Full Cry. The Hunt Ball

One of the great things about her husband was that they could talk about anything, anything, even their affairs, if it came down to that. Usually it didn’t, but on those occasions when it did, they evidenced a rare understanding of each other. They agreed if their son fathered a child before he was ready to be married, they would take care of it and make young Ray fully aware that he must provide financial assistance to the mother if she wouldn’t give him the child. Big Ray summed it up, “You play, you pay.”

When Little Ray’s flapping T-shirt tail got caught in the tractor PTO, the power transfer axle, choking the life out of him in seconds, he had never slept with a woman. That haunted Sister. She wished he had known the richness, the power, even the fear of that connection. He died a virgin. His death causedslashing grief among his classmates and friends, among the members of the hunt club. The hounds, his horses, his beloved cats, all mourned him as deeply as his parents. Their mute suffering tore out Sister’s heart. For three months after his son’s death Big Ray couldn’t go past Tijuana, young Ray’s favorite hunter, without bursting into tears.

On Little Ray’s forty-fourth birthday, gunmetal gray clouds swung down from the mountains. Athena brazenly sat in front of the stable in the big pin oak, Bitsy on the branch beneath her. The two owls made crackling cackling sounds at each other. Sister noticed them when she looked out the kennel window.

Sister remembered odd bits of information. When Ray was born, she flipped through history date books, delighted to find that Julius Caesar had beaten King Juba II in 46 B.C., J. E. B. Stuart had been born on that day in 1833. As Stuart remains the beau ideal of the cavalryman to this day, February 6 seemed a good omen.

Sister had reached the point in her life when she was able to thank God that she had fourteen years with her remarkable son. She’d learned, in her own quiet way, to trust the good Lord. It had been her son’s time.

Shaker dripped in water tracks from his rubber boots as he stepped into the kennel office.“Dragon can go Saturday.”

“Good.”

They’d exhausted the Westminster Dog Show as a topic. The show had ended Tuesday, but being hound people, they had to discuss it in minute detail for days running. And there was a ripe disagreement about who won, who was reserve, et cetera. Needless to say, a hound did not win Best in Show.

“Boss, I know this is Ray Jr.’s birthday. Anything I can do for you?”

“Shaker, you’re good to think of me. No. Just the fact that you remembered makes it a better day. I was lucky to have him.”

“He was lucky to have you.”

Later, when she arrived back at the house, she found a huge bouquet from Gray. The card simply read,“Love is eternal.”

That brought tears to her eyes.

The biggest surprise of the day was when she took a break from chores for four o’clock tea. A new Lexus SUV pulled into the driveway, disgorging Ronnie, Xavier, and Clay.

They stamped in the mudroom door just as they had as boys. Ronnie carried champagne, Clay a hamper basket of treats, and Xavier gingerly held an arrangement of white long-stem roses interspersed with lavender.

They burst through the door, calling,“Hi, Mom.”

Each one kissed her, gave her his present, then plopped at the kitchen table.

She poured the champagne, put out sandwiches, whatever she had. They sat down as they did when they would follow behind Ray Jr., like so many railroad cars hitched to his engine.

After she cried a bit and wiped her eyes, they sat, remembering, laughing, eating.

Ronnie wistfully glanced around the country kitchen.“Where does the time go? Wasn’t it Francois Villain who wrote, ‘Where o where are the snows of yesteryear?’ It was the 1400s when he wrote that.”

“The snows of yesteryear are right here,” Clay, not being poetic, replied.

“Are you going to give us a lecture about evaporation and condensation and how there might be a molecule that once belonged to George Washington in that glass of champagne?” Ronnie rolled his eyes.

“Molecule belonged to Fran?ois Villain.” X winked. “From France.”

“Clever, these insurance agents are clever. Hey, I remember when you weredying,and I meandying,in Algebra I. Rayray bailed you out.”

X turned beet red.“No need to bore Sister with that story, Clay.”

“Ah-ha!” Clay put his sandwich on his plate, thumb-print on the bread. “X sat in front, Rayray behind. Passed him the answers to the tests.”

Sister feigned shock.“X!”

“Makes you wonder about having him as your insurance agent, doesn’t it?” Ronnie giggled.

“If it has a dollar sign in front of it, X is Einstein,” Clay said, a hint of sharpness in his voice.

“If it has a dollar sign in front of it, Dee does the work. Give me credit, I married a woman smarter than myself.”

“Not hard to do.” Ronnie laughed.

“I could be really ugly right now.” X dismissed him with a wave of his hand.

