The Fatal Funnel Cake

by Livia J. Washburn

  “Phyllis solves murders,” Carolyn said, pointing at her. Phyllis would have just as soon she hadn’t done that, but there was no stopping her.

  Chet’s eyes widened. “You do?” he asked Phyllis. “You’re a detective? Really?”

  “I’ve helped the authorities figure out a few things,” Phyllis admitted. “But I don’t think the police here in Dallas would be interested in anything I had to say.”

  “You don’t know that,” Chet said, getting excited. “You should offer to help them if you think Ms. Broderick isn’t guilty.”

  “What do you think?” Phyllis asked. “You’re around the set here a lot. You might have noticed something that could have a bearing on the case.”

  Chet made a face and shook his head. “Well, yeah, I’m here, but . . . to be honest sometimes my mind sort of wanders a little. As long as there’s no trouble I don’t really pay that much attention. I probably shouldn’t admit that, but like I told you, I don’t plan on making this my life’s work.”

  “Of course,” Phyllis said. “But if you think of anything—”

  She stopped short. She had been about to give Chet her cell phone number and ask him to call her if he thought of anything that might be connected to Joye Jameson’s murder. But then she remembered that she wasn’t investigating this case. There wasn’t really even a case to investigate anymore, since the police had already made an arrest.

  Phyllis finished by saying, “If you think of anything, you should call the police and talk to Detective Morgan or Detective Hunt. I’m sure they’d appreciate any help you could give them.”

  “I’m not so sure they would, but I’ll keep it in mind,” Chet promised.

  Phyllis nodded and said, “It was nice meeting you this week, Mr. Murdock. I hope you get to do what you want in life.”

  “Thanks,” the young man said with a smile. “You, too.”

  Phyllis returned the smile, thought about her family, her friends, and her teaching career, and said, “I already have.”

  • • •

  Traffic was heavy on the freeways, even though it wasn’t officially rush hour yet. Phyllis thought that rush hour in Dallas could almost be considered to exist twenty-four hours a day. However, Sam was a steady, patient driver and got them back to Peggy’s house without any problems.

  “This week certainly hasn’t turned out like I expected it to,” Carolyn commented as they sat in Peggy’s living room.

  “You mean you didn’t think you’d win any of the contests?” Peggy asked.

  Carolyn said, “Hmph. Of course I did. I always expect to win when I enter a contest, and I’m never surprised when Phyllis does.” She looked pointedly at Sam and added, “Some results I couldn’t have predicted, though.”

  Phyllis was about to tell her that that wasn’t a very nice thing to say, when Sam chuckled and responded, “You got that right. You didn’t really have any evidence to go on, since I never cooked much of anything around you ladies before.”

  Well, if he wasn’t upset about Carolyn’s comment, she wasn’t going to leap to his defense, Phyllis decided. Besides, he had a point. Before this whole business about going to the state fair had come up, for all they had known, any food he prepared might have been terrible. Once he started trying out various Spam recipes, it was obvious that Sam really was a decent cook, but the rest of them still didn’t know how his skills would stack up against those of the other entrants in the contest.

  Peggy turned on the TV, and it wasn’t long before an early newscast began. Not surprisingly, the arrest of Bailey Broderick was the lead story.

  “Police have made an arrest in the death of television cooking show host Joye Jameson,” a perfectly groomed anchorwoman said. “Bailey Broderick, twenty-seven, has been charged with murder in the death of Jameson. Broderick has been an assistant producer on the program The Joye of Cooking for several years. So far, police have released no information about a possible motive in the killing. Ms. Jameson, who passed away yesterday afternoon during the broadcast of her show, was originally thought to have succumbed to a fatal allergic reaction to something in a funnel cake she had just eaten.”

  Phyllis hoped the anchorwoman wouldn’t mention that she had cooked that particular funnel cake.

