Full Cry

CHAPTER 28

A thin cloud cover, like a white fishnet, covered the sky on Thursday morning. The mercury stalled out at thirty-eight degrees.

Hounds checked down by a man-made lake at Orchard Hill, the day’s fixture.

As Sister waited on a rise above the lake, a froth rising off the still waters, she reflected on the past. In 1585, Sir Walter Raleigh founded the Lost Colony of Roanoke. What would Raleigh make of Virginia now?

She also wondered what those first Native Americans thought when they saw ships with billowing white sails. They must have felt curiosity and terror.

What would this lush rolling land be like four hundred years hence, could she return? Would the huntsman’s horse still echo, rising up as the mist now rose at Rickyroo’s hooves?

At least if Raleigh returned, he would recognize the hunt. Back then, though, they hunted in far more colorful clothing, knee-high boots turned down, revealing a soft champagne color inside. Over time, these evolved into the tan-topped formal hunt boots worn by men and some lady staff members, if the master allows the ladies to wear scarlet—still a topic of dispute among foxhunters. The flowing lace at the neck became the stock tie by the early eighteenth century. But apart from the clothing, those seventeenth-century men would know hound work, good hounds, good horses and, from all accounts, good women, as well as a surfeit of existing bad ones.

Tedi, Edward, Xavier, Ron, Gray, Jennifer, and Sari made up First Flight, the two girls allowed to ride on Thursdays. Sister had petitioned their science teacher at the high school, citing environmental studies. The teacher, an old friend, Greg Windom, agreed. After each hunt, the two students had to write up what they had observed.

This morning they observed a huge blue heron lift off from the lake when he heard the hounds, cawing raucously as he ascended.

A slow-moving creek lurched into the lake on high ground; an overflow pipe at the other end of the built-up lake flowed into that same creek some four feet below. In warmer weather, the creek was filled with five-inch stink-pot turtles: little devils, aggressive and long-necked. They’d snap at you, steal your bait if you were fishing for rockfish or even crawdaddies. Catch one and the odor made your eyes water.

Sister had taught geology at Mary Baldwin College before marrying, although her major had been what was then called the natural sciences. But Mary Baldwin had needed a geology teacher, so she voraciously read anything she could and was smart enough to go out with the guys from the U.S. Geological Survey in the area. They taught her more than anything she found in the books.

She passed on what she could to Jennifer and Sari when they asked questions, but she didn’t push them. As years rolled on, Sister had ample opportunity to be thankful for her study of rock strata, soil, erosion, and such. It helped her foxhunt. People would remark that Sister had uncanny game sense. Yes and no. She had never stopped studying soils, plants, and other animals. While she realized she would never know what the fox knew, she was determined to get as close as she could.

She’d hunted most of her seven decades, starting at six on an unruly pony. She still didn’t know how a fox could turn scent on and off, even though she had seen it with her own eyes. She’d seen hounds go right over a fox. Days later that same fox might put down a scorching trail for hounds.

In her wildest dreams, she prayed to Artemis to allow her to be a fox for one day and then return to her human form. Since this prayer went unanswered, she continued to read, learn from other notable foxhunters, and study her quarry. She knew her hounds, but she knew she would never truly know her foxes.

They knew her. The fox possessed a deep understanding of the human species as well as other species. The quickness of the animal’s mind, its powers of judgment, and its ability continually to adapt were phenomenal. The two times a fox would lose its good judgment were when it heard the distress call of a cub, any cub, and during mating season, when the boys were lashed on by their hormones. This is not uncharacteristic of higher mammals.

One such fellow, maddened by desire, now found himself eight miles from home, smack in the middle of Orchard Hill. The hounds picked him up, then lost him at the lake.

He’d dashed around the lake, leapt straight down from the overflow pipe into the creek, and swam straight downstream until he rolled up against a newly built beaver dam. He thought about ducking under the water, coming up into the lodge, but beavers are notoriously inhospitable, even to a fox in distress. He climbed up on the dam, gathered his haunches and, soaring over to the first lodge, alighted on top. He heard the commotion inside. He hopped from lodge to lodge, finally jumping from the last one onto the land. He had outwitted everyone. Catching his breath, he enjoyed a leisurely trot home.

