The Pumpkin Muffin Murder Page 12

Phyllis said, “When you put it like that, Chief, you make it sound . . . well . . .”

  “Suspicious?”

  “Think about it,” Phyllis said. “Logan was still alive when Dana left the park. You have eyewitness testimony to confirm that. Even if she gave him the muffin that I gave her, and he ate it, there wouldn’t have been traces of it in his mouth this morning.”

  Whitmire leaned back in his chair. “You do have a knack for putting together evidence and testimony to build up a chain of events, don’t you, Mrs. Newsom? I can see how you’ve been able to help out with those other cases.” Before Phyllis could say anything, he went on, “But what if . . . what if Dana Powell came back to the park last night, while her husband was still there but everyone else was gone? They had argued earlier. Maybe she gave him the muffin and told him it was a peace offering. He started to eat it, but she’d poisoned it and he died before he could finish.”

  “She wouldn’t do that,” Phyllis insisted.

  “But it could have happened that way.” Whitmire was just as adamant.

  “So you’re suggesting that Dana Powell, who can’t weigh much more than a hundred pounds soaking wet, undressed her dead husband, put that scarecrow’s clothes on him, dragged a heavy bale of hay down to the cabin and into the dogtrot, and lifted his body onto it?” Phyllis shook her head in disbelief. “Even if she could do that, why would she?”

  “Desperation gives people more strength than you might think they have,” the chief said. “And killers sometimes do things that make sense to them but not to anybody else. Anyway . . . maybe she had help.”

  “Help?” Phyllis repeated with a confused frown. “What do you mean?”

  Whitmire shrugged. “Logan Powell was supposedly cheating on his wife. Maybe she was fooling around on him, too. Maybe that’s why she killed him, so she could be with a boyfriend.”

  “No,” Phyllis said. “I don’t believe it.”

  “You know her well enough to completely rule out the possibility that she could have been having an affair?”

  “Well . . . no. I don’t suppose I do. But I don’t believe it.”

  Whitmire grunted. “I don’t deal in opinion. I’m just concerned about facts.”

  “It sounds to me like you’re dealing more in speculation. No one has said anything to you about Dana having an affair, have they?”

  Whitmire frowned but didn’t answer, which was an answer in itself, Phyllis thought. He toyed with the pencil on his desk and said, “I’ll need a copy of your recipe for those muffins, so we can check the ingredients against the substance found in Powell’s mouth. I’m pretty sure that’s what it was, though.”

  “The recipe’s not going to confirm anything,” Phyllis pointed out. “There’s nothing unusual in the muffins. Just common ingredients, including canned pumpkins and chopped pecans.”

  “Well, we’ll check it anyway. You can drop the recipe off anytime, or just e-mail it to Detective Largo, if you want.” Whitmire took one of his business cards from a holder on the desk, turned it over, and wrote on the back before sliding it across to Phyllis. “There’s her e-mail address.”

  Phyllis picked up the card and put it away in her purse. “Where is Detective Largo? I halfway expected her to be here.”

  “She’s still at the hospital, questioning Mrs. Powell.”

  “After all this time? Isn’t that overdoing it?”

  “We’re just trying to get to the bottom of this,” Whitmire said. “But no bright lights or rubber hoses; you have my word on that.”

  “Do you know what Dana’s condition is?”

  “From what I’ve heard, she’s all right. She just fainted from the stress. I think they’re gonna keep her overnight for observation, though.”

  “Fainting from stress,” Phyllis said. “Doesn’t that sound like something an innocent woman would do after seeing her husband’s dead body?”

  “I imagine trying to get away with murder is pretty stressful, too,” Whitmire said.

  Chapter 18

  Sam was waiting for Phyllis when she got back to the lobby. As she came in, he stood up quickly from the metal chair where he’d been sitting.

  “You all right?” he asked.

  “Of course I am. You weren’t really worried that I’d be interrogated, were you?”

  “Not really, but I’m glad to see you anyway. What’d the chief want?”

