Miss Julia Stands Her Ground

by Ann B. Ross

  “Oh, my goodness, no. Larry is so careful not to let strange thoughts enter his mind and distract him from a prayerful attitude.” She paused again, and I let the silence draw out. Then she said, “That’s why we don’t watch a lot of television.”

  Thank you, Lord, I thought, after getting off the phone, for helping me divert Emma Sue toward the Baptists and away from me. I lifted my head as I heard Hazel Marie clattering down the back staircase.

  “Hey, Miss Julia,” she said, coming to a stop as her feet hit the kitchen floor. “You’re running a little late this morning, aren’t you?”

  “Just a little on the slow side, that’s all. Come sit a while and let’s talk.”

  She laughed and poured a cup of coffee. “We’ve been trying to get together for the longest, haven’t we? I’ve been so busy with first one thing and another, but this is a good time.” She glanced up toward the ceiling. “Lillian’s changing the beds, so we’ll have a few minutes.”

  She drew up a chair and sat across from me at the table. “I think we ought to talk first about what to get Lillian. What do you have in mind?”

  “I’m not thinking of Christmas right yet, Hazel Marie.” Then I took a deep breath and plunged in. “It’s just that with my recent marriage, I have begun to think back over my whole life. It’s been sort of flashing before my eyes, making me wonder about the choices I’ve made and what would’ve happened if I’d made different ones.”

  “Oh, my, you can’t do that. It’s too late to change the past, you know.” She poured cream into her coffee and carefully stirred it. A frown creased her forehead, as she considered the subject. “What you have to do is just accept what’s gone before, and try to do better today and in the future.”

  I nodded, beginning to understand how she could be so happy and lighthearted now, in spite of her earlier waywardness. Hazel Marie didn’t allow guilt over past errors to ruin the present.

  “How do you do that, Hazel Marie? I mean, how do you put the past and all its mistakes aside, and start each day fresh?”

  “I just take the Lord at his word. He’s forgiven me for the mistakes I made and blessed me with Lloyd in spite of everything.”

  Well, my word, I thought, the very thing I’d had pounded in my head from the pulpit almost every Sunday. Could it be as simple as that?

  She leaned across the table, and said, “But you haven’t made the mistakes I’ve made, so what’s troubling you?”

  “Oh, I don’t know.” I bit my lip, wondering how far I should go. “Well, marrying Wesley Lloyd, for one thing. I mean, without looking around to see who else was out there. I married the first man who asked me. And I keep wondering what my life would’ve been like if I’d met Sam first, and we’d had all our lives to be together. I expect you met a lot of boys and men when you were a girl, Hazel Marie, but what kept you from marrying one of them?”

  Hazel Marie got real busy stirring her coffee again. “Miss Julia, I did go out with a lot of men in my young days, and I probably would’ve married any one of them if they’d asked me.”

  “I’m sure they conducted themselves like gentlemen. Or did some of them try to get fresh with you?”

  She laughed, but her face turned a pretty shade of pink. “Lord, Miss Julia, they’ll all get fresh if you let them.” She studied her cup, as she turned it around in the saucer. “I kept hoping to find somebody who’d want a home and a family, like I did.”

  I nodded again, having known the feeling myself.

  “But I didn’t get either one till Lloyd and I met up with you, and you changed everything.” She propped her chin on her hand and looked out the window. “I wasn’t a good girl, I know that, and maybe I’m not much better now. But I’m in love with J.D., and that’s never happened before.” She smiled and shrugged. “A fat lot of good it’s doing me, though.”

  “He’ll come around,” I said, though with little conviction, knowing Mr. Pickens’s reluctance to marry again after trying it so many times with no success.

  “I hope so. Well, I’ve got to get up from here and get busy.” Hazel Marie picked up her cup and took it to the sink. “Now listen, I don’t want you moping around, having regrets over what could’ve been or should’ve been. We’ve all made mistakes, some worse than others, but all we have is today. You should just be happy that you and Sam have found each other. And count your blessings, because some people never find the right one.” She smiled. “I mean, better late than never, right?”

