Darned if You Do

by Monica Ferris

  He stared at her, his eyes at first startled, then sad. “I am ashamed to tell you that I have never gone to Mr. Riordan’s house—have not so much as looked at it while passing by—or I might have noticed that it was getting into a very bad state. I’m glad that you came to see me and made me aware that things have gotten badly out of control.

  “But we’re moving at last in the right direction. With your help, we can get an honest assessment of the state of his house. Maybe it will even be possible to get it back in good order by making repairs.”

  Reluctantly, Valentina reined in her temper. “Kassie Christianson—do you know her?”

  “Not well, but I have long known she’s Mr. Riordan’s social worker. Last time I talked with her, she mentioned your name.”

  “She says I should get an emergency conservatorship. She says then I would have the . . . the authority to go into Tommy’s house and clean it out. But I don’t want to make Tommy mad by throwing away some things he’s really attached to—though I think he thinks he’s attached to everything in the house.”

  “How much does it matter to you, since eventually you will be returning to your home in Indiana?”

  Valentina sighed. “Do you know he plans to sue his neighbor over that tree that fell on his house? He wants her to pay for fixing his roof. And he’s not mad at her. I’m not sure what he’d do to me if I made him mad. So I really don’t want to give him a legal reason to be mad at me.”

  “If you get that conservatorship, there’s no legal way he can stop you doing what needs to be done. And, let me tell you this: If Hennepin County condemns the house, it will be cleared out by county employees. They will be far less motivated to be careful with Mr. Riordan’s possessions, and far more likely to enrage him by their actions. And he can tie things up in the courts for a long time. On the other hand, he will have no grounds to sue you. You can go back home with a clear conscience and no legal vulnerability.”

  Valentina sat silent for a full minute. Then she said, “All right, tell me what I need to do.”

  * * *

  THIS guy Penberthy wasn’t a bad man, not really. He was just trying to get something fixed that never should have needed to be fixed in the first place, and it was partly his fault that things had come to such a pass. Valentina wasn’t the sort of person who bad-mouthed people in the legal profession (or, for that matter, the police)—at least, not out loud—but she generally avoided them whenever possible. In her never humble opinion, they tended to be nosy and uppity.

  However, Penberthy had kindly—and patiently—explained to her the path to an emergency conservatorship and said he would help her fill out the paperwork and represent her in court when she sought one. He was sure there would be no problem getting one but insisted they should begin the process as soon as possible.

  So they spent half an hour filling out the form—which wasn’t complicated—and Valentina gave him the name of the motel where she was staying so he could contact her when he’d made an appointment for the hearing. He’d expressed surprise that she didn’t have a cell phone, to which she’d responded, “I never felt the need to have a leash on me.” To her surprise, that made him laugh.

  Then he had given her some good advice. First, and right away, she should find out who Tommy’s friends were in Excelsior and talk with them. Second, she should recruit—a cool word, recruit—a working party from among them. Third, as soon as the conservatorship was approved, she should go into the house and start sorting things into three piles: valuables (to be sold or kept), good but useless stuff (to be donated to charity), and worthless (to be thrown away). There was going to be a series of quarrels if Valentina were to ask Tommy about the disposition of valuable or good stuff, so Penberthy’s advice, to present Tommy with a fait accompli on her way out of town, was probably sound. She smiled to herself in the car; he had been ready to define the term, and she surprised him by knowing what it meant.

  Judging by her first trip into the house, Valentina thought that Penberthy might have given her a fourth piece of good advice: to rent a Dumpster to hold that third bunch of things.

  But Mr. Penberthy hadn’t told her how to connect with Tommy’s friends in town. Perhaps, since he was such a good thinker, she would call him and ask. Meanwhile, it was lunchtime.

