Hex: A Ruby Murphy Mystery

by Maggie Estep

  I laugh, push his head away and, as Sebastian crouches down at the colt’s hind legs, put my nose up to Lotus Cat’s and nuzzle with him. I feel like an idiot when I notice Ned Ward standing a few feet to my left, staring.

  I look down at my soaking wet shirt then back at Ned. I grin. He frowns a little and walks away. I wonder if I’ve failed some sort of test.

  Over the next few hours, the sun climbs high and beams down over steaming horses and frantic workers. I go about my business trying to pick up the details of my new job while keeping an eye out for Frank, who still hasn’t appeared.

  After the last set of horses has worked, I’m given my final charge of the morning. The bay colt with the white blaze. Raging Machete, aka Joe.

  Joe’s feeling a little droopy, having just put in a five-furlong work in 58.4. It’s the fastest time on the track this morning, which, according to Ned, doesn’t mean he’s actually going to win a race anytime soon. The colt has a habit of putting in blistering works then forgetting how to run when he’s in an actual race. Though Joe is well-bred and cost over $100K as a yearling, he’s not proving to be much of a racehorse. He won his first ever start by ten lengths wire-to-wire but hasn’t run in the money since. And no one can find anything wrong with him. Gaines apparently even sent Joe to some people in New Jersey who specialize in bringing the gold out of late bloomers. They had him swimming every day, gave him acupuncture and massage and even hired an animal psychologist. But no one could find a reason why Joe runs poorly in races. And Gaines, I gather, is sick of him. In fact, everyone seems sick of him, and I think the horse knows it. I swear, he seems sad.

  He’s standing with one hoof tucked under, head hanging low, slouching as I drape the sweat sheet over his back. He stares ahead blankly as I run the lead shank over his nose and through the back of his halter.

  I lightly tug on the shank, asking him to walk.

  He lets out a low groan, sighing like an old man with digestive distress. He’s acting more like a thirty-year-old gelding than a three-year-old stallion. He seems so depressed that I drape my arm over the top of his neck.

  “Come on, it’s not that bad,” I tell him. Joe sighs again.

  I get him walking, and as I talk to him in an insanely cheerful voice, I imagine taking him away from here, keeping him in my backyard and growing old together. I have a recurring fantasy of living somewhere with a few acres and a couple of horses in the yard. I probably wouldn’t even ride them. Just have them around for company. Let them poke their noses in the kitchen window in the morning when I’m making coffee. Groom them now and then, pick out their hooves and whatnot, but basically just let them be.

  Of course, I don’t even have a backyard.

  A few minutes later, as I bring Joe to chomp at the grass on a little embankment, I finally come face-to-face with Frank, who apparently showed up while we were all up at the track with the second set of horses.

  The sullen blond man is grazing a gray filly named Liz’s Tizzy, a lovely allowance mare Ned introduced me to earlier, showing me how she’s an angel as long as you don’t touch her ears, one of which is malformed from when she got into a wasps’ nest as a yearling.

  Frank doesn’t look at me or at anything other than the filly he’s grazing. I try to think of hotwalker small talk, but before I can come up with anything, he turns toward me and scowls.

  “Hi. I’m Ruby,” I say.

  “Oh yeah?” he drawls, not keenly interested.

  “You like working here?” I say, trying to sound cheerful, friendly.

  Frank looks at me like I’m a sick jerk, then says, “Maybe.”

  He tugs on his horse’s lead shank and walks away.

  What a guy.

  I let Joe graze another five minutes before bringing him back to his stall. I take his halter off and watch him turn around twice before burying his nose in a flake of hay. I latch his stall door shut and drape his halter over a hook outside.

  Ned is in the aisle, wrapping a bay filly’s hind legs. He’s down on his knees, trying to keep away from the filly’s hooves, which she keeps lifting and aiming at his head. His hair is falling over his eyes and his glasses are perched at the end of his nose. He looks up at me. The glasses slide back where they’re supposed to be.

  “Who’s that?” I indicate the filly.

  “Sunrunner,” he says, running a proprietary hand up her leg. “Another one by the late Seattle Slew. Well-bred little thing. Not so friendly, though.”

