A Hiss Before Dying

by Rita Mae Brown

  “Did. I’m hoping over time I will get to know Marvella Larson better. She knows more than any of us and I really love the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts.” She pointed to her right. “Don’t you wish Cloverfields still stood? That was the site of the main house.”

  “I do. We’re luckier than many other states. Virginia has preserved so much of her heritage,” Susan agreed.

  “Because we were too poor to tear buildings down at the end of the nineteenth century and for most of the twentieth when everyone put up big glass blocks. Most of that stuff is ugly as a mud fence.”

  They both laughed.

  “Speaking of Cloverfields, do you have your chit underneath your sweater?”

  “Do.” Harry pulled up the brass piece on the box chain. “I wonder who wore this. I wonder about their life and who wore Number Five and Liz’s Number Seven? It makes it real. I like to touch things from the past.”

  “That’s what got MaryJo and Panto into all that tribal stuff. How long have people been wearing those skins, dancing, singing? Plus MaryJo sent away for the DNA testing, which she declares proves she has twenty-seven percent tribal blood. At least she’s shut up about it finally. Remember when she’d constantly bring it up?”

  “Yeah.” Harry stopped at the crest of the hill at the back of Cloverfields. They looked toward the ravines where the bridges had been built, although you couldn’t see down into the ravines. They were too far away.

  “Sometimes, late afternoon, I like to sit with Grandmother and Mother at Big Rawly, look over the fields. Think of footsteps down the hall over the centuries.”

  “That place is so beautiful and isn’t it odd that Big Rawly survived but Cloverfields didn’t? The Garths were supposed to be so highly intelligent but Fate doesn’t always play favorites.”

  “Apparently not.” Susan stared at the sky, long afternoon rays softening everything as Harry turned, drove over a cut hayfield stopping near the site of the old main house.

  As they sat there, a brand-new truck barreled up from the slope to the ravine. Both women watched this $60,000 Ford F-250 diesel rumble by, hesitate as the driver beheld the Volvo near the house site, then move faster, speeding away.

  “Isn’t that Panto?” Susan inquired.

  “Sure is. He must be making the bucks to buy that new big-ass truck.”

  They sat silently for a time.

  “I’m going to follow him.” Harry put down her window. “Hear that?”

  “Loud.”

  “Sounds like he has a glass pack under there but Panto isn’t exactly the hot rod type. That’s the true sound of that beast of an engine.”

  “So what?”

  “When I stood at the top of the ridge, shooting at whoever shot at me, I heard a truck start up. That’s how loud the exhaust note was.”

  “Harry, this can’t be the only truck in the county that sounds like that,” Susan chided her.

  “No and yes.” She turned to Susan. “Something’s wrong. Where did Panto get that kind of money? He’s a lawyer who represents tribes. He’s not representing Altria or Anthem. You get the idea. Something is wrong. Plus he knows me. I think whoever shot at me knows me. I’m going to follow him.”

  “Harry, you’re nuts, number one. Number two, this Volvo station wagon isn’t exactly inconspicuous.”

  “Trust me.”

  “Dear God,” Susan whispered.

  The animals sat still, preparing for who knows what. When Harry took a notion, things happened, often bad things.

  Out on Garth Road, Harry waited for another car to get between her and Panto. Then she pulled out. He drove down Garth Road to Owensville Road, turned left, then turned right down the drive of one of the expensive, lovely homes on the road.

  “There. Are you satisfied?” Susan folded her arms over her chest. “He’s going to MaryJo’s. They work together all the time. Put your imagination to rest.”

  “I’m hungry,” Pewter whined.

  “We’ll be home soon,” Mrs. Murphy told her, as she, too, would be happy to eat.

  They reached the intersection of Route 250, turned west, past Duner’s, the popular restaurant at Ivy Commons, then the countryside opened up a bit.

  Halfway to the right turn to Route 240 into Crozet, Panto’s truck roared by them at such speed, Harry pulled over. Before she could pull back onto the road, a sleek Cadillac CTS also roared by her. They passed the 240 turn.

  “Hey, that’s MaryJo’s car.” Harry wondered what was going on.

  Pulling out behind the wildly speeding cars, both Harry and Susan watched MaryJo tail Panto.

