Miss Julia to the Rescue (31 page)

But whatever his intentions were, I intended to warn Etta Mae as soon as she got home from work. Just to be on the safe side.

“Etta Mae?” I said, my call catching her, she told me, just as she walked in the door of her single-wide after a long day of caring for the sick and ailing. “I hate to tell you this, but Hazel Marie called to say that Sheriff McAfee will be in town the day after tomorrow. He’s set up an interview with Mr. Pickens, but I don’t know if that’s all he’s planning. He may have a few other interviews in mind.”

“Yes, ma’am,” she said in a slightly subdued tone, “I know.”

“You know? Did Hazel Marie call you, too?”

“No’m. He did.”

“He, who? Coleman? Mr. Pickens?”

“No, that sheriff.”

“Sheriff McAfee? Why, Etta Mae, why would he do that? He hasn’t called me, and if anybody’s at fault with what we did in his jurisdiction, I am. Besides, how did he find you?”

“I don’t know. Maybe Coleman told him. He called on my cell right in the middle of me clipping Mr. Avery’s toenails. Made me so nervous, I almost nipped his little toe. Anyway, I don’t think he wants to interview me. At least, not the way he’ll interview J.D.”

“Well, I don’t understand why he’d want to talk to you and not to me. I was the instigator and I take full responsibility for everything
we did. You’re completely in the clear, Etta Mae, I want you to rest easy about that. So unless he wants to turn you against me, I can’t see why he’d come after you.”

“I don’t think that’s what he has in mind,” she said. Then, as if unburdening herself, she went on in a rush. “Actually, I think he’s just interested in dinner and dancin’.”

That stopped me. “A
date
? He asked you for a date?”

“That’s pretty much what I figured. I hope you don’t mind that I said yes.”

“Oh, well, of course not. It’s entirely up to you who you see, but, Etta Mae, be careful. That man is sneaky. Remember how he sent us to that church, so he may have something more up his sleeve than dinner and dancing. And if it’s a snake—I mean if he’s a snake handler—you don’t want to be involved with him.”

“Ugh, don’t worry,” Etta Mae said. “That’s the first thing I’m going to ask him, and if he is, I’m not going anywhere with him. I would’ve asked him on the phone but I was so surprised to hear from him, I didn’t think of it.”

“I think I’m surprised to hear he’s a dancing man. Maybe that speaks well of him, because, I grant you, those snake handlers did a lot of prancing and dancing around, but they did it by themselves, not with each other. Where will you go? There’s no place to dance around here unless you belong to the Cotillion.”

“Well, I don’t belong to that,” she said with a laugh. “Whatever it is. No, there’s a steak house out on Highway 64 with a dance hall next to it. Ardis said he likes steak and he likes to line dance, so that’ll be the best place to go.”

Ardis
? One phone call had certainly gotten them off on a fast track. And steak and line dancing? She’d found out a lot about him even in the midst of cutting toenails, but she hadn’t found out the most important thing: namely, his church affliation. That would’ve been my first question, but then, I hadn’t been asked to dance.

“That sounds nice,” I said, which is about like saying an ugly baby looks interesting. “Well, Etta Mae, I know he’ll be in town
Friday because that’s when he’ll interview Mr. Pickens. But do you have any idea when he’ll actually get here? You know, so I’ll know not to answer the phone.”

“Yes, ma’am, he’s already here.”

“He
is
? You mean he’s
there
?” I could just picture that tall denim-and-boot-clad vibrating man in Etta Mae’s tiny single-wide. They wouldn’t be able to move without touching each other.

Etta Mae laughed. “Our date is tomorrow night, but he got in today. He’s visiting that niece of his. So, no, he’s not here yet.”

Thank goodness for that
, I thought, then thought of something else. For several days I’d been wondering how to bring up the subject, and the only way I could come up with was just to jump in and do it.

“Well, I hope you have a good time, but, Etta Mae, even though I know it’s none of my business, I have to ask you about something else.” I paused, hesitating to pry into her affairs or to criticize her in any way. But I cared about her, and knowing how easily led she was—just witness the numerous times I’d talked her into one escapade after another—I simply had to warn her. And as reluctant as I always am to interfere in the lives of others, a mental picture of those little stars running up the rim of her right ear gave me the impetus to press on. “Have you ever met a woman named Agnes Whitman?”

“I don’t think so. Why?”

“No reason,” I said, attempting to back off. But Etta Mae was naive in many ways—again, witness her willingness to go out with a man who’d already proved to be tricky and underhanded. So, deciding to issue a warning whether or not it was heeded, I went on. “Well, yes, there is, and your mention of Sheriff McAfee’s niece reminded me. Remember he told us she lives in Fairfields? Well, so does this woman and she is somebody to stay away from in case you’re ever invited to her church. Don’t go, Etta Mae, because if you think handling snakes is bad, you won’t believe what those people do.”

“Worse than
snakes
?”

“Well, when you get right down to it, I don’t know if it’s worse, but it’s certainly just as bad. Etta Mae, they cut, pierce and tattoo themselves from one end to the other. And it’s all in the name of getting the body in touch with the soul. Or something of the sort.”

