RMBrown - Outfoxed

by Outfoxed (v1. 0) [lit]

  “But you can still remove a member.”

  “No, I can’t. Only the master of a private pack can remove someone from the roster. I can remove a member from the field.”

  “You could petition the board.” He glowered, which made him look like a middle-aged child angry about having to go to bed.

  “No. Fontaine has endangered no one in the field. He has shown respect to master and staff. Whatever his quarrel with you, it’s between the two of you.”

  “But it’s over the joint-mastership!” Crawford exploded.

  “No.” Her voice was firm. “The joint-mastership allows you two to compete openly. You’re like oil and water. And kindly remember, I do not have to appoint a joint-master.”

  “You can’t appoint one. You have to ask the board’s approval.” With that statement Crawford betrayed the fact that he would use the bylaws of the club not only to dislodge Fontaine but to try and force himself on Sister if he gained enough board support. If he could remove Sister he would, but he knew that was impossible. Crawford hadn’t a clue as to what Sister did as master other than she was responsible for hiring and firing staff and maintaining territory. He wanted a position of power and respect in this community. It took him a while but he learned that money wasn’t enough in Virginia. It helped but it wasn’t enough. He wanted to lord it over people. What better position than joint-master? And when Sister went to her reward he had enough money to bribe everyone. He’d be sole master.

  Crawford had half learned his lesson about money. The other half would come back to haunt him, namely that even poor people can’t always be bribed. Many Virginians still believed in honor, quaint as that concept might be in the twenty-first century.

  “You are exactly right. But I don’t have to recommend anyone.”

  “The board can suggest you take a joint-master.”

  “They can but they won’t,” she replied with the confidence of a person who knows how things get done.

  “You’ve got to end this impasse. What if you died during opening hunt?”

  “I’d die happy.”

  “But the club would be thrown into chaos. You need an understudy—an understudy with a fat checkbook. I can supply this club with a great many things, including building a separate kennel for the half-grown hounds. I know you don’t like to turn them out with the big boys and the puppy kennel gets overcrowded.”

  Her patience wearing thin, Sister stood up, putting her hands in the small of her back. “Crawford. If you are that rich, if you love hunting as much as you say you do, if you love Jefferson Hunt as much as you say you do, you know what—you’d spend the money for the love of the sport. We’d name the goddamn kennel after you.”

  As Sister rarely swore to someone not close to her, Doug’s eyes widened, his shoulders stiffened. He knew that Crawford didn’t know she was really, truly pissed off.

  He snarled. “Only a fool spends money without getting something out of it.”

  “Which proves my point. You don’t love foxhunting as much as you love being important. You want joint-M.F.H. behind your name. It’s a bargain for you, Crawford. To be a master, to be a huntsman, to be a whipper-in, you have to love it. You have to eat, sleep, and breathe hunting, knowing all the while that most people don’t understand what you’re doing or why you’re doing it. People outside of Virginia, I mean.”

  “Maryland,” Doug laconically added.

  “Well, yes. And parts of Pennsylvania.” Sister was loath to credit anyone north of the Mason-Dixon line.

  “Red Rock, Nevada.” Doug, his green eyes alight, smiled.

  “Doug, I know that. Anyway, Crawford, Americans live in cities now. The old ways are lost to them. They think we ride about shooting fox with guns. They think we’re all rich snobs. They haven’t a clue. So you have to love it because you aren’t going to get respect outside of Virginia.” She glanced at Doug. “And a few other important spots.”

  “I know that. I don’t need a lecture on the reality of foxhunting.”

  Doug stood up. “You need one on manners, Mr. Howard. It won’t do to worrit Sister.” He used the old form of “worry.”

  Crawford cut him off. “If you want to mix with white people, then you ought to learn how to use the King’s English. Don’t say birfday. Birthday. Ask not ax. You people can’t learn to talk.”

  “Crawford. That’s quite enough.” Sister, enraged, choked out the words.

  Doug, who cared little what a wimp thought of him, growled like one of the hounds. “Mr. Howard, if you trouble Sister anymore, I’ll decorate the other side of your jaw and for the record, if you become joint-master I will resign as first whipper-in.”

  “I wouldn’t have you anyway.” Crawford looked to Sister. “Damned half-breed doesn’t know his place. You dote on him. You dote on him as though he were your son. It’s understandable but he’s not your son.”

  “Crawford”—her tone deepened, her speech slowed—“I will overlook your desire to be master in any way you can manage. Ambition is a curious thing. I cannot overlook your attitude and insult to Doug. And you’re absolutely right, he is like a son to me. Now I suggest you leave us. I also suggest you take the opportunity to review this conversation. Furthermore, however you feel about Fontaine, Doug, and myself, I expect you to behave like a gentleman at opening hunt. Good day, sir.”

  “Get your ass outta here.”Raleigh, an imposing presence, stood next to Sister, his mouth slightly ajar.

