Outfoxed

by Rita Mae Brown

  People didn’t dress to go downtown anymore. They barely pulled themselves together, properly groomed, to attend church. The South and especially Virginia practiced a dress code much stricter than that of the rest of America but even here in the bosom of courtliness standards were falling. Many wore jeans and T-shirts. Businessmen still paid attention to their furnishings, as did those ladies who were hoping to catch a businessman’s eye. But even their standards of dress were lower than just thirty years before.

  Crawford reached the slots and slid the mail in. One brass slot was marked with the town’s zip code, another was marked VIRGINIA, and a third was marked OUT OF TOWN but it may well have read OFF THE WALL. Virginians, without making noise about it, quietly, calmly, considerately believed any activity of importance took place within the state’s borders. From the Potomac to the Dan River, from the Atlantic to the early steep folds of the Alleghenies shared with its rebellious sister, West Virginia, this was the center of the universe.

  Even Crawford, as he methodically tossed the mail in the slots, listening for the satisfying soft thunk on the other side as it hit a mail basket, even he who knew the world had adopted this point of view. What was Nairobi, London, New York compared to Charlottesville, Fredericksburg, or the dowager herself, great fusty Richmond? Crawford, a direct and active man, hardly realized the seductiveness of the area. When he repaired here with Martha, flush with the first fortune he’d made, he came for the beauty of the place and because it was an hour by air to New York City, only fifteen minutes more by air to Atlanta. Washington, D.C., was a half hour by air or an hour and a half by car if no state troopers prowled the corridors to that corrupted seat of power. He certainly did not move to central Virginia for the people. He made fun of them, decrying them as parochial, falsely genteel, and silently racist.

  When Virginia elected Douglas Wilder, the first black governor in the history of the United States, he questioned his stand on Virginia’s racism. The more he thought about it, the more he decided Virginians were no more racist than New Yorkers.

  As the years rolled along he would travel out of state and find himself irritated by the lack of grace in random encounters. He began to fume about the manner in which people drove in Boston and once in Los Angeles he upbraided a man at a business meeting for not wearing a suit and tie. He told the young man that he was being disrespectful to the other men at the meeting. One should always consider the effects of one’s dress and demeanor on others.

  This is not to say that Crawford Howard, born and bred in the hurly-burly of Indianapolis, that gritty competitor to massive Chicago, had become a Virginian. This is only to say that the state of Virginia, her siren song sweet and strong since 1607, had filtered into Crawford’s ears.

  He began to tip his hat to ladies even if only a baseball cap. He smiled at older women and told them they were alluring. Before telling a male competitor how wrong the competitor was, Crawford might even say something like “Have you considered this . . . ?”

  The natives first ignored him. In their eyes he was a rich barbarian. Over time, his good qualities—vision, responsibility, and determination—won praise from some. He cared far too much about money and talked about it and business far too much but he had come a long way.

  Fontaine Buruss, of course, would never give him credit for smoothing over his rough edges. There were those who agreed with Fontaine but they were often the same people who, if living in England, would not speak to you if you couldn’t trace your lineage back to William the Conqueror. William and his men had a lot to answer for.

  As Crawford picked up the now empty carton, he walked under the cream-colored swinging bowls of light, lamps hanging by heavy chain; he passed the long tables whose red marble tops contrasted richly with the black marble floor. He paused for a moment to consider whether the drunk sleeping on a marble bench in the corner was still alive. He was and Crawford pushed open the door, walking down the cascade of broad steps to his Mercedes.

  He cruised by Martha’s apartment. He told himself he was curious. Then he motored by Fontaine’s office. The light was on. A bead of sweat appeared at his left temple even though the temperature was now fifty-four degrees. He parked in the lot across from Fontaine’s office. The sweat rolled down to his chin. He wiped it off, walked into the lobby, and knocked on the door.

  “Who is it?” Martha’s voice called out.

  “Your beau.” He liked the sound of that.

  He heard a muffled exchange. “Come in,” Martha said.

