The Fatal Funnel Cake

by Livia J. Washburn

  Hank held up an open hand, closing each finger and the thumb in turn until he had a clenched fist. Joye’s smile brightened even more, and as she looked directly into the camera, she greeted the viewers at home by saying, “I hope you’ll excuse us for those technical difficulties, folks. You can’t put on a show like this without having a few little glitches now and then, I suppose.”

  Hank’s camera pulled back slightly, probably in response to a command from Charlie Farrar out in the truck.

  “Now, you were about to tell us all about those delicious funnel cakes of yours, Phyllis,” Joye said.

  Phyllis drew in a deep breath. The audience was settling back down on the bleachers. They had come to see a show, and everyone involved still intended to deliver. Phyllis had no choice but to go ahead, too.

  She began talking about getting ready for the funnel cake competition. She explained about some of the different recipes she tried, the ones with pumpkin, chocolate, and fruit. Then she explained why she had decided on the recipe she’d used in the contest. She didn’t want to stray too far from the taste of the traditional funnel cake, and the maple pecan recipe seemed to fit.

  Joye said, “As you may have noticed, we just happen to have all those ingredients right here on the show, Phyllis.”

  Phyllis smiled and nodded, feeling more comfortable now. “I did notice that.”

  Joye turned to the cameras and the audience and said, “When we come back, Phyllis and I will be making a batch of those wonderful maple pecan funnel cakes, and a few lucky people from the audience are going to get to come down here and sample them with us on national television. Won’t that be fun?”

  Applause and cheers came from the audience. The red light on Hank’s camera went off.

  Joye turned sharply toward Bailey and Reed Hayes, who hurried toward her from the side of the set. “We’ll be going into a third segment—” Hayes began.

  “I don’t care,” Joye said, interrupting the producer. “The first one doesn’t really count because of that trouble. I came here today to make funnel cakes, and by God, I’m going to make funnel cakes!”

  “Well, it shouldn’t be too big a problem, I suppose,” Hayes said. “We have that segment of you riding some of the midway rides coming up, and we can cut it, can’t we, Charlie?” He waited to hear the director’s response, then said, “Charlie says we can cut it and show it tomorrow.”

  “Fine,” Joye snapped. “Just do whatever it takes.”

  The commercial break sped by. Bailey told Phyllis, “Move on over behind the counter. You and Joye will be ready to start mixing the batter for the funnel cakes when we come out of commercial.”

  Phyllis nodded. She was starting to pick up the rhythm of the broadcast, she thought. Everything about it still seemed odd and unnatural to her, but at least she had a better idea now of what was going on and what was expected of her. She glanced at her friends, who smiled at her and gave her encouraging nods.

  It would be all right with her, Phyllis told herself, if she was never on television again.

  Hayes said, “We’re back in three . . . two . . . one . . .”

  The red light on Hank’s camera came on.

  “We’re back,” Joye said, “and my friend Phyllis Newsom and I are about to mix the batter for a batch of her prizewinning funnel cakes. Why don’t you walk us through it, Phyllis?”

  “All right, Joye,” Phyllis said, figuring she might as well fall into the show’s pattern of familiarity. “We’re going to mix the batter and then pour it into two inches of hot oil using a funnel. We use a metal ring to keep the batter contained so we don’t end up with a funnel cake the size of the pan.”

  Phyllis started cracking the eggs and emptying them into the mixing bowl, setting the empty shells in another empty bowl. She started the mixer and she and Joye added the ingredients, explaining to the audience what each ingredient was and how much was used.

  While they were doing that, Bailey checked the temperature of the oil and adjusted the burner under the pan that was waiting to one side. Phyllis didn’t rush what she was doing, but she also didn’t waste time getting the batter mixed, knowing that the oil was already at the right temperature to fry the batter and the metal ring was in the middle of the skillet. She made sure that Joye handled some of the steps, too, having seen The Joye of Cooking enough to know that the host always participated in whatever was being prepared.

