But what on God’s earth was I going to tell him?

I propped my elbows on the table and put my face in my hands. Muffin came to rub against my hair.

I’d never been very fond of Virginia, granted, but it was sad and frightening to think of what might have happened to her. Whatever her problems had been with Luke, however depressed and desperate she might have been, she had jumped from the frying pan into the fire.

I raised my head. Muffin’s eyes looked right into mine. I pulled her against me and buried my face in her fur. She smelled like sweet, healthy cat; she began to purr. Lord, was I going to be able to let Haley take her back?

There was a light knock on the back door. I got up and let Mitzi Phizer in. My neighbor and friend for almost forty years, she knows me too well.

“Lord, Patricia Anne. What’s wrong?”

She’s also a wonderful listener. Except for a few “I declares” and “Have mercies,” she didn’t interrupt my story about all that had happened in the last twenty-four hours.

When I finally wound down, she said, “You think Virginia’s dead, too, don’t you?”

“I think it’s a good possibility, and it makes me so sad. I can’t imagine how she must have felt when she found out what she had gotten into, can you?”

Mitzi shook her head no.

“And it’s more than the snakes. There’s something going on up there that two people have been murdered over.” I paused. “Surely there’s some connection between the two deaths.”

“I would think so.”

“And now I’ve got to call Richard and tell him what’s happened, and I dread it. To start with, it’s not going to make any sense to him. He’s going to think I’ve lost my mind when I tell him his mother ran off with a snake-handling preacher.”

“Why don’t you get Mary Alice to call him?”

I looked up and Mitzi was smiling at me.

“I’ll take Woofer for his walk. You go tell her what’s happened. Tell her the sheriff suggested the call.”

I thought of the sheriff not wanting to disturb Miss Purple Boots’s beauty sleep.

I smiled back. “That’s a great idea.”