad to get back to Red Jacket alive.
Elli finally pulled into the old carriage house that served as her garage, and we both collapsed against the seats. After a while she spoke.
“You know, I kind of hate knitting lace. I’ve had to take out my swatch four or five times already. I can’t get the stitch count straight.”
“You know we have to go through with this. Pauline’s counting on it.”
“Did you hear that Pauline is going to place her Shetland shawl in Liisa’s coffin? She’ll have time to finish it since the ground is frozen now and burial will be in the spring.”
“I guess that’s sweet,” Elli said. “But kinda wasteful.”
My phone rang and Sofi’s number popped up on the screen.
“Where the H-E- double hockey sticks are you? Arvo’s making tomorrow’s memorial service into a doubleheader for Liisa and her father, so I need to make twice the usual number of flower arrangements.”
“You need help?”
“Dang right I do. Think you could find Elli?”
“You’re in luck. I think I can.”
Elli, who had heard the conversation, pulled the SUV back onto the street.
Twenty-Six
Main Street Floral and Fudge reminded me of a beehive in full throttle. I didn’t think I’d ever seen it as busy.
I waved at Charlie behind the counter as Elli and I wended our way through the throng of customers. Some were there to buy flowers for the funerals, some to order poinsettias for the holidays, some were there for fudge and all were there for gossip. And not just about the murders. I saw several pointed looks from the ladies of the church and I knew the stories of where Jace and probably, Lars, too, had spent the night were high on the charts.
We escaped, as quickly as possible, into the workroom where Elli slipped on one of Sofi’s dark green aprons embellished with a single pink rosebud before beginning to stab stems of evergreen and holly into a Styrofoam form.
“This funeral comes at a most inconvenient time,” Sofi complained, without even greeting us. She brushed the sweat off her forehead with the back of one gloved hand. “I wish we could just postpone Christmas.”
She sounded just like Snow White’s dwarf Grumpy which answered one question. Nothing good had happened last night between herself and her ex.
“What do you want me to do?” I asked, although I knew the answer. Sofi pointed to the completed arrangements of snapdragons, daisy poms, glads, greenbills, bachelor buttons, lilies, and several containers of yellow roses destined, no doubt, for the grave blanket.
“Take those up to Pauline, would you?”
I didn’t really mind. I felt restless and anxious and as though the investigation was slipping through my fingers and I had no clue what to do next. As I was loading the delivery van, it struck me that at least one answer had been handed on a silver platter. I was about to head up to the Maki Funeral Home, scene of the murder. It could be the perfect chance to do a little more snooping.
The drops of hail had morphed into heavy, wet globs of snow. Despite the best efforts of the windshield wipers, I had zero visibility. Luckily, I’d driven the route so many times I could do it in my sleep.
I turned off Tamarack into the alley and pulled up next to the door in the Maki’s covered carport, right behind the big, black hearse.
Arvo, who has always had the hearing of a bat, arrived, coatless, to help with the flowers.
“We’ll take the arrangements straight to the chapel,” he said, in a low voice. “You will be able to see how lifelike she is, eh?”
I’d always disliked that term. At every single open-coffin funeral, with the guest of honor primped to the gills as though for an appearance on Good Morning America, my impression was always the same. They did not look lifelike. They looked dead.
Liisa Pelonen was no different.
Don’t get me wrong. She was laid out in a simple gown of white taffeta that could have been a wedding dress and a crown of tiny white rosebuds had been threaded into her blond hair. Long, darkened lashes brushed rouged cheekbones and pink gloss brightened her lips. She was still beautiful, I thought, but not lifelike. Death, as always, had stolen the animating spark that had defined her.
As I stared at her I felt a thunderbolt of rage. Someone had snuffed the girl’s light when she was just about to start her life and I vowed to find that person and bring him to justice. Even if it was Arvo. Or Reid. Or Matti Murso.
“Horace Clump is looking for the Night Wind boy,” Arvo told me, when we were back in the hall outside the chapel. “It won’t surprise you to know he’s calling this a slam-dunk.”
“No. It doesn’t surprise me. Arvo. The two deaths have to be connected, right? I’ve heard that Jalmer was involved in a vigilante group. Do you think that someone he was investigating decided to shut his mouth?”
Arvo’s blue eyes looked puzzled.
“It’s possible, eh? But then why kill Liisa?”
“For the money?”
“How would that get them the money? It’s in a trust fund managed by a lawyer down in Hancock.”
I nodded and felt a frisson of relief. I hadn’t intended to test Arvo but I’d been curious to find out what he knew. It seemed like he was as bewildered as everyone else.
We had just picked up the two pails of roses when his office phone rang. He excused himself and I could tell from his side of the conversation that he was responding to one of the dozens of S.O.S. calls he gets every winter. The hearse, with its heavy body and snow chains, was the most reliable vehicle on the Keweenaw.
Anyway, Arvo was always willing to go and never let any stranded motorist pay for his help.
“I’ll be back in a bit,” Arvo said, shouldering into his heavy jacket. “Why don’t you take the roses out to the greenhouse? Pauly is upstairs resting.”
