It was too true. Pix sat down on the floor. It was that or have her knees buckle under her. Murder? Over some antiques? More had to be at stake.
“My mother knows where I am. She’s waiting for me to come back now,” Pix said bravely. She was about to add that her mother knew about the closet, but fortunately she stopped herself in time or she might have had a companion.
“Your mother is sound asleep and so is Fru Hansen.”
Pix realized there was no way Carl could let her go—not until he got away. Was that what was going on? Was he waiting for someone? Someone in a boat or car who would take him and the treasures away?
He’d said “locking yourself in a sauna.”
“So it was you who locked the door of the sauna!” She was beginning to feel less terrified and more angry.
“Yes, but I wouldn’t worry about that right now if I were you.” He sounded amazingly cool. She couldn’t see much of him behind the light he steadily trained on her, and his voice emerged disembodied out of the darkness,
every nuance emphasized by the lack of facial expression to go with the words.
It was on the tip of Pix’s tongue to ask what exactly she should be worrying about now, but instead, she said, “And you are dealing in stolen antiques.” She might as well get the whole story.
“Absolutely not!” He was righteously indignant. “Nothing has been stolen. Everything you see was purchased fair and square.”
She began to get the picture. Fast cash for great-grandmother’s carved bread platter and a new satellite dish instead. He had to be taking the stuff out of the country, though. If he was simply selling to Oslo or Bergen antique dealers, why the hidden chamber and all the Scandie Sights tags? The tags—ingenious. Mix them in with all the rest of the tour’s luggage.
She opened her mouth to ask another question. She wished he’d lower the beam. It was making her head ache—or maybe that was due to the uncertain nature of her current position.
“Did Kari—”
“Shut up!” He stood up and seemed to listen for something. She couldn’t hear a thing. He sat down.
“I must warn you, Mrs. Miller—may I call you Pix?—it is better if you do not discuss certain subjects. Healthier for you.”
“No, you may not call me Pix,” she retorted instantly, ignoring the threat. The arrogance of the man. “I think this has gone on long enough. Please unlock the door immediately!”
He laughed. It didn’t sound as pleasant as it had in prior days. What was it Mother had called him, and Jan —“dears”? Talk about lack of judgment. Faith was right. People wore masks, and Carl’s had been diabolically deceptive.
“Not just yet. We need to wait some more. Would you like some coffee? I have a thermos here,” he offered.
It was too much. What no cakes, no
She felt utterly defeated. It was all staring her in the face now—the trail that started with Kari and Erik: Oscar Melling must have been onto Carl and Carl had taken care of the old man. Pix shuddered.
“He was an old man. Surely, you didn’t need to…” Her thoughts were grim. Carl hadn’t
“What are you talking about? I had nothing to do with that old fart!” He nursed his grievance for a moment and added, “You have been such a nuisance since the beginning.” Carl was reaching for the thermos as he scolded her. Not a typical Norwegian by any means, he did have that scolding tone down perfectly. The combination of sorrow and sternness that resonates so loudly in one’s breastbone—just where one is supposed to be beating oneself. His British accent had diminished.
“Questions, questions! Poking your nose in other people’s business! We tried to be nice…to warn you, but you paid no attention. What kind of woman are you? Didn’t you get the newspaper?”
Pix nodded. She was waiting for the right moment. He’d have to put the light down to open the thermos and pour the coffee.
“And what do you do? Ignore it! I pity the man who is married to you! And always by yourself! What were you doing in the woods in Stalheim! You’re supposed to come on these trips to make friends! But then, that’s not why you came, was it, Mrs. Miller? Pix.”
She sprang forward and grabbed the thermos from where he’d placed it next to his chair just after pouring a cup and flung the steaming-hot contents directly into his face. He screamed and lunged for her, blinded. She fumbled in the dark for the lock and heard a satisfying click.
She turned the knob as he grabbed her, and for a moment they rolled across the floor, barely avoiding the precious contents of the bags. Pix brought her knee up
squarely into his groin. She was in good shape and almost as tall as he was. He groaned and released her. Pix indeed!
She ran out the door, slamming it behind her, and headed straight for the bow. It was the quickest way off the boat. He was behind her. She threw down chairs as she went. She was at the door and wrenched it open. The air, the cold night air, was sweeter than any fragrance she could imagine. She stepped over the threshold, avoided the coils of rope, and climbed up on the dock.
Carl yelled something in Norwegian. She recognized two words—
“I don’t want to get up yet, Mother.” Pix firmly kept her eyes closed and pulled the down comforter under her chin. Then she realized her head was aching, and everything came rushing back. She opened her eyes. Where on earth was she? It certainly wasn’t Kvikne’s Hotel.
Sun streamed through the wavy glass in two small windows. She was tucked into a bed built into the wall, like a box. She sat up slowly, her head pounding more fiercely as she moved. She reached to the back and felt a lump the size of a fish cake. She’d been hit, hit with something hard. But Tylenol would have to wait. She had to get out of here and get some help. Carl was probably long gone, yet the sooner she raised the alarm, the better the chances were of catching him and finding out what had happened to Kari and Erik—both, she was sure now, dead.
Except she couldn’t move. She was still clad in everything she had been wearing last night, even her jacket, but what had been added was a chain and padlock about her waist, securing her to the bed. Optimistically, she reached in her pocket for her skeleton keys, blessing Faith over and over again. But of course they were gone, as were her knife and matches. She’d dropped the penlite herself in the struggle with Carl. They’d thoughtfully left the chocolate bar—but she wasn’t hungry—and the gloves, comb, and hair spray, no doubt thinking her even more
eccentric, and vain on top of that. She checked her pants pocket. A five-hundred-kroner note was still there. Either they were too honest to take it or hadn’t found the cash, mixed, as it was, with several tissues.
She sank back into the pillows, cursing her comfortable prison. All she could do was wait. She occupied the time by looking at the room. From the angle of the sky, she thought she was up high, a second floor, but the room seemed to be an entire cabin. Besides the bed, there was a rustic long wooden table and chairs, an old hearth with iron fireplace tools next to it, and a stack of wood. A sheepskin rug lay in front of the hearth and shiny copper pots hung on the wall. A brass oil lamp stood on the table, apart from some iron candleholders on the wall, the only source of light. A brightly painted chest of drawers with a wooden rack filled with plates and bowls above it completed the inventory. It was someone’s
Carl. It had been Carl all along. This was what Kari and Erik had found out. That Carl was exporting antiquities. But why kill them? Granted, Annelise had said the market was good for Scandinavian antiques, inflated even, because of the scarcity, but to take two human lives, three, counting Oscar—except Carl had said he’d had nothing to do with Oscar. But if not Carl, then who? Could the police have been wrong? Had it been an accident? But Kari and Erik. Poor Marit! Pix began to sob, and soon the pain in her heart and her head sent her to sleep again.
“You have to wake up!” Someone was shaking her. Mother? She opened her eyes and started forward until the iron girdle pulled her back. The voice was a female’s, but it wasn’t her mother’s. It was the farmer’s wife. That pretty woman with her cap of shining blond hair.
