Free Miss Julia to the Rescue by Ann B. Ross

is not growing or making anything. Looks like that sheriff would realize that a private investigator would be working with him, not with a bunch of crooks.”
    “Sounds like the sheriff may have more than he can handle,” Coleman said. “And he doesn’t want one of ’em to slip away from him.”
    “Miss Julia?” Lillian stuck her head in the doorway. “Y’all come on an’ eat something. Maybe Miss Hazel Marie will, too.”
    As we walked in, Hazel Marie was sitting at the table, staring at the food on her plate. “I don’t know what to do,” she said, her hands gripping the tabletop. Then she sprang up from her chair. “I do know, too. I’m going up there. It’s him, I know it is, and he needs me. I’ve got to get there. Lloyd, will you call and see if I can get a plane? I’ve got to get ready. But no, maybe I better drive. I might need the car.” She was beginning to flutter around, waving her hands, her eyes darting about the room, trying to plan a trip when nobody knew a destination.
    “Wait, Hazel Marie,” I said. “Honey, what’re you going to do about the babies?”
    “Oh,” she said, stopping as if she’d suddenly remembered them. “Well, I’ll just take them with me.”
    “You won’t be any help to Mr. Pickens,” Lillian said, “if you got them two babies with you. So I’ll go an’ help with ’em, but Latisha have to go, too.”
    “That won’t work, Lillian,” I said. “Maybe we can keep them.”
    “No,” Hazel Marie said, sinking down on the chair again. “I can’t leave them. I can’t leave them and I can’t take them, and I want to go but I need to stay here.” And she covered her face and began crying again.
    We all looked at one another, waiting for someone to come up with a suggestion. Then Hazel Marie gathered herself and asked, “Coleman, what do you think? You think it’s J.D.?”
    “I don’t know, Hazel Marie,” he said. “I wish I could go for you and make sure, but we’ve got deputies on vacation and I can’t leave right now. But if you can hold on and we haven’t learned anything more, I think I can get away about Wednesday. As for who the man is, the only other thing the sheriff said was that whoever it is can cuss a blue streak. Said as a church-going man, he’d never heard such language in his life. Does that sound like J.D. to you?”
    “No,” Hazel Marie said, looking up with hope in her eyes, “No, it doesn’t. J.D. is the sweetest-talking man in the world. It can’t be him, I’m sure of it.” She wiped her face with the edge of her robe, then said, “At least I think I am.”
    I looked at Lillian, then glanced at Lloyd. None of us said a thing, but I thought to myself,
That settles it
. If the man in West Virginia known as John Doe was able to offend even a backwoods sheriff with his descriptive language, then he was indeed J. D. Pickens, P.I.
    While everyone in the room reassured Hazel Marie, I slipped out into the hall and over to Sam’s old office, which Hazel Marie was now using as a den. The telephone was on a side table, so I walked over to it, picked it up and, hoping my memory wouldn’t let me down, dialed a number.
    “Etta Mae?” I asked, as a sleep-filled voice answered. “How would you like to go to West Virginia today?”

Chapter 11

    “What?”
    “I’m driving to West Virginia today,” I told her, “and I need you to go with me—not just for the company, but for your nursing ability. Can you be ready in about an hour?”
    “What?” she asked again.
    “Wake up, Etta Mae. This is a job offer because you’ll be on duty. So call that woman you work for and tell her the same arrangement will apply now as the one we had when you took care of Hazel Marie. You can let her know that I expect to be back here on Monday, Tuesday at the latest, so you won’t be gone long. Oh, Etta Mae, I do apologize,” I belatedly said. “I’ve gotten ahead of myself because you don’t know what’s going on.”
    “No, ma’am, I