by Mary McHugh
“I don’t understand,” Tatiana said. “What do you mean ‘bacon frying’? You have to show me.”
“Mary Louise,” I said, “I am definitely not doing my impression of bacon frying on a Russian ship. You’d better not mention this to Heidi. I’ll kill you.”
My friends laughed and all of them started talking at once. “She’s famous for this, Tatiana,” Mary Louise said. “Come on, Tina. You have to at least show Tatiana.”
I shot her a warning glance, and then noticed Tatiana’s eager expression.
“OK,” I said. “Just this once. For you, Tatiana. But you’d better shut up about this, Mary Louise.”
“You know me, Tina,” she said. “The Silent One.”
“Riiight,” I said, shooting her a that’ll-be-the-day glance.
I stood up. “You won’t believe this, Tatiana,” I said, “but I actually did this in public in Scotland. I was there on a Scotch whisky tour—it was a press trip—”
“This was part of your job?” Tatiana asked.
“Yeah,” I said. “Rough, huh? The magazine sent me on these trips to recommend them to our readers. Somebody thought it would be a great idea to get the newlyweds soused on Scotch after the wedding.”
“What’s so bad about that?” Pat asked. “Sounds like the perfect honeymoon to me.”
I continued, “We went around to all these different distilleries and had a slight buzz on, by eleven in the morning, from sampling single malt Scotch. I don’t even like Scotch, to tell you the truth. But I loved sitting around drinking Scotch in the morning, pretending to be seriously considering the differences among all the kinds they gave us to drink. I wouldn’t have known if they were all multimalt Scotch or no-malt Scotch, but I took notes and pretended to be a serious journalist.”
“I want your job,” Tatiana said.
“The best thing was the party the distillers gave for us the last night we were there,” I said. “We danced, sang the Scottish national anthem—they seem to think they’ll be free of British rule someday—talked to all the nice Scottish people. I’m of Scottish descent, by the way, and I thought the Scots would be sort of like my father, a little dour, obsessed with golf, sort of distant. Well, they weren’t at all dour or distant. They were wonderful, cheerful, joyous people. After they sang and danced for us, they asked us to do something in return.”
I stopped. “Are you sure you want me to do this again?” I said to my friends. “Haven’t you seen it enough?”
“We can never see it too many times, Tina,” Mary Louise said. “Besides, Tatiana has never seen you do this.”
“It’s that good?” Tatiana asked.
“Wait until you see,” Mary Louise said, laughing the way only Mary Louise can, with her whole soul and body.
“OK,” I said. “Well, anyway, we all looked at each other, because we couldn’t do anything and we weren’t prepared. One of the people in our group of writers thought it would be hilarious to announce that Tina Powell would do her impression of bacon frying. If I hadn’t had a little—well, a lot of Scotch, I would have melted into a puddle. But, somehow, I went up to the front of this large room in my black and white dress, stockings and heels and pearl earrings, and explained to all these nice Scottish people that I had had a wee dram and hoped they would forgive me for what I was about to do.”
“What did you do?” Tatiana said, laughing. “I want to see it.”
“OK, but remember, you asked for it,” I said.
I lay down on the floor. Fortunately, almost all the other people had left the dining room by then. I remained still for a couple of seconds, and then raised my left arm and wiggled it, then my right arm, next a foot, a leg, another foot and leg, and finally sat up wiggling my whole body like bacon when it is cooking.
My friends have all seen this several times, but they still seemed to find it hysterical. Tatiana laughed so hard, we could see tears in her eyes. She looked at her watch and said, “I’d better go change. I’ll never be able to compete with your bacon frying, Tina, but I’ll do my best. See you later.”
I was still sitting on the floor after Tatiana left, when a familiar voice said, “Ms. Powell, are you all right?”
“Oh yes, Heidi, I was just doing my impression of bacon frying,” I said.
“Is that an American custom?” she asked.
“Not really,” I said. “It’s just something I do after I’ve had a little Scotch in the morning.”
