Ms America and the Whoopsie in Winona

by Diana Dempsey

  Priscilla raises a silencing hand in our direction. She can’t seem to tear her eyes from the oil painting that hangs above the mantel. It features brightly colored sailboats tearing around on what looks like a stormy sea. I’m no art expert but I’d describe it as impressionistic.

  Finally she abandons the painting and walks to the bookshelves in the corner by the Christmas tree. I don’t see what she does but presto!—the shelves swing back to reveal a secret room.

  We three queens gasp. “It’s just like in the movies!” Trixie cries.

  Priscilla flings us an exultant look. “I told you I knew my way around Damsgard.” She flounces into the secret room and you can bet we immediately follow.

  It’s a small windowless room and, yes, there is a shrine inside. Well, more of an altar really, draped in crimson and forest green fabric that crashes to the oriental carpet. On top of it are arrayed several tall gold vases holding stalks of wheat. I also note sprigs of dill and small sculptures of animals. A cat, a bird, and—

  “What’s this?” I hold up a gray stone sculpture that looks like a fat, hairy pig with a prominent snout.

  “That’s a boar.” Priscilla takes it from my hand and returns it to the altar. “Occasionally Freyja rides a boar. Sometimes a falcon.”

  Shanelle guffaws. “I thought you were going to say she sometimes turns into one.”

  Priscilla narrows her eyes. “Freyja has been known to shape shift. It is her choice whether to fly, ride an animal, or be carried in a chariot drawn by felines.”

  I guess that’s where the cats come in. “What’s this?” I hold up a palm-sized uneven chunk of translucent golden stone.

  Priscilla removes that, too, from my hand. “Freyja is associated with amber. As legend goes, she received a fantastic necklace of amber by sleeping with four dwarves on four succeeding nights.”

  Wow. I guess that’s how Freyja found that “passionate fulfillment” that Priscilla referred to. Personally, if I went in for that sort of thing, I would prefer taller men. But to each her own.

  “Amber has been meaningful to many over the centuries,” Priscilla tells us. “It has been found in Egyptian tombs and was even used as currency among the Assyrians and the Phoenicians.” Priscilla gazes at each of us in turn. “It is sometimes called ‘the jewel whose power cannot be resisted.’ ”

  I shiver, hearing that. All this is freaking me out. It’s so far removed from my own experience. And never would I have guessed that anything “heathen” would come within a million miles of Ingrid Svendsen.

  Then again, this just proves Ingrid had secrets. It was no doubt one of those that got her killed.

  “Why was Ingrid into all this?” Shanelle wants to know.

  Priscilla edges closer. “You’re so narrow-minded you can’t think of a reason? Perhaps she was not bound by Western tradition, as you seem to be. Perhaps the Icelandic sagas resounded in her heart. Perhaps she espoused the heathen values of warriorship and understood the value of bold action.”

  “You said she swore you to secrecy,” I say. “So Ingrid was making a point of keeping all this to herself?”

  “Wouldn’t you have done the same thing?” Priscilla demands. “In a town where eyes snoop and tongues wag?”

  I hope they do wag. In fact I’m hoping I can make Priscilla’s tongue wag. I don’t know what to make of this nervy Manhattanite but if she knows Ingrid half as intimately as she says she does, she’ll be a font of information. “Perhaps you’d like to join us for a glass of wine and some soup,” I suggest. I make a point of leading Priscilla out of the secret room. I have a suspicious enough mind that I’m worried she might try to trap us in there given half a chance. “I’m sure by the time we’re done with lunch Maggie will be back from her errands.”

  “That would be delightful—” she’s starting to say when again the doorbell rings.

  I march into the foyer and throw the door open, castigating myself for once again hoping to find Mario Suave on the stoop. No such luck. While this latest arrival is indeed a man, and a man roughly Mario’s age, too, it is not Mario. With his beard, longish dark hair and tweed jacket, he’s a professor-type who’s just sexy enough that some students would fall in love with him.

  He holds out his hand. “I’m Peter Svendsen.” He waits a beat, then, “Erik Svendsen’s son.”

  “Ingrid’s … stepson?”

