A Peach of a Murder

Being a murder suspect is the pits.

All year round, retired schoolteacher Phyllis Newsom is as sweet as pie peach pie, of course, made with Parker County peaches, the sweetest in the state of Texas. All year, that is, except during the Peach Festival whose blue ribbon has slipped through Phylliss fingers more than once. . . .

Everyone's a little shaken when the corpse of a no-good local turns up underneath a car in his own barn. But even as Phyllis engages in some amateur sleuthing, she won't let it distract her from outbaking her rivals and winning the upcoming Peach Festival contest.

She and all the othgr contestants guard their secret original recipes with their lives-and talk a whole lot of trash. With her unusual spicy peach cobbler, Phyllis hopes to knock'em dead. But that's just an expression never in her wildest dreams does she think her cobbler will actually kill a judge. Now she's suspected of murder, anti she's got to bake this case wide open....

LIVIA J. WASHBURN has been a professional writer for twenty years. She received the Private Eye Writers of America Award and the American Mystery Award for her first mystery, Wild Night, written under the name L. J. Washburn, and was nominated for a Spur Award by the Western Writers of America for a novel written with her husband, James Reasoner. She lives with her husband and two daughters in a small Texas town, where she is constantly experimenting with new recipes.

"Peach cobbler killed Donnie Boatwright!" Donnie finished his cobbler and set the empty bowl o the table.

"Mighty good, Phyllis, mighty good," he said, but then h gave a little shake of his head and put a hand on the table t steady himself.

"Donnie, are you all right?" Phyllis asked.

"Yeah, yeah, just a little dizzy. Must be the heat." H lifted his water bottle and drank what was left.

"I'll be a right in a-"

But then he stopped abruptly, his eyes rolling up in thei sockets. He lurched back a step, staggered into a half turn, stiffened, and pitched forward onto his face, toppling like felled tree. Donnie hit the ground hard, without any atteml to catch himself. Screams came from the crowd. Phyllis ju; stood there behind the table, shocked into motionlessness by the sudden collapse, but Mike's emergency training too over and sent him hurrying to Donnie's side. He rolled tb old man onto his back, and Phyllis recoiled in horror as sb saw Donnie's glassy eyes staring sightlessly up at the re( white, and blue canopy over the table.

In the middle of all the sudden commotion and chaos, sb heard Carolyn exclaim as plain as day,

"Oh, my God! Phylis's peach cobbler killed Donnie Boatwright!"

This novel is dedicated to all the teachers who have touched my life, starting with my mother, Naomi Washburn, my teacher in life, and both my daughters' fast-grade teacher.

To Iris Hamilton for teaching a fourteen-year-old how to cook better.

To Marsha Hardin, Rita Heatley, Thomas and Sharon Hicks, Chelsa Holder, Jan Johnson, Marsha Lindenmeier, LouAnn McLaughlin, Jamie McNeil, Mary Nelson, Larry Prather, Kathy Raine, Joan Schmitter, David Slininger, Lisa Tadlock, Linda Tindall, Sherman and Sue NV'all, Fred and Talana Weir, and Andy Zapata, just to name a few, for going above and beyond the job of teaching.

To my agent, Kimberly Lionetti, for guiding me to this story.

And, last, to my husband, James Reasoner, my one and only.

The smell of peaches filled the air, sweet but with a particular bite all its own. Warm sunshine flooded the orchard. Later, the sun would be hot, oppressively so; but now, in the early morning, basking in its glow was like luxuriating in a warm bath. The peach smell could.have come from a scented candle, but was instead the real thing, which made it even better, Phyllis Newsom thought.

.Balanced on a wooden ladder, wearing blue jeans and one of her late husband's shirts, with the sleeves rolled up to the elbows, she reached up carefully into the tree and took hold of a particularly-nice-looking peach. With just a little tug, the fruit came loose from its stem. Phyllis turned and handed it down to Mattie Hams, who was helping her fill the bushel basket that sat on the ground.

Mattie was a sight. Somewhere between eighty-five and ninety, which made her approximately twenty years older than Phyllis, Mattie was still as spry and nimble as a bird. She wore a dress covered with a bright flower print that was even more brilliant in the sunlight, and a straw hat with a huge brim that shaded her face. Like Phyllis, she wore gloves to protect her hands, which could get pretty scratched up from the tree branches while picking, not to mention itchy from the peach fuzz.

"I remember when this orchard was just a sorghum field," Mattie said, tilting her head back so that she could look up at Phyllis on the ladder. "That was before Newt Bishop got the bright idea of growing peaches. Land's sakes, everybody else in Parker County was doing it already, but Newt was always slow to catch on. I remember a time..."

Phyllis knew it was rude, but she tuned out Mattie's reminiscences and searched the tree for the next peach she wanted to pick. Mattie remembered all about the Depression and World War II and working at the bomber plant over at Fort Worth. She had an endless supply of stories about those days. Phyllis had been born just before the war started, but she, i 't remember it, of course. She had been too young. As a teacher ... a retired history ... teacher now-she had`&vested.interest-in the past, and most of the time she realty enjoyed listening to- Mattie's stories. This morning, though, she was thinking about the upcoming Parker County Peach Festival and trying to come up with a recipe for the cooking contest.

