Miss Julia Takes the Wheel

by Ann B. Ross

  “Hazel Marie,” I said, “believe me, it’s not something to worry about. I just have an idea of how Lloyd could spend a constructive summer, that’s all.” And there, I’d given her a hint without going into details, which ought to keep the worrying down to a minimum.

  * * *

  —

  “You want to do what?” Mr. Pickens put his coffee cup down and swiveled his black eyes at me. He and Hazel Marie were sitting with me at the kitchen table and, at his tone, Lillian scrunched up her shoulders and leaned over the sink.

  So I told him again. “But see, it was Sam’s idea, and I should’ve waited to let him present it to you. But he had a semiemergency dental problem this morning, and the dentist told him to come on in. Look,” I said, including Hazel Marie in my glance, “Lloyd is at the age when he needs to be kept busy, and it seems to me, he also needs to learn how to take care of his assets. What better way to do both than to buy, remodel, and either rent or resell a little house?”

  “I can think of a few,” Mr. Pickens said, leaning back in his chair. “He could cut grass, deliver newspapers, bag groceries, babysit his sisters, and that’s just a start. What does he know about buying and selling houses? Or remodeling them?”

  “Well, that’s the thing—he can learn. But it’d be more than learning how to demolish and remodel. He’d learn about investing and turning a profit.” I swallowed hard. “I hope.”

  Hazel Marie, looking at her husband, said, “That would be good for him to know, don’t you think?”

  Mr. Pickens hunched forward, his sweater-clad forearms on the table, as he looked from one to the other of us. “You’re both forgetting that he’s underage. He can’t legally get a loan, sign an offer to purchase, or become the owner of record.”

  “Wel-l,” I said, not exactly meeting his eyes, “you’re his legal guardian, so I thought . . .”

  “But,” Hazel Marie said, “Sam and Binkie are the guardians of his estate. Why would he need to get a bank loan?”

  “Exactly!” I said, pleased that she’d gone right to the point. “He wouldn’t, except for the opportunity for him to learn how banks work. And the loan would be small enough that if things didn’t work out, he wouldn’t get hurt. But, of course,” I went on, avoiding Mr. Pickens’s eyes, “he’ll need an adult to stand in for him, to take responsibility. I would do it, and so would Sam, but not without your approval.”

  Hazel Marie looked at her husband, waiting for his response. Her husband, frowning, studied his coffee cup.

  “No,” he finally said, and my heart sank. “Nope,” he said again, shaking his head, “if anybody’s going to have his back, it’ll be me.” Then he turned that swarthy face toward me, a small smile curling his mouth. “If you don’t mind turning your idea over to Pickens and Son, I pretty much know my way around a construction site.”

  Chapter 23

  *

  So there it was. It couldn’t have worked better if I’d planned it that way. By the time we finished that morning, Mr. Pickens had taken to the idea as if it had been his own, saying that he and Lloyd would be equal partners in the enterprise.

  “I’ll speak with Binkie,” he said, “and let her know what we’re doing. If she and Sam think it’s a good deal for Lloyd, we’ll let his estate buy his half of the purchase price.”

  As I opened my mouth to protest, he put up his hand and said, “I know what you’re going to say, but he can learn about banking when we get a construction loan. We’ll have the house—or rather, the lot, if the house is as bad as you say—for collateral. Which means we’ll be lucky to get enough to replace the roof. We’ll have to count our pennies and be careful how much we spend to get the house in salable condition. More than that, though, he’ll learn he has to risk money to make money, which means he’ll have a say in every decision that’s made. He’ll learn how to compare prices, how to buy smart to stay within budget, and how to drive a few nails. How does that sound?” He was almost daring me to find something to complain about, but I didn’t have a quibble.

  “It sounds just fine to me,” I said, sitting back and basking in what I had wrought.

  “Well,” Hazel Marie said, “it all sounds good to me, too. But what if Lloyd isn’t interested?”

  Mr. Pickens’s eyebrows went straight up. “Why wouldn’t he be? What boy wouldn’t want to fix up a house and sell it for a profit?”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” she said. “It just seems that a lot of plans are being made for him, instead of with him.”