  I returned her smile, and nodded in reluctant agreement, but feeling some chagrin that Hazel Marie had ended up counseling me instead of the other way around.

  As she headed for the back stairs, she turned back to me. “I’m glad we finally had this little talk, although it took us long enough to get around to it. But it was my fault for letting things interfere. Next time you want to talk, just sit me down and make me stay there.”

  “Thank you, Hazel Marie, I’ll do that.”

  And as she hurried upstairs, I buried my face in my hands. I had done my best to find out the truth about Deacon Lonnie, without actually asking her. And I thought she’d answered my question, not only about him but about any number of others. As distasteful as it was to consider, there was no wonder that Hazel Marie had thought Wesley Lloyd was a catch—who wouldn’t after Lonnie Whitmire and the like? Of course, I’d thought Wesley Lloyd a catch, too, but that was before I’d had to live with him.

  The funny thing about it, though, was that my heart went out to Hazel Marie even more. What a life she’d led, yet she was a good and decent person, warmhearted and happy because she believed what she’d been told.

  The faith of a child, I thought, and stood up abruptly. Brother Vern was not going to destroy her and that little boy. I was determined not to care who the child’s father was. He was Hazel Marie’s son, and that would have to be good enough.

  But if Sam could prove a Springer connection by means of modern-day science, then so much the better.

  Chapter 32

  Sam came home earlier than usual that afternoon. He spoke warmly to Lillian as he passed through the kitchen on his way to the living room. Wondering what had brought him, I rose from my chair as soon as I heard his voice.

  “Julia,” he said, cocking his head toward the back hall. “Let’s talk.”

  Without a word, I followed him to our bedroom, the only private place in the house. Turning to him, I couldn’t keep the anxiety out of my voice.

  “What is it? What’s happened?”

  “Nothing that helps, I’m afraid.” He took my arm and led me to the bed, his favorite sitting place. “I’ve spent the day looking into Lonnie Whitmire, who he is and what he is. There’s not much on record, and I didn’t want to ask too many questions.”

  “But you found out something?”

  He nodded. “Not much, but few a things. He grew up on the south side of the county, a little community called Wilkes Creek, and has lived there all his life, some fifty-two years. He’s worked in retail for years, selling shoes at Belk’s for a while, then moving into automobile parts at the NAPA store. For the past couple of years he’s been with some kind of cut-rate store out in Delmont. As far as I can tell he’s never been in trouble with the law. Well, he was fined for letting an inspection sticker on his car run out some years ago, but that’s all.”

  “What about a family? Is he married?”

  He nodded again. “Two children. Both grown and gone. I couldn’t find anything on a wife, not even if he still has one.”

  “Oh, my,” I said, dismayed at the report. “He sounds like a model citizen. I was so hoping that he’d be a chronic tale teller, and that nobody had ever believed a word out of his mouth.” Then I grabbed Sam’s hand. “But, wait. If his children are old enough to be on their own, that means he was already married when Little Lloyd was conceived. Doesn’t that tell us something?”

  “It tells us that he was no better than Wesley Lloyd. If,” Sam said, with a sharp glance at me, “he was the one
responsible. We don’t know that he was.”

  “And,” I said, picking up on his thought, “if he was, which I still don’t believe, his claim to have come to the Lord since then wipes everything out.” I sighed. “Hazel Marie was just reminding me how well that works. But what I don’t understand is why he’s willing to let Brother Vern dredge it all up again.”

  “I know,” Sam said with a sympathetic smile. “But we’ve just scratched the surface. If we could dig deeper, interview his neighbors and talk to his coworkers—things like that—we’d have a better picture of the kind of person he is.”

  “Then let’s put Mr. Pickens on him. He’s used to digging up dirt.”

  Sam looked at me. “You want to let Pickens in on this? We’d have to tell him everything, you know.”

  “Oh, me, I don’t know.” I brushed back my hair in frustration. “I’d hate for him to know and Hazel Marie not. You know I wanted to tell her at first, but I’ve changed my mind now. She’s so happy, looking forward to Christmas and all, and, like they say, ignorance is bliss. Oh, Sam, it is just a mess.”

