The Pumpkin Muffin Murder

by Livia J. Washburn

  “My schedule isn’t that full right now,” Juliette said. “Besides, what lawyer doesn’t like a good murder case?”

  Phyllis wasn’t sure there was such a thing as a good murder case, but she didn’t say that. Instead, she told Juliette, “If there’s anything I can do to help, please let me know.”

  “All right. I’ll try to keep you informed as to what’s going on, but you realize that my first responsibility is to my client now.”

  “I wouldn’t have it any other way,” Phyllis said.

  She hung up and related Juliette Yorke’s plans to Carolyn, who nodded in satisfaction. “From what I’ve seen of Ms. Yorke, she’s a good lawyer,” Carolyn said. “I just hope she can help Dana.”

  Phyllis started the car. “I’m sure she can.”

  “What about you?”

  “What about me?” Phyllis asked with a frown.

  “You’re going to investigate, too, aren’t you?”

  “I don’t want to interfere with whatever Ms. Yorke has planned.”

  “If anyone can come up with the evidence to clear Dana’s name, it’s you, Phyllis, and you know it,” Carolyn said. “That lawyer can handle all the legal technicalities, but you’re the one who can uncover the truth. You know the police won’t do it. They’re satisfied that they already have Logan’s killer, and they’re not going to be looking for anything that might contradict that.”

  Carolyn had a point. As far as Detective Largo and the rest of the police force were concerned, the investigation had been concluded successfully. All that was left for them was the prosecution of the case against Dana Powell.

  “I’ll think about it,” Phyllis said. “I might be able to come up with a few questions. If I do, I suppose it wouldn’t hurt anything to ask around. . . .”

  “That’s what I thought. I’d be glad to help you.”

  “I’ll let you know.” When she had found herself investigating murders in the past, Sam had usually been at her side. As he put it, she was the brains and he was the brawn. Mostly, though, his intelligence and common sense made him the perfect person to bounce things off of as she was trying to figure out what had really happened. Given Carolyn’s argumentative nature, Phyllis wasn’t sure she could fill that role as well, but she didn’t want to say that to her old friend.

  She drove back to the house, mulling over everything Detective Largo had said. Largo seemed to have an answer for everything, but there was one question they hadn’t covered, Phyllis realized.

  What was the significance of the pumpkin muffin in Logan’s mouth, and how had it gotten there? If, indeed, Phyllis reminded herself, it really was a pumpkin muffin. . . .

  When they got back to the house, they found Sam and Bobby in the garage, standing by the workbench. Bobby was wearing the outsized goggles, and he grinned as he said, “Look at me, Gran’mama. I’m a Martian again!”

  “You certainly are,” Phyllis told him. “Thank you for looking after Bobby, Sam.”

  “My pleasure,” Sam said. “Heck, I put him to work. He does a good job handin’ boards to me.”

  Phyllis saw the curiosity in his eyes and knew he wanted to ask how it had gone with Dana, but he didn’t want to bring up the case in front of the little boy. She said, “Bobby, why don’t you go inside with Carolyn now? I’ll be in in a few minutes.”

  Bobby pulled the goggles off. “Okay. I’ll help you paint those boards later, Sam.”

  “Sounds like a deal,” Sam told him.

  When Carolyn and Bobby had gone in the house, Phyllis said, “We got Juliette Yorke to handle Dana’s case. She’s going to try to get her out on bail tomorrow.”

  “That lady lawyer seems pretty smart, from what I’ve seen of her,” Sam said. “How’s Miz Powell holdin’ up?”

  “Not well,” Phyllis replied with a shake of her head. “I don’t know how she’s going to get through this.”

  “With help from all her friends—that’s how she’s gonna get through it. Same as anybody else.”

  Phyllis patted his shoulder. “That’s a nice thought, but there’s only so much that friends can do.” She smiled and shook her head again. “Carolyn thinks that I should investigate the case and try to find out who really killed Logan.”

  “So do I,” Sam declared. “Let’s face it: You’re good at pokin’ around in things like that.”

  “The last time, my poking around almost got both of us killed.”

  “Yeah, but we’re still here and a killer’s behind bars.”

