Death Bakes a Pecan Pie

by Livia J. Washburn

  Flowerbeds, most with cactus growing in them, and concrete walkways divided the asphalt lot from the park itself. As Phyllis, Carolyn, and Eve got out of the car, Phyllis saw at least a hundred people milling around and talking in loud voices, as well as numerous pieces of large, unfamiliar equipment, probably lights and cameras. Movie-making appeared to be an exercise in controlled chaos. That agreed with some of the things she had read about it. Of course, all that chaos would come to an abrupt halt whenever Lawrence Fremont called, “Action!”

  Eve handed her the pie container, which had been in the back seat on the drive over. Phyllis took it and looked around, searching for a familiar face.

  Before she could find one, a young man holding a clipboard hurried over to them and said, “What are you ladies doing? You’re not supposed to be here—”

  “Yes, they are, Chad,” a booming voice said. Phyllis looked around to see Alan Sammons striding toward them. The producer went on to the young man, “These lovely ladies are with me.” Then he put an arm around Eve’s shoulders while he waved the other hand toward the lake and said, “Come on. I’ll show you how the magic is done.”

  Chapter 8

  “We don’t want to take you away from your work, Mr. Sammons,” Phyllis said as the producer led them along one of the concrete walks toward the lake.

  “Alan, remember?” he said. “And you’re not really taking me away from anything. By the time the process gets to this point, my services aren’t really needed all that often. Everything is in the hands of the director, the AD, the director of photography, the grips, people like that. They know what they’re doing, and somehow the system all comes together and functions. The only time they need me is if something goes wrong and somebody has to step in and referee.”

  “The producer isn’t even on location most of the time, isn’t that right?”

  Sammons shrugged. “Some are more hands-on than others. In the old studio system, the director was also the producer at times. That’s not as common now because everything is more compartmentalized. That’s due to the unions, to a certain extent, and also to the fact that the studios don’t really make movies anymore. Production companies do, and there might be half a dozen of them involved in the same picture. The big stars nearly always have their own production company, so when they agree to act in a movie, they’re going to get a producer’s credit, too. It’s always been a big business. Lots at stake for everybody.” He grinned. “Are you thinking about getting into the movie business, Phyllis?”

  “Goodness, no,” she said. “I just like learning about new things. That helps keep the brain sharp at my age.”

  Carolyn said, “I don’t think you have to worry about keeping your brain sharp. Solving murders ought to take care of that just fine.”

  “It would be perfectly all right with me if I never had another murder to solve.”

  “That’s what you keep saying,” Carolyn replied, “but it never seems to work out that way, does it?”

  Phyllis didn’t have any answer for that.

  Luckily she didn’t have to, because Melissa Keller came up to them just then and said, “There you are! I was wondering when you’d get here, Phyllis.”

  Looking at Melissa this morning was a bit more like gazing into that mirror Sam had mentioned. She wore a wig, as Phyllis had suspected she might, and was dressed in a similar outfit of jeans and long-sleeved shirt, although she wore a sweater over the shirt rather than a lightweight jacket. In the novel, Eve hadn’t gone into much detail about the sort of clothing each of them usually wore, but evidently the movie’s wardrobe department had found enough description to work with. Melissa was still a few inches shorter than Phyllis, of course, and Phyllis still believed she looked younger and more glamorous, but she had to admit that overall the casting was pretty accurate.

  “And you brought another pie, too,” Melissa went on. “That’ll make some people happy, especially Lawrence. He said something earlier this morning about how good that one last night was.”

  Phyllis didn’t say anything about her suspicion that Melissa had sneaked the last piece of pie in the kitchen the night before. If she wanted to pretend that she had resisted temptation, that was fine.

  “There’s no need for you to carry that around,” Sammons said. He lifted a hand, waved to somebody, and called, “Teddy!”

  Phyllis expected a young man to respond to that summons, but instead it was a young woman with long dark hair who hurried over. “Yes, Mr. Sammons?” she asked in a voice that sounded very much to Phyllis like it came from Brooklyn.

