“Okay,” she said as he finished sending the email and requested, “Go back to the cowhorn.”
They both studied it again.
“It really is distinctive.” Gray admired the horn.
She slapped her hands on her thighs. “This is giving me a headache. I might as well get used to the cowhorn at the end of our hunts. I am nowhere near figuring this out, and no one has been murdered. So why worry?” She tried to convince herself.
“Honey, someone was murdered. In 1954.”
—
Weevil stood in front of the receptionist’s desk at Brightwood Assisted Living, an expensive place to park the old and incompetent, unloved as well as loved.
No one manned the desk or commanded it. He peered over the top, read the room assignments. The building near downtown Charlottesville on a well-kept side street was a formerly handsome large house converted into suites as well as individual rooms.
Randall Farley lived in room nine. A guide affixed to the wall provided a map of the rooms. Weevil walked down a short hallway, plush carpet, which struck him as odd for it’s hard for people to roll wheelchairs on carpet. But perhaps the people on this hall could still walk unaided, or not walk at all.
Wearing thin goatskin gloves, he knocked on number nine. A TV played within, the sound dimmed. He knocked again.
“Who is it?”
“Your past.” Weevil opened the door.
Randall’s jaw dropped. He tried to rise from the easy chair before the TV; a large bed was visible in a small adjoining room. Weevil produced a bottle of stiff rye that he’d hidden in his inside coat pocket, just in case liquor wasn’t allowed.
Like many whose minds slip, Randall remembered the past clearly.
Randall collapsed back in the chair. Eyes bulging, he jammered, “I didn’t have anything to do with Lennox Bancroft knowing you were sleeping with Evangelista. As for Margaret, those two years later, maybe you did, maybe you didn’t. I swear, I kept my mouth shut.”
“So you say.” Weevil handed Randall the bottle, which the old man opened and greedily gulped.
“You’re dead.”
“In a manner of speaking.” Weevil smiled. “Lennox is dead, his wife is gone, Evangelista, Margaret, too—just about everybody. You made out all right.”
“Just go.”
“That’s no way to treat an old buddy.” Weevil grabbed the remote, cut the volume. “I think you ratted me out to Brenden DuCharme, too. You know, Randall, you were just too interested in where I parked my pecker. If you hadn’t been so fat you might have gotten lucky, too.”
Tears welled in Randall’s eyes. “I had nothing to do with any of it.”
“I think you did. You’re dumb as a sack of hammers, Randall, and all of a sudden, after I was gone, you had investments, investments managed by my detractors, so to speak.”
“I swear I had nothing to do with it, and I didn’t know you were murdered. I thought you were but I didn’t know.” He sobbed. “Why are you here?”
“For the truth. You spread stories about my stealing Margaret’s bracelets, necklaces, and rings. Many of them major jewels. Her husband believed it. Alfred and Binky believed it. Such an old, malicious gossip. I would have thought you had died of shame.”
“Alfred and Binky”—Randall stopped himself, shifted the sentence—“are emotional and stupid. Someone stole a fortune in jewels.”
“Why think it was me?” Weevil’s face was close to Randall’s.
“You had opportunity, if you did steal them.” Randall hastily added, “I don’t care if you did. Feeble and Meeble”—Randall used the nicknames for the brothers—“believed it.”
“They spent money like water. How do you know they didn’t steal their mother’s jewels to pay their debts? If Brenden had known how bad it was, he would have killed them.” Weevil took the bottle of rye from Randall.
Randall greedily grabbed it back. “Goddamned pansies in here. No liquor. No tobacco. No sex.” He grimly smiled. “At least we can still enjoy the pleasure of a drink or a drag.”
“What happened to Margaret after I disappeared?”
Randall shrugged. “Nothing.”
“Nothing.”
“No divorce. She traveled to Paris. Brenden bitched and moaned that she spent a fortune on clothes.”
“Idiot.”
“He realized he ignored her. I remember when she came back she was awfully thin. Lived out her life doing good works. One charity ball after another.”
“Was she happy?”
Randall shot Weevil a withering look as he gulped another slug. “Who’s happy?”
