The Legend of Peg Powler
(A Sewing Box Mystery)
Chapter 1: Friday, November 1, 1991, 1:51 am
Chapter 2: Saturday October 29, 2011, 11:37 am
Chapter 3: Sunday October 30, 2011, 10:30 am
Chapter 4, Monday, October 31, 2012, 8:01 am, Halloween
Chapter 13: Monday, October 31, 2011, 11:02 am
Chapter 17 - Monday, October 31, 2011, 12:43 pm
Chapter 24 - Monday, October 31, 2011, 4:23 pm
Once back at their car, Missy and Jeanette thanked the driver, asking him to thank the Oswig sisters for their hospitality, they’d had such a lovely time. As the women stood, waving, watching the chauffeur drive away, Jeanette, with pursed lips and without looking at Missy, stated emphatically, “We have to find your mother, pronto, and get back to cities. I am not missing that Halloween party.” Her tone was just irate enough to shake Missy out of her good mood.
“What is it with you and that party? What’s so important about it?”
“I promised someone that I would go. I like to keep my promises,” her aunt replied.
Missy felt brave. She gave the door a push. “Who?” she challenged.
Jeanette drew into herself. She responded with a curt, “Someone,” and then moved to the trunk of the car.
Missy followed. “That I know?” As the question came out of her mouth, she recognized how implausible it sounded. “I don’t know any of your friends. Is it a guy?”
Jeanette’s eyes narrowed. “No.”
Missy opened the trunk and the two went about putting their things back in their bags. They’d left hastily, so things were quite a mess.
Missy considered letting it go, but, as she refolded the blouse she’d worn on the way down, she decided to give it one more prod. Without looking at her aunt, she asked, “Then who?”
In a huff, Jeanette’s right shoulder jerked downward, assuming the posture of an adolescent trying to decide whether or not to tell the truth. Her eyes skyward, she grumbled, “ My dog sitter.”
Missy’s eyebrows raised. “You’re going with your dog sitter? That’s who you promised?”
“Yes.” said Jeanette, rather resigned.
Suspecting that something was up, Missy decided to go for broke. “Who is she to you?”
Jeanette exhaled air through her nose like a cornered bull at a bullfight. She then looked directly into Missy’s eyes and snapped, “That’s a subject for another time.” Her stuff stowed, she moved to the passenger door, pleading, “Now, help me find your mother, so we can get out of this town.”
Recognizing that was most likely all she was going to get out the woman, for now, Missy slammed the trunk shut and dropped the subject. Once inside the car, the conversation turned to what their next step might be. Missy was at a bit of a loss. “I just realized I have no idea where that man lives. I mean, yes, in St. Petersburgh, but without phone reception it’s not like we can Google Map him.”
Obviously miffed, Jeanette vented, “It was really stupid of her to run off like that. But then, that’s Dorie’s M.O. Anywhere the wind blows, she goes, with no regard to anyone else.” She paused, and looked at her niece before continuing, “But then, no one knows that more than you.”
Missy shrugged. Growing up, her mother had been more like a special guest star who drifted in and out of the long-running show of Missy’s life. Grandma Jean had been her mother. Dorie? At best, a fun distraction from the day-to-day. At worse, well… when it came to Dorie, the only thing Missy could count on was being disappointed. Missy rolled with it. Though she sometimes wondered if that was why she had so much trouble when it came to adult relationships. “We could just leave her, here.”
Jeanette guffawed. “Naw.” She looked out the passenger side window to the wooded area just beyond ditch. “She’s family.” Her focus returned to somewhere in front of her. “You don’t abandon family.”
“I don’t know what to do.”
“Who can we ask?” Jeanette, her hands now busy searching through the bag of snacks in front of her, seemed over her snit. She produced two cans of flavored sparkling water. “Strawberry, or Lime?”
Missy grabbed the can nearest her. Strawberry. The can was not cold, but still sufficiently cool to offer some relief. It was late enough in the day, that she felt the night already pressing in, and, despite the moderate temperature, there was something unsettling about the prospect. Popping the top, she sipped her drink and stared at the road ahead of them. “What about asking Sam?”
“No,” replied Jeanette. “I don’t want to talk to him again until we find out more about his relationship with Hedda.” She pivoted in her seat, to face Missy, “You know, he’s the one who sort of gave us the road map to our day. It’s like he wanted to get caught.”