Heidi looked utterly baffled. She muttered something under her breath about crazy Americans and left the dining room.
“It’s two o’clock,” Pat said. “Let’s go up to the bar and see the crew’s show. It will take our minds off dead bodies and murderers.”
“Let’s hope,” Gini said.
Every seat in the bar was taken. We stood in the back next to Alex, who smiled when he saw us.
“Sorry I missed your performance of bacon frying, Tina,” he said.
“How’d you know about that?” I asked him.
“A totally confused Heidi passed me as I was coming in here. She was shaking her head and saying, ‘Bacon frying. She was doing bacon frying. ’ Gini told me that was one of your many talents. You have to do it for me.”
“Watch what you ask for, Alex,” I said. “You may be sorry.”
The crew appeared, wearing traditional Russian costumes, reds and blues, greens and yellows, with flowers in their hair and smiles on their faces. One of the waitresses was in a red and white polka-dotted blouse tied in front and a black skirt covered with multicolored flowers. Another wore a long-sleeved blouse and striped apron held up with blue and red ties over her white hemmed skirt. It was as if the Russians tried to cheer themselves up with lots of flowers and colors in their clothes.
We hadn’t seen much joy from the crew, so it was a pleasure to watch them. They sang for us, while the men did a high-energy dance in which they sat down in midair and then leapt up. Tatiana did a lovely Russian waltz with one of the crew members and sang “Dark Eyes” beautifully, soulfully.
Then Sasha, the wild-haired, wild-eyed dining room manager, leapt onto the stage and said, “I am Sasha. I will sing for you Russian song.”
We were expecting a Russian folk song, but Sasha sang us a beautiful sad ballad, in a minor key. We couldn’t understand the words, but it brought tears to our eyes anyway. The Russians are really good at sad. Sasha radiated a sweetness that was evident in everything he did on the ship. Although he often seemed overwhelmed, he was always unfailingly polite and kind whenever we asked him for anything.
We applauded and Tatiana hugged Sasha as they all took their bows at the end.
We moved out onto the deck and settled into brown wooden chairs, which we arranged in a circle. Alex made sure his chair was near Gini’s.
“Did you find out anything from the inspector?” Gini asked.
“It was hard to get anything out of him. He said he wanted to ask Sergei more questions. He said Sergei was once arrested for punching someone in his father’s restaurant.”
“Tatiana never mentioned anything like that,” I said. “Are you sure, Alex?”
“I’m only telling you what the inspector told me,” Alex said. “I also asked him about Brad Sheldon. He said he’s their number one suspect and that it’s only a matter of time until they find him. He didn’t look all that certain that they would find him anytime soon, though.”
“That’s crazy,” Janice said. “Brad could never kill anybody.”
Alex shook his head. “Maybe not, Jan, but the inspector seems to think he could. I asked him where Brad could have disappeared to, and he said he probably sneaked aboard one of the supply boats to go ashore. His body wasn’t found in the river and he was not found on the ship. He told me Brad’s Russian boyfriend, Maxim, has family members in Moscow. The inspector thinks Brad is probably hiding with them. They’re investigating that now.”
“Did he mention anyone else who might have done it?” I asked.
“Wel
l, this doesn’t really make sense to me, but he did mention Heidi.”
“What did he say about her?” I asked, my interest piqued at the mention of Heidi. There was something about her that puzzled me, but I couldn’t figure it out.
Alex continued, “I asked him if he really thought she could have done it, and he said, You mean, did he do it?’ It seems Miss Heidi Gorsuch was originally Mister Gunther Gorsuch. He was head of a boys’ school in Stuttgart. When he became a woman, they fired him—I mean her—and she took this job as cruise director on our ship. She apparently told one of the crew that Allgood threatened to tell his brother-in-law, who runs the cruise line, that she was really a man, if she had him fired. The inspector thinks Allgood was blackmailing Heidi. She could have killed the chef—she’s strong enough.”
My earlier observations of Heidi’s large feet and deep voice suddenly took on a whole new meaning.