  “He’ll love it,” Mr. Pickens said, putting an end to that line of thinking.

  “Lillian,” I said, changing the topic, “who did you say owns that little house?”

  She turned quickly from the sink, as if she’d just heard what we’d been talking about. “Prob’bly ole Mr. Clabe Hammond, since he owns just about ev’rything that’s fallin’ down. He don’t fix nothin’ up.”

  “Tell Mr. Pickens what you told me about his cash-flow problem.”

  She frowned. “I don’t know ’bout his cash, but I heard he lost his shirt tryin’ to buy a hotel that never got built.”

  “That’d do it, all right,” Mr. Pickens said with a smile that verged on the self-congratulatory. And well it should’ve, for it was due to his efforts and a few of mine that the plug had been pulled on an ill-planned boutique hotel right next door to his house.

  “All right,” Mr. Pickens said, standing up. “I’ve got my marching orders, so I’m ready to have at it. Miss Julia, I’ll let you and Sam know our plans as soon as we have any. First order of business, though, is to tell Lloyd what we’ll be doing.”

  “Well, I think asking . . .”

  “Don’t worry about it. He’ll love it.” Mr. Pickens slipped on his coat, helped Hazel Marie with hers, told Lillian that she was as beautiful as ever, and started for the door.

  “One little thing,” I said, stopping him. “Before Sam had this bright idea, I’d planned to take on that house myself. Pursuant to that, I’d spoken to Mr. Nate Wheeler, who’s remodeling Dr. Crawford’s house next door. I had sort of made arrangements with him to help with contracting and so forth, and I thought . . .” I trailed off as he stared at me.

  “You pay him anything?”

  I shook my head. “It didn’t get that far.”

  “Then don’t worry about it.” And out he went, his arm around Hazel Marie as he hurried her through the cold wind to their car.

  * * *

  —

  “I declare, Lillian,” I said as the door closed behind them, “that man unsettles me.”

  “Yes’m, that’s prob’bly what he mean to do.”

  I made a quick turn toward her. “Why, I think you’re absolutely right. He does it on purpose, doesn’t he?”

  “It jus’ the way he is. He’s a teasin’ man.”

  “Yes,” I said, nodding, “that’s what Sam said, too. Well, anyway,” I went on, picking up our cups and saucers from the table, “I hope he knows enough about construction for Lloyd to learn something.”

  “Oh, I ’spect he do. They’s no tellin’ what all Mr. Pickens knows.”

  “That,” I said firmly, “is the unmitigated truth.”

  * * *

  —

  Sam returned from his visit to the dentist, grinning crookedly from the Novocain, and said, “Sorry, honey, to miss being here, but I’m glad to have that filling replaced. How did it go?”

  “Better than I thought it would,” I said. Then, “Almost too well, in fact. I think I presented it so attractively that I talked myself out of a job. There I was, planning to have something to do myself, and by the time they left, Mr. Pickens had taken it over entirely. I don’t quite know how it happened, except he immediately jumped on the idea of doing it with Lloyd. And the next thing I knew, it was Pickens and Son about to go into business.”

  “Don’t you think t
hat’s a good idea?”

  “Well, yes, I do. I just thought I might have a little part in it somewhere.”

  “I expect,” Sam said, as if seeing into the future, “there’ll be times when he and Lloyd will be glad to have you help out. What’s Pickens going to do when he has to go out of town? Who’s going to be there to accept a load of lumber and Lloyd is in school? Who’s going to tell those two that orange isn’t a good color for a kitchen?”

  I laughed. “You’re right. All I have to do is be available, and I’ll have plenty to do.”

  Sam headed upstairs, and as I passed the phone on my way to the library, it rang and I answered it.

  “Julia?” A whisper.

  “Yes?”

  “Can you talk?”

  “Who is this?”

  “Sh-h-h, it’s me.”

  “LuAnne? What’s wrong? Why’re you whispering?”

