10

  The Lakeland Terrace was located on the edge of Uptown, a ritzy inner-city area between Lake Calhoun and Lake of the Isles. It was a five-story security building, redbrick facade, probably built in the Forties. Sophie had been there twice before, both times to drop off a restaurant review. Since George spent only half-days at the paper three times a week, it shouldn’t have come as a complete surprise to her that he kept some of his files at home.

  Once inside die front foyer, she searched her purse few the scrap of paper on which she’d written his apartment number. She’d noticed that her memory wasn’t what it used to be, so she was forced to write herself notes. Just as she found die paper, a young couple came out of the locked door. Assuming that she must be searching for her key, they held the door open. She smiled and thanked them. It was a bad security risk, but then, in her cotton cardigan and khaki trousers, she hardly looked like an ax murderer.

  When the elevator reached the fifth floor, she got out and immediately spotted the box outside George’s door. Damn. She was hoping to talk to him in person if only for a few minutes.

  Then again if he was sick …

  In a moment of angry resolve, she tossed her Midwestern manners to the wind and knocked on the door. She could always leave him die note, but he had to take some responsibility for helping her make sense of the mess he’d once called his job.

  She waited a good minute. When nobody answered, she knocked again. “George, it’s me. Sophie Greenway. I have to talk to you.”

  Trying the handle, she found that the lock hadn’t caught, that the door was open. Now she was in an even bigger quandary. She couldn’t just walk in on him. What if he was asleep or… ? The possibilities were endless. And yet she couldn’t leave with her tail between her legs, begging him on the phone tomorrow for some crumbs of help. This was business. He had to deal with it. Cracking the door several inches, she called, “George? I’m not going away until we talk.”

  No answer.

  Moving hesitantly into the front foyer, die could smell something wonderful cooking in the oven, probably a pot roast. How sick could a guy be if he was about to eat a pot roast?

  “George?” Rounding the entryway into the living room, she found it deserted but saw that someone had been sitting on the couch drinking wine. One wineglass sat on the coffee table in front of the couch and one was on an end table next to an armchair. Had he been entertaining?

  Following the scent of roasting meat through the dining room, Sophie entered the kitchen, growing angrier with each passing second. The man didn’t have the flu; he had other plans. She couldn’t believe his apparent lack of obligation toward helping her settle in her new position.

  Marching past the kitchen table, she was prepared to give him a piece of her mind when she saw him sprawled face down on the white-and-black-checked linoleum in the pantry.

  “George!” she shouted, rushing to him. Both of his arms were flung outward and blood oozed from several wounds in his back. Pressing her fingers to the side of his neck, she could feel that he was still warm. But as she pressed harder, searching for even the faintest sign of life, she realized it was futile.

  For a moment, all she could do was stare. How could this have happened? There was no sign of a fight, not in the living room and not in the kitchen, and no weapon had been left behind. She wasn’t a master of human physiology, but from the position of the wounds, she guessed his heart had been involved. No wonder there hadn’t been a struggle. It had probably been all over in a matter of seconds.

  Glancing up at the kitchen counter, she could see a knife block set to the right of the sink. The slot where the chef’s knife should have been was empty. Perhaps she was jumping to conclusions, but it appeared that George might have been murdered with his own knife. She knew there was a certain irony in that, but she couldn’t think about it now. She had to call someone. The police.

  Backing out of the pantry, she decided not to use the phone in the apartment. She didn’t want to touch anything. That left her cell phone, which was in the glove compartment of her car. As she passed the box on her way to the elevator, she hesitated. Surely this couldn’t be considered part of the crime scene. Besides, if the police decided to take it into custody just because it had belonged to the deceased, there was no telling when she’d see it again. Making a quick decision, she scooped it into her arms and hurried to the elevator. She supposed there was no real reason to rush. George wasn’t going anywhere, and he was surely beyond anyone’s help now.

