Thai Die (9 page)

South of St. Peter, the skies cleared somewhat, and shafts of sunlight turned the highway here and there a blinding white. The Minnesota River had gone west, on its way to caress New Ulm.

The land beside Highway 169 rose to become very flat; the only irregularities in the scene were old, shallow drifts of snow making curved gray snakes across the barren fields.

“Looks like Kansas out there,” noted Bershada.

“Looks like North Dakota to me,” said Shelly.

“Looks lonesome,” said Alice.

“I think you’re all right,” said Phil.

Then came another valley as a major city, Mankato, came into view. “Oh my, it’s grown a lot since I saw it last,” said Doris.

“When did you see it last?” asked Shelly.

“Years ago. I went to college here.” Doris blushed faintly. “It was just a technical college—a trade school, really,” she said, anxious not to mislead them into thinking she went to the Minnesota State University.

“I did, too,” said Phil, determinedly on her side. “We went to the same school, took the same classes. Just not in the same years.”

“What did you study?” asked Bershada.

“Steam,” said Phil. “We both have boiler’s licenses. I was among the last of the steam engine drivers; then years later I went into heating plants. Dorie was one of the very few women after World War Two who worked in a factory maintaining the steam power units.” There was pride in his voice.

“Have you two ever watched Lars Larson work on his steam car?” asked Shelly. “He’s explained how it works to me a couple of times, but I don’t really understand.”

“I’ve seen him driving it around town, but I haven’t talked to him about it,” said Doris. “I’d love to, though, sometime,” she added a little wistfully.

Phil said, “When the weather turns warm, I’ll take you over to his place and get him to start the old machine up for you.”

“What p.s.i. does he run it at?” she asked.

“Would you believe six hundred?”

“Oh my goodness!”

He nodded. “My old steam locomotive did just fine at two, two-fifty.”

“My first factory boiler burned fuel oil and ran at thirty.”

The conversation became even more technical at this point, until they saw incomprehension on the faces of the other two and bashfully fell silent.

“Look at this, we’re crossing the Minnesota River
again
!” exclaimed Shelly. “Are you sure there’s only one river called the Minnesota?”

“Only one,” said Bershada, “but, girl, it gets around.”

After the excitement of Mankato, the land flattened out again, and there was little to see until Vernon Center, which appeared to consist of a house, a bar, and several shedlike structures gathered tightly along the highway, as if waiting for a bus to take them away to Mankato’s bright city lights.

Not long after that, Bershada slowed the car, as it approached a sign along the highway. AMBOY, the sign said, with an arrow pointing left.

“Now, nobody blink, or you might miss it,” said Bershada, making the turn.

Actually, there were two blocks of dwellings, nice single-family houses set back a little from a street lined with trees. Some of the houses already had lights turned on inside. Although it was barely noon, the sky had darkened, and clouds were dropping lower as they thickened.

Alice leaned forward and looked up through the windshield. “I think it’s going to snow.”

“Well, I don’t,” Phil said. “The weather report last night said cloudy, but no precip.”

“The weather forecast this morning predicted light snow,” said Bershada. “But my car can go through up to six inches of the stuff, no problem. And here we are,” she added, pulling to the curb.

“Where?” asked Shelly. All she could see was a large antiques shop outside the passenger window.

“Across the street.”

There, on the corner, stood a picket fence in front of a small lawn divided by a curved walk. It led to a little cream-colored stucco building with a steep, dark roof set with a single small gable. A Model A Ford would have looked right at home parked in front of it. AMBOY COTTAGE CAFÉ, announced a modest sign on the wall beside the door.

“Is everybody hungry?” asked Bershada.

“You bet!”

“Well then, come on!” She climbed out and everyone hustled after her as she crossed the street.

The interior was about thirty feet wide but only twelve feet long, with perhaps a dozen very small, mismatched tables under a high, peaked ceiling paneled in light-colored pine boards. The walls were covered with quilt squares, quaint tchotchkes, small farm implements, and old photographs of the town. Incredibly good smells were coming from the kitchen, which was separated from the front by a pair of small flapper doors, like those in a western saloon. Near the doors was an old-fashioned cast-iron stove. Doris could feel the heat coming from it; she went over to hold out her hands to it. Not that she was cold, it was just a comfort to see a stove like the one she remembered from her grandparents’ farmhouse, one that was really used, not a relic.