  When the batter was ready, Phyllis said, “All right, we can go ahead and pour our first funnel cake now.” She paused. “Would you like to do the honors, Joye?”

  Joye laughed and said, “No, thanks. You’re the blue ribbon winner here, Phyllis, so you go right ahead.”

  Phyllis had her finger over the opening in the bottom of the funnel, the way the professionals did it. She moved it away and let the batter begin to pour into the hot oil, moving it around and back and forth to form the classic shape inside the ring. Joye kept up a running commentary while she was doing that, but Phyllis focused all her attention on the task at hand and tuned out what Joye was saying. After everything that had happened, she didn’t want to ruin the first funnel cake in front of millions of viewers.

  When she was finished, she set the empty funnel aside, picking up the tongs instead. “You have to turn it like a pancake or a waffle, right?” Joye asked.

  “That’s right,” Phyllis said. “The process is somewhat similar. More like a donut since it’s fried, but we have to remove the metal ring first.”

  She removed the metal ring and set it aside, then grasped the funnel cake with the tongs and turned it over to finish cooking. When she judged it was ready, she removed it from the oil and set it aside to drain and cool.

  “We can get another one cooking while we’re putting the maple syrup and pecans on that one,” she said.

  “This is very interesting. I love watching you work,” Joye said.

  “Thank you. It’s not really work, though,” Phyllis said as she drizzled the maple syrup and sprinkled the chopped pecans over the first funnel cake. “Cooking has always been fun for me.”

  “Me, too! That’s the way it is with the best cooks.”

  When Phyllis had the first funnel cake finished, an overhead camera moved in to get a close-up of it. Joye enthused over how beautiful it was, and then as the main camera, manned by Hank, took the shot again, Joye smiled into the lens and said, “I think I’m going to give it a try. Would that be all right, Phyllis?”

  “Well, it might still be a little hot,” Phyllis said. “Just be careful and don’t burn your mouth.”

  “Oh, I won’t.” Joye tore a piece off the funnel cake, popped it into her mouth, and began to chew. While she was doing that, she said, “Oh, my. I know it’s not polite to talk with your mouth full, but this is de—”

  Phyllis had the tongs in her hand and had removed the ring and was about to turn the second funnel cake, but as she heard Joye stop short without finishing the word delicious, she glanced over at the host. Shock surged through Phyllis’s mind as she saw Joye stagger, catching herself with one hand on the counter while her other hand went to her throat. Joye’s mouth hung open, and her lips moved like those of a fish out of water as she gasped for air.

  “Joye!” Bailey cried as she rushed in from the side.

  With a harsh strangling sound, Joye collapsed, twisting off her feet as she fell to the floor behind the counter. For the second time in this episode, the audience members leaped to their feet in alarm and began to shout.

  “Cut the cameras! Cut the cameras!” Reed Hayes yelled as he rushed forward from the edge of the stage.

  Phyllis knew that Joye was having a violent allergic reaction of some sort. During the last few years she had taught, she and her fellow teachers had received training on such things. Too many students now had allergies and were prone to attacks if they were exposed to the wrong thing, and the teachers
had to know how to deal with those potentially serious problems.

  Bailey dropped to her knees beside Joye, who was writhing around on the floor as she struggled to draw air through her swollen throat. Bailey pulled something from her pocket that Phyllis recognized as an autoinjector—a small penlike syringe already prepared with a dose of epinephrine that could save the life of someone suffering from a serious allergic reaction. With swift, efficient motions that told Phyllis Bailey had practiced and prepared for this emergency, the young woman pulled the cover from the needle and stuck it into Joye’s thigh. Bailey’s thumb depressed the plunger. As she pulled the needle out, she sat back a little and a look of relief crossed her face as she waited for the medication to take effect.

