“Hear me out.” Catherine leaned forward toward O.J. “If it were May or June we could have a high tea in the garden but March can be filthy. If we have it in here we almost have to ask people to leave their shoes at the door. You know, it will either snow or rain and, if not, the temperature may be twenty degrees Fahrenheit.”
“Or sixty-four Fahrenheit.”
“Yes. So why don’t we allow everyone to go to their hotel, shower, change, come here to savor the exhibit. Then we can either go to one of the halls at University of Kentucky or to the big room at Embassy Suites.”
“Why University of Kentucky?” O.J. wondered.
“Some of our guests will have children ready, or soon ready, to go to college. If they see our university, meet a few people, a few might enroll. When people think of University of Kentucky they think of basketball and there’s so much more to it than that.”
“You know, I never really thought of that. The Maxwell H. Gluck Equine Research Center is one of the best in the country.”
“We have a lot to offer.”
“Well, if we do as you suggest, then we should provide a dinner. They’ll be hungry by the time they get to the venue, whichever one it is.”
A knock on the open door captured their attention.
“Mrs. Clay-Neal, you might want to turn on your TV. Louisville channel.” Her assistant then walked over to turn on the TV and she left the room.
Both women sat without speaking. When the report ended Catherine turned off the television and sat back down.
“I don’t know what to think.” O.J. finally spoke. “I would guess some people here already have this virus and don’t know it. Have shaken it off.”
“A few, probably. If it’s in Italy and Germany, probably more than a few. How many Chinese have traveled here and back before China took harsher measures? Does anyone know anything?”
“Like what?”
“How long does the virus live? Say, on a table? Hours, days? How long does it gestate? The speaker didn’t specify anything.”
“Catherine, do you expect the media to pass up the opportunity to have us glued to the set, interrupted by ads for great discounts on new trucks? They’ll keep this thing going as long as they can.”
“Up to a point. If this truly is serious, they have to provide sensible, calm information. If not, then I suggest everyone in America cut their cable contract, shut down Facebook. People need to know the truth.”
“Yes.” O.J. thought for some time. “If it’s spreading, as that fellow said, then we’re in for it.”
“I hope not, but you’re going to have to decide. I wouldn’t hit the red button yet but you may have to cancel the meet.”
“Oh, dear.” O.J. was crestfallen.
“You’ll know what to do,” Catherine reassured her.
“I don’t see how anything good can come out of this,” O.J. fretted.
That depends on one’s definition of good. If one is a murderer or thief or both, a coronavirus pandemonium could provide opportunities.
CHAPTER 26
March 6, 2020 Friday
“I told Buddy you would make him a better deal than anyone in Philadelphia.” Carter sat at a table at Franklin Printing Company examining paper colors and weights.
“We’ll certainly try.” Betty sat next to him.
In the next room, door shut, they could hear the printing press.
“If he is going to attract the right kind of client, then he has to send out a proper card, and believe me, in southeastern Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Cecil County, Maryland, they know.” Carter rubbed a fine grade of paper between his fingers. “Right weight. If it’s too heavy then it’s like a recipe card.”
Betty smiled. “Well, it’s not that bad, and heavier paper is now the thing for note cards. I wouldn’t use it, but I see the point. Doesn’t wrinkle or bend. This is to invite people to see the new collection? The stuff he bought from the Rittenhouse townhouse?”
“All four floors.” Carter picked up another paper sample. “I like laid bond, not for a card, of course.”
“One could trace history through papyrus, vellum, the advances in creating papers. Well, don’t get me on that. Let me make a suggestion. Everyone deals with an avalanche of white paper. Buddy would do well to use a cream, light gray, or even a medium shade of tan. Something to stand out when the recipient puts the invitation in the ‘to answer’ pile. Another option would be a thin strip, a border, and that could be in, say, a more youthful color. Can’t do black. And gray, imminently respectable, can be drab. If he has the moxie, go for something a little flashy, a hot aqua, or if that’s too much, a rich burgundy. Did he give you any instructions?”
