The Pumpkin Muffin Murder (8 page)

Carolyn stood up and said, “You’ve done all the cooking today, Phyllis, so Eve and I will clean up.”

“We will?” Eve said.

Carolyn began gathering up the plates. “Yes, we will. Come on.”

Phyllis didn’t argue. What with looking after Bobby for the past few days and now helping with the preparations for the festival, she was a little weary tonight and didn’t mind admitting it.

Sam lingered at the table with her. “Bobby got a real kick out of workin’ with me this afternoon,” he said. “And he didn’t even cut any fingers off.”

“How could he? You didn’t let him use the tools, remember?”

“Yeah, that’s right. When the time comes, though, I reckon he’ll be good at it.”

“I appreciate you mentioning Kenny the way you did. Even though Bobby never met him, I want to make sure he knows about his grandfather. I think it’s important for people to have a sense of—I don’t know—continuity with the generations that came before them.”

Sam nodded. “I couldn’t agree more. Got to know where you came from to really know where you’re goin’.”

Before either of them could say anything else, the doorbell rang. Since Carolyn and Eve were in the kitchen, Phyllis called out, “I’ll get it,” as she stood up from the dining room table. She hoped Bobby wouldn’t open the door before she could get there. Surely Mike and Sarah had taught him not to do such a thing.

She didn’t have to worry about that, she saw. He came running back down the hall from the living room, and when he saw her, he said, “Somebody’s here, Gran’mama!”

“Yes, I know,” Phyllis said with a nod. “We’ll see who it is.”

Sam trailed behind her as she went to the front door, and she was glad he was there. She wasn’t really nervous about answering the door like this after dark—this was a nice, safe neighborhood, after all—but she couldn’t help but remember how she had been assaulted and a murder had taken place right next door a couple of years earlier.

When Phyllis reached the front door, she parted the curtain over the narrow window next to it. The porch light was equipped with a motion detector, so it was already turned on. Phyllis frowned in surprise as she saw Dana Powell standing on the porch with an upset, impatient look on her face. She appeared to be alone.

Phyllis opened the wooden door, then the screen. “Hello, Dana,” she said. “I didn’t expect to see you again so soon.”

“Mrs. Newsom,” Dana said, “did you and Carolyn take my keys back to the office at school?”

Phyllis was taken even more aback by the abrupt question. She glanced past Dana toward the curb at the edge of the street and saw the red SUV parked there.

“Of course we took them back,” Phyllis said. “Or rather, I did. I gave them to Katherine Felton myself.”

Dana’s shoulders suddenly sagged, and a look of contrition mixed with exhaustion came over her face. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean to sound like I was accusing you of anything. I’m just . . . I don’t know what. . . .”

A wave of sympathy went through Phyllis. She stepped back, holding the door. “Come in,” she said. “You look like you ought to sit down and take it easy for a minute.”

“I really don’t have time—”

“I have some nice herbal tea already brewed. And some pumpkin muffins,” Phyllis said.

Over her shoulder, Sam added, “They’re really good muffins, too.”

“I . . . I guess it wouldn’t hurt to . . .”

Phyllis wanted to find out what had happened with the keys, and she wasn’t sure it was a good idea for Dana to be driving around while she was so upset. She needed to calm down and revitalize a little first. Phyllis reached out, put a hand on the younger woman’s arm, and said, “Come in for a few minutes. Please.”

“All right.” Dana sighed. “Thank you.”

Phyllis ushered her into the living room, where they both sat down on the sofa, Dana putting her purse at her feet. Phyllis looked up at Sam and asked, “Could you go get a cup of tea and one of those muffins?”

“Sure,” he said. “Be glad to.”

“Don’t go to any trouble,” Dana said.

“It’s no trouble at all,” Phyllis assured her. As Dana sat back and sighed, Phyllis went on, “What’s this about your car keys? I saw that you came here in your SUV.”

Dana nodded. “I have a spare key. It doesn’t have the remote on it, of course. So I was able to get in and start it. I’m worried about the others, though. My house keys are on there.”