“Or clear his name.” Missy had a soft spot for the old man. So did Jeanette. “There could be nothing to it, but idle gossip.”
“That’s it!” Jeanette’s face lit up with a spark. “Gossip! We need to go where people talk without thinking about who might be listening. Didn’t Sam say something about Pearl’s House of Curls being a hotbed?”
The beauty shop. The term ‘magpies’ immediately sprang into Missy’s head. It was what the Oswig sisters called women without purpose. She imagined there might be a number of such women hanging out at Pearl’s, airing out the town’s dirty laundry. Missy shrugged. It might work.
As if reading Missy’s mind, Jeanette volunteered, “I don’t know why those ladies would call empty-headed women magpies. You know, they are actually very intelligent birds. ”
Missy looked at her aunt incredulously. “How do you know that?”
“Nature. On PBS.” She sipped her drink and added, “I love that stuff.”
Missy filed this new information in the back of her brain, and then asked, “So, how do we get there?”
“I think it’s on the edge of downtown, just off Main Street, by the Shopko. A little white building. Head back to downtown and we’ll figure it out from there.”
Having no alternative in mind, Missy slipped the key into the ignition and started the car.
Within a matter of minutes they found themselves in familiar territory. The post office. The drug store. The dress shop owned by the Bainbridges. They trolled their way a block to the east of the main drag and, sure enough, there it was, sitting in the middle of an open gravel parking lot; a little tiny wooden building, painted white with a large, shiny white sign which declared in large, looping lavender letters, ‘Pearl’s House Of Curls’.
The car’s tires bit into the gritty lot and came to a stop. There were a few vehicles parked near the building.
“How late do you think they’re open?” asked Missy, dreading the idea of walking into an unfamiliar place - especially one so small; without so much as stepping a toe inside, she already felt the sensation of impending claustrophobia wrapping tightly around her shoulders.
“Let’s find out.” Jeanette opened her car door and got out. The woman was fearless.
“We don’t have an appointment.”
“Don’t worry,” said Jeanette. “They’ll have a bunch of beauty products in the front of the shop. We can pretend we’re looking for the perfect shampoo.” With that, she hitched her purse onto her shoulder and strode off toward the building’s main door.
Locking the car, Missy followed suit.
The door opened with a merry jingle.
Oh, my. Missy had been right; the place was small.
And Jeanette was right; the front of the shop was crammed with beauty products.
Heads in chairs and those standing behind said chairs swiveled in their direction in unison. Suddenly Missy felt as if she’d breached a bee hive.
“Welcome,” sang a woman who stood behind one of the chairs, comb and scissors still aloft. Her salt and pepper hair was much larger than her face, which said a lot, for the face was pleasingly plump and rather wide. Dressed in a flat, pastel polyester smock, the woman sassily sashayed her way to the front of the shop. Standing behind the cash register, she sweetly trilled, “Hi. I’m Pearl. We close at five, hons. And I’m all booked up, but feel free to browse. Can I help you find anything in particular?”
Jeanette, with a bottle of nail polish in hand, smiled. “Not really. We’re visiting for the day and just thought we’d pop in. You have a lovely shop.”
This certainly melted the ice. “Why thank you.” she oozed. “So glad you decided to visit. Me and the gals are just finishing up. You let me know…” And then her face froze. Missy froze, too, ready to make a run for it. “Oh… my! I know who you are.” Pearl turned to the rear of store and yelled. “Ladies! It’s them! The ones who put Kathleen Tollefson…” and this last part was said with a harsh whisper, “…in the nuthouse!”
The ladies, three in all, and in varying states of hair repair, made their way to front of the shop in a bustle. Right away, Missy recognized the woman who owned the Bainbridge dress shop on Main Street. They’d met during her first trip to St. Petersburgh. With eyes, large as saucers, the woman cooed, “What are you doing back in town?”
One of the other ladies added, “I hope you’re not going to be digging up anymore dead bodies.” This was greeted with a quartet of giggles, which struck Missy as rather ominous. While she assumed all four were well-over fifty, Missy thought they sure seem to act as if they were in grade school.
“You want some coffee? I think there’s some left in the back.” Pearl turned to a woman with bright orange dye matting her hair to her head, “Hazel, go get ‘em some coffee.”