  I rested my head on Sam’s shoulder, thankful that it was there for me, and wishing I never had to move.

  He rubbed my back in a distracted way. Then he said, “All right, let’s keep Pickens in reserve for now. At least until we hear from Puckett again. But I’ll tell you this, Julia: I don’t like the fact that he just showed up at the door with Whitmire in tow. He may do it again when Hazel Marie’s here, and I know you don’t want that. If we just had something, anything, with Wesley Lloyd’s DNA on it. . . .”

  “Yes, and I’ve racked my brain to think of something, but it’s all gone. I went into a frenzy, Sam, there’s no other way to describe it. I rid myself of everything he owned.”

  Sam drew me closer and spoke against my hair. “What’s done is done, Julia, so don’t beat yourself up about it. Now, listen, I know you don’t want to do it, but maybe we should go ahead and apply for an exhumation order.”

  I could no longer argue against it, so I didn’t try. Just nodded and hoped it could be done without fuss or fanfare. All I could think of was Wesley Lloyd rising up out of his grave, demanding to know why I was spending his money on gravediggers.

  Sometime in the middle of the night, I sat straight up in bed, snatched fully awake by an idea that was perfect in its simplicity. Sam stirred beside me, and I started to wake him and announce that I had the solution to our problem.

  But then I eased back down on the pillow, smiling to myself. No, I would wait and present it to him when the results came in. Wouldn’t he be surprised? I scrooched up to his warm back, so pleased with how my mind had kept on working in my sleep. I’d found a way to settle the matter once and for all, and there would be no need for a front-end loader at the cemetery to do it.

  It was about time that I began to follow through on my own instincts. It’s all well and good to say, as any number of well meaning but unrealistic Bible teachers have done, that a wife should step back and let her husband take the lead. But that didn’t take into account all the instances of men who’d chosen intelligent and capable women to marry. Was such a wife then to bury her light under a bushel just because she had a marriage certificate? Was she supposed to shut down her brain because of it?

  Well, I’d tried, and my trying time was over. Sam would just have to put up with a woman who could both think and act.

  Anxious to follow through with my sleep-induced solution, I could hardly wait for daylight to come. But, as these things happen, I fell back asleep and had to hurry when I woke up again. It was imperative that I get there before office hours started. I didn’t want to be slotted in between patients with a few minor complaints and have to struggle for the man’s full attention.

  It was all I could do not to give away my intentions while we had breakfast, but with Hazel Marie and Little Lloyd at the table, I couldn’t have, anyway. So I tried to hurry everybody along.

  “Lillian,” I said, as I surveyed the table, “we’re through here. Can I make Little Lloyd’s lunch for you?”

  “I don’t need no help with this baby’s lunch,” she said, eyeing me suspiciously. “ ’Sides, you may be through, but Mr. Sam still eatin’ biscuits.”

  “Well, for goodness sakes, Sam,” I said. “How many have you had?”

  “Uh-uh-uh, Miss Julia,” Little Lloyd said, wagging a finger at me. “It’s not polite to comment on what one eats.”

  I had to laugh with the rest of them, but it was mortifying to have my own words thrown back at me. “You are right, and I apologize. Here, Sam,” I said, passing the bread basket to him, “have another one.”

  “I believe I will,” Sam said, smiling. “Lloyd, have you heard the one about the Yankee visitor to the South who thought biscuits were called hot ’uns? Every time he finished one, somebody would pass the basket and say, ‘Have a hot ’un.’ ”

  Of course the child thought that was the funniest thing he’d ever heard. It was always a wonder to me how easily amused he could be. But Sam wasn’t through.

  “Did you hear about the three old men out walking one day?” he asked.

  Little Lloyd shook his head, his eyes bright with expectancy.

  “Well, the first one said, ‘My goodness, it’s windy.’ And the second one said, ‘No, it’s Thursday.’ And the third old man said, ‘So am I. Let’s go get a beer.’ ”

  I thought the boy was going to fall off his chair, he laughed so hard. Lillian liked it, too, as did Hazel Marie, but it took her a while to get it.

