RMBrown - Outfoxed

by Outfoxed (v1. 0) [lit]

  “That’s a big risk for them. Ratshot in the rear if they keep going.”Charlene frowned.“What are we to do?”

  Patsy and Grace said at the same time,“Bring the rope here.”

  “No,”Aunt Netty sharply replied.“The humans need to find the rope where it was dropped or thrown. That will tell them where the human killer was. They must be led to the rope. As it is, by the time we get them there the tracks could be gone, especially if it rains.”

  “We need Raleigh.”

  “Sister, Shaker, and Doug may not follow Raleigh,”Grace said to Comet, who’d proposed the idea.

  “If he goes on hound walk, which he often does, he can help convince the humans. If a hound bolts, even a hound as respected as Cora or Archie, the humans will crack the whip and then finally use ratshot. That’s their job. They’ll think the pack is going to hell. If Raleigh makes a commotion and the hounds honor him, I think the humans will follow. We have to try it, as it’s our only hope.”Yancy listened.“Is it settled then?”

  “Yes. We’ll go tonight.”

  The foxes and Athena silently melted into the forest about an hour before Sister, Shaker, Walter, and Doug emerged on the other side of the meadow. They reached the jump in a few minutes, peering into the woods as a twig crackled.

  They combed the scene. The sheriff and his deputies trained in crime detection were good but they weren’t hunters or country people.

  “There are so many hoofprints here.” Walter ran his fingers through his blond hair.

  “Let’s divide up. Walter and Shaker head south down the fence line, one on either side. Doug and I will head north. Shaker, give a toot, I will, too.” Sister always carried an extra horn, a lesson learned when Shaker fell hard from his horse years ago, squashing the bell of his horn.

  Twenty minutes later Doug, on the forest side of the fence line, found tracks. “Look.”

  Sister climbed over the fence, dropped to her hands and knees. “Yes. Could have been a whip coming in. Betty, maybe. These look like number one shoes, smallish feet. Could be Arts.” She mentioned the other popular shoe.

  “Not a quarter horse. Not round enough.” Doug, too, was on his knees. “God, Sister, that’s half the horses in the hunt field. There were horses yesterday we’d never seen before.”

  “I know. I know.” She stood up, put the horn to her lips, and let out a steady, one-note blast. The hounds heard it, two and a half miles away. They replied, which sounded faint and far away on this cool, overcast morning. “Good hounds.” Sister smiled weakly, for she remained terribly distressed.

  Doug leaned against the fence. “You’ve bred them. They can hold their own against any pack.” A touch of pride crept into his light baritone.

  Walter and Shaker joined them within seven minutes.

  “What took you so long?” Doug asked.

  “We were clipping right along.” Shaker hunkered down. “Ah. Number one.”

  “Maybe Arts,” Sister said.

  “No. Number one.” Shaker stood back up. “If only there’d been a bar shoe or a weighted shoe, a little dog to the inside. Number one. Standard. Well. Let’s follow it.”

  “It might not be the killer,” Sister calmly said.

  “No. But then again it might.” Shaker put his head down and followed the tracks over the fallen leaves. The pine needles carpeting the earth nearly threw them off, but they picked up the tracks again once out of the pine stand.

  They lost them at the flat-rock outcropping and even though they each took a different direction off the flat rocks, they were soon brought up short by a tremendous thunderclap overhead. With no warning the heavens opened. Cascading heavy rain drenched them to the bone.

  By the time the four reached the stable they were all shivering. The tack room, toasty, warmed them as Sister made a fresh pot of coffee on the hot plate. She offered clothing—she’d kept shirts and sweatshirts around for just such a purpose—but the men stood by the gas stove. Slowly they began to thaw out and dry out.

  “See the body?” Shaker asked.

  “Yes. I went down to the morgue.” Walter’s eyebrows furrowed for an instant. “The bruises on his left side were apparent. He’d been hit cleanly in the chest. Right through the heart, I would say. Apart from whatever emotions he felt at the fall I’d guess his death was swift. I suppose that’s a kind of mercy. Can’t jump to conclusions. I’ll have to wait for the coroner’s report. Except whoever shot him was a good shot. Dead-on.” He realized his pun. “Sorry.”

  “You know I never liked that son of a bitch, so I can’t pretend I’m sorry.” Shaker opened a small cigar box, offering the men a smoke.

  “I’ll take one. I need something soothing.” Sister reached in, grabbing a thin cigar.

  Shaker cut the end for her with his round cutter, then held a flame. As she inhaled the end glowed scarlet and gold and he said, “Funniest damn thing, though. I would have bet you dollars to doughnuts that Crawford would be murdered. Not Fontaine.”

  “Countenancing murder, are you?” She closed her eyes gratefully as the mild yet complex tastes reached her tongue and throat.

  “No. But Crawford stirs up hornets’ nests. Fontaine”—he shrugged—“lightweight.”

  “A crazed husband?” Doug offered.

  “Hell, no. By the time he got at them the husbands were bored.” Shaker roared with laughter.