  After placing the 911 call, she sat in her car and watched the light fade over the city. The police had asked her to wait at the scene until they arrived. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t get the image of George lying dead on his pantry floor out of her mind. He might have been a lousy food critic, but he certainly hadn’t deserved this.

  Journal Note

  Sunday, Midnight

  A profitable day. I spent a good part of the morning doing research on the Internet. The more I think about it, the more convinced lam that the name of my Deep Throat, Pluto, must have a larger meaning. I feel that if I could just understand the clues, or which clues are significant, I could figure out who started this whole process. That’s important to me because, the truth is, I would never have considered doing a biography of Constance Buckridge if I hadn’t been fed some tantalizing leads. Bottom line: I’d like to know who I’m corresponding with.

  Here’s what I’ve put together so far.

  Pluto, also called Hades in Greek mythology, was the god of a dark, gloomy place called the Underworld.

  In Roman mythology, Pluto was considered the judge of the dead.

  Since the ground is where he lives, and all wealth comes out of the ground, Pluto was also thought of as the god of wealth.

  He had two siblings.

  Black sheep were offered to him as sacrifices.

  Agamemnon said: “Hades is not to be soothed, neither overcome, wherefore he is most hated of all the gods.”

  Pluto (Hades) wore a helmet that made him invisible. Specifically, he wore the helmet when he went to kill Medusa, a female monster with snakes for hair and a gaze that turned people to stone.

  Pluto sat on a throne holding a two-pronged fork (Food image?)

  Astronomy: Pluto is the farthest planet from the sun.

  Pluto led me to believe that the eminent Ms. Buckridge wasn’t the generous, dawn-to-earth, levelheaded culinary guru everyone felt they knew and loved but instead was a duplicitous fraud. Oh, she can wield a saucepan, but my inside source insisted that she had secrets buried deep in her past, secrets that if fully brought to light would produce a scandal that would sell millions of books. Needless to say, Pluto had gotten my attention.

  My feeling is that Pluto can’t prove what he thinks he knows, and that’s why he brought me in. He not only wants answers, he wants clear-cut confirmation of his theories. The other, more obvious reason, of course, is revenge. In each of the E-mails he’s sent me, lean detect an undercurrent of hate. I’ve had a lot of experience reading between the lines and I know for a fact that something dark is at work here. But then I’m happy — no, not just happy, I’m eager — to be used if it will produce the kind of in-depth investigative biography that has become my trademark.

  After my interview with Oscar Boland yesterday, I believe I can narrow my field of inquiry. I’m mainly concerned with four areas of Constance s past life. First, her relationship to Wayne Buckridge while she was still an employee in his house. Second, the death of Pepper Buckridge. Third, I want to know why Constance insisted that her brother come to live with them and, perhaps more important, why Wayne didn’t like him. Wayne died less than a year after Arthur Jadek arrived. I need to know if there’s a connection. And fourth, I need all the information lean find on her family of origin. So far I’ve come up with very little, and that confirms my own feelings that there’s a real story here. Anybody who is so closemouthed about her past must have something to hide.

  No comment from Pluto today on the Boland interview.

  It’s getting late. I was hoping to type up my interview with Eleanor Simpson, a secretary at WTWN-TV, when Constance had her show there, but I ‘m beat. I visited with her this afternoon in Lake Elmo. I will say that she gave me a fascinating piece of information. I don’t know where it fits, but I intend to find out. I’ll leave the transcription until tomorrow. M.

  11

  “Remember I told you I had something special in mind for our lunch today?” Nathan held the car door open as Sophie got out.

  “Where are we?” She gazed up at a wooden sign affixed to a stone arch above an iron gate.” ‘New Fontanel’,” she read, her eyes moving past the sign to a graveled path that led, as far as she could tell, deeper into the woods.

  As they’d sped along 1-94 heading east, Nathan had kept their destination a secret. All she knew was that he seemed as excited as a kid with a new toy. He’d arrived at her office at the Maxfield on the stroke of one but frowned when he saw what she was wearing.