  He nods. I step back to usher him in out of the cold. As he stomps the snow off his shoes, behind me I hear clattering noises. Then the kitchen door at the side of the house bangs. Maggie and Pop must’ve come back in that way for some reason.

  It’s only when I’m introducing Peter to Trixie and Shanelle that I realize Priscilla is no longer among us. Her luggage is gone, too. Nor is there any sign of Pop or Maggie having returned.

  I race to the kitchen. The side door is ajar. I pull it open even though I already know what I will see in the freshly fallen snow. Footprints. And the tracks left by a trendy leather spinner.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Trixie has trailed me into the kitchen. “First we can’t get rid of Priscilla and then she disappears! Where did she go?”

  “The tracks lead to the street.” I give my nose a hearty blow. “I presume she came by car.”

  Trixie throws out her arms. “How weird is that?”

  I’m mystified, too. And freakish behavior by an out-of-towner who claims to be the BFF of the murder victim certainly raises a host of questions in my mind.

  I want to know more about Priscilla Pembroke. Though I don’t know how I’ll ever find her again.

  First things first. We rejoin Shanelle and Peter Svendsen in the living room.

  This is an amazingly beautiful space, too, with the same rust-colored walls and coffered ceilings as the dining room plus stunning white built-in cabinetry and plush velvet-upholstered seating arrangements. Poinsettias and garlands abound. And the Christmas tree in this room is the grandest of all. Since it’s a real tree, it gives off a marvelous pine scent. A gazillion glittering ornaments hang from its branches, also adorned by green mesh ribbon flecked with gold.

  “We’re all so sorry about your stepmother,” I tell Peter after we offer him a glass of wine. It turns out he’s already heard through the grapevine that Ingrid invited all of us to stay as guests here in his childhood home.

  “Thank you.” He clasps his hands between his knees. “I will admit to you that we weren’t close. Still, it’s a shocking thing.”

  “I imagine you’ve talked to the police.”

  “I didn’t have much to tell them. The truth is that since my father died I’ve had as little as possible to do with Ingrid.”

  Peter seems in the mood to dish the dirt. I’ll take him up on it. “It sounds like you disapproved of the marriage.”

  “My sister and I both did. Nora moved to Chicago and got married years ago so she’s less involved than I am. But she knows the gossip just like everybody else does.”

  This is getting good. I lean forward. “What gossip is that?”

  “Ingrid Svendsen did to my father what she did to her first husband. She homed in on a well-to-do older man and insinuated herself into his life. Granted, my father was divorced.”

  “Her first husband wasn’t?” Trixie interjects.

  “Far from it. He was a well-known doctor with a wife and young kids. He was at least fifteen years older than Ingrid. But did she let any of that stop her?”

  I watch Peter Svendsen get het up. Clearly he’s no fan of stepmommy dearest.

  “Ingrid might have put on a good show,” he goes on, “but she was nothing but a scheming opportunist. Nora and I went ballistic when my father got it into his head to marry her.”

  “You must’ve tried to talk him out of it,” Shanelle says.

  “I tried, Nora tried. We couldn’t reason with him at all.”

  I have to wonder if the Svendsen heirs were more worried about their inheritance than their father’s happiness. “Was Ingrid a good wife to your f
ather?” I ask.

  Peter grudgingly admits she was. “Except for how much money she spent. Too much was never enough. And I’d be damned if I’d let her get her claws into Damsgard.”

  My ears perk up. “What do you mean?”

  “She led you to believe she owned the place, right?” He snorts. “She did that all the time. It drove me crazy.”

  “She didn’t own it?” Shanelle says.

  “No way! That’s one concession Nora and I wrung out of Dad. He stipulated in his will that Ingrid could live here until she died but that’s it. The house was never in her name. Never. And now that she’s gone Damsgard and everything in it will come to me.”

  Whoa! I fall back against the sofa cushions. Shanelle, Trixie, and I look at each other and I can see they’re as astonished as I am. This is a major news flash.

  For Maggie, it’ll be gargantuan.

  That is, if it’s true. Peter Svendsen has a vested interest here. He may not be speaking the whole truth and nothing but.

