by Ann B. Ross
“And that’s not all,” Emma Sue hissed. “He lives with his mother! And always has, all his life, and he’s no spring chicken. She’s on up there in age, too, I understand, but still. I think that’s more than a little strange, don’t you?”
“Well, I certainly do. How can he have the nerve to counsel married people? And Emma Sue, listen to this.” I found myself leaning toward her, as I realized that I had a fellow traveler in a common cause. “You know what he’s going to talk about, don’t you?”
“Making marriages better?”
“Huh!” I almost snorted. “Just read that bulletin and listen to what the pastor must’ve told you about the meeting we missed. It’s all about S-E-X. Think about it. Stirring the embers? Rekindling your relationship? Putting sparks back into your marriage? It’s all about,” I dropped my voice, “passion. And if he’s never been married, what does he know about it, I ask you.”
“Why, Julia, I do believe you’re right.” Emma Sue’s eyes glazed over as she thought about it. “I wonder if Larry realizes that. I don’t think he’d approve at all.”
“Well, I’m just telling you that Dr. Fowler—or Dr. Fred, as he wants to be called—may use euphemisms, but that’s what it comes down to. And I’m here to tell you, I am not going to sit in a group and be embarrassed to death while he talks about private matters in public. Or tries to get us to talk about them.”
And I determined then and there that that was exactly what I would tell Sam. Why should that mama’s boy put me in bed with an upset stomach that I didn’t even have just so I could get out of having to look at him? And why should I have to tell untruths to my husband to keep from meeting the man again?
“Me, either,” Emma Sue said, looking resolved and decisive. “Larry can’t want me to be around talk like that. When he understands what Dr. Fowler’s really talking about, he’ll not want me hearing a word of it. Thank you, Julia. I feel a hundred percent better.”
Chapter 22
Well, goodness, I thought, if Emma Sue spread that word around, it might start a mass migration of wives out of the Monday-night sessions. Not that there’d been all that many to start with.
But as I walked her to the door, she suddenly turned and said, “If you’re right, Julia, and that’s what Dr. Fowler’s going to talk about, I don’t know but that I might not mind hearing some of it. But only,” she quickly qualified, “if no men were involved—including him. I mean, a women’s group led by a woman. And called something else, like, oh, I don’t know, Reaching Your Full Potential or something. I expect none of us knows everything there is to know about marital sparks and embers and such.”
“That’s probably true,” I said, although I’d learned a gracious plenty since I’d been married to Sam. Where he’d learned it I couldn’t say and wouldn’t ask.
“I’ll speak to Larry about it,” Emma Sue said. “He’ll think it’s a splendid idea when I tell him how inappropriate it is for wives to hear what you said Dr. Fowler has in mind.”
“Well now, Emma Sue,” I cautioned, “all I’m doing is interpreting Dr. Fowler’s figurative language. I could possibly be wrong, so why don’t you wait until the pastor hears for himself what the sessions are about. That way, it’ll be his idea that you not attend. Then you could suggest a women’s group if you want to.”
“Oh, Julia, you are so wise. It would absolutely be best for Larry to make that decision on his own. So instead of pushing myself as I always do on Mondays—the weekends, especially Sundays, are so full for us, you know—I’ll just give in to fatigue as I’ve longed to do so often and let him go one more time by himself. The Lord does want us to take care of ourselves, and he’ll forgive me because he knows I need the rest.”
“I’m sure you do, Emma Sue,” I said, opening the door for her. “You push yourself too hard, always doing for others and rarely for yourself.”
She stepped out onto the porch as I held the screen door. She looked back at me through welling tears of gratitude. “Not everybody understands like you do, Julia. I get so tired sometimes that I can hardly put one foot in front of the other. Well, I have to be going. Thank you for listening and, oh, I forgot to ask. Are you going to Mildred’s tonight?”
“Yes, I’m planning to. I wonder what her surprise is.”
“Oh, me, too. I’m so looking forward to it. Well, I’ll see you there.” She waved and walked with a sprightly step down the walkway to her car.
