The Tell-tale Horse

by Rita Mae Brown

  “Master, may I have apple butter?” Felicity asked.

  “Of course, honey, you know where it is.”

  “Girls,” Sister said quietly, as they finally sat together.

  “Oops.” Val, starved, had just dipped her large spoon in the bowl.

  They held hands and Sister prayed. “Heavenly Mother, for this which we are about to receive, we thank you. Amen.”

  “Amen,” the girls echoed.

  “Heavenly Mother. When did you start saying that?” Tootie smiled.

  “Wanted to see if you were listening.”

  “We were.” Val, grateful, picked up her loaded spoon.

  “What do you think, ma’am?” Felicity hoped Sister would like her idea.

  “Splendid, that’s what I think. You’re very creative in your way. Takes time to organize something like this. You all will have to come back as alumnae next fall. There’s only a month left, give or take a day, for this season.”

  “I’ll be here,” Felicity replied, without fanfare.

  Val deliberately put down her spoon. “You’ll be coming back with Tootie and me from Princeton.”

  “I’m going to stay here and find a job. Howie will go to Piedmont Community College for two years, and then if he can pull his grades up he’ll go to UVA or somewhere.”

  Face red, Val opened her mouth but Sister, next to her, put her hand on Val’s hand. “Sweetheart, she has to find her own way. You can’t live everyone’s life for them no matter how intelligent you are.”

  “But Sister, she’s throwing her life away! And furthermore, Howie Lindquist is dumb as a box of rocks. If anyone goes to UVA it should be Felicity.”

  “He’s not dumb!” Felicity flashed anger, rare in her.

  “Ladies, we have to support Felicity, no matter what. Is she throwing her life away? I don’t know. What I do know is that it’s her life. I also know that love is rare. She loves Howie.”

  Felicity melted in gratitude.

  “But she’s so young.” Never having experienced even a twinge of love, Val couldn’t grasp any choice not involving progress on a social, material, or intellectual level.

  “Yes,” was Sister’s one-word reply.

  They sat in silence for a minute; then Tootie, God knows why because it was so unlike her, just as Felicity’s anger was a surprise, blurted out, “How do you know when you’re in love?”

  “Anne Harris!” Felicity laughed, calling Tootie by her full name. “You just know.”

  Val rolled her eyes. “Spare me. I’m eating.”

  Gray, amused, said, “You can’t stop thinking about the person. Your heart beats faster when you see her. Sometimes you feel dizzy. You’ve never felt such energy, like electricity in your veins.”

  “Sounds like the flu.” Val grimaced.

  “Chills and fever. It’s a good flu.” Sister smiled at Gray.

  “Can you avoid it?” Tootie asked.

  “No,” Gray responded firmly. “You can refuse to engage but you can’t really avoid it.”

  “I am never falling in love,” Val declared.

  “Of course not. You’re too in love with yourself.” Felicity shocked everyone; normally she was so mild.

  The statuesque blonde’s face reddened. Then she, too, surprised everyone. “I am pretty self-centered.”

  Everyone put their spoons on their plate at the same time to stare at Val.

  Finally Sister lifted her spoon. “You’re at the time of life when one is relatively self-centered. The real sin is not outgrowing it.”

  “Like Crawford Howard?” Felicity asked.

  “Mmm, he’s egotistical, but I’ve seen worse.” She paused. “Anyone ready for seconds?”

  They were, so she refilled all the bowls.

  Felicity devoured her second bowl. She was eating a lot these days.

  Sister smiled at Felicity. “You’re very young. You and Howie will grow up together, should you marry.”

  “We will. We have to tell both our parents. I thought I’d wait until spring break so I could do it face-to-face.”

  “On the one hand, I do understand your wanting to sit down with them. On the other hand, Felicity, you might want to tell them now and give them time to adjust. I’m assuming you and Howie don’t wish to wait too terribly long before you marry, and I think you need parental consent for that,” Sister said.

  “He’s eighteen.”

  “You’re not,” Val said, a hint of rancor. “Furthermore, has he asked you to marry him?”