“Clearly you’re not. I should kill you, Randall, for your evil mouth, but I’ll spare your sorry ass, not because I’m forgiving you but because your future will just be more and more miserable. You hurt a lot of people.”
Randall didn’t reply. Weevil left the still unsupervised assisted living. If those people coughing up eight thousand bucks a month for starters only knew. Randall had no one to tell that he saw Weevil. And if he had, they wouldn’t have cared.
—
At Beveridge Hundred, Yvonne listened to her lawyer, the head one, on the phone.
“He’s thinking it over,” Bart Hanckle reported.
“Bart, you might inform my soon-to-be ex-husband and business partner that what we showed him is a preview. I have more. Much more and it’s far worse.”
“I like a client who is prepared.”
“Let him know I have such a fascinating play-by-play of him in Mistress Number One’s high-rise. She is sitting on his lap. He’s naked. Never a good idea when you’ve hidden your six-pack behind a wall of fat, but there he is. They are on a very expensive sofa. Mistress Number Two is straddling his face and between his ministrations, when he comes up for air, he praises Jesus.” She paused. “Such a religious man.”
Bart chuckled. “I will be sure to tell him.”
“And you might hint that I also have footage of him with sisters. He treats us far less kindly than he treats the white girls. I don’t know whether if anyone had died her hair blonde it would have helped. This isn’t to say that I like him sleeping with any woman, but there does seem to be some difference in how he handles them depending on race.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Bart knew, as did Yvonne, that whatever else she had would ruin Victor Harris forever.
No amount of money can buy your way out of some types of wrongdoing.
“It is Monday. I expect papers delivered to your office on Tuesday, clarifying that I will receive half of all future earnings of Harris and Harris. I expect half of all cash accounts and stocks and bonds by the end of Tuesday’s business day, central time. In exchange I will give you all footage, and I will switch all my credit cards to my name alone after October 10. If he does not comply, we go to Round Two.”
“It will be done.”
She hung up, leaned back in the office chair. Two days of rain had not dampened her spirits. If anything, she felt fabulous.
She had returned from another riding lesson, held in Crawford’s indoor arena due to all the mud. The arena, climate controlled, full of light, blended in with the other structures. The cost was $350,000 when he built it, but Crawford had the money. Marty, a garden designer, cared how things looked, hence the pleasing exterior and landscaping.
The only oddity that Yvonne noticed was a bit of sound bouncing around, for it was cavernous. Sam, on the ground, told her exactly what to do. She trotted for a few minutes.
After her lesson—she paid cash each time—she drove back to Beveridge Hundred filled with confidence.
The last two days, as she drove toward Chapel Cross, she could see men working despite the rain.
Today, coming back from Beasley Hall, they were still at it. She found herself drawn to the progress at Old Paradise, to this part of the county.
After her lesson and the invigorating phone call, she determined to find a used SUV, not horrible on gas, for Tootie, before that Toyota died
a well-deserved death.
CHAPTER 21
In the distance, the slap slap slap of the huge waterwheel could be heard. Saturday, October 7, Sister did as Gray suggested, moved the cast time to eight A.M. Given that Thursday had been canceled due to the torrential rains of Tuesday and Wednesday, a large field assembled.
Wind after the rains helped dry out the soil just enough so the footing was springy, slick in spots. Rickyroo, Sister’s Thoroughbred mount, at thirteen, loved the footing, loved foxhunting, loved Sister. What he didn’t love was other horses pushing his behind. Wolsey, turned out with Rickyroo, actually didn’t push him but unkind words were spoken. Irritated the hell out of the Master’s horse. He was first, not even first among equals, but first. He didn’t need any lip about his hindquarters.
Shaker’s horse for the day, Kilowatt, would not have lowered himself to chat with a peon in the field. Betty Franklin’s Outlaw, a friendly Quarter Horse, would flick his ears and swish his tail when he passed the field, but he usually had something pleasant to say. Kasmir Barbhaiya’s Jujube, ridden by Tootie at the request for some seasoning, paid not the least bit of attention to the fifty-two horses and riders. All his senses focused on this new task at hand.