“I’ll be ugly for you, Ronnie, since we know you aren’t going to marry for love, why don’t you woo some rich old widow? Think of the good you could then do for the hunt club?” Clay nodded in Sister’s direction.

“Yeah, Ronnie, you could always lash it to a pencil.” X laughed, then realized he was sitting with Sister. “Sorry.”

“Don’t apologize to me, I’ve said worse; you just never heard it. And you all used to say the grossest things when you were kids.” She put her hand on her stomach. “Makes that showJackass,look tame.”

“You’ve watched that?” X was amazed.

“I’m trying to keep current with popular culture.”

“Hardly culture.” Ronnie sighed.

“A phase, grossness. Girls do it, too,” Clay said. “But since girls don’t make movies, for the most part, or shall I say movies are made for teenage boys, we don’t see it. Bet you were gross, too, Sister.”

Sister replied,“You forget how much older I am than you all. It was strict when I grew up. I could have matriculated to West Point and felt right at home, course they didn’t take girls then, but I thought about things gross and otherwise. Didn’t show it.”

“Ever wonder where Ray would have gone to school?” X asked.

“Sure.” She drank some champagne. “Princeton or Stanford. But you know, he was leaning toward the fine arts, driving his father crazy. I don’t know, maybe he would have gone somewhere else. What do you all think?”

“Bowdoin,” Clay said. “He would have loved Maine.”

“Colorado State,” Ronnie pitched in. “I think he would have gone west, but wound up in veterinary medicine or something like that. And he was a good athlete. He would have played football. Bet you.”

X shook his head.“Princeton. He would have followed his father to Princeton. And he would have played football there, baseball, too. Maybe lacrosse. Do they have lacrosse at Princeton?”

“Even if they do, if you want to play lacrosse, you go to Virginia, Maryland, or Johns Hopkins.” Clay spoke with certainty.

“Johns Hopkins is a good school,” Sister said thoughtfully. “I wouldn’t have minded that, and it’s closer than Princeton or Stanford.” She paused. “What a joy to have you all here.”

“We never forget you.” Ronnie smiled.

They always remembered Ray Jr.’s birthday in one fashion or another. They remembered his death day, too, each calling Sister to tell her he was thinking of her. Tedi and Betty always called or dropped by as well.

The boys, for Sister thought of them as“the boys,” grew louder, more raucous. They argued about the NBA, dismissed the Super Bowl, which had just been played. They looked forward to baseball season. They talked horses, fixtures, other people in the hunt field.

“Think Crawford will cough up enough for you to hire someone else, really?” Clay asked.

“Um … if we make this a club effort, I think he’ll contribute more than his share,” Sister replied judiciously. “But if anyone pressures him, he’ll get angry and I won’t blame him. He’s hit up all the time.”

“True.” Clay sipped the coffee that Sister had made to accompany the champagne and sandwiches. “You make the best coffee. Wish I could teach Izzy how you do it.”

“Patience and good beans.” She laughed.

“You know that brass coffee maker Crawford has in his tack room? That thing cost over five thousand dollars. Imported from Italy.” Ronnie relayed this with amazement.

“Does his coffee taste any better than Sister’s?” X’s eyebrows, some gray in them now, rose.

“No,” Ronnie answered firmly. “No one makes coffee as good as Sister.”

“Ronnie, back to the subject of your marriage.” Sister surprised them all by this. “You don’t even have to marry some rich old broad to make me happy. I want to see you happy, and I know, if you’ll relax and let us love you, you’ll find the right man.”

A silence followed.

X chuckled.“As long as it’s not me.”

“For Crissakes, X, you’re so fat, even if I loved you and wanted you, I couldn’t find it, you know?”

They roared, even X.

“Ronnie needs someone. We all need someone.” Clay dabbed his mouth with the napkin. “But I don’t think we have any other gay men in the club. Or at least, that we know about.”

“We don’t,” Ronnie answered grimly.

“Well, Ron, you can’t have someone in your life who isn’t a foxhunter.” Sister was firm. “We’ll keep our eyes open at other hunts.”

“Guys, I can do this on my own.”

“You’ve done a piss-poor job of it so far.” X snorted. “I can count on the fingers of one hand the affairs I know you’ve had. Not counting one-night stands.”

“Do we have to get into this?”

“I’m fascinated.” Sister’s eyes sparkled.

“Yeah, we do. If Rayray were alive, he’d be right here with us, pushing you on.” Clay drained his champagne glass.

With four of them on a bottle, there was little left, even though Sister drank lightly. She got up, pulled a bottle out of the fridge, and handed it to X, who opened it. She always kept a bottle of champagne, a bottle of white wine, and a six-pack of beer in the fridge for guests.