“Phoo, Miss Julia, I wouldn’t get mixed up in something like that. I’m Baptist to the bone.”

“Good,” I said, relieved. “But I don’t want you to think I’m singling you out, Etta Mae. I’m warning everybody I know to stay away from those people. They seem nice enough, but they might run a metal rod through your nose before you turned around good.” I didn’t mention puncturing a line of holes up the side of an ear because I didn’t want to get personal. He who has ears to hear, as they say, let him hear.

I was reassured, though, that she’d had no contact with the Church of Body Modification, which meant that all those little stars were purely for decorative, not religious, purposes, which is a matter of taste, not faith.

As soon as I’d hung up, Adam and his brother made their last trip downstairs, both of them smiling and looking pleased with themselves. The odor of fresh paint followed them down.

“All through, Mrs. Murdoch,” Adam said. “Me and Josh got it finished.”

“Wonderful,” I said, heading for my checkbook. “It just goes to show what can be done when you keep your mind on what you’re doing. I can’t thank you enough.”

Adam handed me a stapled stack of receipts, along with his bill. “You didn’t tell me what you wanted done about the floor, so we just swept and mopped it.”

“That’s fine. The carpet people are supposed to be here tomorrow, which was another reason for wanting the room finished. Now, Adam,” I said as I handed him a check, “that bedroom upstairs needs the woodwork painted. I hope to have the paperhangers in here soon, so we need to get that done right away. Here’s the name and number of the paint you’ll need.”

His face fell as he hesitantly accepted the paint sample. “Well, I sorta promised another lady I’d give her a couple of days.”

“That’s fine,” I said again. “Give her a couple of days when you finish here. You knew I had two rooms to be done, and it won’t take long to paint the crown molding and baseboards. You can send Josh to her while you do that.”

“Oh, no, ma’am,” he said, his eyes widening in alarm. “Josh can’t go out there. He, well, he’s just learning. I can’t send him by hisself. But don’t worry, I’ll put her off and get that room done tomorrow. Josh’ll work here with me.”

I glanced at Josh, who grinned and blushed, apparently unaware of his brother’s concern. But I knew of it, or thought I did. Adam had just made it apparent that he wouldn’t send his brother to Agnes Whitman’s house alone—and I was sure that she was the lady he’d promised to help. Was he afraid that Josh would be influenced by those strange body manipulators? And it suddenly followed, it seemed to me, that Adam’s troubled mind was because he himself had come under their influence.

Something ought to be done about that, but I didn’t know what. I did, however, intend to give it some thought.

I was on edge the rest of the evening, disturbed by my sudden realization of the source of the spiritual crisis Adam seemed to be undergoing, wondering what could be done to help him and wondering also if Sheriff McAfee had checked into a local motel or was staying with his niece, if he’d called Mr. Pickens to confirm their meeting, if he’d called Etta Mae again and, most especially, if he intended to apprehend and arrest anybody.

I knew that was unlikely, given the fact that as far as I knew, Mr. Pickens wasn’t worried about being shanghaied back to West Virginia. Actually, I figured Mr. Pickens was fairly safe, at least until Sheriff McAfee had squired Etta Mae around a bit. But when you’re anxious about something, your mind flies off in all directions and almost anything seems possible.

Twice I went to the phone to call Hazel Marie to reassure myself, but thought better of it both times. No need to add to her
anxiety just to relieve mine. Once, I picked up the phone to call Etta Mae, then put it down again. What was there to say? I wished for Sam, then was glad he wasn’t involved. I dreaded having to tell him what I’d done in rescuing Mr. Pickens and, by doing so, putting the man in jeopardy with Sheriff McAfee.

Then I had another disquieting thought. If it came right down to it, Mr. Pickens had a reasonable defense if he needed one. He could disclaim any responsibility for his precipitous exit from the Mill Run hospital. He had not been mentally competent at the time and had therefore been incapable of formulating such a plan, much less carrying it out. Nobody knew that better than Etta Mae and me after what we’d gone through to get him out of there.

But Mr. Pickens wouldn’t shift responsibility. Would he? No, certainly not. He thought too much of himself to admit to any loss of his faculties. And he was too much of a gentleman to lay the blame at the feet of two women.

At least that’s what I told myself, for I also knew that you could never tell what Mr. Pickens was capable of doing.

Finally, as I took myself to bed, I was comforted by the thought that if we could get Sheriff McAfee in and out of town within the next few days without arresting anybody, Sam would be home and he’d know what to do about Adam and the strange hold that Agnes Whitman seemed to have on him.

Early the next morning, I had another reason to want to leave town: too much was happening at one time. Tucker Caldwell showed up at seven o’clock, along with two crews of workmen—one for the exterior and one for the interior. Right behind them came a huge flatbed truck with some sort of crane on it that unloaded pallet after pallet of bricks that would eventually be my Williamsburg chimney.

And when the pallets had been unloaded and stacked in my yard, I realized my next call would be to a landscaper to resod and replant.

Tucker led his interior crew inside and straight back to the future library, which I, barely dressed, had barely vacated before they tromped in.