The Pumpkin Muffin Murder Read online

  “I’m sure that neither of you grew up in a bed of roses, either. A lot of people had it tough back then, and even tougher the generation before.”

  “Yes, and now people worry about being in an area where their cell phone reception isn’t quite as strong,” Phyllis said. “I guess it’s all just a matter of perspective.”

  Before any of them could say anything else, Bobby came wandering down the hall to the kitchen, rubbing his eyes with his knuckles. “I went to sleep,” he said. “I missed my cartoons.”

  “I’m sorry, dear,” Phyllis said as he climbed up into her lap and laid his head on her shoulder. She patted him on the back and added, “Life is hard sometimes.”

  Chapter 5

  Carolyn’s story had touched Phyllis, so later that afternoon when Carolyn was back from putting up the posters and they were both in the kitchen again, she said to her friend, “I’d like to help more with the festival.”

  “You should have come with me to help with the posters.”

  “I know. I’m sorry, I didn’t think about it in time, what with dealing with Bobby.”

  “Well, you’re entering the cooking contest, aren’t you?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Then you’ll be helping to get people to come and donate canned goods,” Carolyn said. “What are you going to make?”

  Phyllis felt a moment of instinctive hesitation. She and Carolyn had gone head-to-head in so many of these competitions, often finishing first and second, or at least in the top five, that she was in the habit of being secretive about the recipes she planned to enter. The rivalry between them was so keen that she didn’t want to give Carolyn any unnecessary advantage.

  But of course in this case that wasn’t a consideration, since Carolyn wasn’t entering the contest. So Phyllis smiled and said, “Pumpkin cheesecake muffins with a pecan crumble on top.”

  “My, that sounds good. People know what wonderful bakers we have here in Weatherford, so I’m sure a lot of them will show up just to sample the contest entries. So you see, you’re doing your part.”

  “I’d like to do more,” Phyllis insisted. “I’ll bet that you’re going to be delivering canned goods and turkey dinners to disadvantaged families on Thanksgiving, aren’t you?”

  “Yes, I volunteered to do that,” Carolyn said.

  “Well, then, I’ll help you.”

  Carolyn frowned. “Aren’t you planning to have a big Thanksgiving dinner here?”

  “Yes, of course. It’s tradition.” Phyllis had been preparing a veritable feast for Thanksgiving almost every year for so many years that she couldn’t even remember how long it had been anymore.

  “So you’ll be busy with that.”

  “Oh, goodness, not so busy that I can’t afford to take a few hours to help people who’ve been less fortunate than I have. Thanksgiving isn’t just about counting your own blessings. It’s about sharing them with others.”

  “That’s true,” Carolyn admitted. “And we can certainly use all the help we can get.”

  “Then it’s settled,” Phyllis declared. “Anyway, I’ll be doing a lot of the cooking the day before, so things will just have to be heated up on Thanksgiving Day. The turkey will take a long time to roast, and Eve can check on it now and then if she needs to.”

  Carolyn frowned. “I don’t know if I’d give Eve any responsibility for such an important part of the meal. She’s a fine woman, but I’m reasonably sure that none of her husbands ever married her for her cooking, if you know what I mean.”

  “I know what you mean,” Phyllis said with a smile, “but I think Eve can handle it.”

  “Let’s just hope you don’t wind up with a burned bird.” Carolyn added, “If you want to help more with the festival itself, you can always come with me tomorrow and help get the park ready.”

  “I think that would be fun,” Phyllis said. “But what about Bobby? I’d have to bring him along, and he might get underfoot while we were trying to work.”

  Carolyn thought about that for a moment, then suggested, “Let Sam watch him for the afternoon.”

  “Sam?” Phyllis repeated, surprised that Carolyn would come up with that idea. Even though Carolyn had been opposed to the idea of Sam moving into the house to start with, the two of them had become friendly, even though they weren’t good friends and probably never would be. Phyllis would have thought that Carolyn believed Sam couldn’t possibly take care of a four-year-old by himself, though.

  “Why not?” Carolyn asked with a shrug. “Bobby’s not really very sick now, is he?”