Phyllis wasn’t surprised that Dana kept a second set of keys. She did the same herself in case she accidently locked her keys in her car. She asked, “Katherine didn’t give them back to you?”

“They weren’t in the office,” Dana replied with a shake of her head. “Or at least Katherine couldn’t find them. She said she thought you brought them back, but things got really busy in the office, and she couldn’t be sure.”

“I did bring them back,” Phyllis said. “Barbara Loomis and Jenna Grantham were even in there when I gave them to Katherine. They can tell you what happened.”

“They were already gone when I left the school. I haven’t seen them since then.” Dana sighed again. “Now I don’t know whether to be relieved or even more worried. The keys could still be in the office somewhere. To tell you the truth, Katherine’s gotten so absentminded, she could have put them somewhere and forgotten where.” Dana hesitated. “Or she could have set them down on the counter and someone could have walked off with them without her noticing.”

Phyllis shook her head. “Surely not. They’ll probably turn up in a day or two.”

“I hope so. It’s a scary feeling, knowing that the keys to your house and car could be floating around out there somewhere, in the hands of God knows who.”

Sam came back into the living room then, carrying a couple of saucers, one with a teacup on it, the other with a pumpkin muffin. He placed them on the coffee table in front of the sofa where Phyllis and Dana sat, saying, “There you go.”

Phyllis realized she had neglected to introduce Dana and Sam. “Mrs. Powell, this is my friend Sam Fletcher. Sam, Dana Powell.”

Sam gave the visitor a polite nod. “I’m pleased to meet you,” he said. “Heard quite a bit about you the past few days, what with this Harvest Festival comin’ up. I understand you’ve been doin’ a lot to make it successful.”

“I hope so,” Dana said. She picked up the tea and took a sip, and she seemed to calm down a little right before Phyllis’s eyes. “It’s for a good cause, but it’s certainly been a lot of work. I have to go back to the park tonight and make sure that everything is set up like it’s supposed to be. I’ll head over there as soon as I’ve gone home and changed clothes.” She was still wearing the dress she’d worn to school that day.

“Maybe you should skip it, since you’re tired and upset,” Phyllis suggested. “I’m sure the other volunteers can take care of things.”

Dana shook her head. “No, I’ll be fine. I know Carolyn’s going over there, and my husband is, too, along with several of my other friends. I can’t let them down.”

“Have you even had supper yet?”

Dana reached for the muffin and smiled. “This will tide me over,” she said. She took a bite, chewed it, and let her eyes widen in appreciation. “Oh, that’s so good!”

“And sweet enough to keep you goin’,” Sam said.

“That’s exactly what I need.”

Dana seemed to feel a lot better by the time she finished the muffin and the tea. She thanked Phyllis, who said, “Let me get you another muffin. You can take it with you, in case you run out of steam later tonight and need something else to eat.”

“Oh, that’s not necessary—”

“I insist. I can always make plenty more. In fact, I plan to, because they’re going to be my entry in the contest tomorrow.”

Dana laughed. “I think you have a good chance of winning, then. That muffin was delicious.”

Phyllis went to the kitchen to get the muffin. Carolyn and Eve were just finishing up with the dishes. “Sam mentioned that was Dana at the door,” Carolyn said. “Is she still here?”

Phyllis nodded as she wrapped one of the muffins in a paper towel. “Yes, but she’s on her way home to change; then she insists she’s going to the park to help with the last-minute preparations.”

“That and to keep an eye on her husband,” Carolyn said, keeping her voice quiet enough so that it couldn’t be heard in the living room.

“What do you mean by that?” Phyllis asked.

“You saw the way Logan was flirting with you today. I don’t think he meant anything by it, but if he does that with all the women he meets, sometimes he’s bound to be serious about it.”

Eve looked interested. “What’s this about some man flirting with Phyllis?”

“It was nothing,” Phyllis insisted. “I’m still convinced that Carolyn was mistaken.”

