Finally, we made it to the big oak tree. There was the foxhole.

  "Whoo hoo," Ethel whistled softly, peering into the hole. "This does take me back!"

  Then she punched me in the arm again. Ow! What was this, some sort of secret handshake? Before I had a chance to return the gesture, Ethel grabbed the lantern and dove, head first, into the tunnel.

  "Ethel?" I called shakily. "Uh, how's it going in there?"

  Her voice was muffled. "Why don't you come in and see, scaredy cat!"

  I sighed and grabbed our tools. Then I crawled in behind Ethel.

  We inched along like moles. We scratched away clumps of dirt and plant roots.

  I couldn't see much of anything except Ethel's high-ankled boots skittering ahead of me.

  But oh, I could hear her!

  "Well, looky there, a toad just hit me in the nose," she called. "You OK back there? Hope my feet don't stink! Hee hee!"

  I rolled my eyes and called, "Keep crawling Ethel! Do you see any coal?"

  She gasped. "I think this might be coal right here in front of me. Except it's got these knobby, white rocks in it!"

  "Those are the diamonds," I yelled. I passed a pick up towards Ethel's right arm. "Grab a chunk and we can get out of here!"

  "OK," she called. "I'm reaching, I'm reeeachiiing..."

  I heard a strange rumble. Then I heard a muffled squeal: "Betty? Betty! Help me!"

  "Ethel, what happened?" I screeched.

  "Cave-in. While I was reaching my arms out. My arms _ they're trapped. I can't move 'em. And the dirt's right against my face, Betty! I only have about an inch of air to breathe! I'm scared!"

  I backed up a little and started yanking on Ethel's boots. But all that budged were the boots. They came right off in my hands.

  "You're wedged in," I yelled. "I'll go get Daddy!"

  "No!" Ethel called. "He'll tan our hides good if he finds out we came down here! You'll have to go around, use the tunnel that bumps into this one up ahead. Remember? You can dig me out from the other side. You remember, don't ya, Betty?"

  I was in a panic! How could I tell Ethel that of course I didn't remember?

  That I wasn't even really Betty Marie Jones!

  I tuned out Ethel's voice.

  I squeezed my eyes shut.

  Think like Mamaw, I said to myself.

  Then, through a haze in my head, a picture came to me. It was faint and fuzzy.

  But it got clearer. And clearer.

  It was a maze of tunnels. I knew where to go! I scrunched forward and grabbed the lantern. I patted Ethel on the shoulder. "Keep calling my name," I said.

  "Don't stop, whatever you do!"

  I started scuffling back through the tunnel. I passed the hole where we'd dropped in and kept going.

  And then I saw it! A passage jutting off to the left, just as I'd seen it in my mind.

  I dove into the tunnel. I started crawling as fast as I could. As I crawled, I strained my ears.

  I couldn't hear a thing!

  "Ethel," I yelled, "are you there? Call my name!"

  Nothing!

  I crawled further, scrambling and scraping and bumping the dirt walls with my face.

  "Ethel?" I screamed.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  "Betty?"

  What was that? It sounded like a tiny chipmunk, squeaking.

  I crawled forward a little. "Ethel, where are you?" I yelled.

  "Betty."

  I turned to my left and started pawing frantic-ally at the dirt. I dug and dug. I yelped in pain as one of my fingernails tore. Then I struck an arm!

  Ethel's arm!

  "Eeek," I heard, "something's got me!"

  "I've got you," I screamed. I kept digging until I reached her. We clutched each other.

  "It's a miracle," Ethel breathed dramatically. "Thank you Betty! You have emancipated me from certain death!"

  "Nice vocabulary," I said. Then I grabbed the pick and chinked off a lump of the white-flecked coal.

  "OK, let's get out of here," I said.

  We went!

  Finally, we crawled out of the foxhole. We were so muddy and dirty, I wouldn't have recognized my face _ make that Mamaw's face _ if I looked in the mirror.

  As Ethel and I brushed ourselves off, I noticed a big, hairy hulk of a man.

  He was leaning against a birch tree a few yards away. He had a barrel chest, a scraggly beard and beady little eyes that glared out from under one long, black, bushy eyebrow.

  He was squinting at us and chewing on a piece of grass.