Everybody knew that Parker County peaches were the best peaches in Texas-and, therefore, the best in the worldand every summer the peach festival was the biggest thing in the county seat, Weatherford. The State Fair in Dallas was bigger, of course, and the Stock Show rodeo in Fort Worth was bigger than the Sheriff's Posse Rodeo, held in conjunction with the peach festival, but those events lacked the small-town charm of the celebration in Weatherford.

Half of the courthouse square in downtown was blocked off and surrounded by portable fences, as were some of the side streets off the square, and into that area were packed dozens of booths showing off the best arts and crafts and food that the county had to offer. Two stages were set up, for musical entertainment at various times during the day. Whenever a live band wasn't playing, recorded music blared from large speakers. There was a kids' area, filled with games and rides, puppet shows and face-painting booths. A little bit of something for everybody, and during the day of the festival, it was almost possible to forget that Weatherford was part of a much bigger, not-so-nice world. There was nothing like eating cotton candy and homemade ice cream, listening to a high school band and strolling through a display of homemade quilts to make it seem as if time had

:stood still, as if Weatherford had indeed somehow gone back to a slower, more gentle era.

The high point of the festival, at least for Phyllis, was the cooking contest. Everything revolved around peaches, of course. Peach cobbler, peach pie, peach ice cream, peach preserves . . . If there was any way to work peaches into a recipe, somebody was bound to try it. And at the climax of the festival, a winner would be named by a panel of judges. There was a blue ribbon, of course, just a little thing made by the local trophy shop that read BEST PEACH RECIPE PARKER COUNTY PEACH FESTIVAL, with the year printed on it.

Phyllis wanted that ribbon. She told herself it wasn't because Carolyn Wilbarger had won it the past two years while Phyllis's recipes had finished fifth and second, respectively. She just wanted to be recognized for the good work she'd done.

But if that involved beating Carolyn, then so much the better.

Phyllis picked another peach and turned to hand it down to Mattie. As she did so, she saw a burly figure strolling toward them along the row of peach trees. Phyllis had often heard someone described as being "about as wide as he is tall, but Newt Bishop came as close to actually fitting that description as anyone she had ever seen. Despite the fact it was summer, Newt wore a greasy, stained pair of overalls and a long-sleeved white shirt. An old-fashioned fedora was on his head.

Phyllis had never seen him in any other clothes. She knew he even wore them to church, when went to church.

Newt stopped and turned his round, sunburned, jowly face up toward Phyllis. "You findin' some good ones, Miz Nwewsom?' he asked in a thick, rumbling voice.

"Yes, thank you, Mr. Bishop. It looks like you have a good crop this year."

"ought to. Worked hard enough on it. You ladies need 'nother basket?"

Phyllis thought about it for a second. The peach festival was still a couple of weeks away, which meant she had time to experiment. She was thinking about trying a peach cobbler, but she wanted to give it some added spice. She wontiered how it would taste with a little jalapefo pepper, but even if that worked out, it might take several tries before everything was just perfect. That might take all of one bushel, and it would be nice to freeze some this year. Storebought frozen peaches were good, but home-prepared Parker County peaches were better.

"Yes, I believe I will get another bushel;' she told the farmer.

"I'll have the boy bring a basket down from the barn." Newt tugged on the brim of his fedora.

"Ladies."

He moved on, probably bound for the part of the orchard where Carolyn was picking her peaches with the help of Eve Turner. Newt was always trying to sell just a little bit more. He would probably tell Carolyn that Phyllis was buying a second bushel of peaches, in hopes that Carolyn would feel that she had to have another basketful, too.

He grew some really fine peaches, though.

Phyllis looked down at Mattie. "Didn't you have Newt's boy in your class once?"

"Darryl:' Mattie said with a nod. "Yes, he was a very sweet little boy. I never saw Newt at school, though, except at Open House. Parents didn't have as much to do with the schools then as they do now, especially the fathers."

"Yes, I know. I haven't been retired all that long:'

"But you taught junior high," Mattie pointed out. "When I substitute in the elementary schools these days, there are sheets stuck up all over the classroom for the parents to sign up for this and sign up for that, to go on this field trip and provide refreshments for that class party, to volunteer for this and that. In my day, that classroom was my domain, you could say, and I'd just as soon the parents kept their noses out and let me get on about my job. From eight thirty in the morning to three thirty in the afternoon, those were my kids. They didn't belong to the parents during that time."

Phyllis was old enough to understand Mattie's attitude, even though she knew perfectly well it wouldn't fly in today's modem classroom. She had come out here to pick peaches, not to discuss changing theories in education. She reached for another plump fruit hanging from the branch just above her head.

The slamming of a car door made her look toward the Bishop farmhouse and the bam, about three hundred yards away. She saw that a pickup had pulled up in front of the barn. A man stood next to it, talking to Newt Bishop, who had circled through the orchard and returned to the barn by now.