  Crawford snatched his expensive rain gear off the coat-rack, slamming the door on his way out.

  “Really.”Golly fluffed her fur, then stood up, stretched, turned in a circle, and lay down again.

  As Crawford started his motor, Sister sat back down, then stood up again, tossing the bucket of wash water down the industrial sink, filling it again.

  “Money and the demons it incubates,” was all she said as she and Doug returned to their task.

  CHAPTER 30

  Along with the steady rain, charcoal clouds obscured the mountains, pressing down into the dark green pastures. The tops of ancient oaks, walnuts, and hickories were tangled in the low clouds. Overtop the rivers and creeks the mists hung thick but there the color was bright silver. Occasionally a patch of clearness would appear and the flash of red maple or orange oak was startling.

  As Fontaine turned back toward town, his silver Jaguar, swallowed in the rain and mist, was almost invisible save for his headlights. He laughed to himself as he passed Crawford Howard on his way to Sister Jane’s. Crawford’s Mercedes, a metallic deep red, would be hard to miss even in the thickest fog. Crawford, hands gripping the wheel, eyes intent on his side of the road, neither waved nor acknowledged Fontaine, a breach of manners in the country.

  Fontaine laughed to himself as he pulled over to the one-story white store at the crossroads. Low-pressure systems made him sleepy. If he ate chocolate or something loaded with sugar, he could usually keep from nodding out.

  ROGER’S CORNER, a long rectangular sign proclaimed on top of the roof. Two lights aimed at the sign illuminated the rain and clouds more than the sign.

  Fontaine liked Roger’s Corner, especially the worn wooden floors, the ornate black-and-gold cash register.

  “Hey, bro,” Roger, amiable, called out from behind the counter. “Cuts to the bone, don’t it?”

  “Makes me tired.” Fontaine scooped up Moon Pies, Yankee Doodles, and a small round coffee cake. “Your coffee potable today or do I need a sledgehammer to break it up?”

  “Ha ha,” Roger dryly replied as he poured him a cup of strong, good coffee, not café au lait or anything fancy, just wake-you-up coffee.

  Roger had inherited the store from Roger Senior. Both were attractive men, lean and long-jawed.

  Fontaine drank the coffee as he leaned against the counter. The cellophane wrapper on the coffee cake crinkled as Fontaine opened it. “Every time I go to New York City I buy these coffee cakes made by Drake’s. Can’t get them down here. I mean these are okay but thos
e little Drake’s things are the best. I love the crumbs on top.”

  “Never been there.”

  “Gotta go, buddy, gotta go.”

  “If Yankees will stay on their side of the Mason-Dixon line, I’ll stay on mine,” Roger joked.

  “There is that. Hey, Cody been by here?”

  “No. Thought she was in rehab. Betty stopped by last week. Told me. Both kids.” He shook his head, for it was too confusing.

  “People are gonna do what they’re gonna do.” He polished off the coffee cake. “Maybe those places give folks some understanding.” He beamed. “If it feels good, they’ll do it again.”

  “That’s just it, though, isn’t it? Feels good when you’re doing it and feels bad when you’re not.”

  “Life’s just one big hangover.” He held out his cup for a refill.

  “Had a few of those.” Roger laughed.

  “Coming to opening hunt?”

  Roger, a foot follower, enthusiastically said, “Best breakfast of the year.”

  “Muffin hound.”

  “I do my share of running. Tell you who did blow through here . . . Crawford. Not twenty minutes ago. He asked me what my annual take was.” Roger laughed. “I said, ‘Why do you want to know?’ and he said, ‘I’d like to buy this place.’ I don’t know what to make of that guy.”

  “Would you sell it?”

  “I don’t know.” He shrugged. “Man’s gotta work at something.”

  “If he gives you a fair price, you can work at something else. But that man’s a snake.”

  “You know, he might be.” Roger, like a bartender, tried to stay out of other people’s disagreements and personality clashes. “When I first met him I thought he couldn’t pull piss out of a boot if the directions were on the heel. I was wrong. He’s smart enough but he’s not—what am I trying to say?”

  “No practical knowledge. Couldn’t start up a chain saw if his life depended on it.”

  “Kinda.”

  The small pile of cellophane, white wrappers, and napkins diverted Fontaine’s attention. “Did I eat all that?”

  “Yep.”

  He sighed. “Better go straight to the gym. See you, bud.”

  However, he didn’t head for the gym. He headed for Cody’s place, taking the precaution of parking his car behind old holly bushes.

  He knocked on the door, rain funneling off his cowboy hat like a downspout.

  Hairbrush in hand, she opened the door. “Fontaine, what are you doing here?”

  He stepped inside. “You look as wet as I do.”

  A towel wrapped around her head looked like a fuzzy turban. Her white bathrobe was worn thin at the elbows.

  “I’ve got an appointment.”

  “Why didn’t you call me?” Fontaine didn’t unzip his raincoat.

  “I needed time to think.”