When Lillian and Etta Mae returned from their cleaning mission, the first thing Etta Mae did was to call Binkie to learn if there’d been any developments that morning.
“I just can’t get my mind off it, Miss Julia,” she said to me as she waited to be connected. “All day, every day, it’s the only thing I think—oh, Binkie, hi, it’s me. Did you get in to see Mrs. Delacorte?”
Lillian and I listened to the one-sided conversation, which consisted mostly of “uh-huhs” and “ohs” and “okays.” When Etta Mae hung up, her face told the story—there was no good news.
“Mrs. Delacorte won’t talk to her,” Etta Mae said. “And apparently she doesn’t have to. All Binkie can get is the statement she made to the deputies. And she just got that, so she hasn’t read it all yet.” Etta Mae slumped down in a chair. “I don’t know what I’m going to do. It just keeps on and on.”
“Don’t give up on us, Etta Mae,” I said. “My limited experience with all things involving the law tells me that it’s always slow. Seems as if everything is long and drawn out, unnecessarily so, in my opinion. So you just have to ride it out and stand firm on the fact that you have been wrongly accused.”
“I think,” Lillian pronounced, “she need something to eat. Everybody feel better then. What y’all want for lunch?”
We discussed the options and ended up with sandwiches made from leftover roast beef. Etta Mae undoubtedly felt better with a full stomach, but she didn’t look much better. Sadness and worry pulled at her face, and she wasn’t the happy and eager young woman I was accustomed to.
“Why don’t you go take a nap, Etta Mae?” I urged. “You’ve been busy cleaning all morning, so run up and lie down for a little while.”
“Binkie’s going to call back after she studies that statement. I don’t think I can rest till I hear from her.” Then, with a wan smile, she went on. “Besides, I don’t ever take naps. Always too busy.”
“Well, you’re not too busy today. Here,” I said, handing her the newspaper, “go up and at least lie down. Read the paper, and if you get sleepy during that, as I expect you will, you can nap awhile. I’ll listen out for Binkie.”
It was another couple of hours before Binkie called back to say she was on her way over with Francie’s statement. I had to wake Etta Mae from a deep sleep, bring her downstairs and give her a cup of coffee.
When Binkie arrived, she handed Francie’s statement to Etta Mae and said, “Read it, and tell me what you think.” Etta Mae did, passing each sheet of it to me as she finished it.
Instead of a statement, it consisted of several statements, each given at a different time. Francie’s first semicoherent interview was conducted in the emergency room, where she’d been taken after Evelyn had discovered her on Thursday. Francie told the deputy that she’d been “mugged and strangled,” although the doctor’s notes indicated no signs of injury to her throat and neck. That was the extent of the first statement, because the deputy noted that the victim was unable to provide further information, saying, “I don’t know,” “I can’t remember” and “Leave me alone, I’m dying.”
The next interview took place Friday morning in the hospital and was conducted by Lieutenant Peavey. That time, Francie said she didn’t know who had assaulted her, just that she had attempted to get out of bed by herself to see if Evelyn had arrived. According to her, she’d stood up and taken a few steps, then “there was this awful pain on the top of my head as something crashed down on me, and I heard a crunching sound like my bones had shattered, and a blackness darker than night descende
d on me, and that’s all I remember.” There was no mention of either strangulation or theft of a gold bracelet.
Saturday afternoon, when her doctor noted that her vital signs were normal and she was fully coherent, Lieutenant Peavey visited Francie again. This time, the statement she gave was precise and detailed. And different. According to her, she’d been left alone Thursday morning and decided to get out of bed, although she had “strict orders to stay off that toe.” But she was hungry and thought she could hop to the kitchen. “If I fell and hurt myself,” she was quoted as saying, “it would serve them right for leaving me alone.” I rolled my eyes at that.
Then, according to her, before she got out of the bedroom, that “awful pain” struck, which indicated to her that somebody had to have been in the room already—“right next to my bed, just waiting to take me unawares.” Again, according to her, she awoke on the floor, hardly able to move as she listened to her attacker plundering about on her vanity table. At that point, Francie started screaming for help, so the attacker rushed over, drew back her head by the hair and commenced to choke her. It was then that she passed out again and awoke only when those “rough technicians flung me on a stretcher and brought me to the hospital, half dead and terrified out of my mind.”
