Miss Julia Lays Down the Law

by Ann B. Ross

  “Sounds like y’all were anxious to go. Why was that? Was there a problem?”

  “No, we’d been there a couple of hours. We’d eaten, we’d socialized, we’d listened to Connie’s ideas, and it was time to go. See, Detective Ellis, if we’d stayed any longer, the hostess would’ve felt obligated to offer us lunch. And that’s not the way we do things in Abbotsville.”

  “I see,” he said, although I wasn’t sure he did, it being highly unlikely that he’d ever been to a ladies’ coffee. He tapped his pen against his pad as he studied me intently. “But tell me this, Mrs. Murdoch, what did you really think about Ms. Clayborn’s proposals? How did you feel when you had to listen to what sounds to me like pretty ruthless criticism, not just of the town but of each one of you personally?”

  Detective Ellis did understand, I thought, and opened my mouth to tell him how white-faced with anger I’d been at Connie and her arrogance in condemning us for being slack, lazy, and unwilling to lift our hands for the betterment of those who would come after us. Then I closed my mouth, afraid of what would come out if I ever started.

  Detective Ellis waited for my reply, then to encourage me, he said, “I know Ms. Clayborn was pretty hard on you ladies, and probably accused you of some things you had every right to resent. I’d just like to know your reaction, what you thought as you sat there listening to her.”

  He waited patiently for my response, a look of understanding and concern softening his face. “I know this is difficult for you, Mrs. Murdoch. But it’s important for me to know if there were any hard feelings toward her—on anybody’s part. Was anybody angry or upset about what she’d said?”

  “I can’t speak for everyone.”

  “I understand. But what about yourself? I’d really like to know how you felt?”

  And, again, I almost let it all spew out—how I’d felt and what I’d thought and why I’d taken myself to Connie’s house a second time, even though I hadn’t wanted to go even the first time. It was all I could do to contain it all, but years of restraint stood me in good stead.

  “Binkie,” I said, turning to her, “I believe I’ll take the Fifth on that.”

  Chapter 23

  “You did fine, Miss Julia.” Binkie and I were standing outside the sheriff’s brick building before going our separate ways. Then she peered closely at me. “Are you all right? You look a little peaked.”

  “I feel a little peaked,” I said. “Binkie, did I do myself in by taking the Fifth?”

  She smiled and patted my shoulder. “You didn’t take the Fifth. I didn’t give you time.”

  And she hadn’t. Before the words were out of my mouth good, up she’d popped from her chair, talking over me. “Mrs. Murdoch is tired, Detective. Let’s continue this another time. I think you’ve quite overtaxed her.”

  I remembered thinking as she urged me to my feet that she was right—he should’ve seen my tax bill last year. Of course, at the same time I knew that Detective Ellis had had nothing to do with that, and I’d begun laughing at my own errant thoughts.

  “See, Detective,” Binkie had said as she shoved my pocketbook at me and urged me toward the door, “my client needs to rest. She missed her nap today.”

  Detective Ellis hadn’t been sympathetic because he’d said, “I have one last question.” He looked kindly at me. “If you don’t mind, Mrs. Murdoch, let’s go over your actions one more time after you found Ms. Clayborn on the floor. You squatted beside her, shook her shoulder, called her name, pulled down her skirt, and about that time the lights went out. Describe for me in detail what you did then.”

  “Well,” I said, hating to mentally put myself back in that place. “Well, first of all, I was too scared to do anything, as I told you. Then when I heard something somewhere in the house, I knew I had to get out. So I stood up . . .”

  “Just like that?” Detective Ellis asked. “You jumped up and ran out?”

  “Hardly, Detective. I couldn’t just spring up without help. When you get to be my age and your knees give out on you, you’ll know what I’m talking about. No, I had to struggle to get to my feet, just as I have to do when I work in the yard, so I was able to push myself up with my hands. See, when you’re as scared as I was, you can do what you think you can’t do. But I was very careful not to disturb Connie—even with the lights out, I could see well enough to get up without touching her. Then I ran out.”