  “People do this kind of thing if they’re lovers and have had a fight,” Susan observed. “I never thought of the two of them having an affair. Did you?”

  “No. Jesus, they’re going eighty miles an hour on a two-lane highway. I’m going sixty and that’s fast enough.”

  MaryJo pulled next to the F-250, slammed into the truck, then dropped back as cars came toward her from the opposite lane.

  “What the—?” Harry shouted.

  “Don’t go near them, Harry,” Susan warned her. “They’re crazy.”

  MaryJo again slammed into Panto’s truck, pushing him partly off the road. Again, Harry had to pull back.

  “He’s going to head for 64,” Susan predicted.

  “I don’t know.” Harry looked in her rearview mirror to see three animals leaning against one another in the backseat, eyes wide open.

  The stoplight on old Route 250 to turn to Crozet proper was red and a line of traffic headed east as well as a lot of people in the turnoff lane, including Panto with MaryJo right behind him.

  “I’m going to call Coop.” Susan pulled her cellphone out of her purse.

  The unloaded flintlock pistol was sliding on the seat so Harry picked it up, dropping it on her lap.

  Susan filled Cooper in on what was happening.

  “You’re the second report,” the deputy told her. “I’ll be on my way. I’m calling for backup.”

  Harry handed the gun to Susan. “Load this up, will you?”

  “Why?”

  “Just in case.” Harry turned right. “I don’t know, but do it anyway.”

  Once Panto drove under the railroad overpass, he turned left at the Amoco station and floored it. MaryJo, hot on his tail, did the same.

  Cars, trucks driving in the opposite direction pulled off the road. Some honked. Most had the sense to pull off into a pasture if possible.

  The two wild drivers thundered west, even the slightest curve at that speed courted danger.

  Harry, no fool, stuck to sixty miles an hour, sometimes less.

  “Someone’s going to die,” Pewter prophesied. “As long as it isn’t me.” She thought a moment. “Us.”

  “That’s big of you.” Tucker lurched to the right, bumping into Mrs. Murphy, who at least had claws to dig into the plush leather seats.

  Panto slowed, allowing MaryJo to pull right beside him. He lowered the driver’s window and fired. While neither Harry nor Susan could see the sidearm, they knew he fired because MaryJo’s back window exploded as she had seen the gun and pulled slightly ahead of Panto, but still next to him. Furious, MaryJo hit his truck harder.

  Her CTS, heavy, wasn’t as heavy as the F-250 but she could still push. He fired again, hitting her in the shoulder, and in taking his eyes off the road, crunched off the highway with his right tires. He overcorrected and now slammed into MaryJo. Again, they sped, now on a straightaway.

  Susan again called Cooper, who was approaching Crozet from Route 240 and drawing closer, five minutes away at most. Another curve loomed. Panto handling the large truck, tried to corner it but he slid, the heavy-duty truck leaning dangerously to the right and MaryJo used her moment, smashing into the truck with all her might. The new vehicle rolled over but landed upright. MaryJo pulled close, opened her own window, and fired. Harry and Susan saw blood spatter his windshield. MaryJo, half off the road herself, turned around, saw Harry behind her by per
haps fifteen yards. As Harry closed in, MaryJo leveled her .45 Smith & Wesson. She missed the humans but blew out the wide windows in the back. Harry, furious, grabbed the gun from Susan, pulled a U, not easy in the station wagon, and barreled down on MaryJo as the crazed woman was trying to get firmly on the road.

  Using the flintlock, Harry fired and MaryJo’s windshield shattered. The Cadillac stopped. Harry kept going.

  Susan, adrenaline high, shouted, “Bull’s-eye.”

  Covered in glass bits, thanks to the ball’s perfect hit, MaryJo now focused on Harry and Susan, whom she could see just ahead. As she closed in after them, flooring it, Cooper prudently waited about half a mile down the road, as she could somewhat see what was going on. She let Harry pass, then fired her Glock at MaryJo’s tires. One blew, but the woman determinedly tried to keep on. Cooper, a crack shot, blew out another one. MaryJo crashed.

  Sirens blared from all four directions. MaryJo, though alive, was toast.

  “Dammit,” Harry swore, and she rarely swore. “Now I have to replace those windows.”

