Fox Tracks

CHAPTER 20

Gray stamped and wiped his feet on the heavy sisal doormat inside Sister’s mudroom door.

Raleigh slipped through the dog door on the kitchen side to greet him. Rooster remained with Sister in the den, where she was at her desk paying bills. Golly was nowhere to be found, never a good sign.

The handsome man stepped inside the house and placed The Washington Post on the kitchen table, calling, “Where you at?”

“Den!” she called. She always smiled when he used the colloquialism.

Picking up the paper again, he walked down the hall and dropped in the den’s big leather club chair. “Hell Road. Honest to God, the drive home from Washington, never good, was a goddamned mess today.”

“Traffic.”

“Where do all the people come from? Remember when we were kids and the road to Washington was two lanes of pitted asphalt?”

“That was because they still feared we’d march on them again.” She teased him.

“Not my people.”

“Do you know that for sure?”

“Not really. When Great Aunt Tinsley died, she took most of the family history with her. She was the one who knew about all the Lorillards in the War Between the States. Now I wished I’d asked a few questions, but we sure did hear about the time she met Booker T. Washington. A thousand times.”

“A great man.” Sister nodded.

“Don’t you wonder how many people who did a lot for others were never recognized? Or who died at nineteen in war?”

“Yes, I do.” She pushed aside her checkbook, stood, and walked over to the recessed bar in a bookshelf.

She poured Gray a stiff Blanton’s with a splash of water, a pinch of bitters. He liked his bitters, a twist of lemon. After handing it to him, she said, “I’m glad you’re home.”

“Me, too. Oh, read the first section of the Post. Where there’s a little recap of news from other places.”

She dutifully took the paper, sat opposite him in her own club chair. She found the section, her interest now piqued.

“What in the hell is going on?”

He shook his head. “I don’t know, honey, but you can tell everyone you were in on the first murder. I don’t think this is a personal vendetta anymore.”

She read aloud as Raleigh put his head on the chair arm to listen. “Oliver Frontenac, proprietor of the exclusive Chicago Tobacco Emporium, was found shot through the head, a pack of American Smokes on his chest. Police believe nothing was stolen from the store, et cetera, et cetera.” She looked at her Doberman, then at Gray. “This gets under my skin. It really does.”

“It’s getting under mine, too, and maybe that’s because two dead bodies we sort of know is two too many, even if Carter Weems has nothing to do with any of this other stuff going on.”

“Right now, I’m ready to consider anything, no matter how fantastic.” She folded the paper in quarters, smacking it on her knee. “And let’s not forget that an Altria warehouse burned up.”

Altria was the parent company of Philip Morris. “Which brand?” asked Gray. “Do you remember?”

“Marlboro.”

“That’s one of Philip Morris’s biggest moneymakers,” he said. “It is possible that fire was in some way connected, although I don’t see how.”

“What baffles me is why would anyone kill these days over tobacco? Savaging the industry seems to be a done deal.” Sister frowned. “Seems un-American to bedevil an industry that served as collateral for loans from France. We’d have not won the War of Independence without France. Do you have to kill these few people who still sell tobacco products? Or burn out a warehouse?” Sister petted Raleigh, who closed his eyes in pleasure.

Sprawled on the rug, Rooster opened one eye, then closed it again.

“I don’t know, honey, there’s a lot of crazy people in this world. If they’re killing over tobacco at least that’s a dispute over a real thing. You can hold a cigarette or a tobacco leaf in your hand. It’s killing and persecution over ideas that seems to raise human cruelty and perversion to new heights. And you know, this is creeping closer to home. The Henrico County Board of Supervisors approved construction of a mosque, perfectly reasonable, we have freedom of religion in this country, and some of the locals got all up in arms about it, doing their best to show off their intolerance.”

“Midget minds.”

He took a long drink. “I wouldn’t kill for a bottle of Blanton’s, but I might consider it on a bad day.”

She laughed at him. “Bourbon is so sweet. Smells good, though.”

“That it does. I watch myself. You know how that one glass at the end of the day can get bigger and bigger? Or the other trick is you start with one glass of wine or one shot of whiskey, yet the glass is never drained.”

“Gray, you’re not going to turn into an alcoholic.”

“I hope not, but I’m vigilant. Sam certainly provided me with a dismal example and Momma could knock it back, too, when the mood took her.” He smiled at Sister. She always looked so pretty. “How was today’s hunt?”

“Good.” She smiled. “Ran two foxes under the schoolhouse and then picked up a coyote heading south on Cindy’s back farm road. That was wild.”

“Two foxes?”

She nodded. “It is mating season. Looks like our schoolhouse fox has a boyfriend. And Kylie Engle, the sophomore at Custis Hall, slipped in the lower pond. Horse scrambled out. The kid kept her head.”

“Speaking of kids, what have you heard from Tootie today?”

“She was able to get some money refunded to her father. Now she’s packing up her room at Princeton. Val is pitching a fit—Tootie’s version. I’m sure Val’s is a little different.”

He leaned his head back on the chair, stared up at the ceiling for a moment. “Tough call,” he said, and she knew he referred to the right course of action for Tootie.