  There were some nice upscale restaurants on Water Street, but her purse was slender and her tastes plebeian, so she drove a few blocks farther and found a bar-restaurant called the Barleywine. The hanging sign was artsy, a painted barrel with a bouquet of wheat—no, it must be barley—stuffed in it, but there was a simple neon sign in the window: EAT. That reminded Valentina of signs on cheap cafés from her youth, where the food was unhealthy but plentiful and comforting.

  She found a parking space and went in.

  All right, it wasn’t as shaggy as she had thought it might be at first glance. The floor looked like real stone cut into uneven slabs, which she knew was more expensive to install than even-sized blocks, and the bar was beautiful carved wood. And, most curious of all, the wall behind the bar was made all of glass, through which she could see huge steel cylinders that reminded her of a factory. But the smell that permeated the space, besides beer, was of low-cost fried food.

  The restaurant’s three booths were constructed of old-fashioned dark wood, each with a tall pole fitted with brass coat hooks. Nice—or as the kids say, sweet!

  There were perhaps ten people in the place, six of them seated at the bar, the others crowded into a booth. They were varied in dress and age. Nobody was drunk or loud; the juke box was playing a big band tune.

  Valentina chose the booth nearest the back and had hardly gotten around to the short, laminated menu before she was approached by a slim woman with long dark hair, lightly streaked with gray, and very intense dark eyes. The woman was dressed in a black turtleneck sweater under a tan cloth apron printed with the word Barleywine.

  “Would you like to begin with a beverage?” she asked.

  Jesting, Valentina said, “I think I’ll have a taste of whatever you’re brewing in those tanks back there.”

  “You’d have to wait a few days. The beer we’re making right now isn’t ready yet.”

  Valentina stared up at the woman, whose expression had turned humorous. “Oh, this place is one of those whaddya call ’em, microbreweries.”

  “That’s right. On the other side of the menu is a list of what we’re currently offering.”

  Valentina turned the menu over and found a list of beverages, including six beers, none of them a brand she recognized. “All homemade, right?” she said, and the woman nodded. “Well, what do you recommend?”

  “What kind of beer do you normally drink?”

  Valentina drew up her shoulders a little and confessed, “Actually, I don’t much like beer. I’m more a lemonade and fruit juice sort of person.”

  “We have lemonade and fruit juices, too.”

  Valentina looked down at the rest of the beverage offerings on the menu’s back side and, mindful of her wallet, said, “I’ll just have water, thanks. And a BLT with chips.”

  “Coming right up.” As the woman turned away, Valentina admired her dark hair, which was pulled into a very long braid down her back. She’d always wanted long hair like that but could never get it more than a little past her shoulders.

  While she waited for her order, she began to eavesdrop on the quartet in the booth up the way. She couldn’t hear everything, because they were speaking quietly and the music interfered a little bit.

  “. . . couldn’t believe she repeated that to him!” one was saying.

  “She’s always been the type . . .” replied another.

  “. . . shouldn’t have told her, you know what a . . . is.”

  “I heard he went to Phoebe and . . .”

  “Well, can you blame him?”

  Valentina smiled to herself. It sounded a
s if Excelsior was a whole lot like Muncie. She was tempted to go over and introduce herself to see if any of them might be a friend of Tommy’s, but she couldn’t think of an excuse to barge in. And, to be honest, she wasn’t sure she’d like what they might have to say about her cousin. She was not in a mood to hear him bad-mouthed.

  But he must have friends, or why would Mr. Penberthy have suggested she round them up?

  A plate with a big sandwich on toasted whole wheat bread, ornamented with a lot of potato chips, suddenly landed in front of her. Valentina looked up and saw the dark-eyed woman studying her.

  “Are you visiting family here in Excelsior?” she asked.

  “Sort of. I’m here to help out my cousin, Tommy Riordan.”

  “Ah, I thought your face reminded me of someone,” said the woman.

  “Do I look like him?” asked Valentina, surprised.

  “Yes, you do.”

  “Huh.”

  The waitress laughed. “I’m told my daughter looks a lot like me, though neither one of us can see it.”