  “But you had to put your hands in some of the blood on the floor?”

  “No!” I said, shocked at first, but after thinking for a minute, went on. “At least, not on purpose. But when I got outside, there was blood on one hand—the left one, I think.” My voice was quavering by this time, and I was feeling teary as I tried to remember where I’d put my hands when I’d pushed myself off the floor. “But, Detective Ellis, whichever it was, I didn’t mean to.”

  “Okay,” Binkie said, moving toward the door. “That’s enough for today.”

  “She has to be fingerprinted,” Detective Ellis said. “Let’s get that done before you leave.”

  “Binkie?” I said, trembling. They really did suspect me, because none of the other ladies had said they’d been fingerprinted.

  “It’s just routine, Miss Julia,” she said soothingly, although Binkie didn’t do soothing so well. “You were there, and you touched things. They need your prints so they can distinguish them from whoever else was there.”

  “Well, put that way . . .” And we’d followed Detective Ellis to another room, where my finger-, thumb-, and palm prints were taken and probably entered into some database on file in the bowels of the government to be accessible to every law officer in the nation. I could be a future suspect in a crime committed in, say, Idaho. Or New Jersey, even.

  • • •

  As we left the room and walked down the hall to the exit, I recalled Binkie’s remark about my being tired and overtaxed by the detective’s questions—and missing my nap. I removed my arm from her clasp and glared at her. “Now, Binkie, I’ll have you know that I don’t appreciate your implying that I’m senile.”

  “Sh-h-h,” she said, grinning as she glanced behind us. “Nobody knows better how sharp you are than I, Miss Julia. But I wanted you out of there before Detective Ellis thought you were hiding something. Which is what it sounded like when you mentioned the Fifth.”

  So then there we were standing out in the weak November sunshine in front of the sheriff’s office, as she explained that she’d rather the detective think I’d lost some of my marbles than that I was hiding something important to his investigation.

  “I guess I was hiding something, Binkie. See, it was like this. I . . .”

  “Don’t tell me. I don’t need to know.”

  “Well, somebody needs to know, because it’s bothering me. So just listen. I was angry at Connie Clayborn. I was so mad, I could hardly see straight—mad at her arrogance, mad at her insolence in presuming that she knew everything, and mad that some one of us hadn’t slapped her cross-eyed. But, Binkie, I did not hurt her.”

  “Miss Julia, I know that.” Binkie took my arm as we began walking toward our cars. “But I wanted you out of there before Detective Ellis knew how angry you’d been at her.”

  “Well, but I wasn’t the only one. We all were, and now all I can do is wonder who, among my friends, might’ve been mad enough to do what was done. It’s a terrible thing to live with.”

  We’d reached our cars by that time, and still we lingered on the sidewalk. “I know,” Binkie said with sympathy. “But I can’t believe that any of them had a thing to do with it, and I can’t believe that Detective Ellis does, either.

  “But, Miss Julia, you shouldn’t be discussing this with anybody. It doesn’t matter if everybody else felt the way you did. If you’re now having suspicions about them, you can bet that they’re having the same about you. So just keep everything to yourself.” She sto
pped, looked closely at me again, and said, “Are you all right to drive home?”

  “I’m fine. All I need is a little rest. I missed my nap today.”

  • • •

  I had to stop and pull to the side of the road before I got halfway home, and home was only eight blocks away. It had suddenly come to me that I’d admitted to Binkie something I’d not been able to face myself.

  All along, ever since I’d walked into Connie’s kitchen and found her on the floor, I’d been wondering, way back where vague, unformed thoughts begin, about my friends—running each of them through my mind and questioning their hidden capabilities.

  I’d heard them—Mildred had been furious at Connie, LuAnne had felt tricked and compelled to do something she couldn’t do, and Emma Sue couldn’t do anything but turn her anger against herself, as she usually did. But even though I was loathe to remind myself—which I did anyway—Emma Sue’s aggressive husband didn’t work that way.