  "Ewww, who's that," I whispered.

  "Oh, you know, that's just Clem Greeley," Ethel said.

  "Oh," I said.

  Then I froze. Clem Greeley?

  I pictured the smarmy Mr. Spindler saying, "Don't you know a fella around here? A Clem Greeley? He could shut up our little nuisance nicely, couldn't he?"

  I gasped.

  Then I grabbed Ethel's hand.

  "Ruuunr I screamed.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Ethel and I raced through the woods down the holler. I could hear the rasping breaths of Clem as he clomped along right behind us.

  "I don't... know ... why ... you ... girlies ... even ... bother," he yelled out between huffs and puffs. "I'm much ... bigger ... than ... you ... I'm only... gonna... catch ya!"

  "Oh yeah?" I shouted. I followed Ethel as she hopped over a fallen tree trunk.

  "You know what they say, 'The bigger they are, the harder they fall!'"

  "We'll see about that!" Clem grunted. Then he leapt through the air. He was headed straight for me!

  "Aaaaah" I shrieked.

  In mid-air, Clem grabbed one of my corkscrew curls.

  We both fell to the ground, me with a small thump and Clem with a huge thud.

  "Ooof" he grunted. The breath was knocked out of him. I helped matters by aiming one of my hard-soled boots right for his heaving stomach.

  "Arghr he yelled, dropping my hair to clutch at his middle.

  "Ha!" I shouted. I jumped to my feet and dashed off.

  Ethel was way ahead of me. "This way," she shouted, veering to the left. "To Mr. Roper's dairy farm!"

  "Whatever you say," I yelled, racing after her. I guess Clem had recovered. I could hear his big feet crashing through the brush behind me.

  "Ethel, he's catching up again," I called.

  "Trust me," she screamed. She'd come to a split rail fence! What now?

  Ethel made a sharp right and began running alongside the fence. Bewildered, I followed.

  "Ethel," I cried. "Let's hop the fence!"

  "Not yet," she ordered.

  "Why not?" I huffed. By now, I could almost feel Clem's breath on the back of my neck!

  "You'll see," Ethel shouted over her shoulder.

  So we ran.

  And ran.

  We followed that split rail fence forever, it seemed.

  Finally, Ethel screeched to a halt.

  "Now!" she yelled. "Betty, jump long and far!"

  I watched as she scrambled over the rails and leaped way out into the meadow.

  Five seconds later, I was lying in the grass next to her.

  "Peee-eeew! What's that smell?" I blurted. Then I forgot the stench completely! I pointed and screamed!

  "Clemmm!"

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Clem Greeley had not been deterred. Though he was sweating buckets and wheezing badly, he began to lumber over the fence. But he was too big and clumsy to jump but into the meadow the way Ethel and I had. He merely rolled over the top rail with a grunt and a plop. A loud plop. A smelly plop.

  "Aaaargh," Clem shouted in disgust.

  Ethel started shrieking with laughter. "Ha, ha! The biggest dung heap in Bearhead Holler and Clem is making himself comfortable right in it!"

  I joined in the joke. "Whoo hoo! Fee, Fi, Fo, Fum, I'm Clem Greeley and I'm real dumb!"

  Clem shook his fist at us, but he was too exhausted and encrusted with cow manure to chase us. Ethel and I ran off, skipping and laughing.

  "I'm gonna git you!" Clem called.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  We ran and hid in Ethel's daddy's barn.

  I flung myself onto a hay bale. Ethel skipped over to say hello to a sleepy-eyed brown horse. She held our coal chunk up to his nose.

  "Do those little rocks look like diamonds to you?" Ethel asked the horse. It snorted.

  "Me either," Ethel responded.

  "That's the problem," I moaned. "Who could believe those little knobs are raw diamonds? None of the poor folk around here could possibly know what raw diamonds look like."

  "So what we need is someone smart and rich," Ethel declared. "Someone with experience with this sort of thing."

  "Where on earth would we find someone like that in Bearhead Holler?" I wailed.

  Ethel gasped. She jumped onto my hay bale and shook me by the shoulders. "I've got it! Miss Montgomery!"

  "M-m-miss Wh-who?" I stuttered as Ethel jangled me about.