Carter sighed. “No. He dumped it on my lap. He said I was better with color than he, plus I’m gay, so therefore I have innate artistic abilities.”
“Carter, you aren’t gay.” Betty burst out laughing.
“I know. He’s just trying to tweak me into it. Buddy can be a devil. Well, being a Cadwalder, he can get away with murder. So, if I pick a color, can I use white for the paper?”
“You can but I still counsel cream at the least. It’s hard to go wrong with cream; for one thing, it’s warm. Cream and a hunter green border, although that’s a combination used a lot by hunt clubs.”
“Why?” Carter’s eyebrows raised.
“So many of them have green in their colors because since medieval time green is the color for hunting. Another beloved hunt-club color is blue, blue facings. For instance, Glenmore over the mountain uses a marvelous Yale blue. So I say, go for it. Even metallic orange or a hot bronze. Metallic borders are fabulous.”
“I had no idea what I was getting into.”
“Carter, I can see that. That’s why I’m here. And you say he wants five hundred?”
“He does. These are his richest customers, obviously. Given where he lives, he has a wide base. Something I can only dream about but he will be introducing me to his base. Along the way I have met others when we were on horses together, he for furniture, me for jewelry.”
“You have a lot of ladies…and men, too, I guess.”
“I try to travel to at least two hunts per month. Jewelry tends to be an emotional purchase. If I’m called to another state, a big city, I go. I go because it is so emotional people can change their minds in a heartbeat.” He laughed.
“Typeface.” Betty got back to business.
“Oh God.” Carter’s expression nearly curdled.
“Script is always proper for a formal invitation and it should be in black. Traditional script, not brush script or anything with an unnecessary flourish. Script flows as it is. So you pick an ivory card, script, and then a little pizzazz, say with a border, and given that his people for this list know the minutiae of etiquette anyway, I’d not stray far from a deep blue or a burgundy. If it were just for me, I’d use bronze. But that might be too much for the Main Line.”
Relief flooded Carter’s face. “I could never have done this by myself.”
“People don’t think through what paper grades, fonts, and colors truly mean. Tells you a great deal about the sender.”
“Well, you are right. I have never received a piece of stationery from a man with his name in script at the top or even his initials.”
“There you have it.” Betty smiled.
“Did you know that Philadelphia was the largest English-speaking city in the middle of the eighteenth century, larger than London?” Carter asked.
“No. I knew the British took it over and our capital had to move to the other side of the Susquehanna. To York, I think. I’ll give our public schools credit, when I was there they actually taught us history, and civics, too.”
“Mmm,” Carter mumbled. “If people don’t know their history or the history of the world, at least in broad terms, think how much easier
they are to manipulate. All that those who wish to part us from our money, or our freedoms, have to do is twist things, arouse emotions. Done throughout the centuries. Look at Soviet Russia or Nazi Germany. Nothing new about this, I guess. And think of the fabulous jewelry stolen or hocked. Can you think of a grand duchess’s fabulous jewelry? Sold or stolen, all of them.”
Betty exhaled. “Okay, back to business here. Burgundy, blue, or hunter green?”
“Burgundy, a deep burgundy.”
“And script in black?”
He nodded. “Maybe a paper color a touch darker than ivory, a true cream.”
She pulled a sample from the pile. “This?”
“Good. Say, have you ever hunted up there? You know, Radnor, Mr. Stewart’s Cheshire Hounds, Fair Hills? They can all fly.”
“No, but I did hunt once with Green Spring Valley in Carroll County. Beautiful territory, fabulously managed. If I can ever stop working so hard, I’d like to hunt the Midwest and West; you know, Red Rock.”
“Ah, I would, too. They’ll spend big bucks in Reno and Las Vegas.”
Betty slid the papers together then turned them on their side to tap them all into place. “Have you ever seen any Munnings up there? Given the thefts, it occurred to me that there’s enough money in Pennsylvania and Maryland for someone to own a Munnings or even an earlier Stubbs.”