While the hounds cast themselves at the lake bed, Trident, an excellent nose, found a middling scent: a gray dog fox. He kept his nose down and as it warmed, he spoke very softly. Trinity, bolder than her brother and littermate, walked over.

“Line!” Trinity called out.

Cora trotted over and checked it out. “Let’s give it a try.”

The rest of the pack, eighteen couple today, joined them, although the pace was relatively slow. The American hound doesn’t run with its nose stuck to the ground like glue. The animal inhales, lifts its head slightly, moves along, then perhaps thirty yards later, puts its nose to the ground. As each hound is doing this, the line is well researched. And the whole point of a pack is that hounds must trust one another as well as their huntsman.

Shaker knew the line was so-so. He also knew it couldn’t be the first fox they had run; the line would have been hotter, the music louder. As it was, hounds opened but never in full-throated chorus. They were more like geese, calling out flight coordinates at this moment.

But as hounds moved away from the lake, climbing to higher ground, frosty pastures still in shadows, the pace quickened. The music grew louder.

A tiger trap squatted in the three-board fence line. Shaker and Gunpowder easily popped over, the ground falling away on the landing side. They slipped a little, then the lovely thoroughbred stretched out as the hounds picked up speed. They covered the pasture, jumped a log jump into a woods filled with ancient hollies, twenty feet high, the tiny red berries enlivening the woods with endless dots of color. Called possumhaw by country people, swamp holly by newer folks, Shaker knew he’d be in a swamp soon enough. Possumhaws loved the muck.

Sister knew it, too. She also knew raccoon scent would be heavy as the coons love the berries in winter.

Hounds ran on despite the heavy odor of raccoons. The gray fox, a young one, thought the swamp would slow down his pursuers. He was right, but it also held scent. He needed to get up, get out, and fly across a meadow still untouched by the sun.

He figured this out at the end of the swamp, climbed over the slippery low banks, darted through an old pine woods, many of the Virginia pines having fallen from age, then hit the cold western meadow, revving his engine.

Gunpowder kept right up, but stumbled when he ran over flat rock in the piney woods. His right hoof skidded on the slick rock. He pitched forward, pitching Shaker with him. If a horse loses his balance or drops a shoulder, a human can rarely stay on. A cat couldn’t stay perched on even with claws. Shaker shot over Gunpowder’s shoulder, hitting the rock hard.

Gunpowder stopped, put his nose down on Shaker’s face. “You okay?”

Shaker didn’t move as Gunpowder stood by him.

Sister arrived within a minute. She hadn’t seen the fall. Quickly she dismounted and felt for a pulse. There was one, thank God.

She lifted one eyelid. His pupil was dilated. Fearing a concussion, she hoped it wasn’t worse. As for broken bones, no way to tell until he regained consciousness.

The other riders halted, watching with apprehension. “Ron, give me your flask.”

Ronnie quickly dismounted, handing his reins to Gray, and brought her his flask. He knelt beside her. She poured out a little alcohol in her hand and touched Shaker’s lips with it, then rubbed it on his cheeks. Blood rushed to his face, and he flushed.

His eyes fluttered. He started to sit up, but she held him down.

“Not yet.”

Ronnie moved behind his head, holding it.

“Shaker, can you feel your feet?”

“Uh.”

“What day is it?”

“Uh, hunting . . .”

“Can you feel your toes?”

His mind cleared a bit. He wriggled his toes in their scratched boots, polished many times. “Uh-huh.”

“Can you feel your fingers?”

He wiggled his fingers in his white string gloves. “Yeah.” He took a deep breath. “Ronnie, don’t kiss me.”

“You asshole.” Ronnie laughed.

“What day is it?”

“Hunting day.”

“No. What day of the week?”

