The Fatal Funnel Cake (17 page)

Chapter 24

D
avid Miller's office was in a glass, chrome, and steel high-rise in downtown Dallas. A modern art sculpture that reminded Phyllis of something that had been left out in the sun until it partially melted adorned the plaza in front of the building.

“I don't care for big buildings like this,” Phyllis told Sam as they crossed the plaza. “And according to Mr. Miller's card, his office is on the twenty-second floor. I always worry about riding that high in an elevator. It's the only time I really feel claustrophobic.”

“Statistics say it's safer than crossin' the street out here.”

“And you know the old saying about that. There are lies, damned lies, and statistics.”

Sam grinned. “Thirty-seven per cent of all statistics on the Internet are made up, you know.”

“They are? Where did you—” Phyllis stopped in midsentence and narrowed her eyes at him. After a moment she sighed and shook her head.

Even though it was Saturday morning, there were several people in the lobby of the office building. Phyllis and Sam had to go past a security desk, and the guard on duty there stopped them and asked, “Can I help you folks?”

“We're here to see David Miller,” Phyllis told him. “He's expecting us.”

“I'll need to double-check that. Your names?”

“Phyllis Newsom and Sam Fletcher.”

The guard nodded, picked up a telephone, and punched a couple of buttons on its base. After a moment he said, “Yes, I have a Mrs. Newsom and a Mr. Fletcher to see Mr. Miller . . . Thanks.” He hung up the phone and told them, “You can go on up. The elevators are right over there. Mr. Miller's office is on twenty-two, in case you didn't know that already.”

“Thank you,” Phyllis told him. “Do you screen everyone who comes in all the time, or just on the weekends?”

“Pretty much all the time,” the guard said. He smiled. “A lot of criminal defense attorneys have their offices here, and so do some divorce lawyers. You get people with grudges coming in every now and then.”

“I'll just bet you do,” Sam said.

He and Phyllis walked over to the bank of elevators. Phyllis looked up and said, “At least these aren't the kind with glass walls so that you can see how high you're going. I don't care for those, either.”

“Don't the glass walls help with the claustrophobia?” Sam asked as he pushed the
UP
button.

“Maybe a little, but the fear of heights more than counteracts it.”

One of the elevator doors opened, and a computerized female voice announced in dulcet tones, “Going. Up.”

“I don't know if I'll ever get used to machines talkin' to me,” Sam said as they stepped into the car. “Guess I've seen too many movies about how they're gonna take over someday. I'll bet they're already plottin' against us.”

The door closed and the elevator rose so smoothly it almost didn't seem like they were moving. Phyllis knew they were, though, and her nervousness increased a little with every floor number that changed on the display beside the elevator controls. After a few moments, Sam said, “This'll give you a nosebleed.”

The elevator came to a stop, and the disembodied voice said, “Twenty. Second. Floor.” The doors opened.

“Thank goodness,” Phyllis said. “It was starting to seem like there wasn't enough oxygen in here.”

They stepped out into a reception area with marble floors and a horseshoe-shaped counter. There were places for several receptionists to work behind that counter, but at the moment only one was on duty, a very attractive young woman with short, sleek blond hair. She said, “Mrs. Newsom? Mr. Fletcher?”

“That's right,” Phyllis said.

The woman stood up. She wore a white blouse and a fairly short black leather skirt, and she was tall, probably an inch over six feet. Not much of that height came from high heels, either, Phyllis saw as the receptionist walked out from behind the counter. Her shoes were low heeled and looked comfortable.

“Mr. Miller is expecting you,” she said unnecessarily. “If you'll follow me . . .”

They went through a door into a carpeted hall with several doors on either side, all of them closed at the moment. At the end of the hall was a set of double doors. One of them was partially open.

The receptionist stopped at that door and said, “Mrs. Newsom and Mr. Fletcher are here.” She opened the door wide and stepped back so they could go in.

Miller's office wasn't ostentatiously fancy, but it was comfortably and expensively furnished, Phyllis saw, and the wall behind the lawyer's big desk was mostly glass, which provided a spectacular view of downtown Dallas. The window faced north, and Phyllis felt like she could see halfway to Oklahoma when she gazed in that direction. She tried not to think about how high they really were.

Miller stood up from the big leather chair behind the desk. Bailey sat in a slightly smaller chair in front of the desk. Miller extended a hand and said, “Please come in and have a seat, and thank you for coming down here this morning.” He glanced at the door and added, “Thanks, Karen,” to the receptionist.

Phyllis shook hands with the lawyer and said, “I don't think you were formally introduced to my friend Sam Fletcher yesterday.”

Miller shook with Sam as well. “No, but I know who you are, of course, Mr. Fletcher. Watson to Mrs. Newsom's Holmes, eh?”

Sam grinned and said, “I've tried to tell her that, but she claims not to see it.”

“I just think comparing me to Sherlock Holmes is ridiculous,” Phyllis said. “I'm not that fond of it when people bring up Miss Marple, either.” She turned to the young woman seated in front of the desk and went on, “How are you this morning, Miss Broderick?”

Bailey sighed. The slightly haggard look on her face told Phyllis that she probably hadn't slept much the night before. That was no surprise. Phyllis remembered how difficult it was to sleep behind bars . . . and she hadn't been charged with something nearly as serious as murder.

“I'll be all right, I suppose,” Bailey said, “at least when this is all over and my name has been cleared.” She glanced at Miller, then looked at Phyllis again. “It's not that I don't appreciate the concern, Mrs. Newsom, but I'm still not completely clear why you're here . . .”

“Wasn't that obvious from the context of what we just said?” Miller asked. “Mrs. Newsom has something of a reputation as a detective. She's solved several murders.”