“I have only ever seen a Stubbs in a corporate office where the president was a passionate foxhunter. But Munnings…” He paused. “I think Buddy once mentioned to me that the late Jack Young owned one. Hmm, Penelope Tree on a Dappled Grey. The Trees were once powerful in England. The times change. Now if someone makes piles of money they buy a sheep preserved in alcohol. No art but hot wheels. Then again, I wouldn’t mind a Maserati.”
“Oh, talk to Sister. She goes through cars like popcorn.”
“She does,” Carter agreed. “She beats them to death.”
Betty laughed. “She can’t understand how I keep my old Bronco going. Well, five hundred cards it will be, and you’ve given me the information, date May 2, 2020. That gives us plenty of time. No rush. Let me go over this with Bobby and I’ll call you with a preacher’s price.”
“Thank you.” He interlocked his hands, stretched his arms in front of him. “My fingers are stiff. That was a long hunt yesterday.
“Now that we can again hunt on that territory, it’s good. Needs work, but good. I dimly remembered it when the Taylors hunted with us and they got into the argument with Harry Dunbar, so that took care of that.”
Betty nodded. “Hounds and horses are easy. It’s the people you need to be wary of.” She stopped. “You know, my English teachers told me never to end a sentence with a preposition.”
“Your English teachers lost that one.” Carter dropped his hands back into his lap. “Not much hunting left.”
“I always get blue when the season’s over. Drag around for a week then I bounce back. For one thing, there’s so much to do you can’t drag your butt forever. By the way, will you be going to Buddy’s party?”
“Wouldn’t miss it. I like Philadelphia. I never tire of seeing the boathouses on the river or Independence Hall. The other city I love is Charleston, South Carolina. Those girls know jewelry.” He beamed. “Southern women have their own flair.”
“Charleston and Savannah, two gorgeous cities, you step back in time. I hate that we keep tearing down our past and putting up blocks. Maybe the windows are blue or sort of shiny gold, but still, a block. No adornment, and if you think about it, Carter, what is jewelry but adornment, so buildings ought to have some adornment, too.”
“You be sure to tell the American Institute of Architects.”
“Well, who would listen to a Virginia printer? While I’m thinking about lost causes, do you know the murdered man in the truck found at Arthur DuCharme’s has still not been identified? Bobby and Sister think because of the missing fingers they all have to be ex-cons and no one will really care.”
His eyes opened wide. “That’s an awful thought.”
“But realistic. Hire an ex-con, train him because you can’t have a butterfingers throwing around priceless art, pay good money, then kill him. No witnesses, no one to ask for more money. It’s brilliant.”
A silence followed. “Maybe. Well, let me get on home. You’ll be out tomorrow, of course?”
“Saturdays are always a big field unless the weather is bad. Sister keeps them all in line.”
“I wouldn’t mess with her.” He laughed. “Not if she comes up with killing ex-cons.”
CHAPTER 27
March 7, 2020 Saturday
Pears, peaches, forsythias pressed the pause button as the temperature dropped again. The changing seasons meant people could not yet surrender to spring cleaning, needed to keep a heavy coat in the car just in case the mercury plunged in an hour and the errands were not yet completed. People who liked predictability ought not to live in Virginia, especially by the mountains.
Then again, people who liked predictability ought not to foxhunt. Sister changed the fixture to Tattenhall Station, for The Weather Channel forecast a few snow flurries changing to rain. No need to have everyone at the distant fixture she had chosen. In a perfect world hounds would be working Welsh Harp or even Wolverton, but given that Showoff Stables now separated the two, that took care of that.
Cars lined both sides of the Chapel Cross roads, east, west, north, south. As the Jefferson Hunt Club tacked up, people dressed in warm coats of all varieties, wearing scarves and gloves, held signs reading “No Hunting,” “Hunting Is Cruel,” “Hunting Is Elitist.” There were more but Sister needed to get hounds and horses out of there. Reading wasn’t a priority.