  Phyllis glanced at the officer on duty at the desk, then said, “We’ll talk about it in the pickup.”

  Once they were back in the vehicle, she asked Sam whether he would mind driving back down by the park to see how the festival was going. He agreed readily and turned the pickup in that direction.

  “I reckon we can even go back in if you want,” he said as he held up his hand to indicate the duck figure stamped onto the back of it. “This is supposed to be so folks can go in and out after they drop off their canned goods. You’d think that with it bein’ nearly Thanksgiving, though, they would’ve made it look like a turkey instead of a duck.”

  “I suppose they didn’t think of it. Anyway, the lake is known for the ducks that live there. And it’s not necessary for us to go back into the festival. I’m just curious to see how the attendance is holding up. I imagine that by now the news about Logan’s death has gotten around town.”

  A few minutes later they reached the road that led to the park’s north entrance. Phyllis was surprised to see that cars were parked along both sides of the road, even farther away from the park than they had been earlier.

  “Doesn’t look like what happened has hurt attendance,” Sam said. “Fact is, I’d say it’s more crowded now than it was this mornin’.”

  Phyllis nodded as they drove past. “Morbid curiosity, I suppose. People have heard about Logan and want to see where his body was found.”

  “They’ll have to come up with a bag of canned goods to do it,” Sam pointed out. “So that’s something positive to come outta the whole mess, anyway.”

  “I suppose so,” Phyllis said with a sigh.

  “We headin’ home now?”

  “Yes, I don’t think there’s anything else I need to see here.”

  When Sam got back to the house, a blue SUV was parked at the curb where he usually left his pickup. He pulled into the driveway instead and said, “Looks like you got company. You know who that SUV belongs to?”

  Phyllis shook her head. “No, I don’t.”

  She didn’t wait for Sam to come around and open her door for her. She opened it herself and got out of the pickup. The visitor didn’t necessarily have to have something to do with Logan’s death, but considering the way these things usually went, Phyllis would be surprised if that didn’t turn out to be the case.

  Sure enough, when she and Sam went inside, they found Carolyn and Eve sitting in the living room with Barbara Loomis, Jenna Grantham, Taryn Marshall, and Kendra Neville. The women had cups of coffee.

  “Hello,” Phyllis said.

  Barbara Loomis put her cup back on its saucer on the coffee table in front of her and said, “I’m sorry we barged in on you like this, Phyllis. We just wanted to find out if you knew how Dana’s doing. She’s not home, and they wouldn’t tell us at the hospital if she’s still there.”

  Phyllis looked at the concerned expressions on the faces of the women. Of course they were worried about their friend. They had a right to be, considering everything that had happened.

  “Carolyn told us you’d gone to the police station,” Jenna added. “Did they tell you anything about Dana?”

  “She’s still at the hospital,” Phyllis said. “According to Chief Whitmire, the doctor wants to keep her there overnight for observation. However, he didn’t seem to think there was any real reason to worry. She just fainted from the stress.”

  Kendra said, “Yes, but he’s a policeman, not a doctor.”

  “And he’s the one who had poor Dana arrested,” Taryn put in. “I don’t trust him.”

  “It was the doctor’s opinion
that Dana’s not in any danger from the fainting, not the chief’s,” Phyllis explained. “And she hasn’t actually been arrested.”

  “They’ve questioned her, though,” Jenna said. “How stupid is that? Dana wouldn’t hurt Logan.”

  “Of course she wouldn’t,” Barbara agreed.

  “Right now, the police don’t even know how Logan died,” Phyllis said. Chief Whitmire hadn’t told her not to discuss the case, so she didn’t see anything wrong with sharing what she knew with Dana’s friends. Of course, what she knew didn’t actually add up to very much, she reminded herself. Not even the proverbial hill of beans, in fact. She went on, “The autopsy was still going on when I talked to the chief.”

  “Did he call you down there to fill you in on what was going on?” Kendra asked. “You work for the police as a consultant of some sort, don’t you, Phyllis?”