Carolyn looked at Eve and said, “I’ll tell you all about it later.” She hung the damp dish towel over its rack. “Right now, though, I have to get to the park myself. I may be over there late, so don’t wait up for me.”

“I wasn’t planning to, dear,” Eve said.

Phyllis took the muffin back to the living room and handed it to Dana, who stood up. “Thank you so much,” the younger woman said. “And again, I’m sorry I sounded like I was accusing you of something. I just wanted to make sure that Katherine hadn’t gotten mixed up. Actually, I was sort of hoping that she had, because that would mean you still had my keys.”

Phyllis shook her head. “No, I’m sorry. I wish I knew what happened to them.”

“Well, like you said, maybe they’ll turn up.” She went to the door and turned to smile at Phyllis and Sam. “I’ll see you tomorrow at the festival, I hope.”

“We’ll be there,” Phyllis promised. “Wouldn’t miss it.”

P
hyllis was up early the next morning, getting two dozen more muffins in the oven. That would give her plenty for the contest judges, as well as small samples that visitors to the festival could pick up and try once the contest was over.

True to Carolyn’s word, she had been at the park late the night before. In fact, Phyllis wasn’t even sure when Carolyn had come in. She had been asleep by then.

Bobby had slept through the night without any problem, and he was still asleep this morning as Phyllis worked on the muffins. She had just put the first batch in the oven when Sam came into the kitchen, wearing his bathrobe and pajamas and holding a hand over his mouth as he yawned.

“Just heard the weather forecast on the radio,” he said. “Cool front’s still supposed to come through this mornin’. We’re lookin’ at sunny and dry, with a high in the upper fifties.”

“Perfect weather, in other words,” Phyllis said as she closed the oven door. “That ought to ensure that there’s a fine turnout for the festival.”

“I’m sure there will be. There’s signs all over town advertisin’ it.” Sam got a cup out of the cabinet and reached for the coffeepot.

Carolyn came in a few minutes later. Eve tended to sleep in most mornings, so Phyllis knew they wouldn’t see her for a while. Carolyn helped herself to coffee.

“Late night?” Phyllis asked. “I didn’t hear you come in.”

“It was after midnight,” Carolyn said as she sat down at the table. “That’s all right; I don’t sleep as much as I used to, anyway.”

“That’s one of the perils of gettin’ old,” Sam said. “Sleep gets harder and harder to come by.”

Carolyn nodded in agreement. “It certainly does. I wasn’t the only volunteer there, though, by any means. In fact, a few people were still there when I left.”

“What about Dana?” Phyllis asked as she added some more coffee to her own cup to heat up what was already there.

Carolyn frowned and shook her head. “No, Logan was still there, but Dana left earlier. It looked to me like she was upset.”

“Oh, no,” Phyllis said. “I hoped that when she left here, she had calmed down. I know it’s upsetting to lose your keys, but . . .” Her voice trailed off as she saw Carolyn shaking her head again. “It wasn’t about the keys?”

“I don’t know. I couldn’t hear what they were saying. But it looked like they were arguing. They walked out onto that bridge over the drainage ditch leading into the lake, and Logan was waving his hands around and almost shouting. Then Dana stormed off and left a few minutes later.”

“I hate to hear that.”

“Mark my words: It was about another woman,” Carolyn said. “Logan just has that look about him.”

Sam said, “You can tell by lookin’ if a fella’s liable to cheat on his wife?”

“Of course,” Carolyn answered.

“That doesn’t seem possible,” Phyllis said.

“Oh, no? Think about the famous celebrities and politicians who were philanderers. Once the scandals broke, didn’t you feel like you should have known, just by the way they looked and acted in public?”

“Maybe, but it still seems far-fetched to me,” Phyllis insisted. “And Logan Powell isn’t a celebrity or a politician. He’s a real estate agent.”

“Who’s a self-styled big shot in the chamber of commerce. That brings him into contact with a lot of professional women, not to mention the ones who are involved in his own business. Did you ever see a woman selling real estate who
wasn’t
attractive? They’re almost as good-looking as those pharmaceutical reps who go in and out of doctors’ offices all the time!”