“Yes, it is, but I think she’s right.”

“I hope she’s able to make an arrangement so if she wishes she can return to Princeton,” said Gray sensibly.

“I don’t know. Oh, you know what else happened today? I noticed that Donny Sweigart was carrying a pistol. Happened to notice the bulge at his side. If he falls, he’ll break his ribs and oh, that will hurt.”

“Why is Donny carrying a gun?”

“He says we can’t be too careful after the corpse was found at your homeplace.”

“Seems a little extreme.”

“Does, but I gave him permission after the fact. Never hurts to have a good shot in the field.”

“True.” He heard a thump upstairs.

Sister looked at the ceiling. “Now I know where Golly is. I’ll find out what she’s done later. I’ve been paying the bills and that’s trouble enough.”

He laughed. “Damn cat.”

“How true. So very true,” Raleigh solemnly intoned.

Sister returned to the large desk, rolling her chair to the computer. “I just had an idea. The American Smokes murders were in New York, Boston, and this latest, Chicago.”

“Right,” he said skeptically, unsure whether to encourage her.

“Okay, give me a minute here. Here we go.” She peered at the screen. “Just the taxes on a pack of cigarettes in New York City with federal, state, and local taxes is $6.46. That’s just the taxes. The rest of the cost is determined by the brand, et cetera. Okay, now, Chicago has the second highest tax rate at $5.67 per pack, which will go up another dollar, and—” She kept looking. “Can’t find Boston, but the Massachusetts state tax per pack is $2.51.”

“What’s Virginia?”

“Ummm, thirty cents. Which makes sense. Let me look at another tobacco state here. Kentucky, sixty cents. North Carolina, forty-five cents. South Carolina, fifty-seven cents, uh, Georgia, thirty-seven cents and Tennessee, sixty-two cents. Those are the tobacco states.”

“Connecticut.” Gray finished his drink.

“Three dollars and forty cents.” She raised her eyebrows. “It’s not really a tobacco state. I mean it grows cigar wrapper leaf, but that’s not the same.”

“Right.” He rubbed his chin. “Those are today’s taxes. As this depression we’re in deepens, some states will raise what they call ‘sin taxes.’ Never works.”

She turned off the computer, returning to the cozier chair opposite Gray. “Exactly.” He looked at her puzzled, so she continued, “Contraband. The murders are in the states with superhigh taxes. It’s no different than moonshine. Bring in a high-tax product and sell it with no taxes—people will snap it up. I’ll bet there are studies on lost revenue because taxes have climbed too high.”

Gray, as a CPA, chuckled in appreciation. “A good accountant can help the state or the nation figure that out, but I promise you the state or the federal government isn’t going to make those statistics readily available.”

“Why the hell not?”

“Because then they’d have to admit their programs aren’t working.”

“But that’s so stupid,” she blurted out. “If you’re losing revenue, why not fix the problem?”

“Honey, I ran campaign finances, remember? There are people whose entire purpose in life is to vilify a candidate. They have got to find something wrong. Why give them the ammunition? My job was secure. No elected official’s job truly is, and it’s when they think they’re invulnerable that they blow it. Look at George Allen. He became a little overconfident in 2006.”

“George.” She grimaced for a moment. “One of the most likable fellows I’ve ever met. More to the right than myself, but you know all that’s bull, too. You throw red meat to the nutcases in your party, and both parties have them. It’s always a mistake to cater to extremists.”

“True,” said Gray. “And then later people simply can’t admit they’re wrong.”

A long pause followed this. “You did. You divorced your first wife.”

He threw back his head and laughed. “Touché.”

She laughed, too. “And am I ever glad you did.”

“Yeah, well, so am I.” He smiled at her, loving how the light shone on her silver hair. “I’m trying to think of any politician who has admitted he’s been on the wrong track.”

“You’d be thinking for a long time.” She then asked, “So what do you think about my idea?”

“Tell me your idea again.”

“Did you not listen to me?”

“I did, honey, I did, but I may be missing something.”

“Maybe these murders are about contraband cigarettes brought in and not taxed.”

“Ah. So someone could steal cartons from a warehouse or even a store here and carry them up north?”

“Why take that risk?” she said, puzzling it out. “Why not make a pact with growers who hold back some tobacco for you? I mean if people can make moonshine, why can’t they cure tobacco and make cigarettes, or shred the tobacco so people can roll their own? That’s a lot safer.”

Gray studied the woman he loved for a time. “Janie, did anyone ever tell you you could have made a good criminal?”

Upstairs, another good criminal knocked over Sister’s silver tray with a brush, comb, and small perfume bottle on it that had been given to her by her mother. Golly evidenced no interest in perfume, she wanted to nestle in the alpaca sweater her human had put on the bureau instead of in it.

Sister had been in a hurry when she left the sweater there, which she would regret. In kneading the sweater, for Golly loved the cool feeling of the alpaca wool that then turned warm, the cat tore a big hole.

Later, when they went to bed, Sister spotted the damage and saw red. She likely would have stayed mad, too, if Gray hadn’t reminded her that it was mating season. He never failed to make her laugh.