  Phyllis couldn’t dispute that point. “I told Carolyn I’d think about it,” she admitted. “I’d really like to know whether or not that was part of a pumpkin muffin in Logan’s mouth, and if it was, how it got there.”

  “There you go,” Sam said. “Start with that.”

  “Someone needs to look deeper into Logan’s background, too,” Phyllis went on, becoming enthused with the idea despite herself. “The reason he was murdered has to be there. This wasn’t a random killing. It was too well planned for that. Someone must have really hated him to go to so much trouble.”

  Sam nodded. “Sounds to me like you’re on the right track. If I can give you a hand, just let me know.”

  “I will,” Phyllis promised. She went in the house and got out the phone book. She had some calls to make.

  Not all the numbers Phyllis was looking for were in the book. These days, some people didn’t even have regular telephones, only cell phones, especially younger folks. But Carolyn had the numbers Phyllis couldn’t find, since she had worked with everyone involved in getting ready for the Harvest Festival.

  Phyllis made the calls to Kendra Neville, Taryn Marshall, and Jenna Grantham first. She had to leave messages for Taryn and Jenna, but Kendra answered her phone and agreed to meet at Phyllis’s house that afternoon around three o’clock. Then Phyllis called Barbara Loomis, the only one of the three teachers who had a regular phone number listed in the directory.

  A man answered. Phyllis said, “Mr. Loomis?”

  “Yeah, this is Ben Loomis, if that’s who you’re looking for.”

  “Actually, I was hoping to speak to your wife. This is Phyllis Newsom calling.”

  “Barbara? Yeah, she’s here somewhere. Wait just a—Hey, I know your name! You’re the lady who’s solved all those murders.”

  “Well, there haven’t really been that many. . . .”

  Loomis laughed. “Hey, solving even one murder is more than I could do. I can’t even tell what’s gonna happen on the TV shows I watch.” The man’s tone grew solemn as he went on. “Is this about what happened to Logan Powell?”

  “That’s right,” Phyllis said. She decided that since she was already talking to Ben Loomis, she might as well take advantage of the opportunity to ask him a few questions.

  “That was a terrible thing, just terrible,” Loomis went on before Phyllis could say anything. “Logan and I were, I guess you’d say, friendly rivals for several years.”

  “That’s right; you were in the same business, weren’t you?”

  “Yeah, real estate. Commercial development, mostly. Logan was working on a really big deal. I don’t know what’s gonna happen with it, now that he’s gone.”

  “You mean NorCenTex Development?” Phyllis asked.

  “That’s right! Say, you must really keep up with the real estate market if you know about that, Mrs. Newsom.”

  “Well, I’m always on the lookout for good investments, you know,” she said. She thought dangling the prospect of potential investment money in front of Loomis, so to speak, would keep him talking.

  “You couldn’t do better than that mall. When it goes in on the west side of town, once all the zoning issues are taken care of, it’ll be quite a boon now that the economy’s recovered. The slump around here was never as bad as it was in other places, you know.”

  “I know,” Phyllis said, trying to sound like she knew what she was talking about. As a matter of fact, even during the economy’s bad times, it had seemed to her that
Weatherford and the surrounding area just kept growing by leaps and bounds.

  With a rueful chuckle, Loomis said, “I tried to talk Logan into letting me in on the main deal, but he had that pretty well sewed up. I’ve managed to get some of the leavings, though, in locations around the mall property. I should do okay.”

  “I certainly hope so.”

  Loomis laughed again. “Here I am, yammering on about business, when you called to talk to my wife. You should never ask a salesman about his job, I guess. I’ll go find Barbara.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Hang on.”

  Phyllis heard him put the phone down. The few minutes while Ben Loomis went to look for his wife gave Phyllis time to think about what she had just learned. A full-fledged mall being built here in town was a big deal indeed. Weatherford had a lot of shopping developments, especially along the interstate, but the closest actual mall was twenty miles away, in Fort Worth. With the population growing like it was, Phyllis thought, such an enterprise would probably be a big success . . . and it would mean a lot of money for whoever handled the sale of the property.