  "You know, the school teacher," Ethel said. I thought about the teachers at my school back home. I mean, in the present. Most of them were underpaid. And frazzled. And, well, just smart enough to get quickie teaching certificates from the community college.

  "Are you sure some school teacher is the best person to go to?" I quavered.

  "Well, Miss Montgomery isn't just any school teacher,' Ethel scoffed. "You know her story."

  "Refresh my memory," I said with a sigh. It was getting tiresome not knowing anything.

  "It's a tragic tale," Ethel said dreamily. "Miss Montgomery was the daughter of one of the most important men in Lexington. She had it all. She even went to a teaching college in Boston.

  "Then she came back to Lexington. She was going to teach history at a fancy girls' academy. But her daddy had other plans. He tried to marry her off to a well-connected man, but he was cruel and twice her age. She ran away to Bearhead Holler and got a job teaching at our little school. And she hasn't seen her family since." We both sighed.

  "Poor Miss Montgomery," I lamented.

  Ethel broke out of her reverie. "Oh, things aren't so bad for Miss Montgomery," she said brightly. "She is being courted by that cute Mr.

  Hughes!"

  "Do you think she'll want to help us?" I asked.

  '"Course!" Ethel announced importantly. "She adores me! She's the one who gave me my dictionary so I can augment my illustrious vocabulary. Come on. Let's go!"

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Miss Montgomery lived in a simple, one-room cabin at the base of the holler.

  But when she opened the door, her lipsticked smile seemed to fill the room with glamour.

  "Ethel! Betty Marie!" she exclaimed. "What a nice surprise. I was just taking some cinnamon buns out of the oven." She was beautiful. She had wavy red hair twirled into a bun at the base of her neck. Her skin was as white as china. As she set a plate of steaming sweet rolls on the table, I noticed sparkly rubies bob-bing from her earlobes.

  "Wow, where did you get those earrings?" I asked.

  "I inherited them from my grandmother," Miss Montgomery said sadly. "Before I

  ... before I left Lexington. My grandfather had quite an eye for fine

  gemstones."

  "Well actually," Ethel said, "That's why we're here. We need your help. We need a grown-up who can convince Betty's parents that there are raw diamonds in their coal!"

  After I explained everything to Miss Montgomery, Ethel plunked our smudgy coal lump on the clean tablecloth.

  Rude!

  I kicked her under the table.

  "Ow!" she cried, glaring at me.

  "That's OK, Betty," Miss Montgomery laughed, picking up the coal and whisking the black dust away with her fingers. "Well, this is the most un-usual piece of coal I've ever seen."

  She examined the lump, turning it this way and that with a frown on her face.

  Finally, she sighed.

  "I just don't know girls," she said. "I've read geology books. They describe raw diamonds found in Africa. And I do know that those diamonds were dull and whitish before they were cut and polished. But I haven't seen a picture. So I can't say I know whether these are diamonds.

  "And since I never met these deceitful speculators, I doubt your parents would believe me either, Betty," she said sympathetically. "You know, your parents don't think much of schools, or school teachers."

  "Yeah," I said, moping.

  Miss Montgomery picked up a cinnamon bun and munched thoughtfully. Then she swallowed abruptly and cried, "I don't know why I didn't think of it earlier!

  Mr. Hicks!"

  "Who's that?" Ethel asked.

  "A jeweler I used to know in Lexington," Miss Montgomery said. "He was a friend of the family. A very odd man. But a brilliant craftsman when it came to gems. I bet he could identify a raw diamond with one eye covered and one hand tied behind his back."

  "Well that'd be great, if he wasn't all the way in Lexington," I said.

  "Oh, Lexington is just an inexpensive train ride away," Miss Montgomery said.

  "I'm sure if you asked your parents, they'd take you there. Surely they'd be open to talking with Mr. Hicks."

  Coming from Miss Montgomery, that sounded like the most logical idea in the world.

  "You're right, Miss Montgomery," I said. "Thank you so much. I'm going to go talk to them at supper tonight."

  "Thanks for the cinnamon buns too," Ethel said, snatching a couple of them from the plate before running with me to the door.

  "Good luck, girls," the teacher called after us.

  Ethel and I raced up the holler road towards my house. When we were almost there, Ethel veered onto a tree-lined drive.