  Fontaine and Martha, bending over a drafting table, stood up to greet him.

  “Hello,” Fontaine coolly said.

  “Hello,” Crawford replied to equal degree.

  “Did I get the date wrong? Were we supposed to have dinner tonight?” Martha hastily reached for her daybook.

  “No, no, I was dropping off fixture cards at the post office and I don’t know . . . drove by and saw the light on.” He smiled.

  “We’re trying to come up with something English but not too rigid for the Haslips’ new garden. See.” She pointed to designs.

  A moment of silence followed. “We might as well start fresh in the morning,” Fontaine said warmly to Martha.

  “Fine.”

  “A nightcap?” Crawford asked hopefully.

  “Sure,” she replied, a quiet look of happiness on her face.

  This infuriated Fontaine, who rolled a second set of plans, popping them into a heavy cardboard tube. Half sounding playful and half in warning he said, “Watch out for him, Martha.”

  Crawford, face suddenly bright red, replied through clenched teeth, “This is no affair of yours.”

  “You were a damn fool to let her go in the first place. If I weren’t married, I would have asked her out myself.”

  “Since when has that stopped you!”

  Fontaine gave his reply, a straight right to the jaw. Crawford, not being a boxing man, crumpled.

  Martha knelt down as he shook his head, then scrambled up. He did not offer to return the blow. Crawford recognized his physical limitations. He was four inches shorter than Fontaine and about ten years older. No amount of elective surgery could turn back the clock.

  “Come on, Crawford.” She tried to move him toward the door.

  He held his jaw with his hand. Hurt like hell but he managed to hiss, “I’ll dance on your grave!”

  CHAPTER 28

  Bridles, broken down, stripped, and dipped, hung overhead on tack hooks, which resembled grappling hooks. Underneath, a plastic bucket caught the dripping oil.

  Sister and Doug sat on low three-legged stools, buckets of clear rinse water and buckets of washing water between their feet. With a toothbrush in hand they scrubbed each steel bit until it shone. They ran their fingers over the bits, searching for pitting. Korean steel bits pitted quickly. They weren’t worth the money paid for them. German bits were good but nothing compared to English steel. The English from the nineteenth century onward excelled in creating a smooth, perfectly balanced bit with superior steel, no cheap alloys. The expense, initially steep, panned out over time, for the bit lasted generations.

  This held true for English vegetable-dyed leather, too. In order to speed the process most tanners chrome-dyed their leather. Vegetable dyes couldn’t get the consistency of color—Havana brown, tan, or black—that chrome could but the vegetable dye imparted a soft sheen to the leather as well as being better for the leather itself.

  Sister, not a wealthy woman but a comfortable one, refused to cut corners on tack or anything relating to the care of her horses. Since she spent little on herself it all worked out.

  She had splurged by putting a gas stove in the tack room. Fake logs inside it glowed red and it looked just like an old wood-burning stove. Threw out lots of heat, so much so that usually she had to crack a window.

  The day, perfect for cleaning tack, was raw. The temperature, in the low fifties, sounded good but the light rain sent a chill right through you. She was glad she had boug
ht the gas stove.

  With only six days until opening hunt, she and Doug worked to make sure each piece of tack was spotless, boots were shined to perfection, pants, coats, hats, everything was dry-cleaned or brushed.

  The hounds, too, were subjected to beauty treatments. The central room in the kennel was heated, with a large drain in the middle of the floor. Hounds were taken out of their runs to be scrubbed and have their nails clipped and ears cleaned, and were then allowed to dry off on the benches in the central room before being taken to their runs again.

  The runs, scrubbed down each morning with an expensive power washer, were kept scrupulously clean.

  As Shaker worked in the kennels, Sister and Doug merrily chattered away.

  “Someone’s coming,” Raleigh announced as he heard a car a quarter of a mile away. “I’ll go to the door.”

  “Don’t bother. It will be some hunt club member half-hysterical because he or she has lost their boots and they want to know if they can wear field boots. It’s always something.” Golliwog rolled over, turning her head to the side, very coy.