  “I thought that’s what you were doing in rehab.”

  “I did. I needed time to think in my own place.” She stuffed her hairbrush in her pocket. “I need to change a lot of things, break a lot of habits.” She took a deep breath. “I can’t see you anymore. I guess this is as good a time as any to end it.”

  “Why don’t you settle back in before you make sweeping decisions,” he smoothly replied, his voice pleasant, seductive.

  “I need to be clear. Look, you’ll always have a mistress somewhere. It’s your nature. For all I know you’ve got two or three stashed in Richmond or Washington. I don’t know. You’re a player.”

  “Only you,” he lied.

  While he chased skirts with a kind of predictable boredom, he liked Cody. He liked any woman that could ride well, hold her liquor, and make love with abandon.

  “I can’t do it.” Her lips compressed.

  “Anyone else?”

  “That’s not the point.”

  “Yeah,” he said sarcastically.

  “One other thing, Fontaine, and I mean this. You stay away from my sister.”

  His eyes opened; he took a half step back involuntarily. “I resent that.”

  “I know you.”

  “Nobody knows anybody.” He turned on his heel and left, far more upset than he imagined he would be.

  Cody locked the door behind him, sat on the edge of the twin bed that served as a sofa, pushed against the wall, embroidered pillows everywhere. Love didn’t enter into this decision. She’d never loved Fontaine. He was fun, spent money like water. His approach to life was “Do it now.” There was a kind of wisdom to that, since you only have the moment you’re in, but Fontaine never gave much thought to the future. Again, that was part of his charm.

  Cody was realizing she had to think a great deal about her future. She’d seen too many human shipwrecks at forty and fifty and sixty in rehab. Seeing and hearing the old druggies and drunks knocked sense into her head far more than the counseling sessions with the doctors.

  She had to get some training, find a decent job, and forget going out at night to the bars until she could handle it—or maybe forever. What was there about the soft wash of neon light over a polished bar that made her reach for a vodka martini or sneak into the back for a toot? Night seemed to absolve her of tomorrow but then tomorrow would come. Wasted, the sunrise rarely gave her hope. A panic would set in. She’d snort another line until there wasn’t anything left except the shakes and a black hole into which she’d tumble.

  She wasn’t going down that rabbit hole again.

  Tears ran down her face. She knew better than to take up with Fontaine in the first place. She thought she could forget Doug. She did for a while. Maybe she’d treated him badly last spring before he got fed up with her boozing and coking. That way she felt in control. Junk him before he’d junk her.

  She’d thought a lot about him in rehab, too. She dreaded the apologies she needed to make. She knew her mother and father would forgive her. She knew Doug would forgive her, too. In his way, he already had but she had to sit down, face-to-face, and truly apologize. She thought after opening hunt she might have the courage.

  She rubbed her hair with the towel, tossed it toward the bathroom, shook her head. She brushed out her long sable hair.

  “Hell.” She reached for the phone, dialing Doug’s number. The answering machine came on. “Doug, I bet you’re at the stable. I know this is an intense week. Why don’t I take you to dinner after opening hunt? Bye.”

  CHAPTER 31

  The last week before opening hunt kept everyone frantically busy. Turnout for cubbing was heavy and people who should have been legging up their horses starting in July thought that two shots of cubbing would do it.

  Shadbellies for the ladies, weaselbellies or cutaways for the gentlemen, frock coats, Meltons, were brushed out and hung on the line or brought back from the dry cleaner. Caps were knocked off with a small wisk brush as were top hats and the always charming derbies. Spurs submitted to rigorous polishing. Shirts and stock ties were ironed, buttons wiped clean, on the coats. Stock tie pins dangled in open buttonholes, where they wouldn’t be lost in the nervousness of preparation. The last thing a hunter did was to fasten that stock pin horizontally across the tie.

  Ties would be four-in-hand or just flipped over in a cascade of white. Not a hint of yellow or gray for opening hunt; those ties had to be white, white, white.

  Garters—and many still used them, as was correct—were also polished. They’d be just above the boot line and if a lady or gentleman wore the old buttoned pants, the garter would be between the third and fourth button.

  Breeches, whipcord or the newer materials, were checked along the seams, the suede knee patches checked, too.

  The one item everyone appreciated most and talked about the least was a good pair of underpants. Anything with a raised seam eventually rubbed your leg raw. A few underpants were even padded on the crotch to protect that sensitive area from damage. Of course, if they were riding properly, the next generation should be safe.

  Vests also dotted clotheslines. The fortunate few wore white vests
handed down from the nineteenth century and the most proper attire for the High Holy Days of hunting: opening hunt, Thanksgiving hunt, Christmas hunt, and New Year’s hunt.

  Most people wore a canary vest. Tattersalls were used during formal hunting but not during the holiest of holies, although a few hunts demanded tattersall in the hunt club colors. A vest in the hunt’s colors was also proper, although few wore them because they needed to be specially made.