Miss Julia Rocks the Cradle (33 page)

“Miss Julia,” he said in his usual serious manner, “Miss Petty gave us a real talking-to today. You won’t believe what all she told us.”

“What did she say?”

“She told us that somebody has been messing around her toolshed—you know,
since
that body was found, and she was real serious about it too. She said it happened either while she was at school in the daytime or most likely at night, and she’s not going to put up with it.” Lloyd frowned, squinching up his eyes. “Who in the world would plunder around at
night
where somebody had died?”

“I can’t imagine,” I said, trying to keep my voice on an even keel. “Does she have any idea who it was?”

“No’m. She said she called the deputies and showed them where a bucket had been moved and the crime-scene tape had been pulled off, and maybe a few more footprints, but they didn’t give her much satisfaction. Said it was probably kids wanting to scare themselves. Or something.”

“That’s probably who it was.”

“Well, I don’t know.
I
sure wouldn’t be hanging around that place, especially at night. Anyway, she said if we knew anybody who’d done it or who wanted to do it, we better tell them that she was on the lookout. And she said she’s making arrangements to catch whoever it was if they come back. And then she said, ‘You have been warned!’ Like she just knew it was some of us. I tell you, it gave me the shivers, and I haven’t been anywhere near that place.”

“You can’t blame her for being concerned, I suppose,” I said, trying to downplay what he was telling me. “I wouldn’t be too happy if somebody was fiddling around in our yard either. Especially at night.”

“No’m, me either. But what worries me is who it could be that was doing it. Miss Petty and the cops, too, are wrong if they think it was kids. We’d be too scared. So I’m thinking it was somebody else, somebody with a reason to be there. Maybe for the same reason Mr. Stroud had.”

I’d always known that Lloyd was smart, but this just iced the cake. Of course he was correct—that’s exactly what Lillian and I had been doing—not that we’d known Richard Stroud’s reason, but to discover what it had been.

“Lloyd!” Latisha yelled. “You better get on in here if you want a brownie. I’m about to eat ’em all up.”

Lloyd grinned and got up from the ottoman. “She means it too. Anyway, I thought you’d want to know that something’s still going on at that toolshed.”

“It’s a mystery, though, isn’t it?” I said, dismissively, and picked up the newspaper as if I had some interest in it. But underneath I was squirming at the thought that we’d left a trail at the toolshed. It was comforting to know, though, that no one seemed to be following it to the real culprits.

Hearing more commotion in the kitchen than the usual, I threw aside the paper and went to see what was causing it.

“Why, Mr. Pickens,” I said, surprised to see him standing there with a pleased smile on his face and his suitcase at his feet. Lillian was delighted to see him, as always, and Lloyd had just released himself from a big hug, while Latisha stood back, eyeing the new arrival with curiosity.

“I’m home!” he said, spreading his arms as if he expected us to cheer. “Where’s Hazel Marie? Where’re my babies?”

It took a while to explain the visit to the doctor and to assure him that it was a routine visit and that all was well.

“’Cept they got the colic,” Lillian said. “So you better get ready to do some floor walkin’.”

“I can do that,” Mr. Pickens said, somewhat smugly, although I doubted he knew what he was talking about. He’d had plenty of experience with wives, but none that I knew of with infants.

“J.D., guess what! ” Lloyd said, excitement catching in his voice. “Something’s still going on at Miss Petty’s toolshed. She told us somebody has been messing around in it, probably at night, and I think she’s scared to death. She didn’t say she was, but she called the deputies about it because she says she’s not going to put up with it. Can you believe that?”

“Whoa, slow down,” Mr. Pickens said. “Come help me unpack and tell me all about it.”

As they headed for the bedroom, Latisha tagging along behind, Lillian looked at me, her eyes big with concern.

“What we gonna do, Miss Julia?” she whispered, her voice quavering.

“They don’t have a thing on us, Lillian. They think it was children, and they’ll go on thinking that. Nobody saw us, well, except Ronnie and he’s not talking. We don’t have anything to worry about.”

“I hope you right.” Lillian turned back to the stove and stirred something in a pot. Then abruptly she stopped and said, “What if somebody else ’sides us been in there? What if they lookin’ for the same thing we was lookin’ for? What if that somebody else saw us there an’ was hidin’ in a bush, watchin’ everything we did?”

“Lillian, Lillian,” I soothed, “you’re just thinking up things to worry about. There was nobody else there when we were, and there won’t be if we have to go back.”

“No, ma’am, uh-uh. You not gonna catch me goin’ back there. I already have my fill of it.”

“Well, I’m not planning a return trip, believe me. I’m just saying that we have nothing to be concerned about.”

Just then Hazel Marie and Etta Mae, each carrying a baby, rushed in, along with a gust of cold air.

“Where is he?” Hazel Marie asked, her eyes shining. “His car’s outside, so I know he’s home.”

“Right in yonder,” I said, pointing toward the bedroom. “He’s unpacking.”

“Here, Miss Julia,” she said, plopping a baby in my arms. “Hold Lily Mae for me. I’ll be right back.” She dashed for the back hall, but she didn’t get very far. Mr. Pickens met her, and there was a warm and to those who were in the line of sight a somewhat embarrassing reunion. Hazel Marie smothered his face with kisses until she got to his mouth where he stopped her for a good long while.

Latisha, standing right next to them and watching intently, said, “My goodness, that look jus’ like teevee.”