The chanting and waving signs unnerved some of the horses. Staff horses noted the noise, the pressing people, but stood still for their riders to mount up.
Sister, on Aztec, tried and true, knew he might avoid a sign but he wouldn’t bolt or spook.
“Weevil, let’s move off behind the station as soon as you can. Our people will find us. We need to get the hounds out of here. I don’t want any hound mistreated.”
“Yes, Master.”
Gray, also mounting up, put himself between Sister and the anti-hunting crowd, perhaps fifty deep, noisy, and with no regard whatsoever for the animals much less the people.
“Go on, honey. They won’t get past me.” Gray’s example led other riders, mostly the men, to form a barrier.
Thanks to the hounds’ attention to the staff, they managed to ride to the rear of the station. The protesters bedeviled slower riders then followed the last of the riders. Thankfully no one felt compelled to smash a complaining face with a crop. Everyone had the sense to know their behavior needed to be perfect.
As they rendezvoused behind the station, Sister cursed. “Goddamn their eyes.” She counted heads.
Kasmir, close to her, as were Alida, Freddie Thomas, and Bobby Franklin, watched as the protesters marched behind the train station.
Kasmir, pulling out his phone from his inside pocket, dialed Ben Sidell, on duty today. “Sheriff, my property is overrun by protesters. They’ve left the road and are now on Tattenhall Station property. I do hope you and your team can take care of this. I will press charges, of course. I will press charges to the fullest.” He cut off his phone, slipping it back into his pocket.
Weevil blew a few wake-up notes and trotted off. Those people carrying signs, in shoes not meant for the country, wouldn’t be able to follow far.
Three car followers edged away from the Station markers along the roads, Shaker Crown and Skiff Kane; Yvonne, Aunt Daniella, and Kathleen; and surprisingly, Gigi and Elise Sabatini with Ronnie Haslip, the club treasurer, in the car with them, who explained foxhunting. Ronnie, a fellow who looked ahead, realized the Sabatinis were the kind of people who needed attention. He hoped Sabatini wasn’t funding
the Standish fellow running for office and he hoped the Sabatinis did not blame the hunt club for Parker Bell’s death. He practically roped them into following by car. If anyone could smooth potentially troubled waters, it was Ronnie. He was more than happy to do it and Sister loved him for it. She’d known him since childhood, where his perceptiveness was already obvious. Also, Ronnie was one of her late son’s best friends.
Seeing the behavior of the anti-hunting crowd underscored the calm of the hunters. The anti-hunters did themselves no favors.
Hounds reached Beveridge Hundred with only a few yips and yaps. The darkening clouds, the light wind carrying the hint of moisture promised a good day, good if you’d dressed for it.
Juno, a first-year entry, began to feather. Unsure of herself, she needed support, she didn’t open but her tail picked up speed. Dasher walked over, putting his nose down.
“I don’t know what this is.” The lovely young hound turned to Dasher.
“Bobcat.”
“Can we chase bobcat?” Juno did not want to make a mistake and the field was huge today, people would see.
“We can. Fox is preferable, so let’s open but should a foxtrail cross the bobcat we can switch over. The humans won’t know the difference.”
“Really? Not even the huntsman and the whippers-in?”
“No nose, sugar. No nose at all. They have to be right on top of something to smell it. Now staff may suspect but they won’t really know unless they see the quarry. In time you’ll become accustomed to what they lack but you’ll appreciate what they do have. An odd species. Okay, you open first, this is your chance to show everyone, then I’ll chip in. Sing!”
“Bobcat.” She warbled, her voice still a bit high.
“Warm, getting warmer.” Dasher seconded the find.
The whole pack rushed over, Pickens inhaled. “Finally.”
His littermate, Parker, said, “If you don’t hit in the first five minutes, you get bored.”
“Shut up.” His brother snapped back, they were off.
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