  Carolyn scoffed. “She would if Chief Whitmire had any sense! The police wouldn’t ever solve any murders around here if it wasn’t for Phyllis’s help.”

  “Do you really think Logan’s death was murder?” Barbara asked. She caught her lower lip between her teeth, as if the question bothered her.

  As well it might, Phyllis suddenly realized. Barbara’s husband, Ben, was a business rival of Logan Powell’s, she recalled. She had heard Logan threatening to kill Ben Loomis the day before in the park, when Phyllis had accidentally eavesdropped on Logan’s phone conversation. Maybe Ben had decided to strike first.

  Of course, right after that, Logan had mentioned the golf game he and Ben were scheduled to play. The so-called threat had been nothing but a joke. Logan had said so himself.

  But maybe it wasn’t. Maybe the banter masked a real feud going on between the two men over that NorCenTex Development deal. That was something she could look into, Phyllis thought.

  If she were investigating the case, and if there really was a case to investigate.

  She knew she was grasping at straws. Logan’s alleged affair was a much better motive for murder than some nebulous real estate deal.

  Those thoughts flashed through Phyllis’s mind. Barbara was looking at her, waiting for an answer to the question she had asked. Phyllis said, “I don’t know. No one does, at this point. We’ll have to wait until they find out the cause of death.”

  “Well, they ought to let us in to see Dana at the hospital,” Jenna declared angrily. “We’re her friends, and they don’t have any right to keep us from visiting her.”

  “Maybe they’ll let her go home tomorrow. I wouldn’t be surprised if they gave her something to make her sleep after Detective Largo finished questioning her.”

  Taryn spoke up, asking, “Do we need to see about getting her a lawyer?”

  Barbara nodded. “I was thinking the same thing. Her rights need to be protected.” She looked around at the others. “I don’t know any defense attorneys, though.”

  Phyllis did: Juliette Yorke. The woman was from back east somewhere, but she seemed like a highly competent lawyer. She had been involved in a couple of the cases that had ensnared Phyllis.

  “I can recommend someone, if it comes to that,” Phyllis told the four teachers. “Right now, though, I think we all need to just wait and see what happens over the next couple of days. It might not look good for Dana if she rushed right out and retained a defense attorney.”

  “No, I suppose not,” Barbara said. “If there’s anything we can do to help her, though, we’re certainly willing.” The other three women nodded.

  “I’m sure she knows that,” Phyllis said. “Once she’s released from the hospital, one of you might even want to go and stay with her for a while.”

  “I could do that,” Jenna said without hesitation.

  “So could I,” Taryn said, and Kendra nodded, too. Barbara was the only one of the four who was married, Phyllis recalled. The three single women would have an easier time of it if they wanted to drop everything and help out a friend.

  “Do you know if she has any relatives around here?” Phyllis asked.

  “Not any close ones,” Barbara replied. “Some cousins, I think. But Dana’s folks are dead, and she doesn’t have any brothers or sisters.”

  “And she and Logan didn’t have any children,” Jenna added.

  Phyllis remembered Dana mentioning that. She said, “It sounds like she’s liable to need all of her friends, then.”

  “We’ll be there for her,” Carolyn said.

  There wasn’t much else to be said, at least not about Dana and Logan. The talk turned to the festival instead, and Phyllis told the visitors how she and Sam had driven by the park a short time earlier and found it more crowded than ever.

  “Gawkers,” Barbara said, tight-lipped with disapproval. “They just want to see the place where a man died.”

  Phyllis said, “I’m sure that’s why some of them are there, but the afternoon usually has the biggest crowds at something like a harvest festival. Some people probably don’t even know about Logan yet.”

  “I’ll bet most of them do,” Carolyn said.

  Phyllis had to agree with that. “But as Sam pointed out to me,” she said, “they still have to donate their canned goods to get in, no matter why they’re there.”

  Barbara nodded. “There’s that to consider, I suppose. A big crowd means there’ll be plenty of food to deliver on Thanksgiving, I hope.”