  “Glass. Little bits of glass,” Pewter bitterly complained. “It will get into my paws.”

  Harry pulled into a church driveway near the town, stepped out of the car, lifted up Pewter, came round to Susan, and put the cat in her lap. Then she picked up Tucker and told the wonderful corgi to squeeze next to Susan. Lastly she picked up Mrs. Murphy, holding the tiger in her lap as she drove home.

  “She understood.” Pewter was amazed.

  “Sometimes humans get it,” Tucker replied. “I’ve never seen anything like that. Ever.”

  “Let’s hope it was the first and last time,” Mrs. Murphy added. “A new Cadillac banging into a new truck. Usually if people spend money on something they take care of it.”

  “He’s dead. We’ll only hear one side of the story once Cooper drags MaryJo out of the car,” Pewter reasoned.

  “Susan, let me go home after we give Coop our statements. Fair should be home soon and he can drive you back. I don’t want to drive this car any farther than I must.”

  “Sure.” Susan’s heart slowed down a bit. “I think Panto or MaryJo would have killed us if they’d had the chance.”

  “Maybe they’ve tried before.” Harry glanced at her friend.

  “Dear God.” Susan exhaled. “That was the craziest thing I have ever seen. If they’d hit people, other cars, deer, house, dogs, they wouldn’t have stopped or cared. Lunatics. Madness.”

  “Sure was, but even mad men have a kind of logic,” Harry replied.

  April 14, 1786 Friday

  Two ghostly figures walked in the middle of a silver-gray ground fog covering a level pasture called The Downs. Invisible from the waist down they appeared to glide toward each other. On the opposite sides of this pasture waited carriages, an elegant small enclosed carriage driven by DoRe, a larger carriage driven by Everett Franks, enshrouded by the fog now beginning to rise with the sun. The carriages and horses also seemed otherworldly. Birds awakened. A chirp, a squawk enlivened the air. A herd of deer observed the horses and humans from the edge of a wood, only their elegant heads visible.

  John Schuyler took off his hat, offered his hand. “Mr. Tapscott.”

  Henry Tapscott, a lean middle-aged man, did the same. “Major Schuyler, I regret the circumstances.”

  “As do I, Sir. I have encouraged Mr. Holloway to set this duel aside, to find another means of accommodation. He steadfastly refuses.”

  “I fear Mr. Grant is of like mind,” Henry Tapscott, a childhood friend of Yancy Grant, dolorously replied.

  “The surgeon we agreed upon is in Mr. Holloway’s carriage.”

  “Thank you for bringing him. It was easier for you since he lives near to you. Young fellow but many of those he has treated have lived.”

  John craned his neck to look skyward. “The sun is low, but we should make certain they pace off in a north-south direction.”

  “Indeed.” Henry nodded. “You would like to inspect the pistols, Sir?” He pulled the highly polished walnut box from under his left arm, turned it toward John, who opened it.

  Two beautiful pistols lay side by side in satin, the metal, silver, the wood an even richer walnut than the box. John lifted up one, rubbed the nozzle lightly with his little finger. A thin coating of oil remained on his finger. Then he checked the trigger to make sure it hadn’t been tampered with to fire faster. Putting it back, he picked up the other to repeat the procedure.

  “Fine work.”

  Henry bowed slightly. “My own, Sir. Yancy has but one pistol, which he has modified.”

  John hesitated, couldn’t think of anything else to say, then spoke, “We should get started. The mist is rising.”

  “Yes” came the subdued reply.

  Both returned to their carriages.

  John opened the door for Jeffrey and Thomas Downey, the doctor. Each man sat with his feet placed on a warmed brick.

  Wordlessly, Jeffrey climbed down and removed his frock coat. He would be better able to move without it. Henry Tapscott performed the same service for Yancy Grant while Everett Franks, the driver, now on foot, held the horses quiet by their bridles.

  The two antagonists walked to the middle of the flat pasture, where Henry repeated the rules of a duel.

  “You will stand back to back. I will give the command and you will each walk ten paces, which I will clearly count out. Then you turn and fire. One shot. Should one of you be killed or wounded, the other man shall immediately return to his carriage. Do you understand?”

  “Yes,” Jeffrey replied, holding the pistol he had picked out of the offered box.

