“I’m glad you weren’t there,” I said after relating my contretemps with Madge Taylor. “I did nothing but embarrass myself, although in another way, it was a relief to say what I’d been wanting to say to her. I’m just sorry that it had to be so public. I would’ve embarrassed you, too.”
“Oh, no,” she said, being her usual supportive self. “You could never embarrass me, and now I wish I had been there. I would’ve loved to have seen Madge’s face when you called her a nimby, too. Or maybe it ought to be a nimsy for ‘not in my side yard.’”
“Yes, well, I got that in, too. But, Hazel Marie, how is Mr. Pickens doing? Is he feeling better now that his fence is going up?”
“I’m not sure, because he’s looked at that fence as a stopgap measure all along. He’s hoping it’ll be so inconvenient for them that they’ll leave. But that’ll probably take some time.” She paused for a second, then said, “Miss Julia, do you think we’re right in wanting them out of the neighborhood? It worries me that we may not have the right attitude—you know, being concerned about our own children and not somebody else’s who have no homes.”
“Oh, Hazel Marie, I’ve struggled with that, too. But it finally came to me that the Lord certainly tells us to help people in need—not only those next door to us but also those who live far off whom we’ll never know. But if, as I believe, He has entrusted us with particular ones to love and care for, then their welfare should be our primary concern. I think we have a God-given duty to put our own first and above all the rest. Or,” I said, lamely wrapping up my minisermon, “so it seems to me.”
“To me, too,” Hazel Marie agreed. “I just worry so about Lloyd and our little girls, and it seems that those nonprofit people have no regard for anybody except themselves and what they want to do. I just want to be sure that loving my own children like I do is not doing what they’re doing in reverse.”
I’d never thought of Hazel Marie as a deep thinker, but she was surprising me with the depth of her concerns. “I can’t believe,” I said, “that it’s wrong to love those who were given to us more than we care about those who were not—which doesn’t mean that we ignore their needs entirely, and I’ve tried to make that clear to Madge. I would gladly help them if they wouldn’t insist on moving in next door to your children because, Hazel Marie, I believe that your children were given to me to love, too.”
“Oh, Miss Julia, you’re making me cry,” Hazel Marie said as she proceeded to do just that. It took me five more minutes to talk her out of her teary response and to finally hang up, even more determined to beat Madge Taylor at her own game.
Chapter 19
“Miss Julia!” The preemptory tone of the voice on the phone straightened my back and tempted me to salute.
“Yes?” I answered somewhat tremulously.
“I hear you have a dog you want to be rid of.”
“Well, Mr. Pickens, yes and no. First of all, it’s not my dog to do anything with, and secondly, I expect his owner wants him back.”
“Old man Jones?”
“Yes, but Thurlow’s unable to care for Ronnie himself and apparently there’s no one else to look after him. So we’ve been offering temporary hospice care. Ronnie’s about well, though. He has only another day of eardrops to go, and I don’t know what I’m supposed to do with him then.”
“I’ll take him. My girls have been crying for that dog ever since you brought him over here. I was just before going to the pound when Hazel Marie told me that Ronnie might qualify as a homeless canine.”
“Mr. Pickens,” I said, appreciating the irony of his last remark, “you would certainly be doing a good deed to give this fine dog a home. But I’m not sure that Thurlow can let him go—you know how he loves that dog. I do know, however, that Thurlow is worried about Ronnie spending the winter outside in a pen behind the garage where Helen has consigned him. You might mention, if you talk to Thurlow, that in your care Ronnie would continue to be a house dog. If, indeed, that’s the case.”
“Lord, yes. I can just hear the bawls and squalls from every woman in this house if they thought that dog was cold. So,” Mr. Pickens went on, “you think he’d let us have him?”
“I certainly think he’d consider it, especially if you said you’d bring Ronnie to visit every now and again.”
Mr. Pickens grunted, then mumbled something about written invitations and calling cards coming next. “Okay, but hold on a minute,” he said. “Hazel Marie wants to talk to you.”
While I waited I glanced over at Ronnie, who was sprawled out in front of the fireplace, where I’d lit the gas fire against the evening chill. He looked so peaceful and comfortable that I had a pang about turning him over to either Mr. Pickens or Thurlow. I’d grown accustomed to his warmth at my feet and his cold nose on my hand, as well as his obvious pleasure in my company as he followed me throughout the house.
“That dog,” Lillian said, “sure do like you. He smart enough to know which side his bread’s buttered on.”
Maybe so, but I had begun attributing the attraction to his delight at being introduced to Chanel No. 5—unlike, I’m sure, any odor he’d ever encountered before. Still, I would miss Ronnie, for the only problem he presented was that you couldn’t change your mind and turn around—he was always in the way.
“Miss Julia?” Hazel Marie said,