Hazel nodded and waddled off to the back of the house. As she did so, she griped, “Remember, you have to rinse this dye out of my hair. It’s starting to sting.”
Ignoring this, Pearl added hastily, “And use the good cups, hon.” She then turned back to Missy and Jeanette and beamed, “You two are like celebrities in this town. Are you gonna write a book?”
Jeanette and Missy looked to one another. What in the utter…? Missy replied, “No such plans.”
“We like to keep things low-key.” added Jeanette.
Pearly came from around the register and began to usher them to the back of the shop. “Well, nothing low-key about what the two of you did the last time you were in town. People are still talking about it. And the news coverage!”
“Do you remember me?” it was the woman from the dress shop. She was on top of Missy like a bloodhound. “Rae-Lynn? You were in my shop last time. Bought some really pretty things.”
Missy gushed, “Yes, yes… you were so helpful.”
“You know…” drawled the woman with the soon-to-be orange hair, as she presented Missy and Jeanette with cups of hot coffee - one which read ‘Princess For A Day’ and the other ‘I’d Rather Be Shopping’ - “we were just talking about you!”
A hush fell over the room. And the woman with the clown hair clammed up, looking like she’d just swallowed a canary.
Pearl rushed in to fill the void. “Hazel! Get back in the chair. I need to get that stuff rinsed off your head before it starts to affect your brain.” Hazel dutifully plopped herself down into the nearest chair, which Pearl then dropped the back of, so Hazel’s neck was resting on the edge of the sink which sat below a giant mirror. Without even looking, Pearl turned on the water and set about rinsing the dye from the woman’s head. Pearl waved a hand in Jeanette and Missy’s general direction, saying “Pay no mind. Pay no mind.”
Rae-Lynn, who had perched herself on a stool nearby, still wearing a barber’s cape bearing the salon’s lavish lavender logo, offered a sort of apology, saying, “Don’t think too much about it. When we gals get together, we talk about everything.”
“And everyone,” added Pearl.
“’Cept religion and politics,” muttered the fourth woman, whose name they still didn’t know. Her jet black, obviously dyed hair, fell limp and wet around her over-made face. The lady sure had a thing for mascara.
“Oh, that’s not true at ‘tall, Donna” prattled Rae-Lynn. “Not true at ‘tall. Why, we talk religion all the time. I mean, we’re not exactly a bunch of bible-bangers, but we do, on occasion say a prayer, here and there, when needed. Why, just this morning, we were talking about that Pastor John and his crazy groupies running around town protesting this and that and getting in everybody’s faces.”
“You be nice, now, Rae-Lynn,” said Hazel, who was still mid-rinse.”My sister is one of those groupies. Can’t tell her nothing, won’t listen to common sense, so filled with the lord is she. I just want to throttle that Pastor John. He’s a nutbag. But he has her hypnotized or something. In her eyes, he can do no wrong.”
“They give me the creeps,” added Hazel. “Have you seen ‘em around town, today?” This was sent Missy and Jeanette’s way. They’d settled down on two mismatched dining room chairs and were warming their hands with the steaming coffee cups. No way they were going to drink it, for it had sat on the burner too long and was now burnt mud.
Knowing exactly whom they were talking about, Missy ventured, “We, umm… we had a little run in with them at the library.”
“Oh, you’ve been to the library. I love that place so much. And that Madeline? She is a hoot and a half. We all just love it when she comes in and gets her hair done. She spills the beans about whose checking out what books.” Rae-Lynn looked over at Pearl, who had propped Hazel back up and was roughly drying her hair with a big fluffy white towel, before continuing, “Seems Sheriff Paul is questioning his sex-u-ality, again! Checked all these biology books dealing with human sex-u-ality.”
Missy, smiled. The way Rae-Lynn said ‘sex-u-ality’, with its emphasis on the middle syllable, pronouncing it as ‘you’, made her think it worthy of a Prince song - ‘Sex-You-Ality’!
Pearl weighed in, “When will that end? And how will it end? I tell you, next thing you know we’ll be having one of those gawd-awful Pride Parades with naked go-go boys sticking hamsters up their keisters!”
Rae-Lynn, eyes as wide at the thought breathed, “Perish the thought!”