  “In fact, that’s why I’m here,” he goes on. “I haven’t been in the house for four years, since my dad died. I couldn’t bring myself to watch Ingrid play lady of the manor. Now I don’t have to anymore.” He stands up. “I’d like to look around.”

  Man, it’s a full-time job keeping people from wandering in off the street and wanting to traipse through the house. I don’t feel I can stop Peter Svendsen, though, the way I stopped Priscilla Pembroke. After all, I’m only here at the behest of someone who’s no longer among the living. I’ll just keep an eye on him. Make sure he doesn’t lift anything.

  Peter, Trixie, and I have wandered into the library—where the secret-door bookshelf is back in place—when I get it into my head to ask if he ever met Priscilla Pembroke. “She said she was one of Ingrid’s best friends,” I say.

  “That’s not much of a recommendation in my book.” He runs a loving hand across the antique desk. I wonder if he ever sat there and did homework as a boy.

  “Priscilla is an actress,” Trixie adds. “She’s very theatrical.”

  Peter groans. “God save me from actresses.”

  “It sounds like there’s a story there,” I guess.

  “An epic tale. Don’t ask.”

  Before Peter takes his leave, he wants to know how long we’ll be staying in Winona. At this point that’s a good question.

  “Another few days,” I reply vaguely. “I hope that won’t be a problem for you.”

  Peter pulls open the front door and cold air rushes inside. It’s already pitch dark out and we three queens haven’t even finished lunch. “None of this will happen fast,” he says and I know he’s referring to the day he longs for, when Damsgard will be his.

  I have to wonder if he took action to hurry that day along.

  So far this investigation is easy as pie. I plop my butt in the house and wait for potential suspects to come to me.

  Speaking of which, we’ve rewarmed our soup and replenished our wine when Maggie breezes in through the front door, Pop right behind her. They’re both loaded with shopping bags. Bolts of fabric protrude from one of them.

  “Been busy?” I inquire.

  Neither of them stops to chat. “I don’t know what I’d do without your father,” Maggie tells me on her way to the stairs. “He’s going to take me to Minneapolis tomorrow. I’m so terrible with directions I don’t think I could even find it on my own.”

  Judging from Pop’s expression he’s less than thrilled with that ambitious excursion, a two-and-a-half-hour drive each way. But I won’t come to his rescue because I could use the time to give Damsgard a thorough search. “By the way, Maggie,” I call, “did you ever hear your sister mention a Priscilla Pembroke?”

  “I never heard that name,” Maggie says before disappearing upstairs.

  “She hasn’t given herself over to grief yet,” Shanelle remarks after Maggie and Pop disappear upstairs.

  “I don’t know if she’s cried even one tear over her sister,” Trixie says. “It makes me feel bad for Ingrid.”

  “Me, too.” I lower my voice. “But remember. Not a word about the secret room or what Peter Svendsen said about him inheriting Damsgard.” Right now I’d prefer to be the one with the inside info. Plus I’d like to see how Maggie behaves while she believes she’s in line for a windfall from her dead sibling. Which she may well be.

  “Agreed,” Shanelle and Trixie whisper.

  I dispatch the rest of my soup. “I’m going to go talk to Pop.” I wonder if he’s upset, because when I go to find him he is once again shoveling.

  I join him on the sidewalk. He always shovels not only the driveway and the walkways around the house but the sidewalk, too. And he doesn’t dump the snow on other people’s lawns, either. What I know about shoveling etiquette I learned at his knee. “I’ll get another shovel and help,” I tell him.

  “No, you’re all dressed up.”

  “I am not. This is normal for me.” Granted, the heels of my boots are four inches and the only coat I brought with me on this trip is a plum-colored Melton wool with impeccable seaming. But it’s a knockoff! And besides, this is standard wintertime garb for Ms. America Happy Pennington.

  I find another shovel in the garage and get to work. “It’s nice how peaceful and quiet it is here in Winona,” I say after a while.

  He grunts.

  “And I like how the houses are in a square around the park,” I add a minute later. “It’s how I imagine houses in London.”

  Silence.

