Birgitta

By William Mitchell Ross

In the summer of 1978, in Monroe, Wisconsin, the dead body of an elderly woman is discovered in her home. Police Chief Brandon Johns and Det. Samanthia Gates are called to investigate. The crime scene indicates that a possible murder has been committed.
Birgitta Nilsen, the deceased, was a very wealthy widow who lived alone in her house. Assuming inheritance money was a likely motive for her murder, they look at the family first to establish a list of suspects. As they interview the beneficiaries of Nilsen’s Will, they are confronted by a host of lies, deception, and distrust among dysfunctional family members. A third non-family beneficiary appears in the Will further complicating the investigation. As they delve deeper into the case, their increasing frustrations grow, in that none of their suspects has an alibi for the time of the murder, but, at the same time, they all had the money motive.
Eventually, a possible eye witness that could identify the killer is interviewed, but the octogenarian elderly woman, who lives across the street from Nilsen, was hard of hearing, paranoid, and suffered from memory issues further hampering the investigation.
Then, unexpectedly, another suspect surfaces. It was a real head scratcher for Johns and Gates as they try to unravel the mystery behind the murder. Will they get the break in the case that they need to crack it and bring the killer to justice?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Apr 14, 2024
• ISBN: 9798369416877

William Mitchell Ross

William Mitchell Ross lives in Monroe, Wisconsin, with his wife, Marilyn. Bill is retired from his day job in the dairy industry. He is also the former mayor of the city of Monroe, having served for eighteen years. After finally making it to retirement, he enjoys being one of the docents for city tourism, puttering with home projects, and writing mystery novels. Last year, he teamed up with the Monroe Chamber of Commerce and is currently the docent for the “Monroe Mystery Tour” that identifies six scenes of the crime as well as gives visitors a brief historical sketch of Monroe and Green County. The tours run June through September.

Book preview

CHAPTER 1

E llen Schmidt suddenly awoke from a sound sleep with a fierce pounding headache. She opened her gray-green eyes and saw the sunshine streaming in through her bedroom window. The tall window of her second story bedroom was cracked open and a warm gentle summer breeze made the lace curtains sway. She heard a Cardinal singing its heart out. Oh God, what time is it? she asked trying to orientate herself to the morning. It was Saturday. She reached over the rumpled cotton sheets and felt for her husband. He was not there. She tried to prop herself up on one elbow but her head started to spin and she got dizzy. She laid her head back down on the pillow closing her eyes. She called out for Jeff but got no response. Where was he?

Ellen was in her early fifties, plump, with gray strands of hair starting to appear in her shoulder length auburn hair. She wore black-framed glasses. Ellen grew up with five siblings on a dairy farm outside Monroe on Middle Juda Road. Life was good growing up on the farm where hard work and faith in God was thumped into her as the essence for a happy and fruitful life. The cycle of rural life: farm labor; planting; manuring; tending crops; animals; a rooster crowing in the morning. Every Sunday the family attended a country church where the self-righteous minister shouted from the pulpit while delivering and preaching about a benevolent God who gave you the choice of either going to heaven or hell. The last time Ellen was in church was the day she got married and did not want to be reminded of her fate in the afterlife being shouted and preached from a church pulpit. She attended twelve years of schooling in the Monroe school system where she met and dated Jeff. He was a city kid who was good looking and rebellious, and that is what attracted him to her. He had an arrogant self-assured attitude with raging teenage hormones and an abundance of angst. He often bragged about his school detention time. Other girls were attracted to him for his outlandish behavior, but he and Ellen clicked from the get go and they never dated anyone else. They reveled in their sexual freedom and went to parties with their underaged friends drinking themselves stupid. They never discussed marriage until Ellen became pregnant. She often joked that the idea of marriage was only an afterthought – after she got pregnant!

Jeff had an excellent mechanical aptitude and he landed a good paying job after high school at Alphorn Ford located on 18th Avenue that allowed them to buy a two-story white framed home in the 1100 block of 13th Avenue. A couple of years ago they burned the mortgage and celebrated with family and friends. After John was born, they had another son, Samuel. Both boys left Monroe after high school and were now living and working in Beloit and Kenosha. After the boys started elementary school, Ellen worked part-time at Becker’s Leader Store on northwest side of the square and did occasional housework for the wealthier citizens. One of her more interesting clients was Birgitta Nilsen, who paid well. The retired and widowed woman had a reputation and an interesting mysterious history that Ellen found fascinating.