Bailey's tired-looking eyes widened. “Really?”

Phyllis didn't think it would be wise to bring up her theory that Miller wanted her involved with the case more for the sake of publicity than for anything else. Bailey needed all the optimism she could muster right now.

Besides, Sam might be right: Maybe there really was something she could do to help them discover the truth about Joye Jameson's death.

Miller waved Phyllis and Sam into two of the comfortable leather chairs arranged in front of the desk, and as he sat down himself, he said, “I want to go over everything I've been able to pry loose from the police and the district attorney's office so far. I'm sure they're holding things back—they always do—and we'll have a fight on our hands getting everything from them. But for now we know that Joye Jameson died of anaphylactic shock brought on by an allergic reaction to peanuts. The allergen appears to have been introduced into her system by the oil in which Mrs. Newsom's funnel cake was fried.”

Bailey looked at Phyllis and said, “You're lucky they didn't jump to a different conclusion and arrest you.”

“Believe me, I know,” Phyllis said, nodding.

Miller waved a hand. “Such a charge never would have stood up. I could have gotten that thrown out at the arraignment. Mrs. Newsom had no chance to tamper with the oil. It was already there when she arrived, and she was in front of hundreds of witnesses the whole time she was around it.”

“Was all the oil in the bottle peanut oil instead of corn oil?” Phyllis asked.

Miller nodded. “That's my impression, yes, except for some residual traces of corn oil.”

“So whoever did it poured out the corn oil and poured in the peanut oil, filling it to the same level it had been before.”

“That's a reasonable assumption,” Miller agreed.

“Is it all right for me to ask questions?”

“By all means, Mrs. Newsom. You're here so that I can take advantage of that keen brain of yours.”

Phyllis ignored the flattery and turned to Bailey. “Do you remember when that bottle of oil was last used before Thursday's show?”

Bailey had lost some of her dull, dispirited look. She seemed to be taking an interest in what was going on, which was reasonable considering that her freedom was at stake.

“It was only used once,” she said. “That was on Tuesday, when Joye fried some chicken. I opened it then.”

“It hadn't been opened before? The seal was intact?”

“That's right.”

“So no one could have tampered with it before that.”

“No. If they had, Joye would have had a bad reaction to the chicken. She ate several bites from a piece of it during the broadcast.”

Phyllis nodded and asked, “What did you do with the bottle after that episode?”

“I put it back in the cabinet that's built into the set. That's where we keep all the nonperishable ingredients and supplies, just like in a pantry. There's a big refrigerator/freezer backstage for the perishable stuff.”

“Does that cabinet have a lock on it?”

Bailey nodded. “Yes, and we try to keep it locked up whenever no one's around.”

Miller asked, “Who has the key to it?”

“Well, there are several keys. Joye has—I mean, had one. Reed. Our prop man, Dan Connolly. And I have one, too, of course. I probably have to get in there more than anybody else.”

“Any others?”

“I don't know. It's possible. Somebody could have had a copy made.”

Miller frowned and said, “It's probably not the best lock in the world, anyway. Somebody might have been able to get it open.”

“Do you use the same set every time you broadcast from a remote location?” Phyllis asked.

“We've been using this one for about a year,” Bailey said. “It breaks down into its components so it can be loaded on trucks and transported easily. Joye liked for the show to have the same look to it no matter where we were broadcasting from.”

“So everyone on the crew and in the production staff is familiar with it?”

“Sure. The set is just part of the job.”

“So everyone would have known where the oil was kept?”

Bailey shrugged and said, “I guess so. They would if they ever paid any attention to things like that. I couldn't tell you who did and who didn't.”

“We'll try to find out,” Miller said. “I or one of my associates will be interviewing everyone connected with the show.” He paused for a second. “Getting back to the bottle of oil . . . Naturally your fingerprints would be on it.”

Bailey nodded. “Of course.”

“When Ms. Jameson fried that chicken on Tuesday, did she pour the oil into the pan, or did you?”

“Joye did,” Bailey said. “I'm sure of it. But you can check the tapes of the show if you want to.”

Miller smiled and said, “That's something else I'll be doing. I plan to watch every episode you broadcast from the state fair. There's no telling what might show up. Your friend Mr. Hayes is supposed to send a DVD over anytime now.”

Bailey's eyes dropped for a second at the lawyer's mention of Reed Hayes. Phyllis noticed that and wondered if it meant anything. She didn't want to take that tack right at the moment, though, so she said, “What about other fingerprints? Would anyone have had a reason to be handling that bottle of oil besides you, me, and Joye?”

Bailey shook her head. “Not that I know of.”

“Do you have any idea why the autoinjector didn't work?”

The question seemed to take Bailey by surprise. She shook her head again and said, “I don't know. I guess I just supposed the reaction was too strong . . .”

“You told me you'd used one of them on Joye before,” Phyllis reminded her.

Miller leaned forward and looked intrigued. “We hadn't gotten into this yet,” he said. “I'm glad you brought it up, Mrs. Newsom.”

Bailey said, “Yes, like I told you, a couple of years ago in New Orleans I used one of the pens when Joye got hold of some candy with peanuts in it. There weren't supposed to be any peanuts in the candy, but there was one hidden inside the chocolate—”

“Hidden?” Miller repeated. “You mean someone tried to murder Ms. Jameson two years ago?”

“No, no, nothing like that,” Bailey said. “It was purely an accident. The lady who made it was a guest on the show. She made some with peanuts and some without, because we'd told her that Joye was allergic. It was just a mix-up. The poor woman was horrified that she'd gotten it wrong.”