  As soon as everybody had cleared out, going their separate ways for the day, I put on my coat and told Lillian I had things to attend to. Then I drove to one of the medical buildings near the hospital, walked right in, and told the receptionist that I was there to see the doctor. And no, I didn’t have an appointment, but she was to tell him that Mrs. Julia Springer Murdoch had an urgent need to speak with him.

  She was nice enough, although she pointed out that others were there before me. I looked around at those who were sitting in the waiting room, but none seemed in dire enough straits that they couldn’t wait a few minutes more.

  At my insistence that the doctor be told I was there, the receptionist slid the glass partition closed and picked up the phone. I couldn’t hear what she said, but she kept glancing at me while I tapped my fingers on the shelf where people paid their bills.

  Finally she opened the partition and told me I should have a seat, that the doctor would be with me in a moment. Well, I didn’t have a moment to spare, and besides, I didn’t like the looks of anybody I’d have to sit next to. Who knew what they were suffering from or how quickly they could pass along their ailments?

  So I waited on my feet, tempted to put a Kleenex to my face to ward off stray germs swarming in the air.

  “Miss Julia!” Walter Hargrove held open the door that separated those waiting from those being seen, and gave me a pleasant welcome. “Come on in here, and let’s see what’s wrong with you.” Then he cast a broad smile around the waiting room. “Be with you folks in a minute.”

  I followed the hulking man down a hall, past examining rooms to his office at the end. I was still trying to get over the bushy growth on his face, wondering what had possessed him to stop shaving. I realized that I hadn’t seen him at church in a few Sundays, and thought maybe he’d stayed away until his beard had fully flourished.

  He led me into his office, and motioned to a chair in front of his desk. Then he perched on the corner of the desk, and said, “Now, what’s troubling you? Been some time since you’ve been in, hasn’t it? I want you to make an appointment and let me give you a thorough workup. But let’s treat the problem you’re having now. Throat infections’re going around, and they settle in the chest if left untreated. Open up. Say ah. How’s Sam doing these days?”

  I opened my mouth, obedient as always to authority, then quickly snapped it shut. “I’m not here for treatment, so put that thing down.” I pointed to the flat wooden sti
ck in his hand. “I just need some information, which I hope you can give me, and Sam’s doing fine.”

  “Well,” he said, smiling as he tossed the stick into a trash can. “You’re the first patient I’ve had who didn’t have a complaint of some kind. What information do you need?”

  “Do you remember when Wesley Lloyd had his gallbladder operation? It was some ten or so years ago, I think.”

  He put his fingers to his mouth, then thoughtfully began grooming the beard that had sprouted on his chin. “That was a while ago. But, yes, I remember diagnosing him and referring him to a surgeon. I forget which one.”

  “Well, you shouldn’t have forgotten, because I distinctly remember that you were the assistant. And you were the one who told me afterward that Wesley Lloyd was doing as well as could be expected. Except I didn’t know what to expect.”

  “Ah, yes.” He smiled, though I could hardly tell it. “I remember now. It was Dr. Avery. He’s retired now, and living in Florida, I think. As a matter of fact, that surgery might have been one of the last he did. My goodness, I haven’t thought of Tom Avery in years. I expect he spends his days out on the water on that boat he always wanted. Unless he’s dead, but I doubt it, because I would’ve heard.”

  “Dr. Hargrove,” I said, recalling him to the present, “I’m sure I don’t care what the man is doing. I need to know if you still have them in your possession.”

  His eyebrows rose up as he looked at me. “Have what in my possession?”

  “Why, Wesley Lloyd’s gallstones. That’s why you did the operation, isn’t it? To take them out? I want to know where they are.”

  He laughed, whether in amusement or in surprise, I couldn’t tell. “Why, Lord, Miss Julia, that’s been more than ten years ago. I don’t keep those things, and why would you want them, anyway?”

  I waved away his question. He didn’t need to know my purpose. “I expect they’re on a shelf somewhere, soaking in formaldehyde or whatever you use to store such things in. Would you look? Or have your nurses look?”