  “Because,” she said in a normal tone, “I don’t want every Tom, Dick, and Harry to hear me, and I have something to tell you.”

  “Where are you?”

  “I’m at work,” LuAnne said. “Where do you think I am? It’s my second day on the job and you won’t believe what’s happening.”

  “What?”

  Her voice dropped again. “Old Dr. Holcomb—remember him? Well, he passed last night, and we’ve got him. And we’ve also got his wife and his girlfriend!”

  “What! Are they dead, too?”

  “Oh, for goodness’ sake, no. Wake up, Julia, and listen. They’re here grieving.”

  “Both of them?”

  “Yes! It’s a madhouse around here. We have them in different slumber rooms—one’s in the Lilac room and the other in the Camellia room. You know, to keep them apart because everything’s supposed to stay calm and quiet. Serene, even. But I tell you, Julia, every salacious thing we’ve ever heard about him over the years is absolutely true. But don’t tell anybody. Uh-oh, I have to go. Talk to you later.” And she hung up.

  Well, well, so all the whispered stories about Dr. Harry Holcomb were true. I’d heard them for years, but had given them little credence because the man was otherwise highly thought of. He’d been one of those doctors who were always available, not only to their own patients, but to other physicians when they needed help. He was around for school activities when children could get hurt, and first responders knew he was always on call for highway accidents. In fact, he’d been instrumental in organizing the first emergency medical team in the county.

  On the other hand, however, LuAnne had once told me about the time she and Leonard had gone to see Out of Africa. As they went in after the film had started, they’d left in the middle, and as they walked up the aisle they passed Dr. Holcomb and a young woman sitting together. LuAnne said that she’d not been paying attention and wouldn’t even have noticed them except the young woman had suddenly flung a coat over her head.

  “I certainly looked then,” LuAnne had said. “I mean, there was Dr. Holcomb staring straight ahead at the movie while his girlfriend sat there covered with a coat. That sort of thing gets your attention, don’t you think?”

  The remarkable thing about all the stories was the fact that Dr. Holcomb apparently didn’t play around. He was faithful to one girlfriend for years and years—even bought her a condo, I’d heard—and it was a mystery to me why Eileen Holcomb put up with it. Or for that matter, why the girlfriend did, either.

  Of course, I was dying to know who she was. I’d heard it was a nurse at the hospital, but that had been pure guesswork. Someone else said she was a real estate agent, but then a rumor went around that he was involved with a friend of his wife. Nobody seemed to know for sure—just that it was somebody who had held on to his heart for decades, as apparently had his wife.

  I couldn’t help but wonder if he ever got them mixed up.

  Well, live and let live, I always say, except what you’ve tried to keep secret is likely to come out when you die. At least that’s what happened to Wesley Lloyd Springer, and now it was happening to Dr. Holcomb. Be assured, then, that one’s secrets—no matter how well kept—will eventually out. So my advice is to live accordingly.

  Chapter 24

  *

  The following week was quite busy for Pickens and Son, but not for me. They did let me know that they’d made an offer on the little house, after Binkie and Sam had okayed Lloyd’s use of funds, but old man Hammond, thinking that he had a live one, had put an unconscionable price on the house. You’d have thought it had an ocean view and a tiki bar. Lloyd, eager to get started, had been all for paying it, which just goes to show how much he had to learn. Mr. Pickens had laughed in Mr. Hammond’s face and walked away, saying there was more than one decrepit house in town. And he proceeded to put it out that he was looking at several others. A few days later, Mr. Hammond made a fairly reasonable counteroffer, and they went from there until Mr. Pickens was satisfied.

  Hazel Marie let me know that a roofer had been lined up for the following week, and Mr. Pickens had employed a couple of carpenters who didn’t mind heights to repair the rotten rafters.

  “And,” she’d said, “J.D. and Lloyd have spent a couple of afternoons and early evenings tearing out the interior walls. They’re planning to work all weekend, too. Even missing church to get in a full day on Sunday, and I don’t know how I feel about that.”