  Demonstrating precisely how unfriendly she is, the filly pins back her ears and shakes her head at me. This isn’t a flattering look for her. She has a very small head that makes her eyes seem particularly large and flylike.

  “She’s got a weird face,” I comment.

  “Yup. That’s her daddy. Most of them come out like that. But they can run. This one too,” Ned says, finishing the wrap then slowly standing up. He keeps one hand on the filly’s neck as he looks at me.

  “So how are you doing there, Ruby Murphy?” he asks, much more solicitous than he’s been so far.

  “Good. Fine.” I nod. “I like Joe.”

  “Joe.” Ned sighs. “You wanna ask him what his problem is?”

  “Huh?”

  “Ask that horse why he doesn’t want to win any races,” Ned says, in apparent seriousness.

  “Oh.” I nod. “Okay.”

  Ned frowns at me. “You know, you won’t get anywhere falling in love with horses like Joe.”

  “Get anywhere? Where am I going?”

  “I assume that an intelligent woman isn’t looking to spend the rest of her life walking hots or even rubbing. My theory is you’ve got your eye on my job.”

  For a minute I just stare at him, not sure if he’s joking.

  “Yes?” Ned says.

  “Yes?”

  “Is my theory on target?”

  “Uh … I hadn’t thought about it.” I shrug. “I just needed a change from what I normally do. And I love horses. I thought it’d be a kick to do this awhile.”

  He looks at me like I’m completely insane. Yanks the sleeves of his sweatshirt up over his elbows then folds his arms over his chest. “Nothing to do with horses is a ‘kick,’ unless you mean that in the literal sense,” he says. “It’s backbreaking work. No money. No sleep. Beats your body up.”

  “Oh. So why do you do it?”

  “Can’t help it.” He shrugs and looks down, as if admitting to a twenty-year dope habit.

  He suddenly ducks into the tackroom and grabs a box of Vetwrap—the green elastic bandage material sometimes used on the horses’ legs.

  “What’s the deal with that exercise rider girl, the blonde?” I ask quickly.

  “Who, you mean Molly?” He turns back around to face me.

  “Yeah.”

  “What about her?” He looks a little suspicious.

  “What’s she so angry about?”

  “Dunno.” He shrugs, then smiles a little. “They’re all like that. The whole family. Wait till you meet her uncle. Guy’s so surly he makes Molly seem like a cheerleader.”

  Ned stares at the box of Vetwrap like it’s perplexing him. “The girl can ride but she can’t keep her mouth shut. Comes from a long line of ’em. Her mother rubbed for Shug McGaughey until she got nasty arthritis. Now her uncle’s head groom for Will Lott. Whole family of nasty horse people that would just as soon kill you as look at you. But horses like ’em. Molly’s a good rider. She’s an apprentice, you know. A bug girl. That’s why Gaines uses her. She gets a very healthy weight allowance.”

  “Oh?” I say just as Frank suddenly materializes, leading the gray filly to her stall. Ned calls him over and introduces us.

  “Yeah, we met,” Frank says, uninterested.

  “You can call it a day,” Ned tells him.

  Though I know Gaines has two horses running in the afternoon’s races, evidently Frank doesn’t rate enough to be needed. And he certainly doesn’t seem to care. Or maybe it’s just that he has the personality
of a cardboard box. He leads the gray to her stall, puts her away, then walks off without another word.

  “And you can go home too,” Ned tells me.

  “I can?” I say, worried, figuring this means I’m fired.

  “Yeah. You did good,” he says, shucking me on the shoulder in a weird playful manner. “See you at five A.M.?” he asks, arching his eyebrows.

  “Yeah, I’ll be here.” I nod vigorously.

  Ned smiles, looks like he’s on the verge of saying something more, then abruptly turns back to Sunrunner.

  I stare at his back for a second, then grab my bag out of the tack room and quickly try to catch up with Frank. He’s vanished, though. Swallowed up by the maze of barns and dirt roads.

  A passing groom hey babies me and I nod, then walk toward the rest room trailer to clean up before starting the long journey home to Coney.