  Sammons took the pie container out of Phyllis’s hands and passed it to the young woman. “Take this to the craft services table, but put a hands-off note on it. Lawrence won’t happy if somebody else comes along and gobbles it all up before he gets some.”

  “Sure thing, Mr. Sammons,” Teddy said. “Hands off, by order of you.”

  She hurried off with the pie. Carolyn asked, “Is she an actress?”

  “Teddy? No, no, she’s a production assistant. An assistant production assistant.”

  “She’s striking.”

  “Is she?” Sammon said. “I really hadn’t noticed.”

  Phyllis was willing to bet that he had noticed, though. Alan Sammons probably noticed every attractive young female in his vicinity. But if Earl Thorpe could be believed, he behaved himself with them, so Phyllis supposed she couldn’t think too badly of him for looking.

  He ushered them on toward the crowd gathered along the lake shore and around the buildings. The vendors’ booths where arts, crafts, and food would be sold during the festival were already set up and their signs were in place, because during today’s filming everything was supposed to look like it would the next day when the public flocked in here. Orange, brown, and green decorations representing autumn were hung on the buildings and in the trees. Green portable toilets had been brought in and placed around the park, because the regular public restrooms in a rustic stone and wood building wouldn’t be enough to handle the crowd at the festival.

  As Phyllis, Carolyn, Eve, and Sammons approached one of the old log cabins, Phyllis suddenly tensed as she saw the hay bales stacked in the dogtrot and arranged to form a big seat.

  “Oh, dear,” Carolyn muttered under her breath, and Phyllis knew she had noticed the bales, too. Both of them slowed and then stopped.

  “Something wrong, ladies?” Sammons asked with a frown.

  Carolyn said, “It’s just that seeing those hay bales . . . I can’t help but be reminded . . .”

  “They bring back some bad memories,” Phyllis said. “Of course, we knew that case is the one that Eve used in her book, but to actually see them the way they were that day . . .”

  Eve said, “Oh, dear! I’ve stirred up a lot of painful feelings, and I didn’t really mean to do that—”

  “No, it’s all right, really,” Phyllis told her. She summoned up a smile. “After all, I’ve read your book and it didn’t bother me that much.”

  “Me, either,” Carolyn said. “But seeing the scene like this, looking so much like it did, that’s more difficult somehow.”

  Sammons said, “If you’d like to leave, it’s perfectly understandable.”

  Phyllis looked at Eve. She knew Eve wanted her friends to be here today, to share in her success. Phyllis had no intention of letting down a friend, so with a more genuine smile she continued, “No, that’s not necessary. I’m fine. Really. And all of this . . .” She waved a hand to take in the hubbub around them. “This experience is so interesting and exciting I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

  “Yes, I feel the same way,” Carolyn added, although she didn’t sound quite as sincere as Phyllis did.

  A relieved smile appeared on Eve’s face. “I’m glad. But maybe when they bring out the scarecrow prop, it would be a good idea if we didn’t watch. When will that be, Alan?”

  “I think those shots are on the list for this afternoon,” Sammons replied. “I can talk to Lawren
ce and see if we can rearrange things, if that will help. He probably won’t like it, but—”

  “You don’t have to do that,” Phyllis said. “We’ll have had more time to get used to it by then, won’t we, Carolyn?”

  “Of course. This isn’t your fault, Eve, so please don’t blame yourself.”

  “It’s nobody’s fault,” Phyllis said. “Just circumstances. And we can deal with circumstances.”

  Sammons held out a hand and said, “Let’s go on and find a good place for you ladies to sit and watch what we’re doing this morning, then.”

  Instead of going on past the log cabin where the hay bales were stacked in the dogtrot, they turned onto another walk and followed it past the iron skeleton of an old covered wagon and some playground equipment toward the cottage where the park’s caretaker lived. When they came to a concrete picnic table with benches beside it, Sammons suggested, “How about right here? I’ll have some director’s chairs brought over for you to sit in, though. They ought to be more comfortable than these benches.”

  “That’s not necessary,” Phyllis said. “We’ll be fine here, won’t we?”