  “Oh, surely,” I said, with a touch of dismay, “they can spare an hour for church.”

  “You would think,” Hazel Marie responded with asperity. “But J.D. said it was more like all morning by the time it took to dress, go to church, then undress and redress, eat lunch, get their tools together, and get started. He said that I should just consider that their ox was in a ditch and not worry about it.”

  “My goodness,” I murmured, slightly impressed by Mr. Pickens’s knowledge of Scripture. He could come up with an answer for everything. “Well, what can you do? At least, it won’t last forever and they’ll be back in church every Sunday.”

  Hazel Marie sighed. “Well, Lloyd will at least.”

  I left that alone, for it’s unbecoming to criticize a woman’s husband. To her face, at least.

  * * *

  —

  The following week slipped us into March with little letup of cold, windy weather. I drove past numbers sixteen and eighteen Rosewood Lane a couple of times but, not wanting to overstep, didn’t stop. The roofers came to both the Crawford and the Pickens houses, quickly putting on new roofs that looked like fancy hats on bag ladies. Nate Wheeler’s white pickup was parked out front of number eighteen every day—every weekday, that is—and once I recognized Lauren Crawford’s large SUV parked behind it. From that, I assumed that she was her husband’s project manager or at least assigned by him to make sure Nate was working when he was supposed to.

  The second Sunday that Mr. Pickens and Lloyd eschewed church in favor of demolishing the interior, Sam and I drove over and went in. We did it in the afternoon, not during church hours, although I’m not sure that Mr. Pickens took note of the fact. I well knew that the point one is trying to make often goes right over the head of the one at whom you’ve aimed.

  Both of them, Mr. Pickens and Lloyd, were filthy, their faces covered with masks and everywhere else covered with dust and dirt from ripping out cabinets, ceilings, and wallboard. Debris was everywhere, although they were just beginning to haul trash to the large container in the front yard. We had brought cookies and hot chocolate, which were well received, even though I had to look away from their dirty hands and faces as they ate.

  “Lloyd,” I said, wishing there was a place to sit since my back rebelled against standing too long, “what’s the latest word on the Sadie Hawkins dance? Are you still going alone?”

  “Oh, gosh, don’t remind me,” he said, rolling his eyes. “It just gets worse and worse. Now, I’ve heard that Debbie Morse is going to ask me and I have t
o sneak around at school so she won’t hem me up.”

  “You don’t want to go with her?”

  “It’s not that—she’s all right. It’s just that I can’t handle three of ’em, much less four.”

  “But,” I said, “if the first three are still boycotting you, wouldn’t you rather have a date than not? A bird in the hand is worth three in the bush, you know.”

  Mr. Pickens was listening to this, his black eyes dancing in his head. I had a feeling that he was quite proud of his son’s appeal to the fairer sex—probably thinking that Lloyd was following in his footsteps.

  “Well,” Lloyd said, “I don’t know what I’m gonna do. Actually, nothing, I guess, ’cause I’m not supposed to ask anybody myself. I have to wait to be asked, but so far all I’ve heard are rumors that somebody will. I just wish somebody—just about anybody—would. It’s getting down to the wire—the dance is next weekend.”

  Before I could respond, Sam, who’d been wandering around among the studs, turned to Mr. Pickens and asked, “What’s your plan for the interior? Will you put walls back where the studs are?”

  “We’re thinking open concept—that’s all the rage right now.” Mr. Pickens discarded his Styrofoam cup and pointed out what he and Lloyd were planning. “Lloyd thinks we should make this entire half of the house into a kitchen, dining, and living room. Then do two bedrooms and a bath in the other half.” He took out his tape measure and wandered away with Sam to show him the placement of the rooms. “It’ll be tight, since it’s a small house to start with. But if we make one room out of half the building, we’ll have to have a supporting beam right here where this wall will come out.”

  Sam nodded, knowingly. “Probably be worth it, though. One big room will feel more spacious than two small ones.”

  When they walked off, discussing the best place for a washing machine and dryer, as well as where the new furnace would go, I asked Lloyd how he was liking the construction business.