  There are few women working on the backstretch, and the ladies’ rest room is fairly pristine—though it does stink of faux citrus air freshener. I run warm water in the sink and dunk my dirty face in. As I straighten up and dab myself with a paper towel, Molly comes in and stands at the sink next to mine. She gives me a perfunctory smile then turns to studying herself in the mirror. She’s very pretty but all in miniature, like a painting of an Elizabethan child queen, the subject clearly a child but rendered in adult proportions.

  “You’re Little Molly?” I venture.

  The girl turns and scowls at me. “Who the hell are you?” she spits, with a pronounced Brooklyn accent that’s incongruous with her tiny Elizabethan frame.

  “Nobody.” I shrug and smile. “I just saw you riding today.”

  “Don’t call me Little Molly.”

  “I’m sorry. I thought that’s what they called you.”

  “Who the fuck is they?”

  “I dunno, just people at the track, I guess,” I say, horrified.

  “I don’t know who you are but I think you need to mind your own business,” she says.

  She looks at herself in the mirror one last time then turns and heads to the door.

  “Hey,” I call after her.

  “What?” She wheels around, hissing.

  “You don’t have to be so rude.”

  “Oh I don’t, huh? Says who?”

  “You just don’t,” I say.

  “Who the fuck are you?” She sneers.

  “I’m Ruby.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “That’s my name. Ruby. I’m a hotwalker.”

  “You’re a goddamned hotwalker?”

  “So?”

  “I’m a rider, okay? I put my life on the line every fucking day several fucking times a day. I don’t need no shit from some fucking hotwalker.”

  Molly’s eyes are about to pop out of her small head. Thankfully at that moment a well-heeled older lady walks into the bathroom and I watch a phenomenal event take place on Little Molly’s face as she tries to control her fit of pique—for the benefit of the well-heeled lady who looks very concerned.

  “Molly? Is everything all right?” The lady’s gray eyebrows knit together like small sweaters of worry.

  “Oh yes, Mrs. Levy yes, everything’s just fine,” Molly says, stretching her tight mouth into something resembling a smile.

  “Molly and I were just having a tête-a-tête about proper names,” I tell the lady.

  “Oh? Is that so? Well, don’t let me keep you girls,” Mrs. Levy says, daintily walking into one of the bathroom stalls.

  Molly glowers at me then turns and goes out the door. I follow her out, fantasizing about tackling her from behind and rubbing her face in the dirt. Then my cell phone rings. I click the Talk switch and say “Hello, Ariel” into the phone as I watch Molly storm away.

  “I remembered your cell phone number,” comes Oliver’s exuberant voice.

  “Where are you?”

  “At Sloan-Kettering. Getting chemo.”

  “Oh,” I say dejectedly.

  “I’m toxic right now. Where are you?”

  “Belmont.”

  “Again?”

  “I work here now,” I say.

  “You’re working at the racetrack?” My friend sounds completely astonished.

  “Yeah,” I say, launching into a jumbled breakneck explanation of all that’s happened since we parted yesterday.

  “My God, that’s beautiful,” Oliver says when I stop for breath. “Why don’t you get us a horse?”

  “What?”

  “Become a trainer and get us a horse, one of those cheap ones from the claiming races. Make us some money.”

  “I think most of these people don’t make any money. They just like horses. Or they’re immigrants and can’t get any other jobs.”

  “Oh yeah?” Oliver is enthralled and immediately starts pumping me for details.

  I give him a brief synopsis of my day on the backstretch. He in turn horrifies me with details of his afternoon of injections and vomiting.

  “I don’t want to make you stand around talking on a cell phone all day I just wanted to say hello, and I had fun yesterday.”

  “Yeah, me too,” I tell him softly.

  I put the phone away and stand there, feeling sad and useless. The sky is streaked with gray, like it’s empathizing with me.

  I start walking to the main gate, going slowly, my body tired and sore. I’m just passing Barn 27 when I see Frank emerging from a tack room with none other than Little Molly at his side. The two seem to be exchanging vehement words, arguing as they walk up toward the track.

  I want to go home. Lie on the floor. Listen to Bach. Instead, I tail Frank and Molly at a safe distance, wondering what Frank has done to incur the tiny blond woman’s wrath. I follow the pair through the long tunnel leading from the backstretch to the saddling paddock. Ahead, a groom is walking a horse. The sound of hooves echoes off the tunnel’s cement sides.