Perfect, I thought. That would give me a few minutes alone.
Twenty-Seven
The glass-sided room smelled earthy, damp, warm and welcoming. I felt more comfortable here than I had during my earlier visit and I felt a curious longing to sit down on a bench and close my eyes. I reminded myself that it was Pauline’s sanctuary, not mine.
I deposited the buckets of roses on the worktable and gazed around the room, taking in specifics, the seedlings, the hybrids, and the succulents. The amazing spread of blue flowers including orchids, foxglove, iris, and belladonna, drew me. I wandered over to view them more closely and tripped on a clay pot that protruded from underneath the table. Pain lanced through my toe. I hopped around for a minute, seeing stars and trying not to curse. When the pain eased, I knelt to tuck the pot back in its place only to find that didn’t fit. There was something in the way.
I dropped into doggie position, butt in the air, to identify and remove the obstruction, but it was too dark to see anything. So, I stretched out on my stomach and reached as far as I could. My fingers grasped some kind of webbing and I pulled.
It was the strap on a pink, rhinestone-studded, soft-sided suitcase.
For a moment I just stared, shocked that I’d found it, even more shocked at where I’d found it. Did this mean Arvo Maki was the killer? I refused to let my mind go there. I didn’t know enough yet. I wa
nted to grab the bag and hightail it home but then I remembered Pauline was in the house and I thought about how awkward and embarrassing it would be if she caught me.
My heart was pounding ten to the dozen as Pops would say as I unzipped the item and searched through its contents, which included clean underwear, an orange turtleneck sweater, a pair of lime green corduroy jeans, a flannel nightshirt and a bag of cosmetics. There was a pink electronic notebook, too, and a wallet with a driver’s license, a library card and money—a ten-dollar bill and two ones—and some coins.
There was also a photograph of a short, bearded man with a wealth of thick, dark hair, a stocky build and brilliant, intelligent-looking blue eyes. He had his arm around a sylph-like blond and they were both smiling. Liisa’s father and mother.
I replaced the items as neatly as possible and shoved it back in place. The offending clay pot, I set on the tabletop. I was so enchanted by the photo that it took me a minute to realize that there was nothing in the suitcase that would, in any way, help with the investigation. Nothing, except where I’d found it. Did that mean Arvo was guilty?
The silence in the room felt eerie, all of a sudden, and I started to tiptoe toward the door, intent on getting out and getting home before somebody found me there. I was nearly there when a sudden clicking sound practically stopped my heart. An instant later the timed sprinkler system came to life, soaking me to the skin. Geez almighty Louise. I made it home in record time but it wasn’t fast enough to keep my wet hair from freezing.
Moments later I stood in the shower, my thoughts caroming off each other like a mad version of a pinball machine. Had Arvo been the baby’s father? Had he killed his surrogate daughter? But, if so, why had he kept the suitcase packed and hidden in the greenhouse? Why hadn’t he just unpacked it and put it away? Or, better yet, have driven the fifteen miles to the shore of Lake Superior and flung it under the waves? Why leave it in his own house where it could be discovered during a search?
Maybe because he knew his house wouldn’t be searched. Maybe, because he knew that Sheriff Clump would arrest Reid Night Wind for the crime without a second thought.
What if Reid had killed her? Would he have taken away the suitcase and risked having it found in his possession? Or would he have hidden it somewhere in the mortuary in the hope that cops would eventually find it and link the crime to the Makis?
The same scenario could apply to Matti Murso, although somehow I didn’t think Matti would have had the presence of mind to frame someone else.
One thing I knew for certain, though, the killer wasn’t Jalmer Pelonen. I was glad Liisa hadn’t known about her dad’s death. And then I was thunderstruck.
Maybe Liisa had known about Jalmer’s accident. Maybe she had been contacted—and threatened—by the killer, someone from his dark world of conspiracy. Maybe it was the fear of that killer that had driven Liisa to run away with Reid Night Wind. I liked that last theory best, of course. The problem was, none of those possibilities accounted for the money. None, except the one involving Jace’s little brother.
I threw on some old pink sweatpants and a taupe-colored, long-sleeved tee shirt and curled into Pops’s leather chair with a fresh cup of coffee. A moment later my phone rang.
“Hei, Hatti. Jake Jussi here. Remember me?” He laughed at his own joke. “The darndest thing has happened. A pure fluke and I don’t know what to make of it, but I thought you would want to know. I was cleaning out my files this afternoon and I found an unopened letter from Jalmer Pelonen. It was dated three weeks ago and, somehow, had gotten incorrectly slotted. This was the first I’d seen of it. Ya still with me?”
“Yes,” I said, breathlessly. I couldn’t imagine what was coming but I sensed it would be important.
“He wrote to ask me to add another name as an executor in his daughter’s trust fund. Not to replace either of us, you understand. Just one more adult in her life to keep an eye on her and her holdings.”
It had to be Arvo. I felt a little sick. Had Arvo convinced Jalmer to give him some status in Liisa’s business? What did that mean? What could that mean?
“Will this person be in line to inherit?” I asked.