One of Jeff’s fellow auto mechanics, Jake Zimmerman’s girlfriend, Janet, was celebrating her 30th birthday on Friday, the 30th of June, 1978, at Baumgartner’s and he invited Jeff and the whole team of mechanics to join in the celebration. Baumgartner’s tavern was located on the west side of the square across from the historic Green County courthouse. A 30th birthday on the 30th day of the month was a once in a lifetime big deal. Jake was paying for a keg of Huber beer for the occasion, and after that was gone, it was a cash bar. Jeff was eager to go for the free beer and the celebration. He and Ellen arrived at eight o’clock and Baumgartner’s was already packed with loud and happy patrons. Standing under the portal leading into the bar, the weekend crowd did not fail to deliver. The free beer was long gone before they arrived and they saw Jake and Janet standing at the west end of the polished bar having a very good time. They were able to make their way through the crowd to the bar and congratulated the birthday girl. There were inverted shot glasses lined up and stacked like a pyramid in front of Janet. She was certainly in her cups and feeling no pain. Adam Polus, the bartender, kept delivering Janet and Jake glasses of beer and shots paid for by the noisy crowd. Bets were being taken when Janet would pass out.

Standing on the other side of Janet were two obese guys from Illinois wearing Chicago Cubs baseball caps. They were loud and taunting the patrons about the Chicago Bears being a better football team than the Green Bay Packers. It was a good-natured debate with bad jokes flying around about each team. One of the Chicago guys got onto the subject of Limburger cheese calling it ‘mouse trap cheese.’ Jeff winked at Polis. Adam got a slice of Limburger, placed it on a plate and presented it to the obnoxious patron with the compliments of the bar. The burly man stared at it suspiciously and took a whiff scrunching up his nose. Jeff took a ten-dollar bill out of his wallet and placed it beside the cheese. He challenged the miscreant that if he could eat the whole thing, the tenner was his. If not, he would pay Jeff twenty bucks. The patrons quieted down to watched the action. The other Chicago guy turned to Jeff and in a slurred voice raised the bet to twenty bucks, and if they lost, they would give him forty dollars. The crowd cheered and another tenner was quickly placed beside the one Jeff put on the bar. The bet was on.

The man picked up the slice of cheese in his beefy fingers and immediately put it back on the plate. I can’t do this, he mumbled to his companion as he frowned looking down at the stinky cheese. The crowd roared with laughter. Look, you idiot. There is twenty bucks in it for us. The easiest money you will ever see. So, eat the damn cheese and show these cheeseheads what you are made of! The sorrowful drunk picked up the cheese again and stared at it for a whole minute. Then he made up his mind, closed his eyes and stuffed all of it into his mouth barely chewing and swallowed hard. He took a long swig of his cold beer and turned a pale shade of green. Everyone burst into wild applause and Adam rang the bar bell. The poor man suddenly turned and fought his way through the crowd to the bathroom and threw up. The entertainment was well worth the twenty bucks.

Ellen and Jeff hung around until eleven o’clock. Ellen had several shots of brandy washed down with glasses of beer from the local brewery. They were enjoying themselves and the laughter and the comradery of friends and strangers was infectious. She tried looking at the ceiling at all the dollar bills thumbtacked to it, but it made her dizzy. Jeff was watching her and determined it was time to go. He was not in the best of shape himself but he told her he could drive home even though he was over the limit. Once outside, she lost it and vomited on the sidewalk. Jeff helped her into the car.