  “No, I think he’s almost over the ear infection.”

  “And Sam has children, doesn’t he?”

  “Yes, but they’re grown.”

  “They were little once.” Carolyn’s tone took on a slightly caustic edge as she went on. “I’m sure he didn’t take care of them nearly as much as his wife did, but he’s bound to have watched them some. And he has grandchildren of his own.”

  “That’s true.”

  “So I think he could take care of Bobby for a few hours without fouling up too much. Anyway, you’d only be a cell phone call and a ten-minute drive away.”

  “Also true,” Phyllis said. “You’ve convinced me. There’s just one thing you’re forgetting.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I’ll still have to ask Sam if it’s all right with him.”

  Carolyn waved a hand and said, “Land’s sake, Phyllis, you know that man will do anything that you ask him to. He’s your boyfriend, after all.”

  Phyllis felt her face growing warm. “He’s not my—”

  She had started to say that Sam wasn’t her boyfriend, but she stopped as she realized that, actually, he probably was. They had certainly enjoyed some romantic moments over the past couple of years, and they liked spending time in each other’s company in general. And neither one of them was seeing anyone else. Eve had even given up her habitual flirting with Sam since it was so obvious that it wasn’t going to get her anywhere. So, yes, maybe they were boyfriend and girlfriend. But after spending so many years around eighth-graders, Phyllis just couldn’t bring herself to think of it that way.

  “Why don’t we just say that he’s my gentleman friend?”

  “Call it anything you want,” Carolyn said. “You’ve got that man wrapped around your little finger, and you know it. If you ask him to watch Bobby tomorrow, he’ll do it.”

  “We’ll see,” Phyllis said.

  “Shoot, yeah, I’d be glad to watch the little fella.”

  “You’re not just saying that because . . .”

  Phyllis’s voice trailed off. She and Sam were on the sofa in the living room and had been watching the ten o’clock news on TV. Bobby was settled in his makeshift bed for the night, and Carolyn and Eve were both upstairs, as far as Phyllis knew. During a commercial, Phyllis had taken advantage of the opportunity to mute the sound on the television and ask Sam about the possibility of him taking care of Bobby the next day.

  He was looking at her now with one somewhat bushy eyebrow cocked quizzically. “Because of what?” he asked.

  “Because it’s me who’s asking you.”

  A grin stretched across his rugged face. “You know I’d do dang near anything for you, Phyllis. But to tell you the truth, I’d been thinkin’ that I’d like to spend more time with Bobby. No offense, but I don’t get to do much male bondin’ around here. Probably be good for both of us.”

  She had to laugh. “You mean you’re getting tired of being the only rooster in the henhouse?”

  “Well, it’s not exactly like that. . . .”

  “My goodness, Sam Fletcher, you’re blushing.”

  “Yeah, I expect so,” he said. “Anyway, Bobby’s been after me to show him how some of those woodworkin’ tools in the garage operate, so this would be a good chance to do that.”

  Phyllis leaned back. “Woodworking tools? Good grief, Sam, he’s four years old! He doesn’t need to be working with tools.”
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  “Didn’t say that I’d let him use ’em. Won’t hurt to let him start gettin’ familiar with ’em, though. I can see to it that he knows how to handle each tool safely before he ever touches any of ’em.”

  “You’ll be careful?” she asked.

  “You know I will,” he promised.

  Phyllis hesitated a moment longer as she wrestled with an unexpected feeling. It should have been Kenny showing Bobby how to use those tools, she told herself, thinking of her late husband. He had passed away before Bobby was even born, though. That made one grandfather Bobby had never known, and with Sarah’s father doing so badly, Bobby probably wouldn’t remember his other grandfather, either.

  But he would have a good friend in Sam, Phyllis realized, so she nodded and said, “All right, as long as you make sure he doesn’t get hurt. He’ll need to stay well back, and he should wear safety goggles, too.”

  “He’ll love that,” Sam said, grinning again. He gestured toward the TV. “Weather forecast is comin’ on.”