  Raleigh jumped to his feet as the silver Jaguar rolled down to the stable. Fontaine dashed toward the tack room. He wasn’t wearing a raincoat.

  Once inside the tack room, he shook himself slightly.

  “Please,” Golly complained as a raindrop landed on her.

  Raleigh circled three times and lay down on the sheepskin thrown in the corner.

  “Sit down.” Sister pointed to a tattered wing chair.

  “Thank you. Getting everything ready. I knew you’d be here. I didn’t even bother going to the house. How are you, Doug?”

  “Fine. Can I get you coffee or anything?” Doug inquired.

  A small refrigerator and kitchenette were in the corner.

  “No. No.” Fontaine couldn’t ask Doug to leave. After all, both he and Sister were working and he did barge in without calling first. “I’m here to tell you that I had an unfortunate experience with Crawford last night.” He paused; then his tone relaxed. “Unfortunate. Hell, the man really wanted his ass kicked bad. He walked into the office at about nine-thirty. Martha and I were working late. He was sniffing around Martha, as you know that’s sort of on again, and anyway he accused me of impropriety, not just with Martha but with every female since Cleopatra. I passed my hand over his jaw.” Fontaine broke into a grin, an appealing crooked grin.

  “In other words, you wouldn’t serve with Crawford if Christ Almighty told you to.” Sister had to laugh.

  “Well—yes.”

  Doug laughed, too, although he suspected Fontaine had been chasing Cody despite her protests. She’d finished her intensive rehab and was home but she hadn’t called him yet. He wondered if she was okay. Then he wondered if he was okay.

  “I appreciate you coming out here on a rainy day to tell me.”

  “I’m sorry I can’t accommodate you, Sister. And I found out he’s been trying to get Peter Wheeler’s land. He offered him life estate.”

  “That’s no surprise.” Sister knew Crawford would try that.

  “He intends to develop it.”

  “That’s what he says about you.” Sister shouldn’t have blurted that out but there it was.

  “Never. That’s a hunt fixture. If the damned development keeps up we’ll be in the middle of West Virginia riding mountain goats.”

  “You called Gordon Smith.” She figured she might as well show her hand.

  “I did.” He was surprised that she knew. “I called him to ask if he could help me put together a syndicate to preserve the Wheeler place. He’s only interested in commercial real estate, not residential, and the Wheeler place had no commercial application. I was direct about that. He was helpful. I’d only met him a few times at political fund-raisers but he really was helpful. The impediment, as you know, is this conservation easement clause.”

  “I got an earful of that the other night. I assume some members of a syndicate want it and others don’t.”

  “Correct.” He watched the oil drip into the bucket. “I’d better go home and do the same. Saturday will be here before I know it.” He asked Doug if he had heard from Cody.

  “No.” Doug wanted to say, “Have you?” but kept his mouth shut.

  “Betty called to say she’s pleased. She thinks both girls profited from the experience, which I gather was tearful, expensive, and rigorous,” Sister said.

  “So they say.” Fontaine sounded noncommittal. He stood up. “I’d better get rolling.”

  “This will all work out somehow but I’d avoid Crawford in the hunt field if I were you.”

  “No problem. He’ll pop off Czapaka in the first hour. Even if they made a saddle with a Velcro seat and he wore Velcro pants he’d part company with that horse. Beautiful horse. Oh well, overmounted again.”

  “Men tend to do that.” Sister let fly a small barb. “In all respects.”

  Fontaine laughed. “Oh, but the fun of it.” He walked out into the rain and sprinted to the Jaguar.

  “Full of himself,” Raleigh observed.

  “God’s gift, he thinks. Going to seed, I think,” Golly commented.

  “How long before we hear from Crawford?” Sister smiled as she put a bit into the clear rinse water.

  “Um-m, by supper.”

  “Wanna bet?”

  “How much?” Doug, graceful hands, reached over and flipped a girth off a saddle rack.

  “A dollar.”

  “I’ll take that bet. What do you think?”

  “He’ll call or be here within two hours.”

