He usually lets himself in and out, but this time, Nana Mama walked Sampson to the door, whichis a rarity. I went with them. Safety in numbers.

“Thank you for going down South with Alex tomorrow,” Nana said to Sampson in confidentialtones. I wondered who she thought might be listening, trying to overhear her intimacies. "Yousee now, John Sampson, you can be civilized and somewhat useful when you want to be.

Didn't I always tell you that?" She pointed a curled, knobby finger at his massive chin.

“Didn't I?”Sampson grinned down at her. He revels in his physical superiority even to a woman who iseighty. “I let Alex go by himself, I'd only have to come later, Nana. Rescue him and Naomi,”he said.

Nana and Sampson cackled like a pair of cartoon crows on an old familiar fencepost. It wasgood to hear them laugh. Then she somehow managed to wrap her arms around Sampson and me. Shestood there like some little qjd lady holding on to her two favorite redwood trees. I couldfeel her fragile body tremble. Nana Mama hadn't hugged the two of us like that in twentyyears. I knew that she loved Naomi as if she were her own child, and she was very afraid forher.

It can't be Naomi. Nothing bad could happen to her, not to Naomi. The words kept driftingthrough my head. But something had happened to her, and now I would have to start thinking andacting like a policeman. Like a homicide detective. In the South.

“Have faith and pursue the unknown end.” Oliver Wendell Holmes said that. I have faith. Ipursue the unknown. That's my job description.