Ellen was in a mental fog when she woke up the next morning and momentarily opened and closed her eyes trying to remember what happened the night before to give her this crazy hangover. She only remembered bits and pieces of it. This bugger of a hangover was a high price to pay. So much for the anticipated free beer. She would have to ask Jeff how much he spent. She slowly removed the light weight cotton sheet covering her and sat up on the side of the bed. She was wearing a tee shirt and cotton panties. The alarm clock on the wooden stand beside the bed said 9:30. She usually cleaned Birgitta’s house at 9:00 on Saturdays, but Birgitta told her that she would be in Madison today, so there was no rush. She slowly stood up and made her way out of the bedroom, down the hallway, to the bathroom. She stood over a white porcelain pedestal sink and looked at herself in the mirror. The face staring back at her had age wrinkles, straggly unkept hair and blood shot eyes. Oh God, do I look old and a freaking wreck. Father time is chasing me, and I am losing the race waiting to seriously fall apart, just like my mother! she murmured to herself. Then she opened the cabinet above the sink and took out the aspirin bottle. Finding a glass, she filled it with water and swallowed two aspirin, splashed water on her face and returned to the bedroom, lying down again. After twenty minutes she felt well enough to get up and pulled on a pair of blue jeans and a polo shirt. She slipped her feet into a pair of sandals, returned to the bathroom, brushing her teeth and tongue to mitigate the dragon breath that permeated her mouth. Going downstairs and into the kitchen she saw the note that Jeff left on the round oak kitchen table. It reminded her that he and his brother were driving to Mount Horeb today to look at a used 1954 Ford pickup truck that needed restoring. He would be back in time for supper.

Ellen did not feel like going to Birgitta’s house today, but she needed to suck it up and go. She only spent a couple of hours there dusting and cleaning and she could certainly do that. What she needed now was to eat something and walk to Birgitta’s house which was a short one, about fifteen minutes away. She toasted two slices of whole wheat bread and smeared marmalade jam over them and made a pot of coffee. Hopefully, she could keep it down. It had been a long time since she felt this bad and hopefully it would be the last. At eleven o’clock she felt well enough to leave the house to fulfill her duties. She put on a pair of white trainers and exited the front door into the bright sunshine heading to the 1400 block of 14th Avenue. As she walked, she could still feel the effects of her night out and wondered how Jeff was coping.

After Birgitta’s husband died, he left her a very wealthy woman. Birgitta was born and raised in Monroe, so after his funeral she decided to leave Milwaukee and move back to her hometown. She bought the two-story historical house on 14th Avenue that was in the style of a Greek Revival with Italian features. It was a beautiful home with a covered wrap-around front porch. Birgitta once told her that it was too much house for a single widow, and how much she appreciated her help. Ellen appreciated the money even more and cleaning such a fine house was a bonus. And besides, Birgitta was easy to work for and they got along famously.

As Ellen approached the house, the birds were singing and gray squirrels were scampering around the yard chasing one another. She said hello to several people she met along her walk who were also enjoying the picture-perfect day. She had a key to the house, but against her advice, Birgitta seldom locked it. Such a fine home that was not secure bothered Ellen. Birgitta told her it was Monroe, and she did not need to lock it, like so many other homes around town. A tradition of trust that seemed to be generational. Ellen’s parents never locked their farm house either and always left the key to their car in the ignition, even when shopping on the square. She stopped to smell the fragrant pink tea rose in the front flowerbed before ascending the porch steps to the front door which was ornate with beveled glass and, sure enough, it was unlocked. She walked in and assessed the downstairs rooms. They were clean and tidy. She thought that Birgitta was a clean freak of some kind, making her work much easier. She even suspected that Birgitta did some cleaning herself before she arrived. Even though Birgitta had family in town, it seemed to Ellen that they were in some respects estranged and Birgitta never talked about them.

Heading upstairs, Ellen needed to check out the bathroom and Birgitta’s bedroom. That is where she spent most of her time cleaning, changing the sheets and tidying up. The bathroom was located at the head of the staircase and she checked it out first. Bath towels were strewn across the claw foot tub and the sink was stained with the cosmetics that Birgitta applied liberally to make herself presentable. Ellen shook her head. For a sixty-two-year-old woman, Birgitta wore too much makeup and probably took an hour or two to look normal. The bedroom was located on the east side of the second floor overlooking the sidewalk. It had tall floor-to-ceiling windows covered with lace curtains. Antique walnut furniture completed the décor of the room. The door was partially closed, which Ellen found interesting. She opened it and stepped into the room, screamed, and froze. A look of terror paralyzed her face. Lying on the canopy bed, on her back, Birgitta was staring up at the ceiling with lifeless vacant eyes. Ellen forced herself to inch her way to the bedside for a better look, knowing she was dead. She felt her arm which was cool to the touch. The shock started to wear off as Ellen raced down the staircase to call the police.

