“I have no idea.”

  “Do you know which nursing home he was in?”

  Mark screwed up his face and thought. “I used to, but it’s gone into the memory hole now.”

  “Did you ever wish your wife was dead?”

  He hesitated before replying, with an air of resignation, “Often. But I wouldn’t kill her. And strangely enough, I was sad to hear she had died—and I was shocked to hear she froze to death on the street of a small town. That’s a terrible way to go. What kind of a town are they running over there? Sergeant Malloy thinks she was murdered, but he has no proof. Surely it’s bad enough she couldn’t get back up when she fell, and worse that no one saw her fall.”

  “Yes, that is a scary idea, isn’t it? To fall and lie helpless while the cold seeps into your bones . . .” Betsy shuddered.

  “Anyway,” she continued in a stronger voice, “thank you for talking with me. Would it be all right if I contacted you again? It would likely be long-distance, since I’m from Excelsior.”

  His eyes widened. “Oh, from the town where it happened—of course, you would be, I suppose. All right, sure.” He went into a trouser pocket and pulled out a small leather case from which he took a business card.

  “Thanks,” said Betsy, and she gave him one of her own, “in case you think of something that might help.”

  Betsy went back to the Radisson. Annie hadn’t called yet, and she was starting to get a little worried. She had a late lunch in the hotel restaurant, then went up to her room. As she often did when stressed, she got out her knitting. She turned a comfortable chair so it was under the light coming through the window, and set to work on the pink mitten.

  After a while she became aware that the light was fading from the winter sky. She still hadn’t heard from Annie. She pulled her cell phone out of her purse to make sure it was turned on. It was.

  She was about to put it back, when it began to play “With a Little Help From My Friends.” She didn’t recognize the number but quickly pressed “Talk” and put it up to her ear.

  “Hello?”

  “Hi, this is Annie.”

  “Hello, Annie, where are you?”

  “At the Y, only out in the backyard. I borrowed a cell phone from my new friend Alex—Alexandra, I guess her real name is, but she wants to be called Alex. But talk fast, it’s cold out here.”

  “Fine. What have you learned?”

  “That’s the sad part: nuthin’ much. What happened was, someone told me in front of everyone that poor Janet was dead, so that put a chill on me asking about her. I mean, I was already supposed to be her friend, so how could I ask people what she was like? All I could do was act sad she was dead. But some people who knew her came up to me and said a few little things about her. I’ll tell you about them when we get back together.”

  “Do you want me to come and get you?”

  “No, I better stay till tomorrow. Maybe someone will tell me something else. It’s okay here, really. I got a place to sleep and the food isn’t bad. Oh, and someone from the Y is gonna give me a ride to the train depot after supper tomorrow, so I’ll meet you there. That should be around six, maybe a little before or a little after. Okay?”

  “Yes, that’s fine. I’ll come by there around six thirty.”

  “Gotcha. Bye.”

  Betsy was finishing her supper in the hotel restaurant when her cell phone began its merry little summons. She hastily swallowed the last bite of chocolate pie, dug in her purse for the phone, saw it was an unfamiliar number, and murmured, “Hello?”

  “Betsy?”

  “Oh, hello, Connor! Good to hear from you!”

  “How’s it going?”

  “Slow, I’m afraid. I’m in Fargo until tomorrow night when we take the train back to the Cities. It’s snowy and cold here. How are things in New York?”

  “We’re doing fine here. Going out to a Broadway play in a couple of minutes. It’s an exciting city, and we’re having an exciting time.” The phone was taken away from his ear. “Yes, yes, I’m coming right now,” she heard him say.

  “I won’t keep you then,” she said.

  “I’ll be home soon. Good-bye, sweetheart.”

  “Good-bye. I love you.”

  But she was speaking into a dead phone.

  Sixteen

  THE next day, after breakfast, Betsy sat down with the phone book in her room and began to call nursing homes. She had decided that the best way to try to solve this case was not to figure the two deaths were both deliberate, but to consider one first with the other as collateral, then the other. Since she was in Fargo, today she’d try thinking the murderer was after Janet.