  “Don’t you have something more casual you could put on? Jeans? An old sweatshirt?”

  “We’re having Happy Meals at McDonald’s?”

  He smirked. “Would a Cordon Bleu-trained chef do that to you?”

  “I don’t know. Would he?” Since she’d assumed they’d be eating lunch at one of the Twin Cities’ more tony locations, she’d dressed up, not down. “What’s with your face? Your electric shaver break?”

  He rubbed his chin. “I thought I’d try growing a beard again. Just for old times’ sake.”

  She shook her head but smiled. “Is that why we’re lunching at the Golden Arches? You don’t want to be seen around town looking like an aging derelict.”

  “Hey, I thought I looked sort of trendy.”

  The truth was, in his jeans, heavy leather belt, and denim shirt, he looked rough and handsome, the way she remembered him.

  It took Sophie only ten minutes to change. Since the day was warm and humid, she decided to wear a cotton shirt. As she was putting on her hiking boots — she’d noticed that Nathan was wearing a pair, so she thought it might be smart to follow suit — she wondered what it would feel like to spend the day with him again after all these years. Her imagination clicked into overdrive. If she was going to back out, make up some excuse, it was now or never.

  But once she stepped off the elevator and saw him waiting for her in die lobby, all his energy and anticipation focused completely on her, she knew that she couldn’t disappoint him. Maybe she was being selfish, but she just wanted a few hours to enjoy the company of a man she’d once cared about very deeply.

  On their way north through Stillwater, a small, historic town on the St. Croix River, all Nathan would say was that she’d better stop bugging him and be patient. In a few minutes, she’d find out where they were going.

  Well, now they were there and she still didn’t know where they were. “What’s New Fonteney?”

  “A Cistercian monastery built in the 1920s. Or, I should say, it was up until six months ago. That’s when the monks packed up and left.”

  “Where’d they go?”

  “The order merged with a similar one in West Virginia. That left this place looking for a new owner.”

  “You?”

  “No, not exactly. I’ll explain everything, but let’s go take a look first.”

  The iron gate screeched as she pushed it open. “How atmospheric. A deserted monastery. You always were good at finding new places to explore. Remember when we discovered the ruins of that old mansion on Mount Curve, the one that used to sit on that amazing bluff overlooking downtown Minneapolis?”

  “Sure I remember,” he said, locking up the car. “We’d sit on the grass and try to figure out which room had been where. And if we rebuilt it someday, how we’d do it.”

  “Funny,” she said, laughing at her own naivety. “I always thought of that place as ours. In case you didn’t know, they finally cut down the lilacs and built a bunch of condos.” She turned just in time to see him hoist a picnic basket and a blanket out of the trunk. “Fried chicken and deli potato salad?” she asked.

  “Have a little more faith, woman.” Nathan grinned, slamming the trunk shut and then joining her. “Have I ever cooked you a bad meal?”

  “You’ve never cooked me any meal.”

  “Well, we’ll have to rectify that.” Grabbing her hand, he led her through the gate, then turned off the path almost immediately and headed into the woods.

  “I take it this is the back door?”

  “More or less. There’s a main entrance, but the approach isn’t nearly as pretty.”

  As they came to a clearing, Sophie caught her first sight of New Fonteney just as he’d wanted here to see it.lt was .. .She couldn’t quite find the word. “It’s idyllic,” she said finally. “Like a Constable painting.” Huge puffy clouds rose up over the soft, undulating green hills. Next to her, she could feel Nathan breathing it all in. He was so different from Bram. An outdoorsman. Less polished.

  “I love it here,” he said, setting the picnic basket down.

  They stood at the top of a grassy hill. Flowering apple trees dotted the landscape as the ground sloped gently away from them down to the St. Croix River. Sophie was transfixed by the beauty of it. After a few silent moments, they began their search for a suitable picnic site. As they walked along, she could see several low buildings in the distance emerging in the bright afternoon sunlight.