  “If you say so.” Sister exhaled, knowing what the others did not—that Fontaine had had a fling with Shaker’s wife before she left.

  “Business?” Walter asked.

  “Worthless,” Shaker resolutely replied.

  “Better find out who he owes money to, then.” Doug turned his back toward the stove. His pants stuck to his muscled legs.

  “Half the county. I can tell you that.” Sister took off her boots, her wet socks, too.

  “I can see it now: ‘Murder among the hunt set.’ ‘Galloping revenge.’ How about ‘Toff goes to ground’?” Shaker smiled slyly and the others couldn’t help it; they smiled, too.

  “The papers and TV stations will have a field day. Paper ought to be delivered by now.” Walter sipped the coffee, glad for its warmth. “I expect there will be a lot of questions at the hospital today.”

  “Walter, you were kind to come out here this morning.”

  “Sister Jane, I will help in any way I can.”

  “Smart killer, I’d say. Drawing off the young entry like that. Had to be a real hunting man.” Shaker puffed contentedly.

  “He’ll forget something, something so small. . . . They always do, you know.” Sister half believed what she said. Mostly she hoped it was true.

  CHAPTER 38

  The morning after Fontaine was killed, while Sister, Shaker, Doug, and Walter investigated the hog’s-back jump, Crawford Howard nicked himself shaving. Normally, this slip would have brought forth a torrent of vituperation: at the razor, at the shaving cream, at the lighting, and lastly at himself.

  This morning he kept whistling. Fontaine was truly totally dead. He’d called last night to offer his services to Sheriff Sidell and to make certain that swaggering ass, Fontaine Buruss, really was gone, his temperature at least forty degrees below normal. If only that insufferable oaf weren’t in the cooler, Crawford would have the merriment of watching him go into rigor mortis. Let the funeral director deal with that.

  He wondered how to handle Martha. Sensitive, attached to Fontaine, she would be weepy for days, perhaps weeks. She’d sobbed when Sister made the announcement. Crawford put his arm around her, offering solace.

  How he kept himself from gloating even he didn’t know. He congratulated himself on his discipline.

  Washing the white shaving cream off his face, patting his cheeks dry, he scrutinized himself in the mirror. Thanks to a discreet and gifted plastic surgeon in New York City he looked maybe forty-five, not the fifty-four he was. His hairline had receded a bit but other than that, he looked good. He was getting bored with the mustache and beard. Too artsy. He though
t he’d make an appointment at the barber’s to get the beard shaved off. He’d softened a bit but he’d put down his money at the gym, arriving four days a week at seven to work with a personal trainer.

  He had envied Fontaine, his luxurious mane of hair and his trim waistline. Fontaine kept in splendid condition, burning the calories in bed no doubt.

  Ah, but he was dead now. Dead. Dead. Dead. Crawford had never realized what a solid sound that word had. Deadwood. Dead honest. Deadbeat. Dead. He began to enjoy the word. It wasn’t far from “deed.” Was being dead a deed? Was being dead a state of being, which English seemed to suggest, or was dead no being at all, just a linguistic twist?

  Dead.

  Well, he wouldn’t be dead for many a year. His doctors told him that.

  He’d win his ex-wife back. He didn’t think of her as an ex but merely as a woman he possessed who had slipped out of his pocket. He loved Martha but he possessed her. A man had to own many things in order to be important and a good-looking woman was one of those things. Children, of course, were optional.

  She’d want to stay on at the office until Sorrel Buruss decided what to do with the business. Martha was uncommonly loyal. Then he’d steer her toward home again. A pair of diamond spray earrings from Tiffany would help.

  The best thing about Fontaine’s untimely demise, untimely for Fontaine, was that now Crawford would be joint-master of the Jefferson Hunt. Sister really had no choice.

  He’d been reading about hounds. He’d wait but in good time he’d suggest an infusion of July blood and perhaps some Dumfriesshire, also. After all, he could read a pedigree as well as any other person. Top line, tail line. How simple.

  Joint-master. About time, too.

  CHAPTER 39

  Given the jolt of the day, Cody spent that night at her parents’ home. Bobby spent half the night on one phone line while Betty was on the other.

  Cody imagined the county intersected with a series of actual lines and they’d glow when in use. Finally the entire country would be pulsating with talk.

  She and Jen sat in the kitchen eating fruit while overhearing Mom and Dad.

  “Any ideas?” Cody asked.

  “No. He didn’t look bad, did he? Asleep except for the hole in his coat. I’ve never seen a dead person before.” Jennifer took the clinical approach. “I was with the field but I could see he didn’t look slimy.”

  “Fresh is better than nonfresh.”

  Jennifer sang. “The worms crawl in, the worms crawl out, and I’ll play pinochle on your snout.”

  “That’s compassionate.” Her older sister peeled back an orange, tossing the rind at Jennifer.

  “He was old.”

  “Not as old as Mom and Dad. Early forties, I think.”

  “Forty is old.” Jennifer bit into an apple. “I’ll never live to be forty.”

  “Bullshit. We’ll live way beyond that. Don’t give me this dying young crap. James Dean. Kurt Cobain. Elvis.”