  By putting on a hurried and slightly officious voice, she got the information she wanted with hardly any lying. It was at the third nursing home that the administrator conceded that Jasper Bronson had been a patient, and said that his doctor’s name was Christopher Marland.

  Dr. Marland’s receptionist said he was with a patient. Betsy, at her most officious, said it was important and she’d wait. But after five minutes she started to become concerned about the state of her cell phone battery. Finally—

  “Yes?” said a voice every bit as officious as her own.

  “Hello, Dr. Marland,” said Betsy. “My name is Betsy Devonshire and I’ve been hired to look into the death of Janet Turnquist. She was a niece of Jasper Bronson, who is also deceased.”

  “And?”

  “I understand that you were Mr. Bronson’s physician. I’m sorry to interrupt your busy day, sir, but I need to know if there was anything suspicious about Mr. Bronson’s death.”

  “For God’s sake—” began the doctor, but he cut himself off as abruptly as an ax chops a piece of wood. “Who are you in this matter?”

  “A private investigator.” That was sort of true. “I came here to Fargo from Excelsior, Minnesota, where Janet died.”

  “Jasper Bronson was in the last stages of Alzheimer’s. There was nothing more likely than his death. Why would you think otherwise?”

  “I didn’t say I thought anything about it. But do the police, for example, also think otherwise?”

  “That is an outrageous question.”

  “I guess it is. I take it they have not involved themselves in investigating this death?”

  “Of course not! There was nothing to indicate there was anything suspicious or improper about Jasper Bronson’s decease, nothing whatsoever.”

  “I am very glad to hear that.”

  “Good-bye!” The doctor hung up.

  Betsy sat back in the comfortable chair in her room. Might have died at any time: Did Alec Porter know that? If so, that might have made him very anxious to see Janet dead before that happened.

  She got out the phone book again and looked up the number for Regina Kingsolver, attorney-at-law.

  ”Radner and Kingsolver, how may I direct your call?”

  “Is Ms. Kingsolver available for a short interview?”

  “I can check. Who’s calling, please?”

  “Betsy Devonshire, of Excelsior, Minnesota.”

  “May I ask what this is in regard to?”

  “I am conducting a private investigation into the death of Janet Turnquist, who was Jasper Bronson’s niece.”

  It took half a minute of waiting before Betsy heard another woman’s voice say, “This is Regina Kingsolver. How may I help you?” Her voice was quiet and reassuring.

  “Good morning, Ms. Kingsolver. I understand you were Jasper Bronson’s attorney.”

  “Yes, that’s correct.”

  “Were you the one who advised Dr. Alec Porter of the terms of Mr. Bronson’s will?”

  “I talked to him about it, but as he had Mr. Bronson’s power of attorney, he already knew the terms.”

  “Are you sure about that?”

  “Yes, quite. Have you talked with Detective Sergeant Michael Malloy on this case?”

  “Yes, ma’m. Thank you very much for that information, you’ve been very useful. Have a nice day.” Betsy disconnected before Ms. Kingsolver could ask any more questions.

  Power of attorney, wow. So Dr. Porter had access to all of Jasper’s papers. That was a damning piece of information. Betsy was relatively sure Dr. Porter had not told this to Mike.

  She sat back in her chair to think.

  On the other hand: Marty Smith was very protective of his wife. And his own reputation. If it became generally known that Marty was sued by some of his customers for selling them outdated medications—even though it turned out not to be his fault—it might have destroyed his company. Or if someone spread the word that Margaret, in her usual officious way, had made her father suffer months longer than he wished to, and didn’t offer her mother the therapy that might have prolonged her life—her reputation, of which she was both proud and protective, would have been destroyed. Did Carrie know any of this? Was that why they gave her money whenever she came asking for it? If Carrie was becoming less and less stable as her alcoholism advanced, might not Marty have taken action to protect himself and his wife?