  Phyllis turned the sound back on, and they sat there watching as the meteorologist, who looked like she had just graduated from college and was gorgeous enough to be a model, explained that Friday would be partly cloudy and Saturday would be mostly cloudy and cooler as a front came through. No rain, though, which was good. Rain would ruin the festival.

  They sat there through the sports report and the latest explanation of why the Dallas Cowboys weren’t playing as well as they should have been. Then Phyllis turned the TV off because neither of them cared to watch any of the late-night talk shows or any more news.

  Before she could stand up, though, Sam said, “A while ago when you were askin’ me how come I agreed to watch Bobby, you were afraid I said yes just because I’m your boyfriend, right?”

  “No, of course not,” she said. “I mean . . . well . . . I wanted you to be honest with me, Sam. I don’t want you to feel like you always have to do what I want. Or what you think I want.”

  “I’m honest with you. Always have been. At least I try to be. I’ve always felt like you’re honest with me, too.”

  “Oh, yes, of course.”

  “Like I told you, I want to spend as much time with Bobby as I can. He’s full of questions, and he’s a smart kid. There’s nothin’ like a smart kid for keepin’ you on your toes.”

  Phyllis laughed. “That’s the truth. You never know what he’s going to say.”

  “Yeah. Like the other day”—Sam leaned closer to her—“when he said, ‘My gran’mama’s your girlfriend, ain’t she, Sam?’ ”

  “Oh!” Phyllis said. She punched him on the arm. “He didn’t say that! Did he?”

  “Swear to God. He’s a perceptive little cuss.”

  “I’m just . . . not sure I’m ready to be back in junior high again.”

  “Well, now, there’s the difference between you and me. . . . Part of me never left junior high.” His arm tightened around her shoulders.

  Phyllis leaned against him and sighed. “Oh, well. I suppose there are worse things than feeling like you’re in eighth grade again.”

  Chapter 6

  The next day was breezy, and warm for November. After lunch, Carolyn told Phyllis, “We need to go by the school and pick up the scarecrows Dana and her friends made. She has them in the back of her SUV. She said just to come by her room and get the key.”

  That was fine with Phyllis, although she hadn’t been to the elementary school where Dana Powell taught since the carnival just before Halloween a couple of years earlier, when a murder had taken place there. Those weren’t good memories, but at least the killer had been caught.

  “Will we need to take both cars to carry them?” she asked.

  Carolyn nodded. “Probably. There are a dozen scarecrows. We can put two or three in each trunk, and the others can ride in the backseats.”

  Phyllis had to chuckle at the image that conjured up of her and Carolyn playing chauffeur for a bunch of scarecrows.

  They left the house and drove to Oliver Loving Elementary School on the outskirts of town. Carolyn was a frequent visitor, but everyone in the office seemed to be glad to see Phyllis again when they checked in there and got their visitor passes.

  Dana Powell had her fourth-grade students working long-division problems on the whiteboard when Phyllis and Carolyn got to her room. She waved them in, told the kids to keep working, and went to her desk to get the key to her SUV from her purse.

  “Phyllis, it’s good to see you again,” she said with a smile as she handed Carolyn a ring of keys with an attached remote control fob.

  “Phyllis wants to help set up the decorations,” Carolyn explained.

  “That’s great. We can use all the volunteers we can get.”

  “It’s nice to see you, too, Dana,” Phyllis said. “I ran into your husband at the park yesterday.”

  “Logan? What was he doing there?”

  “He said he was looking the place over and deciding where to put the decorations,” Phyllis explained, a little surprised that Dana seemed surprised. She would have thought that Dana would know what her own husband had been doing. Although there were some couples who just didn’t talk much, she reminded herself. Whatever it took to make a marriage work . . .

  “All of that’s been pretty much decided already,” Dana said.

  Phyllis shrugged. “That’s what he told me.”

  “Oh, it doesn’t really matter,” Dana said with a wave of her hand. She wore rings on several of her slender fingers. “I guess he just wants to feel like he’s being helpful.”

  Phyllis wasn’t convinced that was what Dana really thought, but as Dana had said, it didn’t really matter, at least where the Harvest Festival was concerned.