Phyllis recognized Newt by his clothes and his barrellike shape. She had no idea who the other man was, only that he was younger, taller, and leaner.

And perhaps angry, to judge by the way he waved his arms around as he talked to Newt. It was none of Phyllis's business, of course.

A boy about ten years old came trotting through the orchard, carrying a couple of bushel baskets woven out of wicker. He stopped and set one on the ground next to Mattie's feet. "My granddad said you ladies needed another basket," he announced.

"That's right," Phyllis said from the ladder.

Mattie looked down at the boy. "Lord have mercy! Darryl."

-- He grinned. "No, ma'am. Darryl's my daddy. I'm Justin. I'm workin' here this summer, helpin' out my granddad." "Well, that's mighty nice of you. Do you like it?"

The smile abruptly disappeared from Justin Bishop's face. He shrugged. "I guess so. It's work. I'm tryin' to earn enough money to buy me a copy of Scorpion Clone Blaster Four. Armageddon Fever."

Mattie patted him on the head. "Son, I don't have the foggiest notion what you're talking about."

"It's a game, this really cool video game, about these giant scorpion clones from Mars, and you gotta blast 'em before they can sting you and suck your guts out."

"Boy!" Newt called from the end of the row. "You get that basket on down to Miz Wilbarger and Miz Turner, you hear?"

"Yeah, Granddad, I hear," Justin called back. "I gotta go," he said to Phyllis and Mattie, then trotted off carrying the other basket.

"Those video games," Mattie said with a shudder. "I never heard of such:'

Newt wandered back toward the barn and went inside. His visitor, whomever he'd been, was gone now, Phyllis saw. The pickup had driven off, leaving a slowly settling haze of dust over the dirt road that led from the farmhouse to the highway. '

Mattie said, "I need to go visit the little girls' room. You be all right here by yourself for a little while, Phyllis?" "Go right ahead," Phyllis told her. "I'll be fine."

That meant she would have to climb up and down the ladder more often, Phyllis thought, but the exercise wouldn't hurt her. It was a beautiful day, and she got caught up in trying to pick out the best peaches, considering each one carefully before she plucked it off the tree. Her attention strayed to the farmhouse and the barn only occasionally, just enough for her to notice that several more vehicles came and went while she was busy. Probably some of her competition coming to buy peaches from Newt Bishop, she thought. Judging by the way the last one left in such a hurry, peeling out in the gravel in front of the barn, they were eager to get to their stove and start cooking.

Justin Bishop, having delivered the bushel basket to Carolyn and Eve, ran up and down the orchard rows with the boundless energy of the young. Phyllis sometimes wished she still had that much energy, but at the same time she figured if she did, it might kill her. Mattie came back from the farmhouse and started taking the peaches that Phyllis handed down to her, placing them carefully in the wicker basket so they wouldn't bruise. A couple of jets flew overhead, probably bound for the Joint Reserve Base on the west side of Fort Worth, some twenty miles away. Even higher in the sky, big passenger planes droned along, taking off and landing from the Dallas-Fort Worth airport.

Out here in the middle of the orchard, however, it was easy to forget there even were such things as jet planes and video games and cell phones and satellite TV Out here there was only. warm sunshine and leafy trees and the sweet smell of peaches.... Somewhere, somebody started screaming.

Phyllis stiffened as she listened. It sounded like Justin screaming, but Phyllis couldn't tell if he was hurt or scared. At the foot of the ladder, Mattie exclaimed, "Land's sakes, what's that?"

Phyllis descended quickly to the ground. "I think it's coming from the barn:'

She started along the row of trees, breaking into a trot as the screaming continued. Mattie followed, trying to keep up, but Phyllis was younger, taller, and had longer legs. She jogged a couple of times a week, too, in an attempt to stay in decent shape.

As she neared the barn, Phyllis could tell for sure that the screams came from inside the old, cavernous structure. The doors were open, and as she ran inside, going from bright sunshine into shadow, she was blinded for a second as her eyes tried to adjust. "Justin!" she called. "Justin, what's wrong?"

"Granddad!" the boy cried. "Granddad!"

Phyllis could see a little better now. Justin stood beside a large, heavy thirty-year-old car that was more like a tank than an automobile. Newt Bishop had been driving that big car ever since it was brand-new, at least when he went into town. Like everybody else, he had a pickup for work around the farm.

As Phyllis's eyesight sharpened even more, she spotted an old-fashioned bumper jack lying on its side at the front of the car. Stepping in that direction, she peered around the vast hood with its upthrust ornament at the prow. Her hand went to her mouth in horror as she saw the overall-clad legs sticking out from under the car.

Newt Bishop was a large man. Almost as wide as he was tall, Phyllis thought again. And as she forced herself to bend over and look under the car, she knew what she was going to see: the same thing that had made Justin scream and now cry in sniffles and ragged sobs. The bulging eyes, wide and glassy. The trickle of blood from the corner of the mouth. The arms fallen loosely to the side when the attempt to hold up the awful weight had failed.

When that big old car had slipped off the jack and fallen, it had crushed the life itself out of Newt Bishop.