  “And a bigger cleanup in the morning,” Jenna added with a smile. “The trash collectors will be busy picking up everything that people leave behind.”

  Phyllis knew that to be true, as well. Anytime there was a large crowd anywhere, there was trash to be picked up.

  “What about those other scarecrows we made?” Kendra asked. “Dana was going to get them in the morning and store them for next year’s festival. Now, though . . .”

  She didn’t have to finish her sentence. They all knew what she meant. Dana wouldn’t be able to pick up the scarecrows and probably wouldn’t want to, even if she could. She probably wouldn’t want to ever lay eyes on them again.

  “I don’t mind pickin’ ’em up,” Sam volunteered. “You think there’s room in the toolshed for ’em, Phyllis?”

  “I think we can make room if there’s not,” she said.

  “And I’ll be responsible for them,” Carolyn offered. “If you’re sure that’s all right, Phyllis.”

  “I think it’s a good idea,” Phyllis said with a smile. “That way none of you ladies will have to bother with them, and they ought to be safe in the shed.”

  “That’s very generous of you,” Barbara said. “Thank you.” She looked around at Carolyn and Sam. “All of you. I’m afraid Logan’s death has really thrown things for a loop, and it’s going to take some time to sort it all out. But if there’s anything we can do to make it easier for Dana and help her get through it, I’d like to.”

  The others all nodded. Their concern for their friend was touching, Phyllis thought.

  She just hoped that before all this was over, what Dana would really need to get through it wouldn’t be the services of a good defense attorney like Juliette Yorke.

  Chapter 19

  The air the next morning was still cool and crisp, with enough of a north wind to carry away most of the pollution that drifted in from Dallas and Fort Worth and even from as far away as Houston. The deep blue color of the sky was broken here and there by small, puffy clouds as white as snow. It was beautiful fall weather in Texas.

  Phyllis and Sam skipped church in the morning to go collect the scarecrows from the park. When they got there, a crew of inmates in orange and white coveralls from the county jail was already at work cleaning up the trash left over from the festival, under the watchful eyes of a couple of deputies. Mike had worked on cleanup details like that from time to time, Phyllis knew, but he didn’t like it. He preferred being out on patrol where there were more opportunities to actually help people.

  There were a handful of cars parked in the lot. Phyllis saw some children down around the playground equi
pment by the lake, and she spotted an elderly couple who appeared to be walking for exercise on the opposite shore.

  She and Sam qualified as an elderly couple, she mused. There hadn’t been any more talk about that whole boyfriend-girlfriend matter, but as far as she was concerned, it was settled and didn’t need any more discussion. They would continue to take things slowly. That was just the opposite of someone like Eve, who had been known to comment more than once that she had only a certain amount of time left on this earth and she meant to make the most of it. Phyllis could see the logic in that approach, but it just didn’t fit her personality. And she was too old to change now.

  “We don’t have to do anything with the hay bales, do we?” Sam asked as they got out of the pickup.

  “No, I assume they’re the responsibility of whoever provided them,” Phyllis said. “I know there’s not room for them and the scarecrows in our toolshed.”

  They came to the spot where the hay bale had been moved down to the dogtrot. Phyllis pointed it out to Sam, who paused and squinted as he looked back and forth from where he stood to the cabin.

  “Seems like a long way for a little thing like Miz Powell to haul a bale of hay,” he said after a moment.

  “I pointed out that same thing to Chief Whitmire. He didn’t seem to put much stock in it, though. He just said that desperate people are sometimes stronger than you think they would be.”

  “Well, I suppose he’s right about that. If he wasn’t, you wouldn’t hear about mothers liftin’ cars off their kids.”

  “True,” Phyllis said. “I still can’t see Dana doing it.”

  “Neither can I, to be honest. I guess this bale was as close to the cabin as any of ’em, come to think of it, if you wanted to dress a dead man up as a scarecrow and set him up down there.”

  “How do we know he was dead?” Phyllis asked.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Maybe Logan was still alive when he put on those old clothes. Maybe it was his idea.”

  “I can’t see why he’d want to do that.”