Murder by the Slice (19 page)

Marie found a place for her dish, and then turned to take Carolyn’s green bean casserole. Phyllis’s sweet potatoes went into the refrigerator last. As Marie closed the door, she said, “I believe all those dishes have the name of who they belong to on them, but I’m sure there’s no hurry about getting them back.”

“None at all,” Phyllis assured Joel.

“I can even come by and pick them up when you’re done with them,” Marie went on. “How’s Becca doing?”

Joel shrugged. “As well as can be expected, I guess. None of us are doing great, of course. That’ll take some time.”

“She didn’t go to school today, did she?”

“No, she’s in her room.” Joel took a step toward the hall. “I can get her if you want to see her… .”

“Oh, no, let her rest,” Marie said.

Actually, Phyllis wouldn’t have minded asking the little girl a few more questions, but this was hardly the right time or place. But then, was there ever a right time and place for a murder investigation?

Joel stood there awkwardly. Phyllis was afraid that he was going to steer them back to the front door and out of the house, but then he said, “Where are my manners? Would you ladies like some coffee?”

Marie smiled at him. “That would be very nice. Thank you, Joel.”

He fussed around, opening cabinet doors until he found cups. There was already coffee made, so all he had to do was pour it. A sugar bowl sat in the middle of the kitchen table, along with a little ceramic box that held packets of artificial sweetener. Joel got a carton of half-and-half from the refrigerator. His movements were brisk and his hands were steady. He had the sort of crisp assurance that most doctors demonstrated.

Within a few minutes, the four of them were sitting around the kitchen table, sipping coffee. Phyllis sensed that there was still a bit of a strain in the air, but that probably wasn’t going to go away any time soon. The occupants of this house would have to get over Shannon’s death first.

“I suppose you’d all like to know about the funeral,” Joel said.

Actually, Phyllis hadn’t planned on attending the funeral. She hadn’t known Shannon that well. But she couldn’t say that to Joel, not here and now, so she just nodded along with Carolyn and Marie.

“It’ll be at Victory Baptist Church at eleven o’clock tomorrow morning,” Joel went on.

Marie reached across the table and patted his hand. “Russ and I will be there,” she said. Phyllis and Carolyn just murmured noncommittally.

“I’m thinking about establishing some sort of … memorial … in Shannon’s name. I haven’t decided what to do yet. Something for the school, maybe.” Joel looked around the table. “Any suggestions you might have would be more than welcome.”

“We’ll think about it,” Phyllis promised. “There are always a lot of things a school can use that aren’t provided for in the budget.”

Joel smiled again. “I know. Believe me, I know. Shannon preached that sermon to me many times. And I know she was right. I shouldn’t have begrudged her the time and effort she spent on the … school.” His voice began to break a little. “If I hadn’t … then maybe we—we wouldn’t have …”

He had to stop and draw in a deep breath as he struggled to control his emotions. Marie squeezed his hand and smiled sadly at him.

Phyllis couldn’t help but feel sorry for the man. She knew that Shannon had been sincere about wanting to help the school, but at the same time, the question of her involvement with Russ Tyler still remained. Was it possible that she had piled so many jobs on Marie and kept her busy just so she would be out of the way and wouldn’t notice that her husband was having an affair? It could have been that way, Phyllis decided.

“What about Kirk?” Marie asked in an obvious attempt to get Joel’s mind on something else. “How’s he doing?”

Joel shrugged and shook his head. “Who knows how

Kirk is doing? I’ve never been able to get a handle on that kid. Sometimes he seems pretty broken up, and sometimes he acts like he doesn’t even care that Shannon is gone. They didn’t get along very well, you know. I don’t think he’s ever forgiven her for sending him to military school when he was sixteen.”

“She sent him to military school?” Carolyn said.

Joel nodded. “Yeah. She didn’t have any choice, the way he was acting. Running with the wrong crowd, getting in trouble with the law, probably messed up on drugs …” He gave a heavy sigh. “Shannon thought the school could give him some discipline that she couldn’t. I agreed with her. I’d tried to be a father to the kid, to help him grow up, but he wasn’t having any of it. So I thought military school was worth a try.” He laughed hollowly. “I guess it didn’t take. Kirk came back as sullen as ever. Shannon convinced him to go to college, but he dropped out after a semester. He can’t hold a job, and he started hanging out with the same bums who got him into trouble in the first place.”

