Heritage of Darkness (6 page)

Authors: Kathleen Ernst

Tags: #Mystery

BOOK: Heritage of Darkness

10.78Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub

the advanced class is also an experienced teacher. I am
very
happy to announce that Marit Kallerud has agreed to teach the Beginning Telemark class.”



This is not good, Roelke thought. Chloe’s expression suggested

that she’d been smacked in the face with a pickled herring. “Re-

member,” he whispered, “the whole idea of this trip was for you to spend time with …”

Chloe pinned him to the wall with a look that had gone from

stunned to mutinous. He stopped talking.

“We have every reason to believe that what happened last night

was an isolated incident, and Chief Moyer has assured me that his

officers will keep a special eye on the museum,” Hoff was saying. “I hope that you all can move past the terrible shock and throw your-selves into your creative endeavors.”

Roelke glanced at Chloe. She had a
Yeah, right
, expression on her face.

“The painting classes will start a little late today, to give our

instructors a chance to get organized,” Howard concluded, “but I

suggest that you students go ahead and settle into your class-

rooms.”

People drained their cups and started gathering their things.

“This is not going to work,” Chloe said bleakly. “My mother

will be on my case every minute.”

“No, she won’t.”

“Maybe I could switch to the carving class.”

Roelke shook his head. “If you drop out of your mom’s class,

all you’ll do is embarrass her, and—” Over Chloe’s shoulder he saw Marit approaching, and he raised his voice. “Hello, Marit.”

“Good morning, Roelke.” Chloe’s mother looked composed,

but Roelke saw the tight pinch to her mouth. Evidently Marit also

had some reservations about this new arrangement.

Marit turned to her daughter. “I’m sure you’re disappointed

about the new arrangements.”

“Not at all,” Chloe said. “I’ll be learning from the best.” Roelke gave her credit for a game attempt.

Marit smoothed her hair, which did not need smoothing. “Sig-

rid has more experience teaching Hallingdal than I do.”

“It’s
fine
, Mom.”

“So you’ll just have to muddle along with me.” Marit glanced at

the wall clock. “I need to speak with you about another matter,

Chloe. Do you recall Howard saying last night that Vesterheim’s

curator recently resigned?”

Roelke felt Chloe stiffen. “Ye-es,” she said slowly.

“She wrote a grant application for a folklore project. The

museum received funds to conduct oral history interviews about

Norwegian-American Christmas traditions. There are several

interviews left to conduct, and the project must be completed by

the end of the calendar year or the money will disappear. As you

can imagine, Howard’s worried.”

“Ye-e-es,” Chloe said, even more slowly. Roelke marveled at the

degree of wariness she managed to convey in that single word.

“So I told Howard that you’d conduct the final interviews.”

Chloe blinked. “You
what
? Mom, I’m a curator, not a folklor-ist!”

“For Heaven’s sake, Chloe,” Marit said. “You work for the His-

torical Society of Wisconsin. You’ve got a master’s degree in

museum studies. You’ve been involved in folklore your entire life.”

“But I’m supposed to be painting, remember?” Something in

Chloe’s eyes changed. “Or … do you not want the daughter ‘who’s

never picked up a brush’ in your class? Is
that
it?”

Roelke groaned silently.

“You can do both!” Marit waved an airy hand. “Just schedule

the interviews for evenings. Since you’ve never shown a
jot
of interest in painting before, I don’t imagine you’ll be spending all of your time—”

“Next time, please ask before volunteering me to—”

“Vesterheim needs help,” Marit said crisply. “And after every-

thing’s Howard had to handle … well, I can’t imagine that you’d

even consider refusing.”

Across the room, a student snatched a banana. Howard poured

himself a cup of coffee. One of the food ladies started filling the sink with hot water. Everyone was evidently oblivious to the

hushed exchange taking place in the corner … but Roelke felt

something crackle in the air like electricity before a storm.

And at that moment, he realized that he was a complete and

utter moron. Why had he thought he could help ease tension

between Chloe, who he was only beginning to understand, and

Marit, who he barely knew? What the hell had possessed him?

At last Chloe said, “Fine, Mom. Whatever you want.”

“Thank you, dear.” Marit gave her daughter an
All is well
nod.

“Stop by Howard’s office sometime and pick up the files. Now, I

must get to the classroom. Don’t be late!” She smiled brightly and hurried away.

Chloe turned to Roelke. “What was she thinking?”

Roelke had no idea what Marit was thinking.

Chloe folded her arms. “I just agreed to spend my evenings

interviewing octogenarians about paper hearts and
smultringer
.”

Now Roelke had no idea what Chloe was thinking. Just be sup-

portive, he told himself. “Maybe the interviews won’t be so bad.”

“No, no,” she said impatiently. “The assignment doesn’t bother

me. I love meeting elderly people and hearing their stories. But I suggested this trip in an effort to improve relations with my

mother, who has been known to observe that I don’t spend time

with her or share any of her interests.”

“And yet?” Roelke asked, since she seemed to be waiting for a

response.

“And
yet,
she’d just gave away my spare time. Silly me, but I’d expected to spend time with her this week. And with you. Now I’ll

be spending my evenings talking about goats and—”

“Goats?” He really was struggling to keep up.

“
Julebukkers
. Don’t ask. I hate them.”

Roelke tried to remember if he’d ever heard Chloe use the

word ‘hate’ before. He came up empty.

“The real issue is that my mother, evidently, does not want to

spend time with
me
.”

Roelke started to say something along the lines of
At least you’ll
be sharing class time.
Fortunately, common sense kicked in. Sty-40

mied by the notion of a verbal response, he switched into action

mode and picked up her tub of supplies. “Come on.”