  Earlier she had toyed with the notion that Ben Loomis might have had something to do with Logan’s death. Now it appeared that the stakes were high enough to provide a possible motive. Someone would have to take over the NorCenTex Development deal. Phyllis needed to talk to Dana and find out whether Logan had any associates who could do so, or if the whole thing would be up for grabs again.

  Of course, talking to Dana was dependent on her actually getting out of jail.

  “Mrs. Newsom? Phyllis?”

  That was Barbara Loomis’s voice. “Yes, Barbara,” Phyllis said. “How are you?”

  “Not good,” Barbara said. “Have you heard that Dana’s been arrested? We found out when we went to the hospital to try to see her. I can barely believe it, but it’s true!”

  “I know,” Phyllis said. “That’s why I’m calling. I’d like to talk to you and Dana’s other friends, so I thought maybe you could come by my house this afternoon? About three o’clock?”

  “You want to talk about what we can do to help her?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Then I’ll be there,” Barbara said with grim determination. “I can call Jenna and Kendra and Taryn, too, if you’d like.”

  “I’ve spoken to Kendra already and left messages for the other two.”

  “I’ll make sure they’re there,” Barbara promised. “You can call it a council of war if you want, because if going to war is what it takes to clear Dana’s name, then that’s what we’ll do!”

  Chapter 23

  A Sunday afternoon in the fall usually meant that the Dallas Cowboys were playing, and in this part of the world, even for someone who wasn’t a football fan, it was almost impossible not to hear and read about the games. Phyllis, for example, knew that the Cowboys were playing one of their main rivals, the Philadelphia Eagles, that afternoon. She offered to meet with the ladies somewhere else in the house so that Sam could watch the game on the big TV, but he wouldn’t hear of it.

  “The set in my room’s just fine,” he told her. “Me and Bobby can watch the game there, can’t we, Bobby?”

  “Yep,” the little boy said. He had been tagging along with Sam for most of the day.

  “Anyway, it doesn’t really matter,” Sam went on. “The Cowboys are probably gonna lose. I’ve never really forgiven ’em for gettin’ rid of Tom Landry the way they did.”

  “Who’s Tom Landry?” Bobby asked.

  Sam peered down at him for a long moment, then said, “Boy, your daddy’s been neglectin’ your education. You come along with me, and I’ll tell you all about Roger the Dodger and Dandy Don and Bullet Bob and, most of all, the Man in the Hat.”

  Phyllis smiled as Sam led Bobby out of the living room.

  “I’m sitting in on this meeting,” Carolyn announced.

  “I’m not,” Eve said. “I have some errands to run, and Sunday afternoon is a good time to do them. There aren’t very many people out during the game.”

  Phyllis nodded and said an all-inclusive, “That’s fine,” to both of them. She knew that Carolyn would want to be part of any effort to help Dana. The challenge would be to keep her from losing her temper and making things more difficult when they were dealing with the authorities.

  The four teachers showed up only minutes apart. Phyllis had coffee and tea ready, along with some of the pumpkin muffins from the canceled contest. She hoped that none of the visitors would regard her serving them as being in bad taste.

  When the six of them were settled in around the living room with cups of whichever hot beverage they preferred, Phyllis began by saying, “I suppose I should bring you up to date on what’s happened since Dana was arrested this morning.”

  She told them about her conversations with Juliette Yorke and her visit to police headquarters to see Dana. When she described Dana’s tortured emotional state, expressions of anger and pity appeared on the women’s faces.

  “They can’t get away with this,” Barbara said. “Is this lawyer you’ve arranged for any good, Phyllis?”

  “I think so,” Phyllis replied. “She’s the only defense attorney I actually know, but she seems quite competent. And Detective Largo didn’t seem happy that Ms. Yorke was going to be representing Dana, so that bodes well, I think.”

  “I agree,” Carolyn said. “That detective wouldn’t be worried if she didn’t think Ms. Yorke was a good lawyer.”

  Phyllis went on. “I don’t know of any delicate way to put this, but how well is Dana fixed, financially? Can she afford to pay Ms. Yorke, or do we need to start thinking about raising funds for that?”