“Uh . . . what happened?” He started to sit up. Ronnie and Sister let him, since nothing seemed to be broken. He winced when he took a deep breath. “Ahhh.”

“Lucky it’s not worse.” Sister continued to kneel next to him.

“Cracked a few.” His breath was a little ragged when he inhaled. “I’ll tape them up.”

“It will only hurt when you breathe.” Ronnie stood up.

“You’re a big help.” Shaker wrapped his arms around his chest.

“And if you were the last man on earth, I wouldn’t kiss you.” Ronnie figured the best way to help him was to torment him. He was right.

“Jerk.”

“Asshole.”

“Gentlemen.” Sister shook her head.

“Sorry,” Ronnie said.

“Look, honey, you’ve cracked some ribs, maybe broken them. If you’d punctured a lung, we’d know; you can hear that plain as a tire hissing. But I think you’ve suffered a mild concussion.”

“Got no brains anyway.” He smiled his crooked grin, all the more appealing, given the circumstances.

“At least you admit it.” Ronnie leaned over, putting his hands under Shaker’s right armpit.

Sister did the same for his left. “One, two, upsy daisy.”

Shaker stood up unsteadily. Both friends kept hold. He rubbed his head, the horn still in his right hand. “Jesus.”

“Sister, I can call an ambulance.” Xavier carried a tiny cell phone inside his frock coat.

“I’m not riding in any goddamn ambulance. I fell off. Big deal.” Shaker’s head throbbed. He reached for Gunpowder’s reins.

“Don’t even think of it.” Sister took the reins instead.

“Well, someone’s got to stay up with the hounds.”

“Betty is there and so is Sybil. You are going to stay right here. Sari, I want you to stick with Shaker. Jennifer, ride back to the trailer, tie up your horse, drive my truck here, and then drive Shaker to Walter.”

“I’m fine.”

“Yes, and I’m the boss.” Her words had bite. “If you don’t go to Walter, as a precaution, and your damned bullheadedness costs us the season, you’ll have a lot more pain from me than what this fall has caused.”

“Hard boot,” he grumbled.

“You’ll call me worse than that.” She looked up. “Jennifer, move.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Jennifer turned her horse, galloping back toward the trailers, which fortunately weren’t but a mile away.

Xavier said, “Sister, let me go back with her, and I’ll tie my horse next to hers. Just in case the horse gets silly by himself.”

“That’s a good idea, and X, go with her to Walter, will you? She’s only a kid, and I should have thought of that. John Wayne here might feel compelled to give her orders, such as to forget it. I’ve put her in a bad spot. I know he can’t do a thing with you.”

Xavier touched his crop to his derby and cantered off.

Shaker wanted to say something back, but he was foggier than he realized. Ronnie continued to hold him up. He blinked, then handed the horn to Sister. “Better kick on.”

She took the horn. “Jesus H. Christ on a raft,” is what she wanted to say. She’d hunted all her life, but she’d never carried the horn. She was the master. Her field, small though it was today, looked to her. It was her responsibility to provide sport. “Okay, I’ll give you a full report later.”

Ronnie stayed back with Sari and Shaker.

Sister walked away, not wishing to make Gunpowder or their horses fret. Once away from the three, she turned. “Edward, take the field, will you?”

“Delighted.” He nodded in assent.

The field now consisted of Tedi and Gray.

Sister moved out; she could hear hounds way in the distance. Rickyroo had speed to burn. Unless footing got trappy, she could get up with them in five or ten minutes. She trusted her two whippers-in and knew they’d be on either side.

Luck was with her. She had no heavy covert to negotiate, just open meadows, thin dividers of woods and trees on either side. She caught sight of her tail hounds climbing up a rolling meadow. Rickyroo opened his stride even more, and within minutes she was right behind Delia, Nellie, Asa, and Ardent, who were fifteen yards behind the rest of the pack.

She put the horn to her lips. A strangled sound slid out of the short horn.

“Oh, God,” she said.