“We saw a young man leaving just as we got here,” Phyllis commented.

“Yeah, that was Lane Erskine. He’s actually not as bad as some of the others. He used to be pretty wild, but he’s settled down some, I think, since he had a kid and got married … in that order, by the way. But I still wish Kirk would go back to school or try to get a decent job or—or something! I know it drove Shannon crazy thinking that she had raised a failure for a son.”

Phyllis had seen the way Shannon treated Kirk, and it had been a dysfunctional relationship on both sides, as far as she was concerned. Joel didn’t need to hear that right now, though. She said, “I’m sure that in time he’ll straighten out. Nearly all children are vexations to their parents at times, but sooner or later they grow up and make us proud of them.”

Joel grunted, as if to say that when it came to Kirk, he would believe it when he saw it.

Marie said, “I guess we’d better be going,” and got to her feet. Phyllis and Carolyn stood up, too, as did Joel. Marie went around the table and gave him a hug. “If there’s anything Russ and I can do to help, you just let us know,” she told him.

Joel nodded and managed to smile again. “Thank you,” he said. He looked over at Phyllis and Carolyn. “And thank you for the food, too. It’s very kind of you.”

“You take care, now,” Carolyn told him. Phyllis just gave him a smile and a nod.

As they left the house, she noticed that the clouds had thickened even more. The sky looked like there might be rain before nightfall. That could ruin trick-or-treating for the kids.

But considering the atmosphere in the Dunston house, gloom was more than appropriate… .

Chapter 18

On the way back to Marie’s house, Carolyn said, “I don’t believe we’ll be going to the funeral, if you think that’s all right.”

“Sure,” Marie said. “It’s not like you were all that close to Shannon, or even knew her for very long. I understand, and I’m sure Joel will, too, if he even notices that you’re not there.”

“How long did you know her?” Phyllis asked.

“Oh, gosh … since our kids were in preschool together? Yeah, I guess that’s when I met her. She was a lot different back then, let me tell you. Still really … driven, you know, but not like she was later. She just wanted to do the best she could for her kids. She hadn’t really gotten into the whole supermom thing yet.”

“I guess you saw her a lot at school activities and things like that.”

“Oh, yeah. Trips to the zoo and the museums and the Stockyards. And Girl Scouts for a while, until the kids got tired of it. And of course once the kids were all in regular school, there were PTO meetings. That’s where Joel and Russ first met. They hit it off right away.”

Phyllis wanted to ask how Russ and
Shannon
had hit it off, but she didn’t think that would be a very good idea.

“Our families weren’t really
close
close, you know,” Marie mused, as Phyllis drove back toward her house. “But we saw a lot of each other for a while. We could tell that Shannon and Joel were drifting farther and farther apart. Russ was planning to have a talk with Joel, try to help him, you know, but he never did. Shannon and Joel separated before Russ got a chance to talk to him. And then the divorce went through quick after that. Poor Joel was like a deer caught in the headlights. Once Shannon made up her mind, he never had a chance.”

“People ought to be able to get along,” Carolyn said, “especially when they have children.”

“Yeah. Why, if Russ ever told me we were getting a divorce, I’d kill his ass.” Marie laughed. “Well, not really, of course. But I wouldn’t ever let anything interfere with
my
marriage. It comes first. I guess Shannon never really felt that way.”

I guess not,
Phyllis thought.

And the way Marie had threatened to kill her husband just now was only a figure of speech. A rather tasteless one, under the circumstances, but clearly that hadn’t occurred to Marie. She didn’t really mean that she would commit murder to save her marriage.

Did she?

“Here we are,” Marie said as Phyllis pulled up in front of her house. “Thanks for the ride. I appreciate not having to go over there by myself. It was easier with all three of us.”

“We were glad to do it,” Carolyn said. “I’ll see you at church, dear.”

“Yeah,” Marie said as she got out of the car. The chilly wind whipped in through the open door. “Bye-bye.”

She shut the door solidly and turned to go up the walk toward her house. As Phyllis pulled away from the curb, Carolyn said, “She’s really a nice young woman. A little too salty in her language for my taste, but I suppose it could be worse. My goodness, some of the young people today swear like sailors—even the women!”