“Oh, I don’t know…” drawled Hazel, whose locks of orange hair now stood out in spiky tufts, “I might welcome me the sight of some naked men!” The four women guffawed and snorted.
“Hazel! You wouldn’t know what to do with one, if you did!” cackled Pearl. “Now get your butt under a dryer. We don’t want you looking like Bozo the Clown.” She followed Hazel, who ambled over to one of the big hooded dryers near the register, and then made her way to the front door, where she flipped over the ‘closed’ sign, signifying the end of the day.
Missy looked to Jeanette. Was this their signal that it was time to leave? Pearl, sensing their apprehension was quick to say, “Oh, never mind that. We flip that sign over at five, but we’ll all probably be here until it’s time to go home and make supper. So, never you mind.” With that, she flipped a switch on the back of the dryer Hazel was seated at before shuffling back to work on Donna’s hair. Comb and scissors paused mid-clip, she looked over at Jeanette and Missy, “So, you never did say… what is it that brings you to our little town, today?”
Jeanette, without checking in with Missy, said point blankly, “Peg Powler.”
The temperature in the room zoomed to zero, as a wise little smile began to grace Pearl’s face. Her hands still mid-air, she confided, “Well… you might not want to mess with that.” She resumed cutting, as side-eye glances accompanied the click of her scissors and silence fell upon the room.
“It’s just that we… we found this poem.” Jeanette reached into her bag and produced the piece of rumpled paper. Donna’s hand shot out, and Jeanette surrendered it to her. Missy watched as the woman’s eyes, with lashes which looked like fuzzy spider legs, scanned the document, darting back and forth, her lips pursed tight with judgement.
“Ha!” she exclaimed, causing both Missy and Jeanette to jump in their seats. “I remember this. You remember this, Pearl? We used to jump rope to this back in the day.”
“Donna!” barked Pearl. “Sit still! I almost took your ear off.” Pearl glanced over Donna’s shoulder, at the poem, still held in the woman’s hand. “Yep. I remember that. Your mom would come out and yell at us every time we did. ‘You girls stop that or you are gonna raise the devil.’”
“Oh, that’s right,” crowed Rae-Lynn, over the sound of Hazel’s dryer, “I remember that. But we never did.” She trailed off, “We never did.”
“Thing is,” volunteered Pearl, whose attention was once more on the cutting of Donna’s hair, “That? That Peg Powler business? It all belongs to that Pastor John and his ladies.” Tilting her face down, she looked at Missy over the top of her bifocals, “And those people? You don’t want to mess with them. They are all two dimes short of a quarter, if you know what I mean.”
“I almost forgot!” screeched Rae-Lynn. “It’s Halloween!”
The others paid her no attention, as she divulged, “I, for one, will be safe in my bed by 9:00 pm, watching my DVDs of Sex In The City. No way are you going to catch me out on a night like this.”
Donna laughed. “I can’t believe you still watch that show. Aren’t all those women dead now?”
“You watch your mouth, Donna!” Rae-Lynn was not having it. “I love those ladies. In some ways, they are my best friends,” she reasoned.
Pearl paused for a moment, “I thought we were your best friends.”
“Not after nine o’clock!” she grinned.
Donna chimed in, “After nine o’clock, my best friend is a little nip of Johnny Walker.”
“Donna!” exclaimed Hazel, who had thrown off the dryer’s hood, revealing a crown of pale peach fuzz. “You know St. Petersburgh is a dry town.”
“Yeah,” replied Donna, “but Jasper’s only 15 minutes away, and they are not!”
“Oh, dear,” mewed Rae-Lynn, “tell me you’re not drinking, Donna. And alone! Why that’s the gateway to alcoholism!”
“Yeah,” added Pearl, “Next thing we know, you’ll be hanging out with Sheriff Paul, over at The Sleep Inn.” She cocked an eye at Jeanette, “You gals heard of that place? A den of sin A den of sin!.”
Missy and Jeanette were both well-acquainted with The Sleep Inn. The image of Sheriff Paul wearing a pair of false knockers and the same blouse Missy had on, frequently haunted Missy’s dreams.
“You will never believe who I saw, on my way here, waltzing in there this afternoon!”
All eyes fell on Donna, as scissors and dryers were silenced.