  “We’ll have more on that story as it develops,” the woman on the TV screen went on. “In our other top story tonight, a cold front is headed our way, and this weekend it’s going to bring us our first really fall-like temperatures of the season. For more on that, let’s go over to meteorologist Chip Cavaletti in the weather center.”

  The ringing of the doorbell made Peggy pick up the remote control and mute the sound on the TV. “Who in the world can that be?” she muttered as she lifted herself to her feet, obviously reluctant to leave the comfort of her recliner. “I’m not expecting anybody.”

  She went up the hall to the front door and opened it. Phyllis looked past Peggy and saw a middle-aged man standing there. As far as she recalled, she had never seen him before.

  The stranger was about as average looking as a man could possibly be. Medium height, a little stocky but not really fat, with an open, pleasant face topped by a mostly bald scalp. A fringe of slightly wavy brown hair ran around his ears and the back of his head. The one thing that stood out about him was his gray suit, which Phyllis, while not an expert on such things, thought must have been pretty expensive. It just looked like it cost a lot of money.

  “Mrs. Newsom?” the man asked. His voice was friendly and went well with the rest of him.

  “Nope,” Peggy said. “But she’s here.” She assumed the role of gatekeeper. “What do you want with her?”

  Phyllis had gotten to her feet when she heard the man ask for her. She came up behind Peggy with Sam, Carolyn, and Eve following her and said, “That’s all right. I’ll talk to the gentleman.” She smiled at him. “I’m Phyllis Newsom.”

  “David Miller,” he said, introducing himself. His name was as nondescript as the rest of him. “I’m an attorney—”

  Peggy said, “You guys are going from door to door now to drum up business? I remember when you weren’t even allowed to advertise!”

  “So do I, ma’am,” David Miller said, “but that’s not why I’m here.” He slid a business card case from his coat pocket, took out a card, and extended it to Phyllis. “My client asked me to come and talk to you, Mrs. Newsom.”

  Phyllis took the card, saw that the address on it was a piece of prime real estate in downtown Dallas, and asked, “Who’s your client, Mr. Miller, if you’re allowed to tell me that?”

  “Certainly. I’m representing Ms. Bailey Broderick. It’s my job to keep her from being convicted of killing Joye Jameson, and she seems to think that you might be able to help me.”

  Chapter 21

  It was beginning to seem as if the surprises this week held would never come to an end, Phyllis thought as she looked at the bland-faced attorney. After a couple of seconds went by, she said, “I think you should come in, Mr. Miller. Obviously we need to talk.” Remembering that this wasn’t her house, she glanced over at Peggy and added, “If that’s all right . . . ?”

  “Oh, sure,” Peggy said. “You can’t send him away after a bombshell like that. Come on in.”

  Phyllis and Peggy ushered Miller into the living room. Phyllis asked, “Do we need to speak in private?”

  “These are your friends?” Miller said as he looked around at the others.

  “That’s right.”

  “I wouldn’t insult you or them by implying that they can’t be trusted. However, there are issues of confidentiality . . .”

  Peggy said, “The rest of us will go back in the den, and the two of you can stay in here. Don’t worry, it’s not bugged.”

  “The possibility that it might be didn’t even cross my mind, I assure you,” Miller said.

  “You want somethin
g to drink?” Peggy asked. “I’ve got iced tea and Coke, or I can put on a pot of coffee. I’m not a boozer, though, so I can’t offer you a beer.”

  “Nor am I,” Miller assured her. “Thank you, but I’m fine.”

  Sam said, “You let us know if you need us, Phyllis.”

  When the others were gone and Phyllis and Miller were seated in comfortable chairs, she said, “I really don’t see how I can be of any assistance to you, Mr. Miller. You made it sound like Bailey sent you here to talk to me. How can that be?”

  Instead of answering Phyllis’s question, Miller asked one of his own. “You just called my client by her first name. Does that mean the two of you are friends?”