  “Yes,” Yancy also replied.

  “Back to back, gentlemen,” Henry ordered.

  John and Dr. Downey remained at the carriage. DoRe, sitting in the driver’s seat, had an excellent view. The mist was rising fast. Shortly it would obscure their heads so Henry wanted to get the duel under way wherein each man could see the other.

  Just in case, Henry did give them an opportunity. “Would you wish to wait until the ground fog is over your heads?”

  “No, I don’t give a damn about ground fog.” Yancy wanted to get it over with, certain he’d drill Jeffrey.

  “I agree. Let us begin,” Jeffrey, his back now against Yancy’s, said in an unwavering voice.

  John gripped his hands together until his knuckles were white.

  Henry, backed away from what would be the line of fire, called in a loud voice, “One, two, three.”

  The men, ramrod straight, took each step as called. However, the ground fog appeared to be swirling and rising faster on the south end, Jeffrey’s end.

  “Seven, eight, nine, ten. Fire.”

  Each man whirled around and for a split second Yancy squinted to see Jeffrey’s upper body, the mist playing tricks. He leveled his pistol, firing.

  Jeffrey grunted but stood his ground, firing a split second after Yancy.

  “Great God.” Yancy’s left hand grabbed at his right knee while he dropped the pistol. He crumpled.

  Jeffrey, standing, watched for a moment then walked, obviously in pain, back to his carriage. A line of blood trickled from his right biceps.

  “You are hurt, Sir.” Dr. Downey reached to roll up his sleeve.

  “Please go to Mr. Grant first. I believe he suffers a more serious wound.”

  Rolling in the wet grass, tears flooded from Yancy’s eyes. Henry knelt down with him, beheld the entry wound in his right kneecap. Putting his hands under Yancy’s shoulders he lifted him up, and Everett, knowing the horses were fine, ran over to help. With a man on each side, they supported him as he hopped in excruciating pain.

  Dr. Downey, bag in hand, ran over as the two men leaned Yancy against the side of the carriage. One of the horses took a step so Henry quickly grabbed Yancy as he howled in pain. Everett ran to the horses, again holding them by the bridles, standing between them.

  Tersely, Dr. Downey said to Henry, “Cut off the boot.”


  Henry reached into his inside pocket, pulled out a good knife, began slicing the boot along the back seam. “Forgive me, old friend, I know this is very painful.”

  Gasping, Yancy whispered, “Do what you have to do.”

  The boot off, Dr. Downey removed a sharpened pair of long-nosed scissors from his bag to cut away the breeches. Once they were cut above the knee, dropped into the grass, the young man knelt down, carefully examining the front of Yancy’s knee and equally carefully lifting up his leg, then looked at the back.

  “Your kneecap is smashed, Sir. The bullet has exited. I will not have to dig it out, which would only add to your distress, but I must lay you down flat, straighten your leg. Henry will hold you while I do so, as that will be painful. Then I must bandage your knee to immobilize it. You are bleeding but not profusely. Once you are home you must have the bone bits removed or you will always be in pain.”

  John hurried over to help lift Yancy flat on his back. Yancy, a big man, would be difficult for Henry to maneuver. First, Henry pulled a canvas cover from the carriage, spreading it on the ground.

  John, enormously strong, picked up Yancy slowly and bent from his own knees to gently lay him down on the canvas, now with Henry’s help.

  “Do it now, Sir. Remove the bone bits.”

  Dr. Downey nodded, knelt down, too, began the work of cleaning away blood, bits of cartilage, and flesh. Henry held Yancy’s hand as the man tried not to scream when Dr. Downey had to cut and fold back more flesh so he could see the damage. However, tears rolled down Yancy’s face.

  Looking up at John, he said, “Thank you and forgive me.” He hoarsely continued, “I cannot stop these tears.”

  John took his other hand as he had remained on his knees. “I have seen generals weep, Yancy. No need for forgiveness.”

  “Then forgive me for being,” he paused, “an ass. I caused such an uproar at Ewing’s celebration.”

  John smiled at him. “No one was bored.”

  “I will never ride in a race again.” The tears continued.

  “No, but you will always be a horseman and you will breed animals that can run. I pray for your recovery.” John stood up.