CHAPTER 2

P olice Chief Brandon Johns was at home Saturday morning mowing the grass when the call came in from dispatch about a dead body being discovered by a cleaning lady. He was wearing his weekend yard clothes consisting of an old faded tee shirt, shorts and a wide brimmed hat that protected his face from the sun. He had a portly frame, short slightly gray hair and penetrating no-nonsense brown eyes that could intimidate suspects during questioning. His wife, Beth, took the call and immediately knew that he would rush off leaving the yard half mowed. Fortunately, the kid next door could finish the mowing at a price that the chief thought outrageous for a fourteen-year-old. After all, his two sons mowed the grass before going off to college as part of their room and board and they only learned later about slave labor which they constantly reminded him.

Johns grew up on a dairy farm south of Monroe. At a young age, his parents would take him into town where he was fascinated, awed, and impressed by uniformed police officers. He knew from that first experience seeing the officers that he was going to be a cop when he grew up. During his formative years he would hang around the police station doing odd jobs and getting to know the officers and staff. He was a voracious reader and always had his head in a police manual of some kind. He was a good student in high school and attended the police academy in Madison after graduation. Because of the prior time he spent with the police department, he was hired as a rookie cop and excelled. He got along well with his fellow officers and showed an unusual aptitude for leadership and common-sense policing. During this time, he married his high school sweetheart, Beth Lehr. When he was in his mid-thirties, the chief of police retired and the chairman of the Police and Fire Commission promoted Johns to the position. A promotion that was well received by all the personnel within the department, as well as the community. Johns was well liked and respected and was a frequent luncheon speaker when called on by service organizations and other groups. His adolescent sons would occasionally get into mischief, but got no mercy from their father. Johns was as straight an arrow as a parent could get. The only thing that dogged him was his weight. Beth and his doctor were constantly on him about losing his excess twenty-five pounds. But the Swiss-German cuisine at the Ratskeller in Turner Hall and other culinary delights that Monroe offered was his weakness. Something that he could not give up for a diet of carrots, radishes, and lettuce salad.

After he answered the urgent call, Johns told the dispatcher to contact Detective Samantha Gates to meet him at the home of Birgitta Nilsen. He quickly changed his clothes and kissed Beth goodbye telling her that he would be gone for the remainder of the day. She watched as he backed his car out of the driveway and sped down the street out of sight waving after him. Shaking her head, she reminded herself once again that being married to a cop was challenging. A man who loved his job and his family, in that order.

After Johns drove up and parked in front of Birgitta’s house, he saw uniformed Officer Peters’ patrol car parked on the street. It took him twenty minutes to get there after receiving the call. A couple of curious onlookers had gathered in front of the house standing on the sidewalk. They looked at the chief as he parked his car. A lady he recognized, Ellen Schmidt, was standing on the front porch. He hastily exited his car and hurriedly walked to the porch. Ellen’s eyes were red and teary. She looked forlorn staring into space. He asked about Peters and she told him that he was in the house on the second floor. He easily located the bedroom and saw Peters standing inside the bedroom door. He asked Peters for an update. He told the chief that after receiving the call in his patrol car he raced to the house. It took him about five minutes to arrive. He found Ellen in the living room in shock and she told him, in a distraught voice, about finding a body in the second-floor bedroom. He made his way to the bedroom and saw the corpse lying on the bed that looked like a suspicious death, so his training immediately kicked in about preserving a crime scene. He knew that he needed to keep everyone away from the bedroom and that Dr. Ken needed to be called to officially pronounce her dead. Then he stayed in the bedroom, not touching anything, waiting for the chief to arrive.

Johns moved in for a closer look and immediately recognized Birgitta. She was dressed in her bed clothes, light weight pink cotton pajamas, lying on her back. He saw small purple splotches in her eyes and on her face. The hairs rose on the back of his neck. His inner voice screamed suffocation - murder! It was a visceral gut feeling that he knew only so well. There was a pillow lying next to the body that most likely was the murder weapon. This was the part of his job that he hated. The taking of a human life was barbaric and cruel. He instructed Peters to string crime tape around the pillars on the front porch and tell Sam, when she arrived, where he was. Also, he wanted Ellen Schmidt to wait downstairs in the living room to be interviewed later.