Kasmir on Nighthawk rode with Alida on Lucille Ball, so named for her flaming chestnut coat.
Many a horseman or houndsman would counsel newcomers to foxhunting not to name a horse something like Devil’s Boy, nor a hound Viagra. The wisdom was that the animal would live up or down to his or her name. Hounds and horses understand language. This old wives’ tale, as many newcomers thought of it, proved to be true more often than not. And thanks to studies at a Hungarian university, as well as at American ones, it was becoming evident to those needing scientific proof that yes, animals did understand language—at least higher vertebrates did. And they learned it like humans: left brain for logic, right brain for emotion and creativity.
Had anyone known that, witnessing Lucille Ball cut a caper would have made them laugh. Too late to change the redhead’s name now. Once a run commenced, Lucille would settle down. Until then there was prancing, snorting, sideways trotting, casting her eye backward to let Alida know she saw everything, absolutely everything, including the fact that Alida carried her crop sideways so Lucille knew it was in her hands. Lucille could have cared less. She knew her 1200 pounds pitted against Alida’s 135 meant she would win. Alida put up with it because Lucille could jump the moon, had gaits smooth as silk, and was bold, wondrously bold. You put her to anything, you were going over.
A guest, Marilyn Davidson, told Alida to take Lucille to the back of the field. Alida, too much of a lady, squelched the retort, which would have been, “Why don’t you learn how to ride? Then you wouldn’t mind my horse.” All she did was turn her head to reply, “Once we’re going she’s an angel.”
No sooner was this out of her mouth than bam, they were going.
Mill Ruins sat four miles north of Chapel Cross. The soil was not as rich as that at Chapel Cross; the lay of the land was similar, good flat pastures that, heading west, quickly turned into ravines with thick woods. Mill Ruins took advantage of the faster running waters of the feeder creek, wide, to the Tye River miles and miles away, which poured into the James at Buffalo Station. That fast-moving water provided the energy for the mill’s waterwheel. The original settler back in 1752 knew what he was doing. The waterwheel still turned. A miller could grind grain, if one could be found.
Hounds struck to the right of Walter’s house. Sister took a little feel of Rickyroo’s reins, for the pastures were extensive and with a slight roll. They were perfect for galloping, as was the footing.
Staff smiled broadly because a youngster had found the line and had been honored by the pack for the first time. Audrey, nose to the ground, knew she’d joined the big kids. Her littermates, not quite two years old, Aero, Angle, and Ace, desperately wanted to prove themselves. Young, fast, they bunched up right behind their sister. Dasher flew by them. He was called Dasher for a reason. His littermate, Diana, joined him. Pride of place belonged to them and, in their prime, they had plenty of gas in the engine.
Pride of place in the hunt field belonged to the Bancrofts, in their eighties still riding First Flight. Gray fell back to allow them to move up behind Sister. An hour of hard running didn’t faze them. By the second hour they would wind up in the middle of the field.
At this moment, no one was too concerned with their place in the field, because the entire pack shot across the newly mown pasture, jumped over a tiger-trap jump, and headed north into another pasture, large hay bales dotted about like shredded wheat.
Tinsel stopped a moment to check out a hay bale. Yes, the fox had been there but was now gone, so Tinsel needed to catch up.
After twenty minutes of sublime music, hard running, hounds threw up at the junction of Miller’s Creek with Tidy’s Corner. No one ever knew how Tidy received the name. Off of Miller’s Creek, the mill run ran like an arrow back to the mill. Tidy’s creek’s lesser force added to the sometimes turbulent Miller’s Creek. The mill run smoothed out the water to the wheel, but baffles existed along its mile-long route, where water could be slowed if necessary. Too much force could harm the gears in the wheel. If the paddles broke, that was an easy fix. If the gears were damaged to the wheel or the grindstones, that caused big problems. Those former millers thought of everything.