“Just talk to us,” Asa advised.

She stuck the horn between her first and second coat buttons. “Whoop, whoop, whoop.”

Cora heard this, slightly turned her head. “Sister’s hunting us.”

“No joke.” Dasher smiled. “Guess we’d better be right.”

Diana, moving fast, literally leapt, turning in midair. “To the right!” As anchor, and in her second season at this demanding position, she had to keep everyone on the line, correct line at that. The fox executed a 90-degree cut, smack in the middle of the pastures.

Sister watched this. The other hounds came to Diana. Cora put her nose down, confirming the shift.

When hounds are doing their job, Sister thought to keep quiet. If she’d been in heavy covert, she would have tooted as best she could, so Betty and Sybil would know where she was. Not a good thing for the whippers-in to get thrown out.

Her questioning of why the fox would head straight north into another pasture was quickly answered when she galloped well into the pasture, having taken the coop, and saw the herd of Angus on the far side. He’d made a beeline for them.

Sure enough, hounds checked. How many times had she watched this? But now it was in her hands.

“Good foxhounds,” she called out to them, her voice encouraging. “Get ’em up.”

Hounds circled the cattle; Dasher moved right through them. Young Tinsel found the line on the other side, and off they ran. This side of Orchard Hill was divided into ten- to twenty-acre pastures that the owner used to rotate stock. Every fence contained jumps, which made it great fun, except that Sister was so intent on staying with hounds she never saw the jumps. She cleared them, eyes always on her hounds. Rickyroo was in his glory. He lived to run and jump.

Finally, they blasted into fifty acres of apple orchard on the right side of the farm road. On the south side, where there was more protection from sharp north winds, were fifty acres of peaches.

Orchards draw deer, raccoons, possums, and all manner of birds. Even rabbit feed on the edges. The place reeked of competing scents, which the temperature kept down.

But Cora, Diana, Asa, Ardent, Delia, and Nellie untangled the scents. The younger ones, while momentarily overwhelmed, quickly imitated their leaders. They kept on the fox.

He had put distance between them when he used the cattle. Try as they might, they couldn’t close it, but scent held.

Sister caught sight of Betty down on the farm road. She figured Sybil to be outside the orchard.

Edward, Tedi, and Gray were getting one hell of a hunt. They glided through the apple orchard, flattening grass soft underfoot, a welcome change from some of the footing they’d recently been over.

Sister, well up with her hounds, kept a sharp eye in case she might see her quarry. She’d see him before the hounds would.

On the other side of the orchard, a stout coop divided it from the hayfield. Rickyroo took it with ease, and Sister glimpsed the smallish gray.

“Yip, yip, yoo!”

Hounds knew what this meant from their master. Their adrenaline, already high, shot higher. They pressed.

Young though he was, the gray had some tricks in his bag. He looped around the hayfield, dipped into the narrow creek, came out, turned toward the peach orchard, which had a fire stand at the edge: a tower with a roof and ladder.

He climbed up the ladder and flopped on the lookout stand.

Hounds skidded to a halt underneath.

“He’s up there!” Trinity screamed in frustration. “No fair.”

Rickyroo halted. Sister, not entirely sure that the gray had climbed, dismounted. “Ricky, hold the fort.”

Hounds milled under his legs, their excitement bubbling over. Trudy tried to climb the ladder, made it up three foot holds, only to fall flat on her back.

“Nitwit,” Cora said.

The hounds sang and sang. Edward, Tedi, and Gray arrived in time to see Sister’s small butt, covered by her buckskin breeches, moving up the ladder.

She peeped her head up and almost fell back as the small gray walked right up to her, putting his nose close to hers. Cowering wasn’t his style.

“If you throw me down, I’ll bite.”

“Well done, little fellow, well done.” She smiled at him and backed down. Then she plucked the horn from her first and second buttons and tried blowing “Gone to Ground.”