  “I’ll be eighteen in June.” Felicity ignored Val’s question.

  “Honey, time’s a-flying.” Sister gently prodded her.

  Felicity looked down at her empty bowl. “You’re right.”

  “Does Mrs. Norton know?” Sister felt Charlotte Norton was an excellent headmistress.

  “No,” Felicity answered.

  “Sit down with her first. She has a good head on her shoulders. She cares deeply for her students, especially you three.”

  “I won’t get thrown out?”

  “No. However, you might want to keep this between the three of you. Sometimes girls can—well, dramatize. You’re not that way, of course, but who is to say some freshman won’t take a fit? Graduate, then tell the world; at least that’s what I would do.” Sister paused. “But you really must talk to Charlotte—Mrs. Norton. You can trust her.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Felicity’s shoulder squared.

  “If you’re here, if you don’t go off to college, will you organize the alumnae foxhunt?” Tootie was curious.

  “She has to go to college!” Val tossed her blonde ponytail, unable to contain herself.

  “I agree with you, Val, I do. Felicity may have to take some time off or—” Sister turned to her—“you could take night courses. Mary Baldwin offers very good ones. Actually, all the schools do.”

  “I’ve thought about that.” Felicity had been thinking about a lot of things, one being how she could afford her beloved horse, Parson. “Sometimes”—she chose her words carefully—“I wonder if I can do all that needs to be done. Howie really has to go to college.”

  “He can be a coach.” Val had no time for the well-built likable Howard.

  “He still has to get his degree.” Felicity had steel in her backbone when her beloved was criticized. “And I hope he has the chance to play football at a big college. He just has to get his grades up, that’s all. He’s not stupid, despite what you think, Val. It takes him longer to learn than it does for us but once he knows something it’s in his head forever. He’s not stupid.” Her voice raised slightly.

  “He was smart enough to fall in love with Felicity.” Sister lightened the moment.

  Tootie liked soaking up everything about hunting. “Not to change the subject, but when we were coming up over the hill at the old Lorillard place the other day—you know, graveyard at our backs—I smelled a fox but hounds didn’t.”

  “Oh, Tootie, when we can smell it, hounds can’t. It’s over their heads.” Val actually had learned about hounds, scent, and foxes, unlike many who hunt.

  “I know that.” Tootie continued patiently as if talking to a child, which she often considered Valentina. “But the ground was frozen. I didn’t think scent would lift until it warmed a bit.”

  “You’re right, Tootie. I’m impressed you noticed.”

  “What did happen then, Sister?” Felicity, with a good mind, lacked game sense and hound sense, but she was willing to learn as best she could.

  Nature gives each of us various gifts. Some things can’t be learned; you’re born with the knowledge, but a reasonably intelligent person can still learn the fundamentals of any activity.

  “Well, only the fox understands scent. Right?” Sister looked around at the girls.

  “Right,” they replied.

  “Therefore, I can only make intelligent guesses. This is my guess: The ground was tight as a tick. Have you noticed how some horses almost wince when they land on the other side of a jump? St
ings when it’s this frozen. Any scent that hounds might find would have to be fresh, hot. If the scent was, say, an hour old or more, the ground would need to warm a bit, perhaps in sunlight, to lift it. I’m not saying hounds can’t smell a frozen line, but I don’t think they can run it very efficiently. Again, this is guesswork. You might find another master or huntsman who would contradict me. But I think what you smelled, Tootie, was a hot line, fresh as could be, but the bit of wind lifted it up, moved it, and it rose as well. By the time we reached the old Lorillard graveyard, hounds began to feather.” Sister mentioned how hounds move their tails a bit when finding a light line, the feathering seeming to increase with intensity of scent. “As we moved on, though, heading west, the wind already had done its work.” She held up her hand, palm outward. “Again, guesswork. And some spots carry warm air currents that help lift the air.”

  “Do grays and reds ever live close to one another? You know, like neighbors talking over a fence?” Val wondered.

  “For years I thought not. That’s what I’d been told as a child, and I saw no reason to disbelieve it. But I have noticed, when there’s plenty to eat, they occasionally do live near one another. The problems always come during the lean years. That’s when coyotes become especially lethal.”