  “Do you know Tommy?” asked Valentina.

  “Sure. I think just about everyone in town knows Tom.”

  “Really? Are you sure?”

  “Certainly. He’s a friendly man, not hard to like. Why, is there something you’re wanting from people who know Tom?”

  Valentina blinked at the woman’s keen perception. “Well, yes. I’m going to be clearing out Tommy’s house, and I can’t afford to hire a company to do it. So I need to connect with Tommy’s friends who might be willing to help.”

  The woman frowned just a little bit and took a tiny step back.

  Valentina said, “But I’ve been advised by Tommy’s attorney, James Penberthy, to do this.”

  “Oh, well, that’s different. If Jim thinks it’s a good idea, then that’s what you should do.”

  “The problem is, I don’t know anyone in town, so I don’t know how to connect with Tommy’s friends.”

  “Are you staying here in Excelsior?”

  “No, I’ve got a motel room over in Minneapolis.”

  “Hmm, that’s going to make it a bit harder. Could you possibly relocate to Excelsior, even temporarily?”

  “Well . . . to tell the truth, I can’t afford the room rates out here. This business caught me kind of on the hop.”

  The woman said, “There’s a little motel in Shorewood, which borders Excelsior, very good for the budget conscious.” She named a rate that was actually a couple of dollars cheaper than what Valentina was paying now.

  Valentina said, “Is it . . . I mean . . . is it . . . okay?”

  “It’s clean and quiet. No tubs in the bathrooms, but the showers have plenty of hot water. Ask for extra towels; theirs you can just about see through.” The woman touched the side of her narrow nose with a slim forefinger while she thought and nodded. “They’ll offer you a discount if you’re staying for more than a week.”

  Valentina smiled. “Thanks.”

  She paid for her meal, left an adequate tip, and asked the waitress for the address and phone number of the motel. “What’s your name?” she asked.

  “Leona Cunningham. And I’m one of Tom Riordan’s friends.”

  Valentina looked around the place. No one seemed to be signaling for service, so she decided to seize the opportunity. “Can I talk to you for a minute?” she asked Leona.

  “All right, but make yourself comfortable, at least. Have a seat at the bar. Would you like a cup of coffee?”

  Valentina hesitated—she didn’t want to pay for something she didn’t really need—but Leona added, “For free, of course.”

  How uncanny, reading something—accurately—in her face so easily.

  “Thank you, yes, a cup of coffee would be nice. Just black, please.”

  The coffee came in a thick, heavy, old-fashioned mug designed to keep its contents hot. Valentina smiled as she picked it up; it was another reminder of the cafés of her youth. She took a sip. The brew was strong and flavorful. She hadn’t had a good cup of coffee, not like this, in a long time.

  She put the mug down, caressing it with two fingers.

  “So, what did you want to talk to me about?” Leona asked.

  “You said you were Tommy’s friend. What do you know about him?”

  “I don’t think I understand the question,” Leona said politely.

  “Well,” Valentina tried to clarify what she was asking. “He’s my cousin, but I don’t really know him. When he was a little boy he spent a couple of summers with us, but after that I hardly ever saw him. He’s ten years older than I am, so I guess there wasn’t any real reason for us to be close. And he was kind of a strange little boy—” Valentina stopped and gave a hopeful look at Leona.

  Leona shrugged. “He’s an interesting man,” she said. “He has no enemies, but not everyone likes him, because he’s still a little strange.”

  “What do you think, is he backward? You know, slow?”

  “No, I don’t think it’s that. He seems to have some form of Asperger’s, although he functions reasonably well. He’s friendly enough, but he can be socially awkward. He knows everyone’s name, however, and he loves to listen to gossip.” Leona hesitated. “He also, on occasion, will take things that do not belong to him,” she added. She looked inquiringly at Valentina.