“I asked him how Allgood could have known that,” Alex said. “The inspector shrugged and said, he must have found out somehow. You must admit, Heidi doesn’t look like your typical woman.”
I was so flabbergasted, I couldn’t reply.
“Do you buy any of this, Alex?” Gini asked.
“I don’t know what to believe at this point,” Alex said. “I never heard anything before about Sergei or Heidi. I did think Brad must have had something to do with the murder since he was the last one seen with Allgood. Anyway, I don’t know who did it, but you should all be careful. Don’t go anywhere alone. OK?” He put his arm around Gini.
“We’ll be fine, Alex,” Gini said, leaning against him. “Don’t worry.”
But we were all worried. I couldn’t shake the uneasy feeling that whoever killed the chef was still on the ship.
Tina’s Travel Tip: A fur hat with a hammer and sickle pin probably isn’t a good gift idea for a Wall Street lawyer.
Chapter 9
Nesting Dolls and Fur Hats
“What do we do for the rest of the day?”
Gini asked. “I want to go on shore and see some more of Russia. That’s why I came on this trip in the first place. I want to photograph that little town we can see from here. What’s the name of it, Alex?”
“Kizhi,” he said, giving it its Russian pronunciation, Kee-zhee. “You really should see it. It’s very old, all wooden buildings. You can buy fur hats there too.”
“Oh, Alex, do you think you could get permission for us to go there?”
“Let me see what I can do,” he said, and left to find Heidi.
He was back in ten minutes, smiling. “Come on, Hoofers. Heidi arranged for Andrei, our guide, to take you and the rest of the passengers to Kizhi. She said it would be easier for the police to search the ship if we were all off the boat.”
He looked at Gini. “Mind if I come along?”
“I’d love it,” she said. “But won’t you be bored? You must have seen it a million times.”
“I won’t be bored,” he said. “I can’t imagine ever being bored when I’m with you. By the way, your show was awesome last night. You should wear those rain slickers all the time.”
Gini laughed. “Glad you liked them. Incidentally, how old are you? Just asking.”
“Forty-eight,” he said. “Just telling. Hope that’s not too old for you.”
“I’m fifty-one,” Gini said. “I hope that’s not too old for you.”
“I always say, it’s not the number of years we’ve lived that matters. It’s what you learn along the way that counts. Besides, I’ve always been attracted to older women,” he said, smiling. “You can teach me whatever I need to know.”
“I don’t think there’s much I could teach you,” Gini said, grinning wickedly. “But I’ll try.”
We filed out to the pier, where we could see the town of Kizhi, now classified as an outdoor museum because of the ancient wooden buildings preserved there. This was entirely different from the other small villages we had seen. There were no red and blue and yellow domes dotting the island, just dark wooden buildings with white domes above the trees.
We joined our guide, a large unsmiling Russian, impatiently waiting for the rest of the passengers. His round, mustached face was shaded by a white cap pulled down to his eyes. He wore a red, thigh-length loose vest over a white dress shirt with a red and blue striped formal necktie. He carried a paddle with the number twenty on it, which he held up.
“I am Andrei,” he said when we had all gathered around him.
He didn’t seem particularly thrilled to be ushering a group of mostly Americans around an island he had visited hundreds of times. “I will be your guide for today’s tour. Today, I show you very old buildings, very important historically. Please keep moving. Do not stay in one place too long. Look for number twenty, which I hold up if you get lost.”
I was standing closest to him. “Are we still on the Volga River?” I asked.
“No,” Andrei said. “This is Lake Onega, the second largest lake in Europe. And this island is unique. Is kind of open air architectural museum with buildings from the thirteenth century and churches built by Peter the Great in the eighteenth century.”
We moved in closer to hear him.
“You will see many beautiful things,” he said. “Because there are so many ancient buildings, this island is protected by UNESCO as a World Heritage site. The buildings are mostly made of wood, so there is always danger of fire.”