  As Frank and Molly emerge from the tunnel, I see Molly gesticulating wildly. Frank hangs his head then suddenly turns on his heels and walks away from her, back toward me. He’s so preoccupied he doesn’t notice me. I follow him as he heads straight past the security gate and out in the direction of the train station.

  Frank is evidently mulling over his troubles and doesn’t notice as I get on the train and take a seat two rows back from him. At Jamaica, I have to stay on the train rather than switching over to the Brooklyn bound subway.

  At Penn Station, I follow Frank up the escalator and out onto Eighth Avenue.

  It’s early afternoon. Office workers are milling about in the half gray day, clutching newspapers and Starbucks cups. Frank pauses for a moment, fishes an electronic organizer from his pocket and fiddles with it. After a few minutes of this, he starts purposefully heading down Eighth Avenue.

  I’m relieved when he makes a left on Twenty-third Street, evidently heading to the Chelsea. Once I’ve watched him enter the place, I call Ariel to tell her she’s about to get a visit from her boyfriend.

  “Oh …” she says in a plucked, tight little voice.

  And right on cue I hear her doorbell ring. “There’s Frank,” I say into the phone. “I’ll call you when I get home. Or call me later.”

  “All right,” she says, though I can tell she wants to ask me eight hundred questions.

  I hear the doorbell ring once more before she clicks off.

  I put the phone away and look around me.

  I need to buy cat meat and I’m in the middle of Chelsea, a neighborhood I don’t know well. One given over to wealthy gay men and dot com people, who, come to think of it, are probably prime candidates for organic meat consumption.

  Sure enough, I hit the jackpot at the first gourmet health food store I stumble into.

  I fight my way through narrow aisles packed with expensive girls and arrogant guys, all of them looking disaffected, even as they shop for produce. As I make my way to the meat counter, I feel alienated and gnomish. I don’t know if it’s Manhattan or the world at large that’s gott
en like this: wealthy, pathologically self-involved. Shiny in a glassy, organized religion kind of way. One minute New York was a juicy boil of lust, crime, and possibility, the next it was just another innocuous American city. Thankfully, a lot of Brooklyn and all of Coney are intact. Lonesome and soulful in their faded neon grunginess.

  A vicious-looking brunette in a red raincoat blatantly cuts in front of me in the meat line. I growl at her back. Her cell phone rings.

  “Brent, hi! How are you?” she gushes into her minuscule phone.

  When she finishes her conversation, I tap her on the shoulder. “You cut in front of me,” I say.

  “What?”

  “You cut in line. Get behind me please.”

  “Ohhh.” She forces out a faux smile and comes to stand behind me.

  I order my organic ground turkey and get the hell out of there, scurrying for the Brooklyn bound subway, back to a safe corner in a world that baffles me.

  Pietro Ramirez

  15 / My Girl, Dancing

  I’m running my hand up Elsie’s smooth coffee leg, thinking that this is what it all boils down to: being next to someone, touching someone you know wants to be touched by you. For a few good moments I think about this and nothing else, but then Elsie, feeling my hand on her leg, wakes up from her little nap and turns over. She’s got her breasts covered with a T-shirt, but I know what’s under there and how it looks and that just isn’t good.

  “Hi baby,” she says, opening her eyes and putting her hand to my cheek.

  I kiss her hand. “Go back to sleep, my lady,” I tell her, pulling the sheet over her.

  She makes a little moaning sound and then says no, she’s slept enough. She sits up in bed. Looks down at her chest. I wince. She shrugs.

  “I gotta pee,” she says.

  I sit up in the bed, holding my head and feeling horrible as Elsie trots off into the bathroom.

  The fact is, I ought to be down at the Inferno. We’re opening up in three weeks, and Indio, the fire-eater from the sideshow, is down there supervising an ungodly bunch who are repainting my Inferno as well as designing a couple new mummies and a coffin or two. Indio’s a good kid, but he smokes too much weed, and I imagine is right now passed out in a coffin somewhere while his crew runs amok.