The Pumpkin Muffin Murder (6 page)

“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.”

T
he 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.”

“And we’re glad to have her volunteering,” Jenna said. “She’s worked with some of the resource kids on their reading and made a big difference.”

“You taught junior high, didn’t you?” Barbara asked.

“That’s right. Eighth grade. American history.”

Barbara shook her head. “You couldn’t pay me enough to teach junior high. All those hormones in the air.”

“Yeah, and the kids can be a pain, too,” Jenna said with a smile.

Phyllis handed Dana’s keys to the secretary. “Mrs. Powell said we could leave these here and she’d pick them up later.”

“I’ll make sure she gets them,” Katherine promised.

“What were you doing with Dana’s keys?” Jenna asked. There wasn’t any suspicion in her voice, just curiosity.

“Carolyn and I picked up the scarecrows,” Phyllis explained. “We’re going to take them over to the park and set them up on the hay bales.”

“That’s going to be cute,” Barbara said. “I’m glad Dana thought of it.”

“I didn’t know it was her idea.”

Barbara nodded. “Oh, yes. She’s very creative.”

“And she has her husband to help her.”

“Logan?” Barbara asked with a puzzled frown. “I wouldn’t say he helps all that much with things like this. He’s like my husband. Too busy with his business all the time. They’re in the same line of work, you know. Real estate.”

“I know,” Phyllis said. “I ran into him at the park yesterday morning, and as a matter of fact, he was talking to your husband on the phone.”

“You were at the park?” Jenna asked.

“That’s right. I took my grandson there to play. He really loves the place.”

“It’s a nice little park,” Jenna agreed. She glanced at her watch. “Well, I’d better get busy. I still have a lot to do, and my conference period will be over before you know it. Talk to you later, Barbara. Nice seeing you again, Mrs. Newsom.”

“You, too,” Phyllis said. She hadn’t meant to linger this long at the school. Carolyn was probably already at the park by now. But there was a bond between teachers, even between active ones and retired ones, and she always enjoyed visiting with people who knew what it was like to stand up there in front of a classroom full of students and try to plant some knowledge in their heads. It was one of the most frustrating but at the same time one of the most rewarding jobs in the world.

By the time Phyllis reached the park, Carolyn had already unloaded three of the scarecrows from her car and propped them up on bales of hay. Thin wooden stakes went down through the gap between the shirt collar and the back of the overalls and were driven into the hay to hold the stuffed figures upright. Phyllis thought they looked very distinctive and picturesque.

There were a lot more people here today than there had been the day before. City employees were unloading and setting up portable toilets and sawhorses for crowd control. The sound of hammering filled the air as other employees erected the booths that were being rented by local businesses to promote their goods or services. All the local civic clubs were sponsoring booths, too, that would be used for various arts and crafts displays, games and face painting for the kids, and concession stands. It was definitely a busy place.