He helped Chloe haul her stuff to her classroom. Marit was

busy at the front. Seven women and two men were already seated

at tables, laying out tubes of paint and jars of rice and a bewildering variety of other clutter. They reminded Roelke of his grand-

mother and friends playing bingo in the church basement long

ago. Some of the ladies set out their game cards with equal preci-

sion, and surrounded them with troll dolls and oversized dice and

whatever else they considered lucky.

Chloe picked a spot in the back row, far corner. “Thanks,

Roelke. Can we meet in the lounge at lunchtime?”

“It’s a date,” he promised.



Roelke’s classroom was a big industrial-looking room on the

ground floor. Three tables had been arranged in a U in front of a

blackboard. Emil Bergsbakken was arranging decoratively carved

objects on another table. Roelke slid into the lone empty chair.

The woman on his left had warm gray eyes and a long mane of

silver hair held in place with butterfly barrettes. “Lavinia Carmichael,” she said in response to Roelke’s introduction, and offered a firm handshake.

“Good morning,” Emil called. The carving instructor looked

tired. Well, Roelke thought, it was a short night. The evening

before, when they’d arrived at his farmhouse just north of Deco-

rah, Emil had politely showed Roelke to the guest bedroom and

immediately retired. Emil had likely known Petra, and was shaken

by her death. Hell of a way to start the week, Roelke thought.

“Norway has a rich tradition in woodcarving.” Emil held up an

ornately-carved mantel clock. “This is an example of acanthus

work. Note the flowing leaves and vines.”

“Stunning fluid energy in that piece,” Lavinia murmured.

Roelke, who knew nothing about fluid energy, nodded.

Emil continued, “Now, this platter shows chip carving, which is

the style we’ll be working with this week.” His voice gained

strength. “V-shaped gouges carved into the wood create intricate

but balanced patterns, because life is made up darkness and light.

This carving tradition stretches back over 1,500 years. The most

common motifs are geometric.”

Lavinia shook her head in admiration. “Look at the symmetry

in those rosettes.”

Roelke, who knew nothing about rosettes—symmetrical or

otherwise—nodded again. Since his objective had been to accom-

pany Chloe and Marit, he really hadn’t given this chip carving class much thought. He could whittle a simple bird or turtle, but that

was about it. Now he wondered if he was in over his head.

“I’m going to pass around some handouts,” Emil said. “Then

we’ll begin.”

Lavinia took two knives stored in plastic tubes from a well-

worn canvas bag. “Thank heavens,” she murmured. “I’ve been

looking forward to this class for months, and when I heard about

Petra last night, I was afraid Howard would cancel everything.

Trust Petra to go out with a bang.”

That seemed cold. “I beg your pardon?”

Lavinia flapped a hand. “I shouldn’t have said that. Never

mind.”

“Sure,” Roelke said. “I take it you knew Ms. Lekstrom, though?”

“Oh, I knew her.” Lavinia flipped through an over-stuffed

three-ring binder and opened it to a blank page. “If it weren’t for her, I never would have discovered chip carving, which I love.”

“Wasn’t Petra a painter? Did she carve, too?”

“No, Petra stuck to painting. That’s the point.” Lavinia accepted

a packet of papers and passed the stack to Roelke. “But I shouldn’t speak ill of the dead.”

Emil said, “I want to analyze some designs so you understand

the foundations of chip carving. The first important element is

focal point.” He held up the platter. “As you can see here …”

Roelke tried to follow along, but his mind was turning over

Lavinia’s cryptic comments. At the reception, Sigrid had men-

tioned that Lavinia was a member of the Sixty-Seven Club, but

evidently Petra had said or done something that caused Lavinia to

give up painting altogether.

He turned that over in his brain. Simply passing that tidbit on

to Chief Moyer would lead to official questioning. That might be

inevitable, but it would be much more pleasant for Lavinia—who,

after all, had no idea she’d just been chatting with a cop—if he

could discover the story unofficially.

He drummed one thumb against the table. Someone—maybe

him, maybe Chloe—needed to talk to Marit.

six

Chloe watched the clock’s minute hand creep toward noon

with tensed muscles, ready to bolt.
Yes
—

“Remember,” Mom called, “I want everyone to finish mixing

their paints before lunch.”

Chloe dropped back into her chair. Shit. The long morning

wasn’t over yet.

The first thing Chloe had learned about rosemaling was that

she evidently had the eye-hand coordination of a goldfish. Mom

had begun by teaching some basic brush strokes. As she’d wan-

dered the aisles, she’d found nothing to compliment in her daugh-

ter’s attempts.
There are no flat lines in a C-stroke, Chloe.
…
Hold
the brush straight up and down, Chloe
…
You must
turn
the brush in
an S-stroke, Chloe.
Chloe had been enormously relieved when Mom announced that they were moving on to the preparation of

their paints.

Now, Chloe dubiously regarded the blobs on her palette. She

had imagined squeezing dollops of paint from their tubes, grab-

bing a brush, and going to town. Instead, the class had just spent over an hour mixing their own shades from complex equations.

The second thing Chloe had learned about rosemaling was that

she had no eye for color. Mom had yet to approve any of her

daughter’s attempts.
Try adding a pea-sized dollop of yellow

ochre.
…
Fold in the light hue instead of squashing it, your color’s getting muddy
…
Don’t use so much Prussian blue, it’s too strong.

I am not staying here through lunch, Chloe thought. In desper-

ation she leaned toward the woman sitting to her right. Gwen was

a ringer—clearly an experienced painter. Chloe had spent the

morning both feeling intimidated by her tablemate and trying to