The last statement, taken again by Lieutenant Peavey, had been given early Sunday afternoon. It was then, and only then, that Francie recalled a “terrible and sickening odor” that she attributed to cheap perfume. “So,” she was quoted as saying, “I knew then that it was that little twit of a home nurse who was supposed to be looking after me and who left me by myself, then came back because she wanted my bracelet. Her name is Etta Mae Wiggins. No one but her would wear such cheap perfume, and I’d smelled it before, so I know it was her. She nearly killed me, and after all I’ve done for her, too.”
Etta Mae put her head on the table in despair. “Shania Twain by Stetson is not cheap. And I don’t wear it all the time, only on special occasions, like for the lunch party.” She raised her head. “I don’t even like bangle bracelets, and I’m not a little twit, either.”
“You most certainly are not,” I assured her. “This thing,” I went on as I flapped the pages of the statement in front of Binkie, “speaking of odors, smells to high heaven. It gets richer and more specific by the interview.”
Binkie nodded. “Yes, but the prosecutor will say that’s because Mrs. Delacorte’s memory returned gradually. He’ll use the head injury and resulting concussion as the reason for a temporary loss of memory.”
“Well, I think,” I said, “that she’s making more than half of it up. She’s been lying in bed in that hospital, building up an imaginary event and adding more and more to it, just for the attention she gets. I tell you, Binkie, the woman cannot be believed. Why, she told us one time about being accosted by a gang of drug dealers in Panama when she was on her way to a diplomatic luncheon. She said she just drew herself up and told them that she was a lady and unaccustomed to dealing with trash. And if you believe it, which I don’t, they apologized and let her go. That, Binkie, is the kind of tall tale she can tell.”
“Yes, well,” Binkie said with a long sigh, “maybe so. But we have to deal with her statement. It’s all we have because Etta Mae can’t prove where she was between eleven o’clock and fifteen or so minutes past twelve that day when she arrived here.”
“I was in my car for about twenty minutes,” Etta Mae said with a stubborn look on her face. “Driving home. Then I was in my single-wide, taking a quick shower, changing clothes and redoing my makeup, then in the car again driving here to Miss Julia’s. I may not be able to prove it, but that’s what I was doing.”
“Wait just a minute,” I said. “Maybe you can prove it. Binkie, can you get Francie, maybe through one of the interviewers, to describe what Etta Mae was wearing that morning?” I turned to Etta Mae. “What were you wearing?”
“My usual uniform,” she said. “A light blue scrub suit, Easy Stride running shoes and a navy cotton cardigan because it was chilly early that morning.”
“Good!” I said. “Because you weren’t wearing that when you got here. So—”
“So,” Binkie finished for me, “what we’ll do is time the distance from Mrs. Delacorte’s house to your single-wide, Etta Mae, then time it from there to Miss Julia’s house. What’s left will be how long it took you to get out of your uniform and into the clothes that Miss Julia can testify you were wearing when you got here.”
Joy bloomed on Etta Mae’s face. “That’s it! I can prove it, can’t I? I didn’t have time to do it.” Then reality set in and she said, “What if Mrs. Delacorte says she doesn’t remember? What if she says I was wearing something different?”
“Don’t worry about that,” Binkie said. “I’ll get Lieutenant Peavey to ask her, along with other questions, and she won’t think it’s important enough to say anything but the truth. Besides, she won’t be able to describe what you wore to the luncheon. And you also visited another client earlier, didn’t you? We’ll get that statement, too, and confirm what you had on.” Binkie looked at me. “Can you describe in detail what she was wearing when she got here? And Etta Mae, not one word to her now or later to help her remember.”
“Of course I can,” I said, then frowned. “And it certainly was not a scrub suit. It was, well, a dress, dark in color. Oh, and long sleeves and a deep décolletage—I remember that in particular. And she had a large tote bag, maybe navy blue? Or black? And high heels.” I smiled with relief. “How’s that, Etta Mae?”