  “Yes, I think so,” Carolyn said. “Thank you for your consideration, Mr. Sammons.”

  “Don’t mention it,” the producer boomed. “We wouldn’t even be here if it weren’t for you ladies. You were all part of Eve’s novel.”

  Eve nodded and said, “I certainly couldn’t have written it without these two. And Sam, of course. Why, nothing really exciting happened until Sam moved in with us.”

  That was true, Phyllis realized. The first murder in which she had gotten mixed up had been committed shortly before Sam rented the extra room in the house, but they hadn’t discovered that it was a murder until after he was one of them. And since then . . .

  Maybe it was his fault all these bizarre things kept happening, Phyllis told herself with a smile. She didn’t really believe that . . . but it was an interesting enough idea that she was probably going to tease him about it when she got the chance.

  ◄♦►

  One of the movie crew came up and summoned Alan Sammons to deal with some question or problem mere moments after Phyllis, Carolyn, and Eve sat down at the picnic table, so they were left to themselves to watch the whirlwind of activity in the park. People scurried everywhere, men shouted to each other and shoved equipment around, and none of it made the least bit of sense to Phyllis.

  After a while she saw a large group of people moving around from the other side of the lake, following the road that circled the park. She wondered if those were the extras and searched for Sam and Ronnie among them. Sam hadn’t said anything about working as one of the extras, but Phyllis didn’t believe for a second that a movie fan like him would pass up an opportunity to appear on screen.

  Sam’s height and Ronnie’s blue hair helped Phyllis pick them out of the crowd. After a minute, Sam spotted her and waved, and that prompted Ronnie to wave, too.

  “They look like they’re having fun,” Eve said. “I may have to get in on that myself before the day is over.”

  Carolyn said, “Better you than me.”

  “What do you have against being in a movie?”

  “I don’t know. The whole thing just seems a little . . . undignified to me. But I never had that urge to be a performer.”

  “I don’t know about that,” Phyllis said. “All of us were teachers, after all. We got up in front of an audience every day.”

  “A captive audience,” Carolyn pointed out. “It’s not the same thing.”

  Eve said, “I think Phyllis is right. We had dozens of critics watching us all the time. And a lot of the time they were a hostile audience.” She laughed. “I hadn’t ever thought of it that way, but there certainly are a lot of similarities.”

  Carolyn just shook her head, still unwilling to go along with the idea.

  Before they could talk about the subject any more, Earl Thorpe hurried past, then stopped abruptly when he realized who they were. “Good morning, ladies,” he greeted them. “What do you think of it so far?”

  “It’s a little on the frantic side, isn’t it?”

  “This?” Thorpe waved a hand at the crowd. “This is nothing. Everything’s going smooth as silk.”

  “I’m glad to hear it,” Eve said.

  “Did you get all that work done last night?” Phyllis asked.

  “Yeah. You’d be hearing some yelling if I hadn’t.” Thorpe was wearing some sort of headset with an earpiece in one ear. He lifted a hand to it and pushed the earpiece in better with a finger to help him hear as someone spoke to him. “Be right there,” he said into the microphone attached to the headset, then told Phyllis, Carolyn, and Eve, “If you need anything, I’ll be around, although you might have trouble catching me.”

  Eve waved a hand and said, “You just go on about your business, Earl. We wouldn’t think of bothering you.”

  Thorpe smiled, nodded, and hurried off.

  “There’s Julie,” Carolyn said.

  They looked where she was pointing and saw not only Julie Cordell but also Heidi Lancaster and Robert Harkness. The three of them were standing about fifty yards away, drinking coffee from styrofoam cups. The casual clothes they wore were actually their wardrobe for the movie, Phyllis guessed. As she watched, Melissa came up and joined them, and looking at the four of them, for a second it did seem like she was looking at herself, Sam, Carolyn, and Eve. Alan Sammons had referred to what they were doing here as magic. In some ways, it really was . . .

  But if a magic spell had fallen over Holland Lake Park this morning, it was shattered seconds later by a loud, angry voice.