A very attractive woman—probably somewhere in her late thirties, tall, with honey brown hair and blue eyes—came out of the kitchen. “Are you all together?” she asked.

“Yes,” said Bershada, pulling off her dark red wool coat.

The place was nearly full, but the woman gestured toward an empty table under a side window. “I’ll bring you some menus,” she said. “Would any of you like coffee?”

“I would,” said Phil, shrugging himself out of his old army-style parka.

“Me, too,” said Doris, and there was a polite chorus of agreement that coffee would be nice.

The woman went into the back room. “That’s Lisa, the owner,” Bershada said.

“She looks nice,” said Shelly.

“Let’s ask her about her other shop,” said Alice, who was eager to see it.

When Lisa came back with a tray of steaming mugs and menus tucked under one arm, Bershada said to her, “When the lunch rush is over, will you show us your other shop? I’ve been bragging about your spinning and dyeing.”

“Well, if you can wait until two . . .”

“Yes, we can,” said Alice firmly.

Doris, still standing, began a struggle to get out of her long wool overcoat, which had a gray houndstooth pattern printed on a cream ground. Phil was behind her in an instant, taking the coat off her shoulders, hanging it on the back of her chair. She held her knit hat and mittens, felted to make them thick and warm, in one hand.

Lisa gestured at the hat and mittens. “Did you knit those yourself?”

“Yes,” said Doris, shyly holding them out.

“They’re well made.” Lisa said, examining them professionally before she handed them back. “I’ll return in a minute to take your order.”

Doris sat, picked up her coffee cup and took a sip. The coffee was a Scandinavian brew, strong but not bitter. She took another, deeper, sip and nodded. “This coffee is delicious,” she said.

“Let me see that mitten,” ordered Bershada, after taking a drink of her coffee.

Doris handed it over. “It’s not that good,” she said.

“Come on, honey, how can you say that? This is really nice! I like the suede palms.”

Doris had sewn a thin piece of suede in the palm of her mittens so they wouldn’t slip on her steering wheel. “Thank you.”

“I say, I say, I say,” said Phil in almost a Cockney’s accent, “look at all this, then!” He lifted his open menu to indicate the object of his happy surprise.

Everyone was duly amazed at the variety of foods on the menu. Here were roast chicken and vegetable wraps, spinach quiche, and salads garnished with pine nuts and homemade sourdough croutons.

“And, oh boy, look at the pies!” said Phil. “Makes it worth while to go traipsing through all this highfalutin stuff to get pie for dessert!”

Doris gave him a look and he grinned at her. “Gotta keep up the male side at this party,” he said.

“I think I’ll have the salad,” said Bershada, “so I’ll feel less guilty about the pie.”

Everyone else ordered the salad, too—except Phil, who had a bowl of chili with whole-grain bread. And he asked for his slice of pie to come with a scoop of vanilla ice cream.

The food was delicious, and everyone cleaned his or her plate—or bowl. Then they went for a little walk, stopping to look into the store windows two doors up, where Ms. Lindberg had her yarns and handmade hats and mittens on display.

“Is that a spinning wheel I see?” asked Alice, shading her eyes to peer into the dimness.

“I think so,” Bershada replied.

Phil went to the door and tried it, but it wouldn’t open.

“Let’s go back,” said Shelly, shivering and looking up at the sky.

“What, you’re cold?” asked Bershada, surprised. “It’s not that cold out here.”

“I know, but I’m chilled to the bone. Can’t you feel it? I hate this damp cold.” She shivered again.

Phil looked at her with his eyebrows lifted and a grin starting, until he realized she said “damp,” not “damn.”

“It’s like England,” Shelly went on after making a face at Phil. “I spent two weeks over there many years ago, and I don’t think I got warmed up until I was back home for a month.”