  “Shoot ’em.” Val felt no affection for this predator.

  “You do and it helps until you kill the head bitch.” Sister sighed. “Then all the females go into heat and you have more coyotes. They’re here to stay. The issue is, can we manage them and protect our foxes?”

  “Why not?” Felicity leaned forward, reaching for toast.

  “I don’t know. The coyote is relatively new to Virginia. We don’t know the animal the way someone from Wyoming does, nor do we know how this efficient predator will affect our balance of nature. Coyotes adapt. Conditions here are different from the West. All I know is, I mean to protect my foxes.”

  “They’re fun to chase.” Val loved riding hard.

  “Not for me.” Sister smiled so as not to sound critical of Val. “It’s a straight shot. I love the fox, all the ruses, doubling back, walking on top of fence lines, all the incredible things a fox does to fool us. I enjoy being pitted against God’s most intelligent creation.”

  “Don’t you think coyotes will change? It won’t just be us.” Tootie, ever thoughtful, was miles ahead of the other girls on this.

  “Lynn Lloyd”—Sister named the master of Red Rock Hounds in Reno, Nevada—“says she has observed coyote running more like foxes with the population pressure out there in the high desert. She can see for fifty miles and, on a ridge, one hundred. We can’t watch our quarry like Lynn can, so I believe she’s observed a crucial adjustment in the coyote, proof that the animal is flexible. We know they’re smart.”

  The phone rang.

  “I’ll get it, ma’am.” Tootie hopped up. “Hello, Arnold residence. This is Anne Harris speaking.”

  “Tootie, how are you?” Marion Maggiolo’s lilting voice rang out. “I’m fine, Miss Maggiolo. How are you?”

  “Recovering.”

  “Yes, ma’am. That must have been horrible.”

  “It was. When are you coming up to see me?”

  “When I get some money.” Tootie laughed.

  “You don’t have to buy a thing to visit. I’m always glad to see you. Is Sister there?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Tootie said. “Sister, it’s Miss Maggiolo.”

  “Ah.” Sister put her napkin on the table and rose to take the receiver from Tootie. “Marion, darlin’, how good to hear your voice.”

  “I called you the minute the sheriff called me.” Marion’s voice dropped a few notes. “Did you know that the woman we found was High Vajay’s mistress?”

  “What?”

  “Her first job at Craig and Adams was as High’s secretary.”

  “That doesn’t mean the affair continued when he retired.”

  “Doesn’t mean it didn’t either,” Marion replied.

  “Mandy will kill him.” Sister put her hand on her hip.

  “Unless he kills her first.”

  “Marion, how can you say that?”

  “How do we know he didn’t kill Aashi? Maybe she was blackmailing him. Maybe she was in love with him and pressuring him to leave Mandy. Happens every day.”

  “Marion, I just thought of something. High said your sheriff sent him a photograph of Aashi over the computer. He said he didn’t recognize her.”

  “What?”

  “That’s what he said.”

  “Liar,” Marion breathed out. “I’ll tell the sheriff.”

  “Could be it wasn’t a good picture. High’s smart, he’d know they’d find out she was once his secretary.”

  “Could be High Vajay had a strong reason to kill her too.” Marion felt no need to find reasons why High didn’t kill Aashi. As far as she was concerned, he was the prime suspect. Having a prime suspect gave her some comfort, no matter how illusory.

  Thursdays, after two thirty, Sister ran her feed store errands. Her friends and hunt club members knew her schedule. If you wanted to see her at the stable or kennels you didn’t drop by Thursday afternoons.

  She returned by five, happy to miss what passed for traffic in their part of the world. After dropping off specialty feed bags, body builder for the older horses, in the stable, she walked in the mudroom back door, dogs at her feet since they’d made the journey too.

  There on a shelf sat a dozen pure-white roses with drops of blood on them. The symbolism gave her a shudder.

  She searched for a card, not expecting to find one.

  “Kids,” she spoke to Raleigh and Rooster, “I’m in the crosshairs.”