  And who knew the level of anger among the others who’d been trapped into listening to Connie’s sneering rant against all we held dear? No wonder Detective Ellis had looked so tired and strained—he had too many suspects.

  I rubbed my eyes, trying to think clearly even as I castigated myself for considering the possibility that people I’d known most of my life were capable of causing what I’d found in that kitchen.

  How I longed for Sam, so much so that it crossed my mind to turn around and drive to Raleigh. Accost him in his hotel room and bare my soul so he could assure me that there was no way in the world that what was flickering in my mind could actually have happened. Why, I’d even wondered about that lovely Sue Hargrove, who’d spent weeks designing and stitching angels’ wings and sprinkling them with gold glitter.

  How could I suspect any one of us? Well, maybe because I had no other options. Except, I thought, Connie’s husband— Stan, the night runner. So where was he in Detective Ellis’s investigation? How many times had he been interviewed?

  Those were the things that I so wanted to discuss with Sam, who wasn’t there to discuss anything. With him, I wouldn’t have had to watch my words, weigh my opinions, or withhold anything. I could express myself fully, and, I suddenly realized, I could feel perfectly free and justified to tell him exactly why I visited Connie that awful day when I found myself at the wrong place at the wrong time.

  If Sam had been home, I could’ve told it all for I would’ve no longer felt constrained by my promise to the pastor. Too much had happened since I’d made it, and after he’d taken Emma Sue out of town—thereby avoiding me—he could no longer, in conscience, hold me to it.

  So I quickly drove home, hoping and half praying that Sam would be there or that he’d left word he’d be home the next day. Instead, Lillian was frying chicken—jumping back each time the grease popped—Lloyd was in the library watching television while doing homework on the floor, and Latisha was running back and forth between them, talking and talking.

  “Has Sam called?” I asked as soon as I got in the door.

  “No’m, ’less he call while Latisha talkin’, an’ I didn’t hear it.”

  At a burst of laughter from Latisha, I said, “I’m going upstairs to put my feet up for a while. If the phone rings, I’ll get it.”

  I’d barely settled myself in the easy chair in our bedroom when the phone rang. I snatched it up before one of the children answered it.

  “Julia,” Sam said, and I felt the tension in my body begin to ease away. “How are you, honey?”

  “Oh, Sam,” I said, as tears sprang to my eyes in relief at the sound of his voice. “I’m fine, but how are you? Have you decided what to do about that senile judge?”

  Of course I wasn’t fine, but I didn’t want to inundate him with my problems before expressing my interest in his.

  He laughed. “I tell you, Julia, when you’re part of a committee or board or whatever we are, you have to listen to every member’s opinion. Then everybody has an opinion about that opinion. But I’m enjoying it, more than I thought I would. Everybody’s congenial—of course, I knew several before I got here, went to law school with a couple—so we all get along.

  “But the best times, Julia, are at dinner. You’d think we’d get enough of each other during the day, but we don’t. We sit around a table in a restaurant and talk and talk, tell tall tales, and laugh our heads off. Then we fall into bed and get up the next day and do it all over again. It would be perfect if you were here. I miss you, sweetheart.”

  That was thoughtful of him to say, but I knew he wouldn’t have felt free to go and come with his friends if I’d been there.

  Unhappily for me, he sounded so lighthearted and enthusiastic about what he was doing that I could not bring myself to unload a pile of worries on him. I could wait until he got home.

  “When will you be home, Sam?”

  “Maybe tomorrow, late. We’ll definitely finish up tomorrow if we can agree on the wording of the report we have to submit to the governor. If we can’t, it’ll be Sunday, for sure. We’re watching the weather channel, and we all want to be home by Sunday afternoon before that storm moves in.”

  I could do nothing but accept that, even though it meant continuing to carry my worrisome burden alone for another long day. Which, I reminded myself, is what good wives do.

  Chapter 24

  That wasn’t the end of the telephone calls on that busy day. Just as Lillian announced supper, the phone rang again.

  “Julia, it’s Sue Hargrove,” she said. “I know we’ve all had a hard day and you probably have plans, but my house is empty tonight. Everybody’s off doing one thing or another, and I thought a few of us might get together to work on ornaments.”