  “Elvis was old.”

  “Forty-two. I don’t exactly get Elvis.”

  “See. You have to be old to get him. Like Nine Inch Nails. Old.”

  “They’re not old.”

  “Yeah they are. Another decade. What matters is what’s happening right this minute. The eternal present.”

  “Have you been reading self-help books? That doesn’t sound like something you’d say, Jennifer.”

  “The therapy sessions are warping my mind.”

  “Not enough.” She sighed. “So you have no compassion for Fontaine Buruss?”

  “All he wanted was for someone to slob his knob. Yuck.”

  Cody laughed and Jennifer laughed, too. Fontaine, driven by sex, gravitated toward a female as she lurched out of puberty. Maybe he didn’t sleep with underage girls and maybe he did—who knew? Or if they did, they weren’t talking—but any sign of sexual maturity captivated him. He was handsome. Women are fools for handsome men.

  Betty called from the next room, her small office off the kitchen also called the recipe room, since she kept file after file of recipes. “Keep it down. How will it sound in the background if you two are whooping it up?”

  “Yes, Mother,” they both said.

  “Who are you calling now?” Cody asked.

  “Aunt Olivia.”

  “Mom, she lives in Chicago.” Jennifer giggled.

  “She grew up with Fontaine. She’ll want to know.”

  “Is there anyone you haven’t called? What about the bag boy down at Kroger’s?” Cody teased her.

  “You two are taking this shock rather well.” Betty strode out of her office.

  “Shit happens.” Jennifer burst out laughing again.

  Betty’s hand flew to the space between her breasts. “Jennifer.”

  “Mom, it’s not like he was my best friend. And he didn’t look so bad dead.”

  She walked across the kitchen floor, her slippers barely making a sound, opened the refrigerator, taking out a soda.

  “Better take two. You’ll be thirsty from all that talking,” Cody advised.

  “And what do you think of all this?”

  “I don’t know.” Cody grew somber. “I got along with him.” This was an understatement but since her family had no idea of her affair, they couldn’t appreciate her approach. “Once you knew what he was, he was easy. That’s how I see it.”

  “And that’s how most women saw it.” Betty popped open the can. “But murder?”

  “Yeah, well.” Jennifer suddenly darkened.

  “Guess he pissed the wrong person off.” Cody tidied up her pile of orange parts.

  “What if it wasn’t personal? You’re assuming it is. What if this is some nutcase who is opposed to hunting?”

  “In Virginia. Mom.” Jennifer rolled her eyes.

  “Pretty farfetched.” Cody supported her sister.

  “Well, serial killers are around us. This could be some person’s sick idea of power. Random killings in the country. It happens. No place is ever safe from that kind of sickness now. People kill to kill.”

  “Bet he owed somebody money.” Jennifer had a pedestrian worldview so at odds with her heavenly beauty.

  “He did owe money.” Betty sat down with her girls. “Cody, you used to see him at the barn. Weren’t you trying out that horse—uh . . .”

  “Keepsake.”

  “That’s the one. Ever notice anything off the mark?”

  “He didn’t talk business with me. If anyone had good reason to kill Fontaine, apart from someone he owed money to, it would be his wife, don’t you think?”

  “She’d never!” Betty’s voice grew loud.

  “I didn’t say she did, only that she had more reason than anyone. That is, if your soon-to-strike-again serial killer idea is wrong,” Cody replied.

  “I wouldn’t laugh about that. There are serial killers in Virginia. There are too many unsolved murders.” Betty raised her voice. “And that’s the thing, Cody, that’s just the thing. How in the hell did Fontaine get separated from the field to follow a splinter group of the pack? It doesn’t make any sense.”

  CHAPTER 40

  November resembles a curveball. Just when you think you know where the ball will go over the plate it shifts on you and you’re swinging wind.

  The rain morphed into tiny ice bits clicking on windowpanes; cars skidded off roads. Inky and Aunt Netty met at the base of Hangman’s Ridge. They trotted to the kennels, a half-mile distance but seeming much farther in the biting weather.

  “No hound will show his face in this. They’re curled up in deep straw.”Netty thought they were spoiled.

  When Sister built the main building out of cinder blocks she had dropped fluffy insulation in each row before the next row was laid over it. The result was a structure that hounds couldn’t chew to pieces when bored yet one that stayed cool in summer and warm in winter. Then, too, hounds threw off a lot of body heat, making the sleeping quarters toasty.

  “We won’t need to worry about Raleigh a
nd Golly. They’ll be in the big house.”Inky squinted through the sleet.“She takes good care of her pets.”

  Aunt Netty said,“Before you were born and the blizzards hit, she put on her snowshoes and fed us.”

  “Don’t most masters feed their foxes if the weather is bad?”

  “Some do. Some don’t. Some believe that a fox has to survive nature’s tantrums. Others believe a little help now and then is a good thing.”Netty paused. The kennel loomed up ahead.“Might as well go right up to the chain-link fence and bark.” She trotted up.“Yoo-hoo. Cora. Archie.”