Binkie held up her hand. “Don’t answer that. And whatever you do, don’t correct anything. We don’t want any hint of collusion here. Come on, Etta Mae, let’s go time how long it took you to do all that driving. Then we’ll see the lieutenant and get it on record. He’ll want to talk to you, too, Miss Julia.”
Well, Lord, I hoped I’d come close enough in describing Etta Mae’s luncheon attire to convince Lieutenant Peavey of her innocence. Because, frankly, the main thing I remembered was all that bosom she’d had on display.
Chapter 23
I wanted to go with them, but Lloyd came in from school, then Sam arrived, so I stayed to catch them up with the latest developments.
“So,” Sam said when I finished, “the lieutenant will have the victim, Francie Pitts Delacorte, saying that Etta Mae was wearing a light blue scrub suit that morning and still wearing it when she left at eleven, and a witness, you, Julia, testifying that she had on a dark, long-sleeved dress one hour and fifteen minutes or so later, which should prove that Etta Mae did leave and go home during that time. So let’s say it takes twenty minutes to drive from Francie’s house to Etta Mae’s trailer and another twenty minutes to drive here from the trailer. That eats up forty minutes of the hour and fifteen, leaving about thirty-five minutes unaccounted for.”
“She was dressing, Sam, and fi xing her makeup. Who’s side are you on, anyway?”
Sam grinned at me. “Just thinking like a prosecutor, sweetheart. And like a certain lieutenant. Still, I’ve never known you to be able to change clothes and put on makeup in thirty-five minutes.”
“Yes, and Etta Mae puts on a lot more than I do, so it takes her longer. But seriously, Sam, what worries me is that she was in a real dither when she got here, all rushed and anxious and upset. And it could’ve taken her less than twenty minutes to get from one place to the other. But of course, it all depends on traffic, and it could’ve taken her longer. She could’ve caught the red light in Delmont both ways, and that would’ve slowed her down.”
“Let’s wait and see what Binkie says after they time it. To get to Delmont from Mountain Villas, you have to go through downtown Abbotsville and through Delmont, too, because the trailer park is on the other side. I expect twenty minutes both ways would be about right.”
Lillian and Lloyd had been listening to this, both as interested as Sam and I were. Lillian brought the coffeepot over for refills, her face squinched up as she thought about our time lines.
&
nbsp; After a few minutes, Lloyd said, “But Etta Mae does everything real fast. Driving, dressing, everything. She doesn’t waste a minute.”
“That’s called efficiency, Lloyd,” I said, “but you’re right. I’m not sure this is going to get her off the hook. If I know Lieutenant Peavey, he’s going to think she still could’ve hit Francie, grabbed a bracelet and got out of there with enough time left to do everything else.”
Lillian stood with the coffeepot in her hand, staring off in the distance. “Yes’m,” she said, “but where that bracelet at now? I seen her jewel box this mornin’, ’cause them deputies strewed everything out, an’ I didn’t see no gold bangle bracelet. Didn’t see much of anything ’cause she don’t have much.”
“That’s a good question, Lillian,” Sam said. “The bracelet and the weapon both are missing. Binkie said that Mrs. Delacorte suffered a large flat injury to the crown of her head, but the deputies didn’t find anything in or around her house with evidence of having been used.”
“What kind of evidence would be on it?” I asked.
“Oh, strands of her hair, probably. Some blood, if it broke the skin, depending on how hard she was hit.”
“Well, that’s another thing we don’t know,” I said. “Just how hard was she hit? She had a bandage on her head when I saw her, but the way she exaggerates, it could’ve been a little tap and nothing more.”
“She was knocked out, Julia,” Sam reminded me with a smile.
“That’s her story,” I said.
Later, Sam and I sat in the living room before supper, wincing at each bang of a basketball as Lloyd again and again hit the hoop over the garage door.
“Sam,” I said, “I’ve been wondering about something. Now, I know this is a delicate subject, and you may not want to answer it. But tell me this—from a man’s point of view—what does Francie Pitts have that nobody else seems to have?”
