Suddenly she smiled. “But you wouldn’t believe how thrilled Terry is to have them there. The children. He doesn’t even want to leave them to go to work.”

“What about your father-in-law?” I asked. “Is it all right with him?”

“He’s worse than Terry. Rides them around on his wheelchair.” Betsy shrugged. “So we’ll be all right. I’ve just got to adjust to being a mother and count my blessings.”

“Speaking of which.” I reached in my purse and pulled out the Ziploc bag with the cameo in it. “I think you’ll be happy this showed up.”

Betsy held out her hand and took the bag. Her eyes widened.

“The cameo,” she whispered.

She undid the bag, took the cameo out, and held it to her cheek in a touching gesture.

“Oh, thank you, Mrs. Hollowell. Thank you so much.”

“You’re welcome, Betsy. I’m just so glad it was found.”

“Where was it? The church?” She held the cameo out and looked at it. “I looked over every inch of the church.”

“It was in Virginia’s car,” I said reluctantly.

“The car they found Monk’s body in?” Her hands closed around the cameo, clutched it.

“Between the seats.”

The “Oh” from Betsy was more a breath than a word. The blood drained from her face; she jumped up and rushed down the hall to the bathroom.

Mary Alice turned around to me. “She’s upset,” she explained as if I had totally missed the obvious.

“Well, of course she is, Sister. She didn’t let me finish. She probably thinks that the cameo being in Monk’s car means that the same person killed Susan and Monk both. One of the snake handlers like that Joe Baker.”

“It’s still possible. The murderer could have found the cameo, put it in his pocket, and dropped it when he put the basket of snakes in Virginia’s car.”

“That’s pretty far-fetched.”

“But not impossible. Think about it.”

“I don’t want to think about it. Just thinking about snakes gives me the creeps.”

Sister got up and went to stand by the fireplace, holding out her hands to the space heater. She glanced at her watch. “We need to go.”

I nodded at the hall. “Well, we can’t leave until we know she’s all right.”

A ray of sun spliced across the white vinyl floor; the clouds were breaking up.

“The Packard guy,” Mary Alice said when we heard the sound of tires on the gravel driveway. “Lord, he needs to shave.” She went to open the door.

“Hey, Mrs. Crane. I saw your car,” I heard him say. “Did you find your cousin?”

“She was in Nashville at a dancing convention.”

I heard Albert chuckle. “I figured she was all right. I told you Monk was running an underground railroad for frustrated women.”

“Come on in.”