Phyllis knew that was true. She had heard stories from some of the other retired teachers about kids as young as first and second grade coming to school and spewing obscenities that threatened to turn the air blue around their heads. And of course the only place they could have learned those words was at home. Or day care. But the filthy words had originated in
somebody’s
home, that was for sure.

As they got back to the house and Phyllis pulled into the driveway, she saw Sam come out the front door and start toward his pickup. His long legs carried him quickly along the walk, and his face wore a concerned expression. Phyllis stopped the car in the driveway, opened the door, and stood up to call over the top of the Lincoln. “Sam! What’s wrong?”

He stopped and looked around at her. He wore boots, jeans, and a denim jacket over a flannel shirt, and looked more like a weathered old cowboy than a retired basketball coach and history teacher.

“Got a call from the sheriff’s department,” he said.

Phyllis’s heart leaped into her throat. Ever since Mike had become a deputy, she had hated those words for their potentially ominous portent.

“What is it?” she asked, her voice tight with the strain she felt.

“They’ve arrested Gary Oakley.”

Phyllis frowned. “Who?”

“That custodian I knew up in Poolville. You met him the other day at the carnival, after all the uproar. You know, out in the parking lot.”

Phyllis remembered the man now. She also remembered that Gary Oakley had been acting a little suspiciously that day, asking Sam to help him get away from there without being questioned by the deputies. He had told some story about needing to get home to feed his dogs, but at the time Phyllis hadn’t been sure she believed him.

“What did they arrest him for?” she asked now.

“They think he killed Mrs. Dunston,” Sam said.

“Dear Lord!” Carolyn exclaimed. She had gotten out of the Lincoln and was standing close enough to hear what Sam and Phyllis were saying. “You mean that nice man we talked to is a murderer?”

Sam started to shake his head, then stopped and shrugged instead. “That’s what the sheriff thinks. I don’t know whether I believe it or not, though. I knew Gary pretty well, and he never seemed like a killer to me.”

“Why did he call you?” Phyllis asked. “Don’t people who have been arrested usually call their lawyer?”

“Usually. Maybe he doesn’t know any lawyers and wants me to find one for him. Or maybe he wants to borrow money to pay for a lawyer. I don’t know. He just asked me to come see him, so I reckon I’ll go.”

That was so much like Sam, Phyllis thought. A friend called for help, and he answered without hesitation.

But in this case, the friend might actually be guilty of a very serious crime. If the accusation was true, would Sam be able to see that in time to protect himself from getting involved with Gary Oakley, or would his friendship blind him to the truth?

“Why don’t I go with you?” Phyllis suggested.

Sam frowned slightly. “I think I can handle this—”

“Of course you can, but a lot of the deputies know that I’m Mike’s mother, and so does the sheriff. I just thought it might make things go a little smoother if I was along.”

Sam shrugged again and seemed mollified. “Well, sure, I’m always glad for your company, Phyllis.”

“Just let me put my car away while you’re warming up your pickup.”

She knew that engines didn’t have to be warmed up as much as they did in the old days, but it seemed like the right thing to say, anyway. Quickly, she finished pulling the Lincoln into the garage, and then got out to join Carolyn on the front lawn for a second.

“Be careful,” Carolyn said. “If that man’s really a murderer, there’s no telling what he might do.”

“We’ll be in the middle of the sheriff’s department,” Phyllis pointed out. “I think we’ll be safe enough.”

At least, she hoped that was the case.

Sam had the pickup running. He started to get out and open the door for her, but Phyllis waved him back into his seat and opened the door herself. Such gestures were nice, but she was no shrinking violet who r
equired
them of the men around her. As she slid onto the seat beside Sam and closed the door, she thought how …
manly
the cab smelled. It wasn’t any particular scent she could put her finger on, but rather a blending of aromas that served as a reminder of the fact that the person who spent more time than anyone else in this truck was male.

The closest route to the sheriff’s department was along two sides of the square, out the old Fort Worth highway past the farmers’ market, and over the railroad overpass. The sheriff’s department and county jail were on the left just past the overpass. It didn’t take long to get there, but Phyllis had time to ask, “Did Mr. Oakley say anything else besides telling you he’d been arrested?”