  AFTER a light lunch, Betsy got in her rental car and used her GPS again, this time to get to Gateway Avenue South, where a newer and larger-than-expected brick building sat near the back of a parking lot. The lot was freshly plowed, with great piles of snow along its border and heaped up around the big stand-alone sign reading NORDIC NEEDLE at the entry to the lot. Betsy pulled in between an SUV and a little Saturn so coated with dried salt its color could not be determined.

  The center entryway led past the checkout counter, with its shelves of small kits, cards, and souvenirs, to slanted counters filled with books of patterns. The shop was large, well lit, and open, and the walls were covered with framed models of different kinds of needlework.

  Betsy had barely begun to look around when an employee, a nice-looking young woman with blond hair just reaching her shoulders, came over to her. “May I help you?” she asked.

  “Yes, I’m Betsy Devonshire and I’m here to talk to Roz.” Roz was the owner of Nordic Needle.

  “Oh, hello, Ms. Devonshire! I’m Zoe. Roz told us you were stopping in. Just a minute, I’ll go get her.” She hurried away.

  Betsy wandered around the rest of the store. It was neat, clean, and extremely well organized, nothing out of place or awkwardly situated.

  She paused by the instruction manuals and pattern books on Hardanger, wondering if perhaps she should give the craft another chance—she had taken a class on Hardanger a few years ago and had been surprised to find herself a dismal failure at it. It wasn’t that complex, really, but every stitch had to be placed exactly right, and Betsy was more creative than accurate.

  She shouldn’t have been surprised; there were other needle arts she seemed to have no talent for, either. It used to bother her, before she discovered there were very few needle artists who could do everything.

  Still . . . She picked up one of the books and was pleased to see it had been written by Roz and Sue, founders of Nordic Needle. Beginner’s Charted Hardanger Embroidery was the title, and on the cover was a simple (ha!) chart of the little squares and weavings that formed the base of Hardanger patterns.

  She knew Roz and Sue’s story, how they both fell in love with the Norwegian needle art back when supplies and patterns were hard to find. They started out ordering them just for themselves and a few friends—and before long ended up with a small shop in downtown Fargo. They expanded into other kinds of needlework, and moved to a bigger shop. Then they got into catalog sales and then into wholesale, and now their company was housed in a building they had designed themselves.

  Sue had retired recently, but Roz was as busy as ever with the business.

  “Hello, Betsy!” came a cheerful voice, and Betsy, startled, turned to see Roz smiling at her. She was an attractive middle-aged woman, a little above medium height, with short, dark hair and brown eyes.

  “Oh, hello, Roz! Thanks for taking time to talk with me.”

  “No problem for someone who is a good, steady customer. But I suspect you didn’t come to Fargo just to pass the time of day with me. May I ask what did bring you out here?”

  Betsy hesitated. But she would leave no stone—however unlikely—unturned. “All right. A customer of mine is a suspect in the suspicious death of her cousin, a homeless woman named Carrie Carlson. Carrie was found frozen to death in Excelsior earlier this month. And now another homeless woman has been found frozen to death in Excelsior.”

  Shocked, Roz said, “What in the world is going on in your town?”

  “That’s what we would like to know. The Excelsior police investigator on the case is Sergeant Mike Malloy. He thinks the two deaths are related, and therefore it’s a case of murder, but while he discounts the notion of two murderers, so far he can’t find any reason why any one person would want to murder both of them.

  “And there’s this weird link to my shop: Both dead women have relatives who are customers of mine. And Mike is looking sideways at both of them as suspects. But neither of the dead women has ever been in my shop—or at least none of us remembers seeing them.”

  “What motive could either of your customers have for murder?”

  “Well, one customer is Margaret Smith. She’s Carrie Carlson’s cousin—Carrie is one of the victims. Margaret had been harassed by Carrie, who actually broke a window in Margaret’s house when Margaret wouldn’t give her some money. And the other victim is Janet Turnquist. She is my customer Emily Hame’s aunt. Emily is the beneficiary of a will Janet wrote, leaving her a small fortune.”