  “Phyllis is going to help me deliver canned goods and turkey dinners on Thanksgiving, too,” Carolyn said.

  “Well, you’re really getting into the spirit.” Dana smiled.

  “I have a lot to be thankful for,” Phyllis said. “I’d like to pass some of that along.”

  “That’s a good attitude.” Dana motioned at the keys. “You can just drop those off at the front desk if you’d like. I can pick them up later.”

  Carolyn nodded. “All right. I’ll see you after school.”

  They said their good-byes and left the classroom. As they walked out of the building, Phyllis said, “You’ll be helping with the preparations after school?”

  “Yes. I’m sure it’ll take until sometime tonight to get everything ready,” Carolyn replied. “We may be working late.”

  “I’d offer to help you, but . . .”

  “I know. You have Bobby to take care of. What you’re doing this afternoon is plenty, Phyllis, really. Having the two cars means I won’t have to make two trips.”

  Carolyn knew what Dana’s SUV looked like. It was bright red and easy to spot in the parking lot, so she had parked nearby and Phyllis had followed suit. Carolyn pushed the button on the remote to unlock the vehicle as she and Phyllis came up to it, then pushed another button that opened the rear gate. With a loud beep, it started to rise.

  At the sight of the scarecrows that filled the back end of the vehicle, Phyllis said, “They look almost like a bunch of bodies piled in there.”

  Carolyn frowned. “That’s a rather gruesome thought, isn’t it? Of course, given your predilection for finding bodies . . .”

  “Don’t even start,” Phyllis said in a tone of mock warning.

  The scarecrows had been made by stuffing overalls and flannel shirts with crumpled newspaper with wire running through them, so they were lightweight and flexible. The heads were stuffed burlap bags on which button eyes had been sewed. Noses and mouths had been drawn on with markers, and straw hats were pinned to the heads. The feet and hands were made of dried johnsongrass leaves that Carolyn had collected from a friend’s family farm. They had been happy to get rid of the troublesome weed that reduced crop yields.

  As Carolyn had predicted, they were able to put two scarecrows in each
of the car trunks. Phyllis put one in the front seat of her car, on the passenger side, then lined up three more in the backseat.

  “We could use the HOV lanes, if there were any in Weatherford,” she told Carolyn with a smile.

  Carolyn had loaded her car the same way. She stepped back, studied the grinning scarecrows for a moment, and then said, “That’s just creepy. I suppose they’ll look good sitting on bales of hay around the park, though. The hay was supposed to be delivered this morning, and the booths and decorations will go up this afternoon and this evening.”

  “I can take Dana’s keys back to the office, if you’d like,” Phyllis offered. “You can go on to the park, and I’ll catch up to you.”

  “All right.” Carolyn tossed the keys to her. “I’ll see you there.”

  Phyllis walked back into the school while Carolyn got in her car and started the engine. A couple of teachers were standing at the counter in the office, talking to Katherine Felton, the school secretary, when Phyllis walked in. They looked over at her and smiled, and the one who was short, a little plump, and pretty, with curly dark hair, said, “It’s Mrs. Newsom, isn’t it?”

  “That’s right,” Phyllis said.

  “You may not remember me. I’m Barbara Loomis.”

  “Of course I remember you,” Phyllis said truthfully. The woman’s name had come back to her almost right away, possibly because Carolyn had mentioned her just the day before. She nodded to the other teacher, a tall blonde, and added, “And you’re Ms. Grantham.”

  “That’s right,” the woman said. “Jenna Grantham. It’s good to see you again, Mrs. Newsom. Carolyn talks about you all the time.”

  Jenna was around thirty, Barbara about ten years older than that. Phyllis didn’t know either of them well but had seen them on numerous occasions, usually when Carolyn asked her to come along to some school function.

  Barbara said, “Carolyn certainly has stayed involved with the school, even though she’s retired.”

  “Well, she likes it here,” Phyllis said. Carolyn had taught at this particular elementary for the final few years of her career, after having spent most of her time at one of the older schools. “She’s always enjoyed being around the children and doing things to help.”