  “We’ll have to go read the plaque about the statue tomorrow in the light,” I say.

  He stands his shovel upright in a pile of snow. “Out with it already. Say what’s on your mind.”

  I abandon the small talk. “Fine. Have you noticed that Maggie isn’t exactly mired in grief?”

  “Everybody grieves in their own way. You know that.”

  “All she’s done since her sister died is plan how she’s going to redecorate Damsgard. At the funeral home she couldn’t wait to get Ingrid buried so everybody could move on to the reading of the will.”

  He flushes, and not from the exertion of shoveling. “As I recall, young lady, you were plenty darn eager to get your check after you won Ms. America.”

  “That’s different! I won that prize money fair and square.” My fellow contestants might quibble with that assessment but that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

  “And maybe Maggie has all this coming to her fair and square.” He gestures to take in Damsgard and its expansive lot. “Maggie always had it a lot tougher than her sister. Why do you think she left Winona in the first place? Her father may have been a judge but he didn’t leave her any money to speak of. She had to work for a living.”

  “Wasn’t that true for Ingrid, too?”

  He leans closer. “Ingrid married money. Twice.”

  That’s what Peter Svendsen said.

  “Maggie wasn’t so lucky,” he goes on. “Donovan’s father wouldn’t marry her. Heck, he was such a deadbeat he wouldn’t even support his son. And Maggie didn’t have any skills. All she could do was nails. And since she didn’t want the snobs around here to see how far she’d fallen, she left.”

  I ponder that. I do have to give Maggie credit for uprooting herself—which I am having trouble doing—and for starting a business that flourishes to this day. I step closer to my father. My breath puffs in the frigid night air. “I admire you for defending Maggie, Pop, really I do. But you know as well as I do that this doesn’t all add up.”

  He looks away.

  Even though I tossed my shovel, I plow forward. “So where was Maggie, exactly, when Ingrid got shot?”

  He shakes his head and says nothing. He won’t meet my gaze.

  “You were upset that she wasn’t right next to you when the lights came back on.”

  “That’s because I was afraid something happened to her!”

  “So where was she? How did she explain it?”

  “She did not k
ill her sister!”

  “Are you saying she hasn’t told you where she was? If she is innocent I do not understand why she can’t just say where the heck she was when her sister got shot.”

  He points his finger at me. “You better not be thinking what I think you’re thinking, young lady.” He grabs his shovel and stomps up the driveway. Then he delivers the sort of line I hear from Rachel. “I’m not going to talk about this anymore.”

  “You can’t pretend this isn’t bothering you, too,” I call after him, but his pace does not slow.

  I finish the shoveling. There’s no doubt that shoveling is an excellent activity when a person is trying to think things through. At least for us Przybyszewskis.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  It’s a few hours later, while we three queens are sitting around in our jammies watching the big-screen TV and waiting for my new pore-refining white clay masque to work its magic on our complexions, that once again the doorbell rings.

  I spring to my feet. “I can’t believe it!” For this must be Mario. Not only is the third time the charm but clearly the gods are toying with me by making sure the sexiest man alive heaves into view while I am makeup-free, wearing droopy cotton, and engaged in an unsightly beauty regimen.

  “I’ll get it,” Trixie offers.

  I leap up the stairs to the landing, prepared to dash inside my room to render myself presentable, when I hear Trixie loose a shriek of excitement.

  “Mrs. P!”

  It’s my mother!

  I pound back down the stairs. “What in the world are you doing here?”

  She throws out her arms. “You think I don’t know how to get on a plane?”

  I have to say, she looks good. Since she started working outside the home, she dabs on makeup every day, styles her light red hair in a large pouf, and experiments with fashionable clothing. I am impressed to see her decked out in a classic black wool car coat with a trendy funnel-neck collar.

  Trixie releases her and I give my mom a hug. “Since when do you fly to another state on a moment’s notice?”

  “Since my daughter comes down with a cold that could kill her.” She hugs Shanelle. “And I will have you know that if those crazy planes let a person bring homemade chicken soup on board, I would have that with me. Close that door so we don’t all catch our death.” She peers at us quizzically. “What the heck do you three have on your faces?”