So did the fox. He dabbled at the corner, zigzagging between both creeks. Hounds found tidbits of scent but nothing held. Given that they were American hounds, their work ethic was sensational. The devotees of the three other types of foxhounds would praise their hounds, too: Crossbreds, English, Pennmarydel. But American hounds have ever been prized for their drive. What could be lacking sometimes was biddability, listening. That’s why Sister, Shaker, Betty, and Tootie played with them once they were six weeks old, and walked hounds throughout the year for the rest of their lives. You want them to listen. Even more, you want them to want to listen.
They were listening now as Shaker encouraged them.
“Find your fox. He’s here.”
“Where?” Parker wailed.
“If you’d shut up and put your nose to ground, you big baby, you might find him,” Cora reprimanded him.
Tatoo, steady, not a flashy hound, walked northward. A tingle. He walked a bit faster. More tingle.
“Think I’ve got him.”
Cora loped over, putting her nose to ground. The two lovely animals walked shoulder to shoulder. Both made hounds, they didn’t want to open if they weren’t sure, or if the scent faded. Important to push a hot line in the direction in which the fox was moving. And no made hound wanted to run heel—which is to say backward—although they do it for a few moments to double-check their efforts, the intensity of scent.
Foxhounds, bred as we know them for over a thousand years—and more than that if one goes back to ancient Greece, where they might not be recognizable as our foxhounds but they were scent hounds—over all those centuries, the animal improved. A foxhound is born to hunt. That is what it lives to do.
Sister and some of those with her were also born to hunt, a drive unfathomable to many people in the so-called modern world. They couldn’t realize that the human is a medium-sized predator. It’s how we survive. It’s what we are.
So those foxhunters, rapt attention, observed the ancient ritual.
Even Marilyn Davidson, unaccustomed to the pace, watched. As she hadn’t parted company with her horse on that hard run, her own confidence soared.
Now Ardent joined Cora and Tatoo. Sterns waved slightly.
“A lot of back and forth,” Ardent commented.
“New fox,” Cora replied. “We haven’t picked him up before. He’ll learn we don’t give up.”
The fox, young, moved into the woods, ground falling away now. A vixen, Hortensia, who knew Mill Ruins well as pickings were good, called to the youngster.
“Come over here to me.”
“Yes, ma’am.”<
br />
“The pack will find your scent again. You’ve never run before. I’ve never seen you here. This place is overrun with those stupid hounds about once every three weeks.”
“I came off the mountain. Too many coyote.”
“Follow me. Step in my footsteps if you can. We will reach another fork in the creek. You jump into the creek and swim as far as you can. I’ll lead them away.”
“Aren’t you scared?”
“What’s your name, son?”
“Ewald.” Noticing her raised eyebrows, he said, “Mother named me.”
“Well, Ewald, the hound doesn’t exist who is as smart as the fox. But you have to learn.” A loud song picked her head up; she listened. “Okay. They’ve found your line and they’re about seven minutes away. Jump in. Swim as long as you can and don’t worry, they’ll pick up my line. Climb out and if you swing back toward the mill, you’ll find an old abandoned outbuilding. Good place for a den. I take it your father threw you out?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“A little early for that. Usually you young fellows are sent on your way the end of October through November.” She listened again, as the whole pack was singing now. “Don’t leave the building until you hear the big trailers pull out. Rumbling engines—you’ll know. Make that your den. Been empty for years. Oh, one last thing. James is the big red fox who lives behind the mill. He’s a pain in the ass. Don’t fret. I’ll fix it if he becomes troublesome. He wants to tell everyone what to do. Go. Go now.”
Ewald jumped into the creek, swam upstream. Hortensia watched, waited until she could identify Dasher’s voice, then trotted due west, heard Cora, Ardent, Trooper, Tatoo, and broke into a flat-out run. This was going to be like taking candy from a baby.
Tootie, on the right of the creek, watched as Betty did from the left side of the creek. Dasher reached the spot where Ewald had leapt into the creek and Hortensia had turned right.
“Vixen! Hot, hot, hot!” he screamed.
The whole pack screamed behind him as the field turned right on a rutted farm road, the worse for the recent rain. After the rain the red clay was serviceable if slick. A few downed trees, trunks conveniently without limbs, provided impromptu jumps. Bobby Franklin had a devil of a time getting around a few of these.
Crazy Like a Fox Page 17