  “You may be a lifesaver, Sue,” I said. “Sam’s away, too, and my house is full of children—loud ones. Actually, only two, but it sounds like more. I’d love to get away for a while. I’ll see if Mildred wants a ride.”

  “I just spoke to her, and she thinks she’s getting a cold, so she’s going to stay in. Helen has plans so she can’t come. It’ll just be Roberta, LuAnne, Callie, and you and me. We’ll get started about seven, if that’s not too early for you.”

  “Not at all. See you then.”

  Learning that Mildred was coming down with a cold, I thought of Hazel Marie, realizing that I had not checked on her lately. So even though the phone had rarely been left alone that day, I used it again.

  “Hazel Marie,” I began as soon as she answered, “I apologize for not calling you before this, but I’ve been keeping up with you through Lloyd. And, by the way, thank you for letting him stay with us—he’s been wonderful with Latisha. And of course I always love having him. But how is everybody at your house?”

  “I think we’ll live, but it’s been touch and go. As soon as one of us begins to feel better, somebody else gets worse.”

  A coughing fit overtook her, so I waited until it was over.

  “Miss Julia,” she was finally able to say, although her voice was raspy, “I was shocked to read about Connie Clayborn. I didn’t know her, but I know you did. You must be devastated.”

  “I was. I mean, I am.”

  “But you found her? How awful for you!”

  Before I could respond, Hazel Marie was convulsed with more coughing. It went on so long that I said, “Why don’t we talk when you’re feeling better.” Gasping for breath, she agreed. So, hoping that she had a good supply of Robitussin, I hung up and went to the kitchen for dinner.

  • • •

  Gathering my pocketbook and car keys, I told Lillian where I was going and urged her not to wait up for me.

  “Just leave a lot of lights on downstairs,” I said. “It’ll look as if somebody’s up.” That dark figure running by our house was still on my mind.

  As I drove to Sue’s almost authentic Cape Cod house, it occurred to me that getting togethe
r tonight might not be such a good idea. We were certainly behind with our sale items—reason enough for a sewing session—but I had a feeling that after the day we’d all had, there’d be more on our minds than Christmas ornaments.

  I knew I wanted to talk, or rather to listen—we’d all been interviewed by Detective Ellis and I wanted to know what he’d asked and, more important, how they’d answered. Well, Roberta wouldn’t have been interviewed. At least, I assumed she hadn’t because she’d not been invited to Connie’s coffee.

  And thinking of Roberta made me think of Coleman. We should’ve gone out to see him again, but, I declare, I’d had too much on my mind that day. But then I thought, Coleman. Wouldn’t he be a perfect stand-in for Sam? Binkie hadn’t wanted to hear about my inner turmoil, which was understandable. She was my lawyer and couldn’t put herself in the position of defending the indefensible, if I happened to fall into that category. No way could I talk to Lillian that night, either, because nothing could be said that would be out of Lloyd’s hearing, much less Latisha’s.

  So I was about to explode, needing to release some of the stress I was under. But no one knew better than I that I would have to hold my tongue in the presence of a bunch of women who were also under stress and who couldn’t be trusted, even in the best of times, not to tell everything they heard to everybody they knew.

  I determined to keep a tight rein on my mouth. I would listen, learn what I could, but I wouldn’t say one thing that could be repeated, and likely repeated incorrectly.

  • • •

  Sue had us around her quilt-covered dining room table again, and for a while the conversation was, if somewhat subdued, pleasant enough. We worked on our ornaments and confined our talk to how one color worked with another and the like.

  Finally, LuAnne could stand it no longer. “Well, I don’t know why we’re not talking about those interviews we had. That’s the main reason I came tonight, but we’ve been sitting around here like being questioned by the police is an everyday occurrence. But, I tell you, it’s not for me. Where’re the scissors?” She looked around, found them, and snipped a thread. “I don’t even know why they had me come in in the first place. I’d only met her that one time.”