  Chapter 9

  Phyllis turned her head and saw Lawrence Fremont stalking across the park, trailed by the young production assistant Teddy. As he walked, Fremont looked back over his shoulder and continued berating the dark-haired young woman. He had some rolled-up papers in his right hand, and he punctuated his angry words by slapping them sharply against his left palm.

  Fremont’s tirade had caused many of the surrounding conversations to quiet down, so Phyllis was able to make out some of what he was saying.

  “ . . . amateurish . . . terrible lines . . . find . . . bring them to me . . .”

  Phyllis wondered if that was a copy of the script he was holding. From the sound of it, he wasn’t happy with something Jason and Deanne Wilkes had written and wanted to talk to them. If that was the case, Phyllis wouldn’t have wanted to be in the couples’ shoes.

  The talk welled back up again as Fremont passed. Teddy turned and scurried off to carry out his orders. Fremont went down to the edge of the lake and stood there flipping through the pages he held. A few minutes later, Teddy approached him again, and as Phyllis suspected, she had Jason and Deanne with her.

  Fremont turned and confronted the screenwriters. He waved the pages, which appeared to be paper-clipped together, then started jabbing his finger at them in different places, clearly pointing out things he didn’t like. Jason and Deanne both responded rapidly, probably trying to explain something, but Fremont kept talking over them.

  Finally, he took the paperclip off the pages and threw them up wildly in the air. They scattered, some landing on the bank but others flying out over the lake and landing on the water, where they floated. That display of anger made people fall silent again. Fremont stomped off, leaving Jason and Deanne to stand beside the lake looking dejected.

  Then Deanne turned to her husband and spoke to him in obvious anger. Jason countered with a shrug, which just made Deanne madder. She walked off, too. Jason stood there by himself now as he took off his glasses, rubbed wearily at his temples, and let out a visible sigh. No one approached him, perhaps not wanting any of Fremont’s anger to rub off on them.

  After a moment, Jason put the glasses back on and started picking up the pages lying on the ground around him. He didn’t try to retrieve the ones floating in the lake. Somebody would have to get a pole of some sort and fish them out, Phyllis tho
ught. They wouldn’t want paper floating around out there to get in any of the shots.

  “My goodness,” Eve said.

  “Is that the first time you’ve seen him blow his stack like that?” Carolyn asked.

  “Yes. I’ve heard stories about his temper, of course, but . . . Oh, my, I feel sorry for Jason and Deanne. I wonder what they wrote to set him off like that.”

  Phyllis said, “From the way Deanne was acting after Fremont stomped off, more likely it was Jason who wrote what he didn’t like.”

  “You mean she threw him under the bus,” Carolyn said.

  “Well . . . that’s what it looked like.”

  “I got the same impression.”

  As Phyllis watched, Teddy came up to Jason Wilkes and spoke to him, then put a hand on his arm. Jason nodded and forced a smile onto his face. They walked off together. Teddy’s solicitous attitude and Jason’s response to it made Phyllis wonder if the young production assistant had anything to do with the friction between Jason and Deanne. Eve had chalked up that argument to creative differences, but that might not be all that was going on.

  Things quickly got back to normal after that incident. Phyllis supposed that with so much to do, the movie-makers had no choice but to put such disturbances behind them and move on.

  She saw Earl Thorpe hurrying around, talking to members of the crew working with the cameras and lights, pointing and arranging things and giving orders as if he were directing this movie, not Lawrence Fremont. She hadn’t seen Fremont again after the fit he’d pitched with Jason and Deanne Wilkes.

  The extras began to spread out through the park, and members of the crew drew back to the edges. Phyllis took that to mean that shooting was about to get underway. She had seen Thorpe talking to the extras, evidently giving them instructions. She noticed that as they began to mill around, no one looked toward the cameras, so Thorpe must have warned them about that. People moved along the walkways and stood in front of the vendors’ booths, children scrambled around and climbed on the playground equipment, young couples held hands. Phyllis had been to enough of the real Harvest Festivals to tell that this was a reasonable approximation of what went on at one of them. She wondered if the cameras were already rolling, getting background shots that could be edited into the movie later.