Queen of Disguises

Melanie Jackson

Description

Amateur detective and singing sensation Dinah Galloway has enough on her plate without having to worry about being pursued by a vengeful stalker. The red-headed twelve-year-old is in the running to sing in commercials promoting beautiful British Columbia. To clinch the job, Dinah has to get fit at a wellness retreat on Salt Spring Island. Veggies? Exercise? Yech! Grudgingly, though, Dinah admits that her lifestyle could be a little healthier. Off to Salt Spring she goes, along with the two other finalists: one friendly, the other the last word in sulky. Her friends Talbot and Pantelli make their usual disruptive appearances, along with Dinah's ever-anxious mother and cool, elegant sister Madge. Hoping to shed not only pounds but her crazed pursuer, Dinah learns the true meaning of personal best—it truly is how you play the game, not whether you win or lose.

Sujets

• Découvertes
• Mysteries
• Juvenilee Fiction
• health
• Detective Stories
• Dinah Galloway

Informations

• Publié par: Orca Book Publishers
• Date de parution: 01 avril 2009
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781554695218
• Langue: English

Extrait

A Dinah Galloway Mystery
Queen of Disguises

Melanie Jackson
ORCA BOOK PUBLISHERS
Copyright 2009 Melanie Jackson
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented, without permission in writing from the publisher.
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Jackson, Melanie, 1956- Queen of disguises / written by Melanie Jackson.
(A Dinah Galloway mystery) ISBN 978-1-55469-037-4
I. Title. II. Series: Jackson, Melanie, 1956- . Dinah Galloway mystery.
PS8569.A265Q38 2009 jC813 .6 C2009-900014-8
First published in the United States, 2009 Library of Congress Control Number : 2008943722
Summary: Competing for a spot in a commercial, Dinah must become healthy while eluding a vengeful pursuer.
Orca Book Publishers gratefully acknowledges the support for its publishing programs provided by the following agencies: the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program and the Canada Council for the Arts, and the Province of British Columbia through the BC Arts Council and the Book Publishing Tax Credit.
Cover design by Lynn O Rourke and John van der Woude Mask photo credit by Dreamstime Orca Book Publishers Orca Book Publishers PO Box 5626, Stn. B PO Box 468 Victoria, BC Canada Custer, WA USA V 8 R 6 S 4 98240-0468
www.orcabook.com
Printed and bound in Canada.
Printed on 100% PCW recycled paper.
12 11 10 09 4 3 2 1
In memory of my mother, Pearl Chandler, a true pilgrim soul. MJ
Contents
A Vengeful Prelude
Chapter One: A Stalker... But Where?
Chapter Two: Stage Fright
Chapter Three: Pantelli s Not-So-Dazzling Feat
Chapter Four: Sinister Surprise at Trout Lake
Chapter Five: The Talons of Revenge
Chapter Six: Welcome - sort of - to Salt Spring
Chapter Seven: Strict Rules, By Gum
Chapter Eight: Only the Beak Knows...
Chapter Nine: Exercise? Try Exorcist
Chapter Ten: The Mysterious Madame Sosostris
Chapter Eleven: Chilling Howls
Chapter Twelve: The Fine Art of Weaponry
Chapter Thirteen: Cloaked in Suspicion
Chapter Fourteen: The (Mis) fortune-teller
Chapter Fifteen: Too Many Right Moves
Chapter Sixteen: The Howler, Revealed
Chapter Seventeen: Not So Queenly After All
Chapter Eighteen: Dinah s Personal Best
A Vengeful Prelude
Game s on, Dinah Galloway.
Oh, not shot put or the hundred-meter dash or speed skating or any other sport you d find at the Olympics. Mine s the revenge game. A game of hide-and-seek, where I m It and you re the target. The one I hunt down. And when the game s over, you won t sing or snoop anymore.
That ll be a gold-medal day for me, Violet Bridey. That s right. VIOLET BRIDEY. The one you cruelly called Beak-Nose. Remember? Hmph! I happen to think a prominent bump is distinctive: gives one that Matterhorn look. Most imposing.
But back to the delicious revenge I m plotting. All those months in prison, I nurtured my plan as tenderly as the begonia I kept on my windowsill. Pruned it back when it grew too much in the wrong direction; enriched it when it withered.
Not much else for me to do there except grow things. The begonia: an orange one, the color of fire. The idea: ink dark, cold as revenge.
Your fault I was an inmate, Dinah. You poked your freckled-and, if I may say so, rather snub-nose, with those ever-smudged glasses teetering crookedly on top, into my oh-so-lovely plans. I had my fortune, that glowing moonstone, in the palm of my hand. How cleverly I d stolen it, you must admit.
Then a scream from you, and the police were alerted. The prison walls closed around me.
The other inmates thought the walls were brick, but I knew better. The walls hemming me in were you. Your face was on every one of them. You, the red-hot redhead, as critics drooled.
As they never drooled for me. Too melodramatic, they sniffed. No matter how hard she tries, she ll always be an amateur. Couldn t act her way out of a Theater for Dummies book!
Yet even the critics had to acknowledge my particular talent. They never knew when I took on more than one role in a play, not till the end, when the lights came up. How I savored their eyes, bulging with astonishment; their slack jaws. It was all I could do not to laugh out loud at them as I took my bow for my multiple roles.