Sensing she had the room’s full attention, Donna milked it for all it was worth before spitting out, “Ray Tollefson!” she brayed.
“Oh, that’s no surprise.” dismissed Pearl. “He’s scum of the earth.”
“But he had a woman with him! One of those fancy types, probably from the Twin Cities. You know the type he likes.”
“I certainly do not,” sniffed Pearl. “Those kind of women are cheap, but they don’t come cheap.”
Missy’s heart sank. Clearly they were talking about her mother.
“How long ago was that?” braved Jeanette.
“Oh, an hour? Hour and a half ago? How long have you been here, Donna?”
“An eternity.” All four laughed. “No, I swear, this is the afterlife and you women are my own personal hell. Now get me out of this chair. I have to go home and make some pork chops for my lazy no good.” Pearl duly freed the woman of her barber’s cape and shoved a hand mirror in her upraised mitt. After a cursory look or two, Donna declared it “good enough,” rose and told Pearl to put it on her “bill”.
Pearl laughed. “Oh, hon, the day I deliver that bill, the state of Minnesota is going to run out of paper!” Again, they all had a laugh, and then Pearl barked, “Hazel! Get your behind in this chair. I need to be getting home, too.”
Jeanette and Missy took that as their cue. They thanked Pearl and the ladies and were told to “just drop your cups in the sink.” Missy took Jeanette’s nearly full cup, for neither had taken so much as a sip, and made her way to the back of the shop, where she dumped the burnt coffee and decided to rinse the cups before leaving them in the sink. As she waited for the water to warm up, her eye caught sight of a tiny flyer tucked in the corner where the cupboard above the sink met the wall. It was on pale gold paper with black block lettering and simply said, “Don’t forget! October, 31, 2011, The Ablution.” And in smaller letters, at the bottom, as if it were a signature, were the words, “Opus Dei”.
Missy’s mind rolled through all that she’d seen and learned that day. There had been something at the library on an old microfiche, but she couldn’t remember the name associated. This was the same event, tonight - the same one Jeanette wanted so very much to avoid. Leaving the cups in the sink, Missy decided to keep this information to herself. Saying anything to her aunt would only bring up the fact that they still weren’t on their way back to Minneapolis and that Jeanette absolutely had to get to that Halloween party, a party she was going to with her ‘dog sitter’. Missy’s face rumpled into a doubtful grimace. She was pretty sure she knew the nature of that relationship, but she’d give her aunt time to come to terms and tell her the whole story.
Pearl, who was in the process of teasing up Hazel’s peach-colored halo, paused and walked them to the door. “Thanks for stopping in. I take it you’ll be hitting the road back to the cities now. Have a safe trip and enjoy the drive. Come back and see us the next time you’re in town.”
Jeanette and Missy, again, thanked her for her hospitality and expressed how much they’d enjoyed the conversation. “Oh, you know us old gals,” griped Pearl, “anything that pops into our heads falls right out of our mouths. Take it all with a grain of salt. Unless you have high blood pressure. Then? You really should lay off the salt.”
Back in the car, Jeanette breathed a sigh of relief.
“Did you find that stressful?” asked Missy.
“Oh, that? That was fine. Fun, in fact. Reminds me of when my mom and Terry would get together for coffee.”
“Then what is it?”
Jeanette turned to her niece and gave her a level look. “The prospect of going to The Sleep Inn and dragging your mother out of that basement. Because you know that’s exactly where she is and while I have seen many things in my lifetime, something tells me this is going to be something I won’t be able to un-see!”
“Hopefully it won’t be that bad,” Missy said, with more than a bit of doubt in her voice. “Maybe they’re just having a hamburger.”
“Kid. I know your mother. If there’s a meal to be had? She’s eating the whole thing. Trust me; she’s in that basement.” She bent down and retrieved another can of sparkling water. Popping the top, she pointed to the windshield in front of her and said. “Well, what are we waiting for? Put this thing in drive and let’s get this over with.”
Missy did as told. Perhaps her reticence had something to do with not wanting to witness anything untoward involving her mother. But then, another part of her knew it was simply because she didn’t want to return to The Sleep Inn. That place held memories…
The kind you don’t want to relive.
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1 comment:
Ohhh the Beauty Parlor.
It's a mystical place! LOL
XOXO
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