  That look turned to an expression of horror as Joye began to spasm even worse. Her arms and legs flailed, and her choking sounds rose to a frantic babble. Hayes knelt on her other side, and Hank came around the set to loom over the three of them. “What’s wrong with her?” the burly cameraman cried. “That thing was supposed to stop the attack!”

  Sam was out of his chair, standing beside Phyllis now with one hand gripping her arm to support her. Carolyn, Eve, and Peggy gathered anxiously around her as well. The audience crowded forward to see what was going on, and Chet Murdock and the other guard, who had returned from dealing with Ramón Silva, couldn’t hold them back. The other guard was calling for more help on a walkie-talkie.

  Joye’s body jerked and her back arched up from the floor. She held that pose for a second, then slumped down loosely. People screamed and shouted. It was obvious to everyone what had just happened, but Hayes confirmed it by holding a hand to Joye’s neck for a long moment, searching for a pulse, before he looked up and announced bleakly, “She’s dead.”

  Chapter 14

  An hour later, Phyllis, Sam, and the others sat alone in the bleachers and watched with grim expressions on their faces as several paramedics wheeled a gurney bearing a zipped-up black body bag away from the broadcast set.

  Several uniformed Dallas police officers stood around the set, guarding it while the crime scene technicians continued scouring the area for every possible bit of evidence. Off to one side stood Bailey Broderick, Reed Hayes, Charlie Farrar, the cameraman Hank, and the rest of the crew. A couple of officers were keeping an eye on them to make sure none of them left before the detectives in charge of the case had a chance to talk to them.

  At the moment, those detectives, a man and a woman, were interviewing Chet Murdock and the other security guard who had been on duty when the fatal allergic reaction had struck down Joye Jameson.

  “I don’t get what they’re doing,” Peggy said. “They’re acting like there was some sort of foul play here, instead of just a terrible accident.”

  “We don’t know for sure that it was an accident,” Carolyn said. “We’ve known people who appeared to die of natural causes before, but then it turned out to be something else . . . haven’t we, Phyllis?”

  “I don’t want to even think about that,” Phyllis said honestly. The knowledge that Joye had died right after eating a piece of her funnel cake was already nagging at her. She didn’t see how it was possible that the two things could be connected, and yet the conclusion was inescapable. Somehow, that funnel cake had caused Joye’s reaction . . . and her death.

  Sam said, “I imagine the cops are goin’ to these lengths because it was somebody famous who died. They know it’ll get a lot of press coverage, and they don’t want there to be any questions later on about them not doin’ their job the way they should have, so they’ll cover every possibility.”

  “I suppose so,” Carolyn said. “But if you ask me, they’re acting like they think Joye’s death is suspicious.”

  “Any unexpected, unexplained death is suspicious by nature,” Phyllis said. “That’s all that’s going on here.”

  She wished she could believe that. But deep down, she thought Carolyn was right. The entire building had been locked down as soon as the police arrived, although plenty of people had gone in and out first. There was no way the security guards on duty could have stopped that.

  Now everyone was gone except for the five of them, the police, and the show’s crew. The audience members and the other people who had been in the exhibit hall when the police arrived had been questioned briefly, a process that didn’t amount to much more than getting contact information. Since Phyllis had been right there on the set with Joye, the police wanted her to wait and talk to the detectives, and her friends hadn’t wanted to leave without her, so they were all still here, too.

  The female detective who had been questioning the crew came over to the bleachers and said, “Mrs. Newsom?”

  “Yes?” Phyllis replied as she stood up.

  “Would you come with me, please?” As Carolyn started to get up, too, the detective put out a hand to stop her and added, “Just Mrs. Newsom, please.”

  “Phyllis, you don’t have to talk to them without a lawyer,” Carolyn said. She had an instinctive distrust of the police, probably because she and her daughter had both been suspects in a murder case several years earlier.

  “I don’t need a lawyer,” Phyllis said. She hoped that was true. She hadn’t forgotten how she herself had been locked up in jail less than a year ago.

  As she stepped down from the bleachers to join the detective, the woman said, “Actually, if you’d like to have an attorney present, that’s all right.”