You see, Dinah, I am the Queen of Disguises. And now I ve figured out the ultimate disguise, hee hee. That s how I ll avenge myself on you.
Prepare to meet your own personal It , Dinah Galloway. Your curtain call.
Chapter One A Stalker... But Where?
LET THE GAMES BEGIN !
A voice blasted out of the loudspeaker right over our heads. I jumped, bumping Madge.
You re so jittery today, Dinah, my sister scolded. Anyone would think you d developed a nervous twitch. Especially in your neck. Why do you keep looking behind us?
I don t know. It s weird. I have this feeling someone s watching me. I craned round again, surveying the dozens of other kids waiting, like me, for an audition to sing in commercials for Vancouver s 2010 Olympics. Two of us would be chosen: one for a commercial featuring opera, one for swing.
Swing, a-ring-a-ding-ding, as Sinatra would say. That d be me. I hoped.
The other kids, and the sas (i.e., significant adults) accompanying them, were staring anxiously at the door of the Witherspoon Advertising Agency. When Mr. Witherspoon deigned to open it, we d be called, one by one, to go in and sing.
The loudspeaker re-erupted. LET THE GAMES BEGIN !
Some of the younger auditioners started crying. The volume was set so loud . According to a secretary who had popped out earlier, the repeated announcement was supposed to rev us up. Put us in mind of athletes slaloming down hills and so on. But it was merely deafening us. I and a lot of the other kids stuffed our fingers in our ears.
Madge didn t need to. She had her iPod on and was test-listening to different pieces of music for her wedding, planned for the end of August. Madge was the only person in the crammed hall with a blissed-out smile.
As usual, male glances fluttered and settled on her like hungry bees. My eighteen-year-old sister was a drop-dead stunner. She had creamy skin, softly wavy auburn hair and lupine-blue eyes with-get this-long, naturally dark eyelashes, as compared to my stubby reddish ones.
Maybe I had the feeling of being watched today because of Madge. Maybe I d intercepted some of the stares meant for her.
An elbow like a wrecking ball knocked me aside. It belonged to a pale, slick-haired, practically lipless boy my size. That is to say, shorter than your average tween. Reaching up a tuxedoed arm, he plucked one of Madge s earphones off.
Hey, baby, he greeted her, pitching his voice low. Can you give me directions? I m lost in love.
Um, I said nervously. The kid looked like Countlet Dracula, but I felt I ought to warn him. Madge isn t the most patient-
Quiet, Pee Wee, the kid said out of the corner of his mouth.
To my astonishment, Madge broke into a lovely smile. You re so sweet, she cooed to the kid. Interrupting my appreciation of Debussy.
He flapped his eyebrows at her. In the next room, it ll soon be my d but, see ? Ha ha ha.
So cute, Madge smiled.
And, grasping his shirt and tuxedo collar all at once, she hoisted the kid and jammed him in a nearby wastebasket. Weight lifting pays off, she remarked to me. Then, calmly, she replaced the dangling earphone and listened on.
Madge was talented at tuning the world out, even when she wasn t iPod-equipped. My sister was a dreamy artist who floated through much of her life musing about how to portray beauty in urban settings. The grimier, the better. This was her specialty, what she described as putting opposite ideas together, the clash before the creation. Uh, oka-a-a-ay. Anyhow, I was secretly quite proud of Madge. She d be starting next month at the Emily Carr University of Art and Design.
Oh, Cornwall, gushed a big, platinum-dyed-haired woman in a black-and-white check dress. Shoving other auditioners and sas out of the way, she lumbered over to him. Your nice tux, son! You promised to be careful.
She tried unwedging Cornwall from the basket. Then-
AUDITIONS WILL BEGIN SHORTLY. WE WILL CALL FOR SINGERS IN ALPHABETICAL ORDER.
Startled, Cornwall s mother fell backward, knocking over a fat, cherubic little boy and girl. Carl and Carlotta Featherwhist, the Singing Toddler Twins. I d got to know Carl, Carlotta and their mom at auditions; I even babysat the twins sometimes. They were good kids, if a little hyper.
Flattened by Cornwall s mother, the twins now erupted into wails.
Over the heads of some sas, I spotted the telltale neon orange of a snack machine. Using my head as a battering ram, I plowed through the crowd. Madge had her music; I had mine. In this case, the sound of a package of Fudgee-Os crashing to the vending machine slot.
As I tucked two chocolaty cookies in my mouth at once, a finger timidly tapped my shoulder. I turned, face bulging, to see a thin girl with long, neatly combed chestnut hair. She peered at me shyly out of large, dark eyes.
Angela Bridey! I got out, more or less.
It was kind of an awkward moment, since I d helped send her Aunt Violet to jail the previous fall for attempting to steal a valuable moonstone ring. But then, I thrive on awkward moments. They re so much more interesting than regular ones.
I gulped down the Fudgee-Os and smiled