  Doug glanced at the wall clock, a cat with a tail for a pendulum, its eyes rolling in time with the tail. “By three. Okay. You can give me that dollar now.”

  “Ha.” She scrubbed an eggbutt-jointed snaffle. “I can feel waves of distrust and disgust coming off your body around Fontaine. Is this a guy thing because the ladies preen when they see him coming?”

  “I don’t know if it’s a guy thing. I flat out can’t abide him. He’s pompous, racist in a sly way, and he doesn’t give a shit about anybody or anything other than his own pleasures.”

  “Well, that’s about as much as I’ve ever heard you say about anybody—ever. What else?”

  “He treats me like a servant. I may work for you, Sister, but I’m not his slave. Fontaine wants to hear not ‘Master’ but ‘Massa.’ No shit.”

  “I suppose there is that in him. It’s all smoothed over, of course.” She reached into the bucket, scrubbing under the water. “It’s Cody. I can’t prove anything but it’s the way he looks at her.”

  “Damn him!”

  “I can understand Crawford’s anger, too, but I know Martha didn’t have anything to do with Fontaine on that level. He was enjoying playing the savior too much to spoil it. Besides, he has too many other women to service. Why in the world would Cody fool around with him . . . if she has?”

  “I don’t know if she has.” Doug laid the girth across his knees, scrubbing the underside. “At first I thought maybe he leaned on her, using her parents. He does a lot of business at Franklin Press. Maybe he threatened to take business elsewhere. She feels guilty about what she’s put her parents through over the years. I thought, okay, maybe that’s it.”

  “You don’t now?”

  “No.”

  “It can’t be a sexual attraction.” Sister was incredulous. “She’s not that dumb even if he is handsome.”

  “No. He has a hold on her.”

  “You think she has slept with him then?”

  A sickly look passed over Doug’s handsome features. “Yeah.”

  “Oh, Doug, I hope not but if she has, maybe it’s over.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Do you think she loves you?”

  “I don’t know.” His voice dropped.

  “Steady on. Whatever is supposed to happen will happen and even if she brings you pain this will lead to the right woman. Maybe not to Cody but to the right woman.” His stricken face broug
ht a swell of sympathy. “Doug, I didn’t know you cared that much. I hope she is the one, truly. If she’s the one you want then I hope it works out.”

  “Thanks, boss.” He smiled weakly. “You like her, don’t you?”

  “I love her. I’ve known her since the day she was born but I’m afraid for her. She’s been a handful since birth. Betty said she kicked like a mule in the womb. I don’t know what to tell you, Doug. It seems there’s something inside Cody that drives her on like Juno’s fly biting Europa.” She didn’t need to explain mythology to Doug. He loved the Greek myths.

  “Maybe people are born like that.”

  “I don’t know but I do know you can’t try to satisfy her or anybody. You take care of yourself. You can’t fix Cody.”

  “I hope that’s what rehab was about.”

  “I do, too.”

  “Car!” Raleigh informed them.

  “Crawford.” Golly rolled onto her other side.

  When Crawford strode through the door Sister couldn’t help but laugh as Doug shook his head.

  “How’d you know it would be Crawford?” Raleigh asked in amazement.

  “Cats know everything.”

  CHAPTER 29

  Crawford, narrow-eyed, waited for an invitation from the silver-haired master to sit down. Once he heard that he unzipped his raincoat, the latest, most expensive Gore-Tex model, hanging it on a coatrack by the door.

  “Crawford, hand me that sponge as long as you’re standing up?” Sister asked.

  He handed her a long, natural sponge before easing himself into the chair Fontaine had just vacated. “Knees. Football.”

  Sister pointed to her entire body. “Bones. Life.”

  Doug laughed.

  “Just wait.” Sister waggled her forefinger at him.

  “I hurt now.”

  “Where?”

  “Where I broke my shoulder blade.”

  “Okay. That counts. You can join the aches-and-pains club.” She dipped the fresh sponge into the clear rinse water. “Crawford, I’m all ears.”