  That surprised Phyllis. She said, “Am I being read my rights?”

  “Oh, no. This is just informal questioning. We’re just trying to find out what happened; that’s all. But no one who wants a lawyer is going to be denied one.”

  Phyllis shook her head and said, “I’m fine.”

  The detective motioned toward the broadcast set. “Let’s go over here.”

  The two of them stepped up into the working kitchen that had been built for the TV show’s trip to the state fair. Phyllis couldn’t help but glance at the spot where Joye had collapsed and died, but then she forced herself to look away.

  The detective must have seen what she did. She said, “I’m sorry to have to put you through this, Mrs. Newsom. That must have been a terrible experience, watching Ms. Jameson die right in front of you like that.”

  “It was terrible, all right,” Phyllis said.

  “We’ll get this over with as quickly as we can. I’m Detective Charlotte Morgan, by the way. My partner over there is Detective Al Hunt.”

  Detective Morgan was probably forty years old, Phyllis estimated, and rather attractive, although there was a certain hard-bitten cynicism visible in her face, no doubt put there by all the awful things she saw in her job. Blond hair fell just past her shoulders. She wore jeans and a brown leather jacket. Her partner, Detective Hunt, was a stocky, gray-haired man in a rumpled suit who came a lot closer to fitting the popular image of a cop.

  “So,” Detective Morgan went on, “just tell me about what happened here today.”

  “Well, I was on the show to make funnel cakes . . . You know about the funnel cake competition and how I won it yesterday?”

  “Yes, ma’am, Mr. Hayes and Ms. Broderick told us about that. Unless you saw something unusual earlier, you can just take up the story from where you came out and started making funnel cakes with Ms. Jameson.”

  That was what Phyllis did, going back through the fifteen minutes or so she had been on the set with Joye. She included every detail she could think of. Detective Morgan took notes, and from time to time she glanced up as if she were surprised about something.

  Phyllis figured out what that something was when Morgan commented, “You must have an exceptional memory, Mrs. Newsom. Most witnesses are a little more vague about things.”

  There was a good reason Phyllis had gotten in the habit of being as observant as she was, but she was hesitant to explain it. On the other hand, it wouldn’t t
ake any time at all for the detectives to find out about her background if they wanted to.

  “I’ve been around several criminal investigations in the past,” she said.

  “Oh, really?”

  “My son works for the sheriff’s department over in Parker County,” Phyllis said. “I’m acquainted with a number of people in the department, and in the Weatherford Police Department, as well.”

  “This isn’t really a criminal investigation,” Morgan pointed out. “Not at this point, anyway.”

  “No, of course not. But because of, well, being around those sorts of investigations in the past, I’ve learned to keep my eyes open.”

  The detective studied her for a moment, then said, “Let me get this straight. You’re a retired schoolteacher, right?”

  “That’s right.”

  Detective Morgan was starting to look even more cynical now. “And an amateur detective?”

  “I never said that.”

  “Look, Mrs. Newsom, I realize that when some people get to be a certain age, they have to find something to occupy their time—”

  Phyllis felt a flash of anger. “That’s not it at all, Detective,” she said.

  “I don’t mean any offense. I’m just doing my job.” Morgan closed her notebook. “I think I’ve got all I need from you right now, Mrs. Newsom. You gave your contact info to the uniformed officer who canvased everyone, didn’t you?”

  “Yes, I did. I gave him the address where we’re staying here in Dallas, my address in Weatherford, and my cell phone number.”

  “Then that’s all we need. Thank you.” Morgan started to turn away, then paused. She waved a hand at the counter, where all the ingredients for the maple pecan funnel cakes were still sitting, along with the one from which Joye Jameson had taken a bite and the pan of oil, now cold, with the scorched second funnel cake still in it. “Does any of this stuff belong to you? Because we’re going to have to take it all in as evidence, and we can give you a receipt for it . . .”