  “Wait a minute: a fortune? I thought you said both dead women were homeless.”

  “They are. But a great deal of money was left to Janet by her uncle on his death. He died very shortly before Janet.”

  “And you’re in Fargo because . . .”

  “Janet is from Fargo. Her uncle, Jasper Bronson, is, too, and he also died here. I’m here to see what I can find out about both or either of them.”

  “So the stories I’ve heard about you are true! You are a sleuth!”

  “Only once in a while. I’m looking into this because I’ve been asked to by both Margaret and Emily.”

  “Is there anything I can do to help?”

  “Did you know Jasper Bronson?”

  “No,” Roz said. “I’ve never even heard of him.”

  “Well, perhaps it’s just as well,” Betsy said. “I’m here in your shop to talk about my real job, selling needlework supplies. I have a friend working on the murder mystery at a place I have no access to. Meanwhile, I’ve always wanted to see your operation.”

  Roz proudly gave Betsy the “grand tour,” which in addition to the display room included a big back room where orders were taken and billing and other accounts were kept. Betsy had brought along an order for stock for her own shop. She handed it over to another employee, Chris, and the tour went on. A shipping room was next, and it had a side door through which mail and delivery people could drop off and pick up shipments. The basement was very large, with shelf upon shelf of stock, each item with its own identifying number. The mail-order business had caught up with and surpassed the brick-and-mortar shop’s business some time ago.

  “Very efficient,” said Betsy, with real envy in her voice—she had thought of and discarded an idea for going into catalog sales. “You seem to have just about everything figured out.”

  “We do our best,” said Roz with a smile. “There’s even a nice restaurant right across the street.”

  Betsy showed Roz the manual on Hardanger she had chosen. “Ring this one up for me. I thought maybe I’d give it another try. I’ll need a square of fabric, thread, and a needle, too—I can start working on it on the train ride home.”

  Roz gathered the materials, and put them on the manual at the computerized cash register. Then she seemed to think of something, and frowned. “What did you say the dead woman’s name was? The one from Fargo?”

  “Janet Turnquist. You couldn’t possibly know her, could you?”

  “Was she, um, sort of crazy?”

  “She had a mild form of schizophrenia. Why?”

  “Because I think she came here to take a class on Hardanger.”

  Betsy went into her purse for her personal credit card and also brought out the color print of Janet’s mug shot. “Is this her?”

  “What an awful picture!” Roz held it out at arm’s length, tilting her head a little from side to side. “But yes, that’s her. So we are talking about the same person. But now she’s dead? That’s very sad, I’m sorry to hear that.”

  “How did she manage to afford the class?” Betsy asked. “She was very poor, living in shelters.”

  “Yes, I thought that was the case. It was very clear that she couldn’t afford the class, so I let her come for free—which, mind you, I almost never do. She had come in before, several times, very shy and rather strange. She couldn’t afford to buy much, usually just floss and then only when it was on sale. Once or twice I gave her some odd fabric ends. My employees kept an eye on her, afraid she was a thief, but if she was, they never caught her at it. She’d gotten hold of an old book on Hardanger and was trying to teach herself how to do it. She was asking questions about it, and finally I said I was teaching a class and she could sit in if she wanted to. She’d come in as early as an hour before the class started to be sure to be on time—I don’t think she had a watch—and I think sometimes she walked a considerable distance to get here.”

  “Was she a good student?”

  “Well, if you had asked me that early in the class sessions, I would have said she was more interested than talented, very determined but pretty impatient with herself. I finally realized she couldn’t see very well and loaned her a pair of magnifying glasses. And all of sudden she could do much better. The next time she came in, she had the money to buy them. But the class ended before she finished her bookmark, and I never saw her again.”

  “How long ago was this?”

  “The class started the second Friday in August, and went for four weeks. She seemed to really enjoy the stitching.”

  Betsy thought. “You know, I got an inventory of everything that was in her possession when she died, and there wasn’t a Hardanger bookmark listed. Maybe she lost it, or gave it away. And her magnifying glasses were missing a lens.”