“Oh, no. This is strictly an advisory position. Like mine. At first I was taken aback, you know, but then I thought it through and it makes sense. The new trustee could keep an eye on both of them.”
“Both of them?”
“Liisa and her young husband.”
The sick feeling was getting stronger.
“You mean Jalmer didn’t trust Reid Night Wind with Liisa or her money?”
“No, no, I don’t think that was it. Jalmer knew they were both young, that’s all.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Of course not. What’s wrong with me? The pannukakku must have gone straight to my head. The third trustee is an attorney and Reid’s brother, Jason Night Wind.”
If I suffered from syncope I would have fainted.
“What?”
“You know him?”
“Yes,” I said, my brain scrambling to make sense of this. “When was the letter dated? Three weeks ago? That must mean that Liisa had been in contact with her father and that she’d shared her plans for marrying Reid Night Wind.”
“I’d say so. Oh, and Night Wind, as trustee, will be able to facilitate the release of the trust fund to his brother. Hope this helps. Good-bye, Hatti.”
I stared at the bookshelves but didn’t see them. This was terrible news for Reid. One more nail in his coffin.
It was terrible news for me, too. It meant Jace had withheld vital information about the case. It meant we were not really partners trying to solve a crime. It meant we were two separate agents, each with our own agenda. It meant he hadn’t trusted me enough to tell me the truth. A part of me realized I shouldn’t have been surprised. After all, he hadn’t told me the truth at the altar, either. A bigger part of me was shocked senseless. I’d trusted Jace at the beginning and, on some level, I’d trusted him even when he’d broken up with me. I’d trusted that he had an unshakeable reason.
The old anguish of rejection rolled through me again and I got to my feet and started to pace. Eventually, I made it to the kitchen where I couldn’t help but notice covered dishes of brownies and casseroles and three-bean, potato and macaroni salad. I opened the refrigerator door and smelled Mrs. Moilanen’s lamb stew and Miss Irene’s potato soup. In the breadbox, there was a fresh tiikerikakku, or tiger cake from Aunt Ianthe. The marbled confection of orange and chocolate layers topped with a fudge frosting was my favorite. Well, to be honest, it was everybody’s favorite.
The Ladies of the church basement had been busy and, I suspected, I was about to host another potluck.
The phone rang again. This time it was Pauline Maki.
“I am so upset,” she said, disregarding my greeting. “I don’t know when I’ve been more upset.” I could hear the anger quivering in her voice and I knew she had discovered Liisa’s suitcase.
“I can imagine,” I said, inadequately. “I would be upset, too.”
“I am glad you realize it,” she said, “the consequences here could be catastrophic. Something will have to be done.”
I was getting confused.
“About the suitcase?”
“Suitcase? What suitcase? I’m talking about Edna. She has gone completely off the deep end. I learned from a reliable source that she has abandoned her swatch and started off on her Shetland shawl. Even worse, she’s doing some kind of fern design instead of the shells in my pattern. It’s anarchy, Hatti, and I won’t have it!”
“No, no, of course not,” I said, half laughing at the irony of Pauline being as upset as Ronja Laplander had been. “Listen, there’s lots of food here. Why don’t we have a potluck and an impromptu knitting session tonight? We can iron it all out. Can you make the calls?”
“Yes, yes, of course.” She paused. “What suitcase were you talking about?”
I started to brush her off but stopped. It
was too late in the day to play games. Maybe, if Pauline knew about the suitcase she’d confront Arvo and he would either admit what he’d done or be able to clear his name.
“I found one under a table in the greenhouse. Pink and soft-sided with rhinestones on it. It looked like something that would have belonged to a teen-aged girl and I just wondered how it had gotten there.”
The next few seconds felt awkward, almost as if Pauline were struggling with herself about something.
“I’m afraid I don’t know,” she said. “But you can be sure I will look into it.”
All the ladies arrived at once so there was no chance to speak with Pauline, privately. The entire circle was there except for Sonya.
“She called to tell me she was going down to Hancock to pick up her patient,” Elli said, with a concerned glance at me. “She intends to join us later.”
None of the men showed up, not even the Reverend Sorensen who was usually attached at the hip to his wife or Arvo.
“Quite frankly,” Pauline was saying to everyone in her vicinity, “I told them not to come. We have some things to settle.” Her eyes narrowed on Edna Moilanen’s plump face. “Either we are going to knit our shawls correctly or we are not going to knit them at all.”
“But, Pauline,” Mrs. M. said, “I don’t see why we can’t have a little variation, a little individuality.”
“No more ferns. No cat’s paws. No diamonds in the rough. It is shells or it is nothing.”
I watched the hostility flash then disappear in the older woman’s eyes. Each of the feminine pillars of Red Jacket society likes to have her own way but, fundamentally, they are kind. Edna Moilanen, I thought, had considered Pauline’s terrible, horrible week and decided to cut her some slack.
“All right, Pauline,” she said. “Shells, it is.”
It was a perfect spot for a Bible verse and Miss Irene obliged.
“Then said Jesus unto him, put up again thy sword into his place: for all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword. The Gospel of Matthew.”