  Valentina laughed. “Is he still doing that?” she said. “We came to call him ‘Klepto’ when he stayed with us. He was a teenager at the time. After he went home the first time, Mom and I went into his room to clean it and found our missing stuff under the bed. The next summer, he did it again, and he’d gotten better at sneaking. It was never anything really valuable—we didn’t own anything valuable back then—just things like Mom’s thimble and my new sandals. And he didn’t break them or light candles to them, or slobber on them. Just took them and hid them.”

  Leona said with a smile, “And as an adult he does the same thing.”

  “You mean, all those things in his house are stolen?”

  “Oh, no, no, not at all! He buys some things, some things are given to him, and he brings home other objects that people have thrown away. A lot of people around here know about his collector’s habit—just not that it has gotten so far out of hand.”

  “And Mr. Penberthy has put the responsibility of fixing this problem on me.”

  “Not completely. You don’t have to fix Tom—nobody can fix Tom. All you have to do is fix his house. And you’d have to do that anyway, because look at how leaving it to him and Hennepin County has worked out.”

  “Yeah, the government is not your friend,” sighed Valentina, and the two laughed, but not happily.

  “So how do I connect with these people who Mr. Penberthy said would volunteer to help me?”

  “When you get yourself relocated to Shorewood, get me your room number, and I’ll hand it around so people can get in touch with you. Meanwhile I’ll talk your problem up. Back when this place of mine was called the Waterfront Café, its nickname was Gossip Central, and it’s still a good place to spread the word.”

  “Oh, so this place belongs to you.”

  “That’s right. Another place you might consider visiting is Crewel World.”

  Valentina’s eyebrows rose sharply. “Cruel World? What, a store where you buy whips and handcuffs?” She did not think enlisting the aid of sadists was a good idea.

  “Crewel—C-R-E-W-E-L, as in needlework.”

  “Oh. Of course. I should have known. Whew!”

  Leona chuckled. “We have our dark side, but that’s not it. Anyway, drop in there, introduce yourself, and ask the owner—her name is Betsy Devonshire—to pass the word.”

  Leona gave Valentina directions to the shop. “Go down the street toward the lake,” she said, “just the one block. Then turn right and look for the sign on your right.�
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  Chapter Eight

  CREWEL World was the middle of three stores in an old, two-story redbrick building. On one side of it stood a used-book store, and on the other side a deli. Each had a big front window of plate glass with a narrow, diamond-paned window stretched above it. The needlework shop had a hanging wooden signboard painted with a needle pulling thread that spelled out Crewel World.

  Luckily, there was a parking space right in front. Valentina pulled into it, then got out of the car into the bright September sunlight. She shivered a little, despite the sun, because there was a sharp chill in the air and her Windbreaker was inadequate against it. The previous day had been overcast, but at least it had been warm. “Almost feels like frost,” she murmured to herself. Back home in Muncie the leaves were still on the trees and not even starting to turn. Here in Minnesota the season was far advanced.

  She remembered what her cousin had scrawled on one of his rare Christmas cards: All thet is tween hear an the North Pole is a bob wire fence ha ha ha.

  Tommy never was good at spelling or grammar. On the other hand, his comment had been clever. And—she thrust her bare hands into her pockets—it had been right on the mark, too.

  She stopped to look in the big front window of Crewel World, which had finished needlework projects displayed all over it. The theme seemed to be Christmas. Ugh, Christmas already? It wasn’t even Halloween yet. There were samples, big and small, of needlework, but mostly big and mostly needlepoint. Valentina was not big on needlepoint, because the canvases it required were so expensive. Besides, for rich detail, she thought counted cross-stitch was the way to go. Like the piece in the window, right at eye level, which depicted a country cabin deep in snow with three deer looking at a Christmas tree in the cabin’s window. The stitcher had used some sparkly white floss for the snow.

  She noticed that there were no knitting models. Valentina loved to knit. Her house back in Muncie had knitted afghans on chairs and on the couch and bed. She had sweaters and mittens and shawls and table runners in wool and cotton and acrylic and blends, all of them knit by herself.