  "Where are you going?" I demanded.

  "Home!" she said with her mouth full of cinnamon bun. "I left all my chores undone while we were running around. I don't want my mama to get any madder at me than she already is."

  "You're not going to help me talk to my parents?" I wailed.

  "Heck no!" Ethel said. "You know your daddy always scared me a little bit!"

  "Me, too," I whispered.

  "Come on," Ethel comforted me. "You know your parents so well. You'll be able to wheedle a trip to Lexington out of them, easy. By tomorrow night, you'll be back triumphant from the big city. And rich too!"

  I wanted to yell, "I don't know my parents at all! I'm not Betty Marie! I'm just Amy!"

  But all I said was, "Uh, you're probably right. OK, see you tomorrow then."

  "Triumphant!" Ethel yelled, raising a fist in the air.

  "Uh huh," I quavered.

  Then I gulped hard and headed "home."

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  "Lexington?" Great-granddaddy slammed his knife and fork on the kitchen table so hard the glasses shimmied and the dishes shuddered. "Absolutely not, young lady. I told you to keep out of this!"

  "But Daddy, what if those rocks are diamonds and not just impure coal?" I asked. "Aren't you curious? We may be rich beyond our wildest dreams."

  But Great-grandma and Great-granddaddy wouldn't hear of a trip to the city.

  "You're dreaming, girl," Great-granddaddy said. "And I don't need to visit some stranger in the city to see that those ugly rocks aren't diamonds!"

  "Isn't it worth the risk ..." I began. But Great-grandma interrupted.

  "Elizabeth Marie Jones" she said. "You are disrespecting your parents. You know that your father can't work in the mines. He had consumption as a child and his lungs can't take the coal dust. This land is our livelihood. Selling these mineral rights is the only way to keep putting food on the table.

  "Now you get to bed and stop talking non-sense about things you don't understand!"

  "It's you who doesn't understand," I whispered as I trudged up the steps to the loft. But I didn't go to sleep. I didn't even go to bed. I waited. And I waited.

  Finally, Great-grandma smothered the fire in the big, black stove.

  Great-granddaddy snuffed out his corn cob pipe. They went to their bedroom and shut the door.

  In a flash, I stuffed the chunk of diamond-coal in my skirt pocket. I raced down the loft steps. Si-lently, I slipped out the front door. I started running down the road. I was making a break for it!

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Soon, I was standing in some bushes, throwing pebbles at an upstairs window of Ethel's house.

  "Please let this be Ethel's window," I whispered. Mamaw, of course, would know exactly which window belonged to her best friend. Me _ I could only guess.

  After a few minutes, Ethel stuck her head out the window. I had been right!

  Ethel yawned, then mumbled, "Who's there? Is it my secret admirer?"

  I couldn't resist. I lowered my voice to a growl and replied, "Oh Ethel, my darling, your face moves me more than a Moon Pie. Your voice, it's like mockingbirds to my ears. I, Clem Greeley, have come to declare my undying devotion."

  "Eeeeww!" Ethel screeched. "Clem Greeley!"

  I let out a giggle.

  "Got you, Juliet," I called. "Now could you kindly get dressed and come down from yonder window? And bring some food. We're going on mission impossible."

  "Mission impossible," Ethel repeated. "Catchy. I'll be right down."

  Five minutes later, she emerged wearing a dress and sweater and carrying a small, cloth bag.

  "I've got a poke full of leftovers from supper," she offered. "Fried chicken and pecan pie. So what are we doing?"

  "Mama and Daddy refuse to go to Lexington to find that jeweler," I said. "So I'm going myself! I have no money, so I'll have to sneak on to the train. And Ethel, I need you to go with me. I need your help!"

  Ethel started trembling. "I don't know, Betty," she said. "My parents will whup me good if I sneak out."

  "Mine too," I said.

  "And I've never been on a train before."

  "Me either," I said.

  It was the truth. I'd only ridden the bus on my few short trips out of the holler.

  "But Ethel, trust me," I said. "This is for more than just me and my mama and daddy. It's about much more than that. Oh, if only I could make you understand."

  Ethel gripped me by the shoulders. I braced myself for a shake, but she only

 

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