  “Wait until you get inside the main hall. All the wood timbering — you couldn’t afford to build a place like this today. Really, Sophie, it’s amazing. And perfect.”

  “For what?”

  He switched the picnic basket to his other hand. “I want Mom to buy New Fonteney. She’s been talking for years about opening another campus for the cooking school. This place is ideal. It’s secluded, with sublime views, but near a main highway and a small funky town. It has separate rooms for ninety students, which would be just about right. There’s already a great garden, an apple orchard, a grape arbor that the brothers nurtured for years. I’m told they even made a little wine, just for themselves. There’s a small guesthouse for visitors. A barn. A large kitchen. We’d have to add to it, but there’s plenty of space. It wouldn’t be a problem. The main hall is straight out of a Brother Cadfael novel. Ever read any of those?”

  Sophie shook her head.

  “The first time I was here, I thought I was in some kind of medieval time warp. The monks were all walking around in those dark brown cowls. I even got to sit in on one of their evening complines. It was almost unearthly, it was so peaceful.”

  “What would you do with the sanctuary?”

  He shrugged. “I suppose we could use it for a study hall. Maybe a library. It’s an impressive space, but not as churchy as you might think. Everything here is simply constructed, no stained glass, no obvious ornamentation, and yet it’s so powerful. I’m sure we won’t have any trouble putting every building to good use.”

  As they strolled toward the main hall, they continued to talk. Nathan explained what he’d learned from his first visit to New Fonteney. “The monks valued solitude, chose to live away from large towns. They wanted time to work, pray, study, to live a balanced life dedicated to God. I was impressed, although it’s not the kind of life I’d want. And yet I don’t know.” Once again he breathed the air in deeply. “I always feel so relaxed when I come here. It’s a special place. I’d hate to see that change.”

  “Do you think it will?”

  “I think the peacefulness at New Fonteney is part of the karma, to borrow a term from our past. I’d like to see some of that being passed on to the students.” He set the picnic basket down again, then spread the blanket on the grass.

  The sweet, delicate scent from the apple blossoms was almost unbearably lovely. As Sophie watched Nathan smooth the wrinkles out of the blanket, time melted away.

  “What are you thinking?” he asked, sitting down and pulling her down beside him.

  “Oh, nothing very important.”

  His brown eyes seemed so sad. “You mean, nothing we can do anything about.”

  She looked away.

  “Sophie, listen. I don’t want this day to be a bummer for either of us. I just thought we could spend a few hours together. But if we can’t, if it’s too hard …”

  “No,” she said softly. “Of course not. I’m fine. Are… you fine?”

  “I think so.”

  After a long moment, she began rubbing her hands together, hoping a change in subject would help. “What kind of grub did you bring?”

  He laughed, dragging the picnic basket in front of him. “That’s something I always loved about you, Soph. You never had a lot of pretensions.”

  “That’s because to be a good card-carrying Minnesotan, you must never get the big head.”

  “God, where did all that crap come from? I’ve lived all over the world, and I can tell you from firsthand experience, the Midwest is a weird place.”

  “That’s our Scandinavian heritage you’re defaming, Mr. Buckridge. You’re making light of the only place where true, God-given values are left in this world.” Hearing a low rumbling in the distance, she looked up at the sky. Dark clouds were gathering along the western horizon. “You know, unless you brought something pretty minimal for us to eat, our picnic plans may have to be put on hold.”

  “Nonsense.” He eyed the heavens with perfect serenity. “I checked the weather forecast before we left. We’ve got hours before any storm hits.” He opened the basket and took out two champagne flutes and a bottle of 1990 Veuve Clicquot. “I was lucky enough to find this in a local wine shop.”

  She was impressed. It was one of the world’s great luxury bottlings of champagne.