Etta Mae laughed as she began to unwrap Baby Julie, shedding blanket, cap, and sweater, one after the other. “Looks like I’ll be heading back to the sunroom. Here, Miss Julia,” she said, exchanging babies with me, “let me swap with you and get that one unwrapped.”

“At least in the sunroom you’ll get a full night’s sleep for a change,” I said. “And we’ll see how Mr. Pickens likes changing and feeding every two hours or so.”

“It’ll be interesting, won’t it?” Etta Mae laughed, then expertly took both babies to their crib, sidling past their parents who were still making a spectacle of themselves.

After that, there was a constant coming and going with Lloyd going out to Mr. Pickens’s car to retrieve his hanging bag and Mr. Pickens folding up the cot that Etta Mae had been sleeping on and Hazel Marie putting away his clothes and Latisha following two steps behind Mr. Pickens everywhere he turned, and one baby after another announcing dinnertime.

I was finally able to catch Mr. Pickens alone in the back hall. “Mr. Pickens,” I whispered, “I would deeply appreciate it if you wouldn’t ask about Sam in front of the others. He’s working on his book and won’t be here for dinner, so if you wouldn’t mention it, I’d be grateful.”

Those black eyes bored into mine as he studied me, quickly recognizing a deeper concern in what I’d said. “Want to tell me a little more? Maybe I can help.”

“No, not at this time, I don’t think. I just don’t want to discuss it in front of the children, and Hazel Marie has enough on her mind without adding anything. But,” I went on, not wanting to close any door that might shed some light on my predicament, “maybe later we can talk.”

“Anytime,” he said, and put a comforting hand on my arm. “I’m always ready to listen.”

I nodded and moved away as Hazel Marie called to him. I was left thinking that I might indeed talk to him in his capacity as an investigator about a certain knothole in a toolshed, but as an adviser on marital problems? With his credentials, I hardly thought so.

“Lillian,” I said as soon as we’d finished breakfast the next morning, “I want you and Latisha to take a break. You’ve been working night and day ever since those babies have been here.”

“No’m, Miss Etta Mae been the one gettin’ up at night. I been sleepin’ most of the time.”

“Still, you need some time off. Take the weekend off and rest up.”

“I guess I will, then, but who gonna do the cookin’ ’round here?”

“I expect we’ll manage all right.” Although, frankly, I wasn’t sure how well we would.

Lillian had been running by her house occasionally to check on water pipes and so forth, but it had been some time since she’d spent a night there. I thought she and Latisha both would be pleased to be going back, but Latisha pitched a fit.

“I thought we was
livin’
here,” she wailed. “What Lloyd gonna do without me around? An’ them babies
need
me!”

It took awhile for Lillian to calm her and to assure her that she’d be back after school every weekday. “We got to see ’bout our house,” Lillian told her. “And think of all the play-pretties you got waitin’ for you.”

“Well, I don’t know, Great-Granny,” she said, wiping her eyes with the hem of her dress. “Look like every time that big ole black-eyed man come, we have to leave. An’ that’s just a pure-tee shame.”

My heart went out to her because she had truly latched on to Mr. Pickens, following him around throughout the house and gazing at him in awe. That’s what happens when a child grows up without a father—Lloyd was doing the same thing. Mr. Pickens had a huge gap to fill in the lives of those two fatherless children, and I had to admit, so far he was doing fairly well at it.

And why wasn’t Sam here helping him? I wasn’t the only one who needed him, and he should’ve thought of all he meant to these children before he took off and took up with Helen Stroud.

And just as I began to build up another head of steam over Sam’s lack of consideration, he called.

“Julia? ” he said, as the sound of his voice weakened my knees. “James said you came by yesterday. Is there anything I can do for you?”

Yes, yes, you can come home!
The words flashed through my mind, but I bit them back.

“Well,” I said instead, “I did have a matter to discuss with you, but James said you were unavailable so I left.”

Sam laughed under his breath. “That James. He’s worse than a nursemaid. You should’ve come on in, Julia, I would’ve stopped whatever I was doing.”

Uh-huh, I thought, you would’ve gotten up from the table and left your guest stranded just to talk with me? Not likely. Then I realized that James hadn’t told Sam exactly when I’d come by. He didn’t know that I’d been there when he was fully engaged with somebody else.

“It doesn’t matter,” I said stiffly. “It really wasn’t all that important.”

“Well,” he said and let a few moments pass. “I’m always available to you, and you’re always welcome at my house.”

And so are you at mine,
I thought,
so why don’t you get yourself back here?
Instead of saying it, though, I told him of Mr. Pickens’s return, then brought the unsatisfactory conversation to a close.

Then, before I could fall into the depths again, the phone rang under my hand. Hoping that Sam was as unhappy with the previous call as I had been, I snatched up the receiver only to hear an unexpected voice.

“Miss Julia? It’s Poppy Patterson. I hope I haven’t caught you at a bad time.”

“Why, no, I was just, uh, standing here. How are you, Poppy? ”

“Actually, not so good. I’m still upset over what happened with Mr. Jones last Sunday. It’s keeping me awake at night, trying to think of what I can do to make it right. I’ll just be done in if he’s not in church tomorrow, knowing it’s my fault he’s not there.”

“Oh, Poppy, you shouldn’t feel that way. Thurlow Jones is one of those people you can never please. If it hadn’t been what you said last Sunday, it would be something else.”