  “Oh, goodness, I think she can pay,” Jenna said. “Logan was doing really well in his business, and Dana’s been teaching long enough that she makes a pretty good salary, too.” She looked around at the others. “Don’t you think?”

  They all nodded, and Barbara said, “Money shouldn’t be a problem, as long as the district attorney doesn’t try to freeze their assets or something like that.” She frowned. “Can he do that if she’s charged with murder?”

  “I don’t know,” Phyllis said. “That’s something I can ask Ms. Yorke the next time I talk to her, though.” She paused, then said, “There’s something else I need to be blunt about. Detective Largo believes that Dana killed Logan because he was having an affair. Do any of you know anything about that?”

  Kendra stared wide-eyed at Phyllis and asked in a voice that had a little surprised squeak in it, “Are you saying that the police think Logan was cheating with one of us?”

  “What?” Phyllis stared back at her for a second, then exclaimed, “Oh, no! That’s not what I meant at all! I just wondered if Dana had ever said anything to you about being suspicious of Logan.”

  “She never said anything to me,” Barbara said, “and anyway, I don’t believe it. Logan had his faults—to be honest, he sort of neglected Dana in favor of his work most of the time—but I don’t think he was cheating on her.”

  “I never heard anything about that,” Taryn said, and Kendra chimed in, “Neither did I.”

  Phyllis said, “Detective Largo claims that it doesn’t matter whether Logan was really cheating. She says that if Dana believed he was, that’s enough to constitute a motive.” She glanced over at Carolyn. “And we know that she did believe it, because she fought with Logan about it at the park on Friday night and then said something about it to Carolyn and me yesterday morning before his body was discovered.”

  “That’s terrible,” Barbara murmured as she looked down at the floor and shook her head. “I’m surprised she kept it from us like that. We were all so close. But honestly, she never said anything to me about suspecting Logan of such a thing.”

  “So none of you would have any idea whether or not it was true?”

  Jenna said, “Even if it was, I don’t see how it’s going to help matters to dig up a bunch of dirty laundry now. Say that you proved Logan was
fooling around. Wouldn’t you just be making the police’s theory stronger?”

  “Not necessarily,” Phyllis said. “You see, if we’re assuming that Dana didn’t kill him—”

  “She didn’t,” Carolyn said.

  “Then the unavoidable conclusion is that someone else killed him,” Phyllis continued. “It seems to me that the most likely suspect would be the woman he was having an affair with. Maybe she wanted Logan to leave Dana, and he refused.”

  The four teachers exchanged long looks; then Barbara shook her head. “I’m sorry, Phyllis,” she said. “We’d help you if we could, but we just don’t know anything about that.”

  Phyllis was disappointed, but she had no choice but to believe them. She knew it was entirely possible that Dana had held in all her worries about Logan and never shared them with her friends. Phyllis hoped she could ask Dana about that directly, once Dana was out of jail. Until she heard differently, she was going to hope for the best and assume that Juliette Yorke would be able to arrange bail.

  “All right,” she said. “None of you know whether Logan was having an affair or not. What can you tell me about him? What do you know about his business, his background, anything that might give someone a reason to want him dead?”

  “Well, he was in business, right?” Taryn said. “He’s bound to have had some enemies.” She glanced at Barbara. “No offense. I don’t mean to say that Ben has enemies.”

  Barbara laughed and shook her head. “None taken, because of course he does. Anytime someone’s successful, there’s going to be somebody out there who’s jealous of that success, at the very least. Or someone who thinks that they’ve been done wrong. And I know from experience that real estate can be pretty cutthroat. I’m not saying there’s anybody out there who’d like to murder Ben, but I’m sure there are people who wouldn’t mind seeing him fail or even go broke. They’d get a big kick out of it, in fact.”

  “But not Logan Powell, right?” Phyllis said.

  “No, not Logan. They were friends, even if they were competitors. Oh, Logan might have felt a little resentment if Ben snapped up some juicy deal he had his eye on, and vice versa, but—” Barbara stopped short, her eyes widening. A look of anger appeared on her face. “Wait just a minute! You’re not saying that Ben could have had something to do with Logan’s death!”