  She decided not to mention this to anyone, not Shaker, Betty, even Gray. Word can get around and her instincts told her that whoever did this wanted to shake her up. Sister wasn’t going to act like prey. Yes, she might be in the crosshairs but she was a hunter to her core. She’d sniff this wretch out, somehow, someway.

  CHAPTER 8

  The sky, a brilliant blue, glittered overhead. Crawford Howard, spirits rising, drove his big S Mercedes just for the fun of driving. He needed a break. Not that things weren’t clipping along, but sometimes he’d let small problems nag him and spoil his day. Although he had come a long way in developing his foxhunting sense, he was only beginning to appreciate Sister’s and Shaker’s gifts with hounds, horses, and foxes. Exercising, feeding, breeding, maintaining a pack of hounds proved far more difficult than he had anticipated.

  Foxhunting is art, instinct, and a dash of science.

  He cruised past the stately home-fired brick country club. In the long slanting last rays of sunset, the faithful whacked away on the driving range. It was February 22, and the light was moving closer to the equinox.

  He parked his car and waited until High Vajay finished his swing. “What are you doing out here in the cold? You’ll tear a muscle.”

  High, one of the few who actually liked Crawford, nudged the bucket of balls with his Number Four driver. “I’ll get better at this game if it kills me.”

  As it was not public knowledge that High was under suspicion for murder, he thought it best to keep cool and stick to his routine.

  “It just might.” Crawford peered down into the bucket, counting eight left. “When I saw you out here I had to stop. These other people are as crazy as you, I guess.”

  “Look who’s talking,” Cindy Chandler, a stalwart Jefferson Hunt member and a good golfer, called out to him. She said this with good humor so he smiled back.

  “She’s right.” High needled him. “Any man who buys his own pack of outlaw hounds defies convention.”

  Crawford smiled. He liked that he was the talk of the town. He just wished he hadn’t lost his pack at Paradise—a humiliating consequence of his fragile ego, and the result of his having deserted the JHC.

  “Crawford, come back. We miss you.” Cindy was sincere. “Surely there’s a way to patch this up. Your Dumfriesshire hounds
would flourish, and you’d save the money of building a kennel.”

  “Shaker has to apologize first.”

  Shaker had decked him at the last hunt ball.

  “Unusual circumstances.”

  Crawford, on the dance floor, had collided with Shaker and Lorraine Rasmussen, which somehow pulled down Lorraine’s strapless top, her glories exposed.

  “Well-built woman.” Crawford had lived long enough in Virginia to know understatement worked better than overstatement.

  Cindy shook her club at him. “You men!”

  High bowed slightly to her. “As a beautiful woman, you know exactly how we are.”

  She shook her head, returning to address the golf ball, which said not a word in return.

  “I’ve had enough.” High picked up the bucket and walked back to his mud-splattered Range Rover. He prized all things British, and in truth the hideously expensive SUV could go through anything.

  Out of earshot, Crawford asked, “You knew the Craig and Abrams woman who was killed, didn’t you?” Crawford had no way of knowing that High had denied such knowledge to the sheriff when first queried.

  High lowered his voice as he opened the back door of the Rover. “Ben Sidell called on me, once they knew who she was and where she worked. Yes, I knew her. She was very sweet.”

  “Sorry.”

  “Me too. Her whole life was in front of her.”

  Satisfied, Crawford switched to his favorite subject, business. “Do you still own Craig and Abrams stock?”

  “I do. I bought Hutchison Essar stock too. That’s how much I believe in the industry. Eventually one or both of those companies, currently in competition, will build WiFi systems to blanket all of India. It’s happening here; it will happen there. WiFi is the real golden pot at the end of the rainbow.”

  “Vodafone wanted to take a controlling interest in Hutchison Essar?”

  Vodafone, a British mobile phone company, realizing that the European market was stagnating, had bid for a controlling interest in Hutchison Essar, India’s fourth largest mobile operation.

  The street value hovered at $13.5 million. Vodafone wanted a 67 percent stake. India’s mobile phone market was booming, with customers signing up at the rate of 6.6 million subscribers a month.