Blowing the horn proved easier if she wasn’t moving, but she needed work. Laughing, she took the mouthpiece from her lips, “Okay, so it doesn’t sound like ‘Gone to Ground.’ How about ‘Up in the Air’?”

Everyone had a good laugh, including the fox.

“Sister, that was thrilling,” Tedi enthused.

“You’re being very, very kind.”

Betty and Sybil came in just as Sister was blowing her mightiest.

“This is one for the books.” Betty smiled broadly.

“I don’t know about that.” Sister swung back up on Rickyroo, who was having the best day. “But I think it’s time to go in. We’ve sure had some big days, haven’t we?”

“And the reds have just started breeding,” Betty mentioned, knowing the grays had been at it for two or three weeks.

“I always said the best hunting is late January through February.” Sister, high from the chase, and having managed a few warbles, laughed.

“Grays cheat,” Trinity complained.

“No, that’s the way they do,” Asa reminded her.

“Not as bad as the time three years ago when a gray jumped in the backseat of Tedi’s car. He’d foiled his scent. She drove him home!” Cora giggled.

Since Jennifer and X had taken her truck, Sister, Betty, and Sybil loaded up hounds. Sari and Ronnie heard the whole story. They stayed back, waiting for Jennifer and Xavier to return.

Sister, using Betty’s cell phone, reached Jennifer on the truck phone as she pulled out from the hospital.

Shaker grabbed the phone. “Three cracked ribs, two separated, a mild concussion. I’m fine.”

Xavier took the phone from Shaker. “And he’s bald. Walter had his chest shaved before they taped him so it wouldn’t hurt when he took the bandages off. Such a manly chest.”

Sister heard Shaker laughing, then wince. She said, “We could sell tickets. Raise a little money for the club. You know, help your huntsman change his bandages, see his naked chest.”

“Wouldn’t get a dime,” X replied.

Once off the phone, Sister told the others, “He’s okay. Cracked ribs, two separated.”

Tedi and Edward both said, “Good news.” Tedi added, “And you did great!”

“All I had to do was keep up, that was enough. Let’s be honest, it was a pretty good day for scent.”

“Janie, you did great.” Tedi patted her arm. “Take the compliment.”

Sister smiled. “You’re right.”

Gray walked over. “Are we still on for tomorrow night at the club?”

“You know, dinner there is like taking an ad on local TV.”

“Exactly right.” Gray reached for her hand. “I’m serving notice on all other men.”

“Flatterer.” She laughed.

Betty, Sybil, Jennifer, and Sari, once back at Roughneck Farm, all helped get the hounds fed, cleaned, checked over. Then the girls took care of the horses.

Shaker kept trying to do chores until Sister finally lost her temper with him, banishing him to his cottage.

“He’s worse than a child,” she said to Betty and Sybil.

“They all are.” Betty kept working. “Overgrown boys.”

“But isn’t that what makes them fun?” Sybil, lonely for male companionship, winked.

“You’re right,” Sister agreed.

The phone rang in the office.

Betty hurried in to answer, then called for Sister.

After listening to Ben Sidell, Sister rejoined the others as they washed down the feed room. “Girls, they’ve identified the burned body. Donnie Sweigert.”

“Oh, no!” Sybil exclaimed.

Betty, too, exclaimed, “This is awful. What in God’s name was Donnie doing there?”

“Said he had a high alcohol content in his blood.” Sister thought Donnie not a very intelligent man, but how could he be dumb enough to be dead drunk, literally, in the middle of a fire?

“God, I hope there wasn’t hemlock in it,” Betty gasped.

“No.” Sister clasped her hands together.

“Well, he worked at the warehouse for years. Maybe he got drunk and fell asleep,” Sybil thought out loud.

“With a can of gasoline next to him?”

“Jesus.” Betty whistled.

“Before this is over, we’re all going to be calling for Jesus,” Sister said. “What is going on down there?”

“Doesn’t make any sense.” Sybil, too, was upset.

“It makes sense to somebody,” Betty rejoined.

“Yes—that’s what scares me,” Sister half whispered.