BLUEBERRY MUFFIN MURDER
JOANNE FLUKE
-1-
Hannah Swensen awoke to a curious sensation. Her body was warm, but her nose felt like an icicle. She sat up in bed, reached out to snap on the light, and stared at the little puffs of moisture her breath left in the air. No wonder her nose felt so cold! The furnace had gone out again and Lake Eden, Minnesota, was smack-dab in the middle of a February cold snap.
"Moishe? Where are you?" Hannah glanced around the bedroom, but her feline roommate wasn't in any of his usual places. There was no orange-and-white cat nestled in the cushioned depths of her laundry basket, the top of her dresser held only its usual collection of books, and the windowsill with its view of the bird feeder was bare. There was, however, a good-sized lump in the middle of her bed.
Hannah stared at the lump for a moment. It was too small to be one of her pillows and too large to belong to an errant sock. She lifted the covers to find her feline roommate curled up in the middle of her bed, soaking up the warmth from her electric blanket.
"What are you doing under there?" Hannah asked, eyeing her fiercely independent tomcat with surprise. Moishe seldom cuddled for more than a few moments, and he'd never crawled under the covers with her. The cold must have driven him under her quilt and blanket. And he came equipped with a fur coat!
As if on cue, the alarm clock began its infernal electronic beeping. It was time to get up in the predawn freeze, when all Hannah really wanted to do was crawl back under the covers. She sighed and reluctantly swung her feet over the edge of her bed, feeling around with her toes for her slippers.
One slipper was immediately accessible. Hannah wiggled her left foot inside and attempted to find its mate. This took a moment, for it was hiding out near the foot of her bed. By the time Hannah located it and shoved her foot inside, her teeth were chattering in a lengthy drum roll.
"Come on, Moishe. Today's a big day." Hannah slipped into her warmest robe, a quilted relic from Lake Eden's only thrift store, and belted it around her waist. Then she folded back the covers until Moishe was exposed with no place to go. "I know it's cold. We'll have breakfast in front of the fireplace."
Hunger must have won out over comfort in Moishe's mind, because he padded after her down the hallway and into the kitchen. Hannah flicked on the lights and gave a thankful sigh as she saw that the timer on her coffeemaker had worked. She poured a cup of the strong brew, cupped it in both hands, and took a scalding sip. There was nothing better than hot coffee on a very cold morning. Then she filled Moishe's bowl with kitty crunchies and carried her coffee and Moishe's breakfast out into the living room.
The fireplace sprang into life as Hannah flicked the switch on the wall, and Moishe settled down in front of the blaze to have his breakfast Hannah pulled up a chair, rested her feet on the hearth that was home to the fireplace tools she didn't really need, and gave thanks for the wonders of a gas log. All things being equal, she preferred a real fireplace that could burn aromatic woods like cedar and pine, but a gas log was much more convenient. She never had to carry wood up the stairs to her second-floor condo, or sweep out the ashes and haul them down to the garage Dumpster in a metal pail. Her fireplace was hassle-free and the warmth was instantaneous. Flick, it was on. Flick, it was off.
As she sat there toasting her feet and waiting for the caffeine to jump-start her morning, Hannah heard a distant clanging from the nether regions of the basement. Someone was working on the furnace. Which early riser had notified the maintenance people?
Hannah considered it as she sipped her coffee. There was a separate furnace for each building, and her building contained four condo units, two on the ground floor and two on the second floor. It was doubtful that Mrs. Canfield, who owned one of the ground-level units, would have noticed the problem. She'd once told Hannah that she didn't stay up past ten, and the furnace had been working just fine then. Clara and Marguerite Hollenbeck, the two unmarried sisters who owned the unit above Mrs. Canfield, were out of town this week. They'd stopped by Hannah's cookie shop on Monday to tell her that they'd be attending a Bible teachers' conference at Bethany Lutheran College. The Plotniks lived directly below Hannah and they were the most likely candidates. Phil and Sue had a four-month-old baby, and he still demanded an occasional bottle in the middle of the night.
There was a grinding noise from the basement, and Moishe looked startled as he lifted his head from his food bowl. The grinding was followed by a series of clanks and clunks, and Hannah felt a surge of warm air emerge from the heater vents. The furnace was back on. At least she wouldn't have to worry about leaving the gas log on for Moishe, or putting her stash of Diet Coke in the refrigerator to keep the cans from freezing and popping their tops.
"I've got to get ready for work, Moishe." Hannah gave him a pat, drained the last of her coffee, and flicked off the fireplace. Once she'd carried his bowl back to the kitchen and given him fresh water, she headed off to the shower. Today would be a busy day and she had tons of cookies to bake. As the proprietor of The Cookie Jar, Lake Eden's coffee shop and bakery, she'd contracted to provide all the cookies for the Lake Eden Winter Carnival.
As Hannah turned on the water, adjusted the temperature, and stepped into her steamy shower enclosure, she thought about the plans that Mayor Bascomb and his Winter Carnival committee had made. If they were successful, the carnival would bring new life to Lake Eden at a time of year when everyone needed a boost. There wasn't much winter business in their small Minnesota town, and the promise of crowds with cash to spend had everyone filled with enthusiasm.
Lake Eden was a popular tourist spot in the summer months, when the town was flooded with visitors. Every year, on the day that fishing season opened, a lengthy parade of fishermen towing boats drove through Lake Eden to try their luck at the lake that was just within the town limits. The sky blue water was peppered with boats from dawn to dusk in the summer, and a record number of walleyes were pulled from its depths.
Good fishing wasn't all Eden Lake had to offer. With its picturesque shores and sandy beaches, it was also a popular family vacation spot. Summer cabin rentals were in high demand, and the lucky locals who owned them used the profits to pay their mortgages and fatten their savings accounts for the lean winter months.
When the summer season was over, right after Labor Day, the tourists and vacationers left town. The fine restaurants that overlooked the lake shut down their grills, the Lake Eden Bait and Tackle Shop boarded up its windows, and the boat launch was chained off for the winter. By the time the leaves on the trees had begun to display their fall colors, only the year-round residents were left.
Hannah liked the fall season. The nights were brisk with a hint of snow to come, and hoarfrost lined the edges of the road when she drove to work. Winter wasn't bad either, at first. Then the snow was white and pristine, the crisp, cold air made the inside of her nose tingle, and her regular customers at The Cookie Jar were full of holiday plans and good cheer.
When Christmas and New Year's were over, it was another story. Heating bills soared and seemed to approach the magnitude of the national debt, and business slowed down to a trickle. There was a brief flurry of activity for Valentine's Day, but after the heart-shaped boxes of chocolates were only a pleasant memory, winter seemed to stretch out endlessly with no spring flowers in sight.
Late February was the dreariest time of year in Lake Eden. The weak, anemic sun barely peeked out of overcast skies, and tree branches were black and stark against a horizon that was sometimes indistinguishable from the colorless banks of snow. It was difficult to maintain a sunny disposition when every day looked exactly like the one before it, and depression became the epidemic de jour. To combat this yearly malady, Mayor Bascomb had scheduled Lake Eden's very first Winter Carnival in the third week of February.