  “Well . . . no, not really. We’ve only spoken a few times, and then not for long. I suppose I just think of her as Bailey because I’ve seen her on TV so many times. You know, like Regis. That’s just the way people think of him, whether they’ve ever met him or not. I’ll bet most people who come up to him on the street say ‘Hello, Regis,’ not ‘Hello, Mr. Philbin.’”

  Even to herself, Phyllis sounded like she was babbling. She must have come across that way to David Miller, too, because he said in a tolerant tone, as if humoring her, “I’m sure you’re right, Mrs. Newsom.”

  That annoyed Phyllis. She said bluntly, “What is it you want from me, Mr. Miller?”

  “According to my client, you were closer to Joye Jameson than anyone else when she was stricken with her fatal attack.”

  “That’s right, I suppose. I hope your client isn’t trying to say that I deliberately caused that allergic reaction.”

  Miller waved away that suggestion. “No, not at all. She thought that you would be able to testify as to how genuinely surprised she was when Ms. Jameson collapsed, and how she made an immediate attempt to save Ms. Jameson’s life.”

  “She did,” Phyllis replied without hesitation. “Bailey wasn’t just surprised. She was completely shocked, and I’d be glad to testify to that opinion.”

  “Ah, but there’s the problem,” Miller said. “It’s only your opinion. It isn’t evidence. Perhaps Ms. Broderick was doing a fantastic job of acting.”

  Phyllis shook her head. “No, I’m convinced it’s the truth. And aren’t you supposed to be on her side?”

  “Of course. But if you were on the witness stand, don’t you think the prosecutor would raise the possibility that Ms. Broderick was acting?”

  “Oh,” Phyllis said. “You’re right. That’s exactly what would happen.” She frowned. “That brings us back around to me not understanding how I can help you.”

  “I told you why my client suggested that I talk to you. To be honest, even though you were an eyewitness, I’m not sure your testimony would help our case that much. I probably would have gotten around to talking to you eventually, but I wouldn’t have come right over here from the jail if I hadn’t thought of something else.”

  “I’m sure I don’t know what that could be,” Phyllis said.

  “Your name struck me as familiar somehow,” Miller said with a faint smile tugging at his lips. “So I did a little quick research. It didn’t take long to figure out where I’d heard of you before.”

  He took out his phone, touched the display screen a couple of times, and turned it so she could see what he had called up. It was a search engine screen, and her name was in the search box, with a number of results below it.

  “You’re the crime-solving grandma from Weatherford,” he said.

  Phyllis bristled. “I really don’t appreciate being referred to that way,” she said.

  “I’m sorry, I meant no offense. I was just quoting one of the websites about you.”

  “You mean some newspaper story about the cases I’ve been mixed up in?”

  “No, although there are certainly quite a few of those available online, if anybody wants to take the trouble to look. I was talking about one of the fan sites.”

  “The what?”

  “The Phyllis Newsom fan sites. There are several devoted to your crime-solving activities.”

  “Wait a minute,” Phyllis said. “There really are such things?”

  Miller looked at her for a second, then said, “Don’t tell me you’ve never set up a Google Alert for your name.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “It’s a thing where Google sends you an e-mail with a link every time somebody mentions your name on a website or a blog or anything like that.”

  Phyllis shook her head. “I had no idea such things existed.”

  For a moment Miller looked like he didn’t believe her. Then he chuckled and said, “I didn’t think you were serious. But you are, aren’t you?”

  “Completely,” Phyllis assured him.

  “Well, if nothing else, it’s a refreshing attitude in this day and age. You’re something of a celebrity among true-crime buffs, Mrs. Newsom. More importantly for my purposes, though, you’re someone who’s obviously quite observant, or you wouldn’t have been able to solve those other murders. I want you to take me through everything you remember leading up to the moment when Joye Jameson took a bite of that funnel cake you’d just prepared.”

  “Everything? Right here and now?”

