Claws For Concern

“Yes, I did. Sylvia Delaney was a good woman. Worked hard all her life, was a devoted member of her church. A good woman in every respect. She was no plaster saint, mind you. She had a temper, and you didn’t want to get her angry, believe you me.” Ernie paused. “I didn’t get to know her, mind you, until Bill was in high school. By that time I myself was fresh out of college and in my first or second year teaching at the high school in Tullahoma.”

“Was Bill one of your students?” I asked.

“I had him for sophomore English,” Ernie replied. “He had potential, but even then he was slipping around drinking. I had to send him to the principal’s office on several occasions because he came to class high as a kite. I met Sylvia for the first time when she came to school to talk to his teachers and the principal about his escapades. The principal threatened to expel him more than once.”

“But he did manage to finish high school?”

“Yes, he did. By some miracle he managed to stay sober through his junior and senior years, and after that he joined the Marines,” Ernie said. “I suspect, but I don’t know this for sure, that he was dishonorably discharged.”

“Then he came back to Tullahoma?”

“He did,” Ernie replied. “Stayed there until about twenty years ago, then he disappeared. If Sylvia knew where he was, she never said.”

“That was after the Barber murders,” I said.

“I wondered if you knew about that.”

“Jack told me about the case,” I said. “Bill’s mother was his alibi, Jack said.”

“Yes, and that was what saved him. They tried hard, the sheriff’s department did, but they could never shake Sylvia,” Ernie said. “Some people still believe to this day he killed the Barbers, despite Sylvia’s swearing up and down Bill was with her all that night and never left the house.”

“What do you think?” I asked. “Did she lie to protect her son? Or was she telling the truth?”

“Let me put it this way,” Ernie said. “The Sylvia Delaney I knew wouldn’t tell a lie to save her own life, and I don’t believe she would lie to save her son’s, either.”

I thought I detected a note of doubt in Ernie’s voice. “But?” I asked.

“But Bill was her son, and she had done everything she could all her life to take care of him. She was like a tigress where he was concerned,” Ernie replied. “But, in the end, I can’t be sure she didn’t lie.”

“I have learned over the years that, no matter how well you think you know someone, you can never really know everything about them. They always have the capacity to surprise you.”

“True,” Ernie said. “We would all do well to remember that.”

I had been so absorbed in my conversation with Ernie that I had shut out everything else. Now, however, I came out of my fog of concentration to hear Helen Louise speaking to me and Diesel meowing at the same time.

“Excuse me a moment,” I said into the phone. “Yes, sweetheart, what is it?”

“I’ve been trying to get your attention for two minutes, I swear,” Helen Louise said. “I want you to ask her a question.” She rubbed Diesel’s head to quiet him down.

“What is it?”

“Ask her what happened to the daughter,” Helen Louise replied. “The one child who survived the murders. I’ve been wondering about her.”

“Good point,” I said. “Ernie, Helen Louise, who is here with me, has a question. What happened to the one Barber child who wasn’t home when the murders took place? What was her name?”

“Elizabeth Barber,” Ernie said. “She was sixteen or seventeen at the time. A junior in high school, and a girl with a bit of a reputation. Too beautiful for her own good, if you ask me. She was spending the night with a friend. She’s still in Tullahoma, married now with several young children of her own. She’s Elizabeth Campbell now, and her husband is a prominent businessman in town.”

“I didn’t realize she was that old,” I said. “For some reason I thought all the children were younger.”

“Elizabeth was about ten years older than her brothers, who were twins,” Ernie said.

“Were you acquainted with their parents?”

“To my regret, yes,” Ernie said. “At least in Hiram Barber’s case. He was a petty, disagreeable man who thought the whole world was against him. His wife was a quiet, sweet woman, and I never could figure out what she saw in Hiram. Perhaps when he was younger and they were first married, he was a nicer man. Somehow I doubt that, though.”

I loved the way Ernie didn’t mince words when it came to assessing someone’s character. Miss An’gel didn’t hold back, either, though in typical Southern grande dame fashion she could deliver a devastating set-down in such a polite way that the person involved was never quite sure he or she had been snubbed.

“Sounds like you had personal experience of him,” I said.