The others laughed, but they also agreed this was a cruel sort of cold and turned back to the restaurant.

They found it almost empty and Lisa waiting for them.

“You don’t have anyone working in your store,” said Bershada, faintly accusing.

“No, I don’t have a lot of customers—and most of them know to come in here and find me.” She pulled on a light jacket—her shop was just a few doors down from her restaurant.

“Well, I want to see you do some spinning,” said Alice, child-like in her determined interest.

“Come on then,” said Lisa, and led them out under the lowering sky.

 

 

 

BETSY looked over at the huge, white Baroque-style church on top of a tall, sudden hill to her right. The snow had begun as she started out for St. Paul and was now coming down heavily, blurring the outlines of the cathedral, its dome nearly invisible high above. She consulted her Google map—she was not very familiar with St. Paul, though she recognized the cathedral and could see ahead the immense block that was the Xcel Energy Convention Center.

She hadn’t meant to leave Excelsior today. What she had said to the Monday Bunch was true—she
did
have a lot to do. Plus, she really was tired from the sale yesterday. It would have been nice to stay at home, cleaning and doing laundry, catching up on her bookkeeping and stitchery, taking little naps. But she’d started thinking about Doris and the burglary of her apartment, and the fact that Mr. Fitzwilliam had been found dead in the disorder of his own antiques store, and so here she was. She had no expectations, but she’d told Mike Malloy that she was going to get involved in the burglary case and she couldn’t think how else to start.

She turned right onto Exchange Street, found a parking place, and got out to walk back up the street.

There were lights on in Fitzwilliam’s Antiques, and she could see people moving around inside. The place was pretty much as Doris had described it, except the beautiful upholstered chairs were no longer in one window. The other window was empty, too. Must be good sales lately, Betsy thought, opening the door to enter.

“Hey, who left the door unlocked!” shouted a man’s voice.

Betsy stopped just inside the store, waiting for developments, unbuttoning her coat.

From somewhere in the far back she heard a woman’s voice reply. “I did! I’m taking stuff out, and it’s making me crazy having to put it down to unlock the door, then remember to lock it again when I come back in. Nobody’s out in this storm anyhow!”

“I am!” Betsy announced.

There was a startled silence, and then the woman shouted, “Eddie, take care of that!”

A man came out from behind a high shelf that was half full of old dolls, children’s books, and toys. He was tall and thin with dark hair and brown eyes. His old twill trousers, very dusty, were held up with blue suspenders. His eyes were red-rimmed and sad.

“I’m sorry, we’re closed,” he said. “For good, I’m afraid.”

“Oh, I suppose I should have realized . . .” said Betsy. “May I offer my condolences?”

“Thank you. Did you know my father?”

“No. In fact I never met him.” It was stiflingly warm in the shop, so Betsy pulled her heavy coat open. “I’m here because a friend of mine is involved in this case.”

“Who’s your friend?”

“Her name is Doris Valentine. She brought something from Thailand to Mr. Fitzwilliam.”

“Is that so?” he asked in the tone of someone with his suspicions confirmed. “How do you connect to her?”

“I told you, she’s a friend.”

He looked Betsy up and down. She was casually dressed in jeans and a green sweater—one of her earlier efforts. And it had cat hair on it.

“You’re not a cop.”

“No. Or even a private eye.” Betsy smiled. “I’m Doris’s landlady. But I also do investigations.”

“Okay.” He was still frowning, but at least he put down the big cardboard box he’d been holding.

“If you like, you can call Sergeant Mike Malloy of the Excelsior Police Department. He can tell you I sometimes do a good job of investigating.”

Again he looked her up and down, but this time he nodded and seemed to relax a bit.

Betsy said, “You see, she had her apartment practically destroyed by a burglar looking for something. This happened soon after she brought a statue of the Buddha to Mr. Fitzwilliam, and just after Mr. Fitzwilliam was killed and his shop was torn apart in a search. I think this burglar was looking for the same thing in both places.”

“What thing?”

“The statue, probably. Because it seems to have disappeared. Unless you’ve found it?”

“No,” he said.