  “It’s never too soon to start putting together a strong defense,” Miller said. “I promise you, at this very moment there are assistant district attorneys already working on the case they’ll present to the grand jury when they ask for an indictment against Ms. Broderick. I don’t want them to get too much of a jump on me.”

  “I can certainly understand that. Do you want to ask questions or . . . ?”

  “Just tell me what happened, start to finish, in your own words.” Miller took a pad and pen from his briefcase so he could make notes while Phyllis was talking.

  Phyllis led the attorney through the events of the previous afternoon, starting with when she and her friends had arrived at the broadcast set. Miller took copious notes, evidently preferring that method to recording what she told him. He didn’t interrupt her to ask any questions, but when she was finished, he said, “The cooking oil you used for the funnel cakes was already there on the set when you arrived?”

  “It was,” Phyllis confirmed. “The people on the show had my recipe. Anyone could get it from the state fair, I suppose. Someone—and I assumed it was Bailey—assembled all of the ingredients and had them ready when I got there.”

  Miller nodded. “Yes, that agrees with what Ms. Broderick told me. Making preparations like that is part of her job.”

  “The bottle of cooking oil was sitting on the counter when we got there,” Phyllis said. “It wasn’t a new, unopened bottle, either. I’d say a cup or so of oil had been used from it.”

  “You see, right there is a good reason for me to be here,” Miller said. “I might not have even thought of something like that to ask about it, but to you, noticing it is just second nature.”

  “Well, to be fair, when you cook a lot you pay attention to such things. You don’t want to start something and then realize halfway through that you don’t have enough of one of the ingredients. If my friend Carolyn had been making the funnel cakes, she would have been able to tell you the same thing.”

  “That may well be,” Miller said, “but I’ll bet she wouldn’t make the instinctive leap to the next question that information brings to mind.”

  “You mean, where was the oil kept before the show?” Phyllis asked.

  “Exactly. That’s something I’ll need to find out from my client. I didn’t have a chance to do a lengthy interview with her. I’ll do that in the morning, after the bail hearing.” Miller leaned back in his chair. “Right now, I’m trying to get everything straight in my mind, so I have an accurate picture of the events. I really appreciate your help with that, Mrs. Newsom.”

  “I’ll do whatever I can,” Phyllis said. Somethin
g else occurred to her. “There’s bound to be security camera footage from the Creative Arts Building. Maybe that would show you if someone was messing around with the ingredients. I’m convinced someone substituted peanut oil for corn oil.”

  “From what I’ve heard about the case, I agree, although I don’t have my hands on the autopsy report yet. That’s something else I hope to accomplish over the weekend. There’s a chance that may have to wait until Monday.”

  “There’s something else bothering me . . .”

  As Phyllis’s voice trailed off, Miller urged her, “By all means, go ahead. Given your history, Mrs. Newsom, I’d say your instincts are to be trusted.”

  “Why didn’t the injector work?”

  “The one that Ms. Broderick used in an attempt to counterattack Ms. Jameson’s allergic reaction?”

  “Yes. The epinephrine should have stopped the reaction, shouldn’t it? That’s what those pens are made for, and according to Bailey, she used one once before when Joye had a bad reaction.”

  Miller nodded slowly and said, “That’s true. That’s something else the autopsy report might answer.”

  “Don’t the authorities have to turn copies of all their findings over to you?”

  “Yes, they do, but we’re a long way from a trial yet,” Miller pointed out with a slight smile. “And the police have been known to drag their feet during the discovery phase. But I’ll find out everything that they have; you can count on that. Do you think the autoinjector is important?”

  “Someone could have tampered with it, too.”

  Miller thought about it and nodded. “That would explain why it didn’t work, wouldn’t it? Maybe they substituted something else for the epinephrine so it wouldn’t counteract the allergic reaction.”

  “I saw Bailey take the pen out of her pocket. We need to find out where it was before that and who could have gotten to it.” Phyllis paused. “I’m being presumptuous, aren’t I? Telling a high-powered defense attorney how to handle an investigation. Good grief.”