He pointed to a large boat anchored on the lake. “That is fireboat, ready to put out fires if they occur. Many of these buildings have not been adequately maintained. There is fear they will decay and be destroyed in the next ten to fifteen years if something isn’t done to preserve them.”
He walked us to a massive wooden building and opened the door. “Come, we go in old farmhouse, where fifteen people lived with their animals.”
We followed him into the house, which had an earthy smell due to the dirt floor on the lower level. “This part of house was the barn,” Andrei said. “Cows and horses and chickens lived here. The warmth from their bodies heated whole place. Is very cold here in winter—many times it was seventeen degrees below zero on your Fahrenheit scale. No central heating in those times, so farmers glad to have animals indoors for heat. We go upstairs where people lived. Come.”
We climbed the stairs to a large room, where the family would have done everything—made the pots that cooked the food that they grew, created fabric using wool from the sheep they raised, dined and read and studied. There was a large loom on one side of the room with a vividly colored cloth woven in bright blues and reds and pale yellows. Nearby, a blond, sweet-faced woman sat in the corner in traditional Russian dress—a white blouse with a dark blue apron covering her long, light blue skirt. She was mending clothes. Near her a cradle hung on a wooden arm suspended from the ceiling. It was cleverly designed so the baby could be moved to whatever part of the room the mother was working in.
At another table, a dark haired, slender woman was working with beads on a tray making earrings, necklaces, and bracelets. She looked up and smiled as we walked by. Snuggled next to her on her chair was a little tortoiseshell cat, who woke from her nap to watch us with luminous green eyes.
“Do you speak English?” Pat asked the woman.
“Oh yes,” she said. “For tourists. Many American or British.”
“Would you mind if I petted your cat?” Pat asked, stopping to kneel next to the cat, really just a kitten.
“You can pet her, the woman said. “ You like cats?”
“Oh yes,” Pat said. “I have a cat named Eliza. She’s a tortoiseshell too, just like yours. I miss her.”
“This one Sophia. So sweet. Good company for me.”
“I know,” Pat said. “Eliza is sweet too. She sleeps on my bed at night and bumps her face against mine in the morning when she sees that I’m awake. When I come home from work at night, she runs to the door to say hello and I pick her up for a hug. I don’t know how I ever got along without her. I love her. M
ay I?” And she reached down to pick up the kitten.
“She like that very much,” the lady said, smiling.
Pat cuddled the cat close to her chest, rubbing her face against its soft fur. The kitten purred loudly in Pat’s arms.
“Sophia easy for me to take care of,” the woman said, “ I am often here. She comes with me. I don’t want to leave her at home. She is no trouble. Just goes in box, eats when hungry, and sleeps next to me here. Not even get scared when visitors come. ” She smiled at Pat. “She likes you.”
“I inherited Eliza,” Pat said. “I didn’t want a pet. Didn’t even like cats very much. Then one of my clients was moving away and asked me if I would take her. I said I would and she’s been the joy of my life ever since.”
Sophia purred even louder.
“I always think cats look like they’re smiling when they purr, don’t you?” Pat said.
“Oh yes,” the lady said. “Smiling at you.”
Pat didn’t want to leave, but Andrei was urging us along for the rest of the tour.
“Good-bye, little cat,” Pat said, returning the kitten to her mistress. “Stay warm.”
“Imagine fifteen people in here every day, all year long,” I said to Pat. “I’ve had days when I went nuts with two kids and a husband in the house.”
Andrei overheard us. “The women did get out of house,” he said. “Besides picking crops in the field, it was their job each day to load horses and cows into boats and take them to the grassy meadow across the lake so the animals could graze. At end of day, the women went back to get animals and bring them to house for the night.”
“And I complained when I had to pick up my kids from soccer practice,” Mary Louise said.
“Me too,” I said. “We had it easy.”
Andrei led us down a ramp from a door on the top floor. We left the house and walked toward a strange-looking church, also made of wood. I had never seen as many domes on one church as there were on this one. They were all made of a light-colored wood. I strained to hear Andrei describe it.