After Peters left, he closely examined the room. He could see no signs of a struggle. He surmised that the killer must have entered the house sometime during the night, gone to the bedroom and assaulted Birgitta as she slept. Someone who was familiar with the house and Birgitta’s routine. He would need to call in Scott Brady’s forensic team from Madison, Dr. Ken to examine the body and Albert Swensen to take the crime scene photos. It was going to be a very busy day.

Sam drove up and parked behind the chief’s car. The crowd standing on the sidewalk was growing in numbers. She had been with the police department long enough to know that the curious onlookers were only the beginning of rumors, gossip and speculation that would fuel Monroe’s grapevine. Sam was married to Drew Nelson, a physical therapist at the hospital. After she married Drew, her colleagues requested that she keep her maiden name of Gates at the PD which amused Drew and sometimes caused confusion, but Sam got used to it and all was well with her having two surnames. They had a daughter, Karin, who was an energetic six-year-old youngster. Sam was tall, five-feet-ten-and-a-half inches, a lithe figure, and wore her chocolate brown hair short.

Sam’s father, Earl Gates, had been a police officer in Silver Bay, Wisconsin near Kenosha. He was tragically killed by two druggies while making a routine traffic stop when Sam was sixteen years old. His sudden death in the line of duty devastated the family. She idolized her father and spent many hours as a child at the PD totally consumed by watching, observing, and taking in all the activity. The other police officers loved her and her enthusiasm. She was fascinated and enthralled by what she saw and repeatedly told her father that one day she was going to be a police officer just like him. After his death, her mother, Sharon, became clinically depressed and her older brother, Phil, became addicted to drugs and alcohol causing the family to fall apart. But she somehow rose above all the chaos, graduating from the University of Wisconsin with a degree in police science, went to the police academy graduating first in her class, and started a career in law enforcement. After moving to Monroe, Sam moved her mother into the Parkview Nursing Home for care, suffering from a heart condition and depression. Phil met a girl in rebab in Chicago and turned his life around going straight. He and Elaine would make the short trip to Monroe to visit Sharon in the nursing home and reconnect with Sam. They decided to have her father’s coffin exhumed and removed to the Greenlawn cemetery on the east side of Monroe. A well cared for cemetery that Sharon could visit and feel close to her deceased husband. After her mother passed, she was laid to rest next to her beloved husband and Sam would take Karin there to talk and introduce her to her grandparents with stories about them.

Being a woman, Sam was an anomaly in the world of law enforcement, but her intellect and work ethic soon earned her the respect she craved and needed from her colleagues and superiors. When she arrived at the Monroe PD, after a short time working at the Silver Bay PD, Johns soon realized that her aptitude and natural intelligence was far superior to her fellow officers in solving crimes, especially murders. Their working relationship was more than supervisor, subordinate – it was one of those kinships of mutual respect, trust, and loyalty.

Sam ignored the curious crowd as she made her way to the porch, ducking under the yellow crime scene tape, speaking briefly to Peters and then entered the house. She saw Ellen sitting on the living room sofa wiping her tears with a tissue. Ellen looked at her with a sad face. Sam asked her how she was doing and all Ellen could say, and repeated several times, was that she could not believe it. Leaving her, Sam went to the second-floor bedroom and saw Johns standing next to Birgitta’s bed staring out the window, lost in his own thoughts. She looked down at the corpse lying on the bed. The sight of it sent shivers up and down her spine. She had seen murder victims throughout her career, but it never got any easier. A human life cut short was tragic and the scene was horrific, affecting her in a personal way. Johns turned around and smiled at her.

Sorry to bring you out on a Saturday, he said.

A sudden death ignores the calendar, the day of the week, and shapes us to its own time and place.

Ah, ha. Feeling philosophical today, are we? Johns said.

Sam grinned. Not really. I hate seeing a corpse and knowing what lies ahead as we investigate the death.

You are so right. Take a closer look and tell me what you see.

Sam leaned in for a closer examination. She could smell a faint scent of lavender oil on the body. From her first glance coming into the room, she immediately knew this was an unnatural death. Her suspicions were confirmed looking at the purple splotches on Birgitta’s face and eyes. From my experience, I would say she was smothered to death.

I agree and I think Dr. Ken will confirm that. We are treating this as a crime scene so I am going downstairs to make some telephone calls. Wait here and put your gray cells to work and try to imagine what occurred in the wee hours of the morning.

Sam nodded as the