Snoop to Nuts by Elizabeth Lee

tightly shut eyes, over the edge of her nose, to make a wet spot on her pillow.
    “Meemaw.” I tapped her again.
    She sighed and finally opened her blurred eyes, brought her legs over the side of the bed, and sat up to look straight at me.
    “Hunter here to get me?” she asked in a deadened voice.
    “He’s downstairs.”
    “I figured he’d be coming for me. Poison in my caviar, right? Only thing Millroy ate different from everybody else. Hunter arresting me?”
    “No! Just wants to talk to you again.”
    She sighed and made a slow move to get up, searching over the side of the bed for her slippers and then waving me from the room. “Let me get dressed. Tell him I’ll be right out. Oh, and call Ben. Say I need him there this time.”
    I headed for the door but she stopped me.
    “Hunter tell you what kind of poison it was? You know I never bought a poison in my life. Not to kill ants or fleas or anything. So they sure can’t blame me if it was arsenic or anything like that.”
    “Spotted water hemlock,” I said.
    “You mean that stuff we’ve got along the river? Well . . .”
    I closed the door behind me.
    When Miss Amelia came from her apartment into the kitchen, she was straightening the collar of her flowered blouse. She’d put on blue slacks and white huaraches. Her hair was neatly combed back from her face and her signature pink lipstick was drawn precisely over her lips. As pretty as she looked, her face was pale, her eyes sunken. I thought I’d never seen a woman quite so ready to walk her last mile.
    Hunter got up quietly from his seat at the long table, stiff hat turning in his hands. He bowed his head as he wished her “Good morning.”
    Justin was leaning back against one of the tile counters, both hands behind him holding on tight. He glowered at Hunter. I knew my usually calm brother was having a hard time with this. Hunter was his lifelong friend, but none of this was about friendship anymore. It was about Blanchards fighting for Blanchards. I knew too well, in this kind of fight, we won or died like my uncle Amos did.
    Bethany and Mama sat on the edge of their chairs. Their faces were stiff with worry. It looked and felt like the morning of a hanging.
    Jeffrey Coulter stood off to one side, watching. When I glanced at him, wishing he’d go away, he gave me an unpleasant smile.
    “Are you really going to pull my grandmother back into the station, Hunter?” Justin’s voice was strained. He pulled away from the sink to stand as tall as his five feet ten would let him.
    Mama piped up. “I called Ben, Mama. He’ll meet you there. He said to promise you won’t be there long. Said if the sheriff’s not charging you, you’re not staying.”
    “Why in hell are you doing this to her, Hunter?” Justin took a step toward his old friend. “You know this woman here never hurt a soul in her life.”
    “Wouldn’t if I didn’t have to, Justin.” Hunter looked a little like the one in danger of being hung.
    “Swear to God, Hunter. I never thought I’d want to kill you like I do right now.” Justin made a move that died quickly, just fizzled out as his hands fell to his sides.
    Jeffrey Coulter made a noise and shook his head.
    “Please, Jeffrey,” my soft-spoken sister said, her round blue eyes wide. “Don’t you get involved.”
    Coulter shrugged his shoulders and stepped way back from the rest of us.
    “Hunter’s doing his job,” Miss Amelia said. “You let him be.”
    She might have been sticking up for him, but when she turned, her eyes were defiant. “I know I’m the one with means and motive, Hunter. That’s what people always say. Even my good friends will start to wonder:
Miss Amelia got mad over losing out to Ethelred Tomroy. Went ahead and diced up a good dose of hemlock and gave it to the parson ’cause he passed up her dish.
That’s what they’ll all be thinking after a while. Doesn’t make it true.”
    She turned to me. “You coming with us, Lindy? No use keeping