“Okay, okay,” Ronnie ’fessed up. “My walks on the wild side were furtive and unsatisfying. It’s a different day now. You all know who and what I am. I gave up hiding and lying. Maybe I will find a good man.”

“A good man who rides hard,” X corrected him.

“A hard man who rides good,” Sister mischievously added.

They laughed.

After the boys killed the second bottle, they readied to leave. Wives waited. It was Friday night, and both X and Clay faced social obligations. Ronnie had a church vestry meeting, and then he’d join X and Dee at a small dinner the Vajays planned.

As they gathered their coats, Sister nonchalantly said to all,“Fellas, I’m no spring chicken, so I’ve been doing research about human growth hormone. What do you think about my asking Dalton Hill to bring me some from Canada? I can’t get it here. I want to try it.”

“I wouldn’t mind either,” Ronnie chimed in, “but you look great. You don’t have to take anything.”

“The Wall Street Journalcarried an article about it June 2003, I think.” X’s brows furrowed. “I’m interested in it myself.”

“Supposed to help you with muscle, lean muscle,” Sister said.

“Don’t talk to Dalton Hill.” Clay held up his hands. “He is so goddamned fussy. He’s the last person to talk to about something like that.”

“Well, he is a doctor, and he is Canadian. He can get it up there,” she insisted.

“Not him. Really. Let me think about it.” Clay smiled. “It’s like everything else in the world. If there’s a market for it, then there’s a way.”

“A huge market, I’d think.” Ronnie clearly had no idea what was going on or why Sister was throwing out a baited hook.

She had done her research about HGH. If she could get it, she would. That wasn’t her purpose though, and she wondered if she was right to do this. Too late now.

“Clay, you think Dalton is ‘prissy,’ for lack of a better word? You think he’d be offended?”

“He’d go off about stuff being illegal in the United States. But maybe you could get a referral from him and fly to Toronto.” Clay’s voice kept even. “That’s better than risking, well, you know.”

“I’ve read where you can buy it online, out of the country, but online.”

“You can,” Clay spoke again, a bit more volume, “but you don’t know what that is. How do you know it wasn’t harvested from monkey glands? You don’t want that. How do you know it wasn’t taken from the pituitary gland of someone who died of AIDS? Come on, now, if you’re determinedto do this, you have to be careful. You have to find medical-grade HGH. None of this online stuff. You’re much too valuable to us.”

“I’m so glad I brought this up. I’ve been a little embarrassed to bring it up with Tedi or Betty.”

“Well, Tedi could buy the entire laboratory,” Ronnie interjected. “She’d take it if she knew about it. Even if she already looks like a million bucks.”

“Never tell a billionaire she looks like a million bucks.” Clay punched Ronnie.

“Now, now, Tedi doesn’t have a billion dollars,” Sister gently chided him.

“Triple digit millions,” Clay said, pulling on his coat.

“More power to her.” X bore no one the least amount of envy.

“Clay, instead of Wake Forest, you should have gone to Columbia or New York University, one of those northern schools full of rich kids,” Ronnie teased him.

“Damn straight. Yankees taught me the value of money by keeping it all to themselves. But, hey, I learned a lot at Wake. I’ll be a Deacon until I die.”

“Actually, Clay, I think your father taught you the value of money,” Sister gently inserted this observation.

“He did, he did,” Clay agreed. “Sister, let me look into this. And whatever you do, don’t go to Dalton.”

“You’re right. I knew you’d know.” She kissed Clay on the cheek as he went out the mudroom door, then kissed Ronnie and X, too. Ronnie gave her a bear hug.

She watched as they drove down the snow-packed road, then she closed the door, leaning her head against it, tears falling on the floor. Corruption and greed had claimed one of the boys as surely as death had claimed her son.

CHAPTER 40

“Hear me out.” Sister sat in the kitchen at Sam’s house. She’d called him at work and told him she’d be there at six-thirty.

Sam shifted in the wooden kitchen chair; they sat at the old porcelain-topped table.

“I didn’t take a drink. Not knowingly.”

“I hope you’re telling me the truth. You have got to tell me who you left the AA meeting with and where you went.”

“I can’t do that.”

“All right then, let me tell you what I think. I think someone who we don’t realize is a recovering alcoholic, like, say, Clay Berry, left with you. And you were hungry. You went to eat. I think you looked away or got up to go to the bathroom and that person spiked your drink. What was the old phrase? ‘Slipped you a mickey’? And whoever did this is behind the killings of Anthony and Mitch.”

Sam’s face registered a flash of fear. “Why?”

“They knew something, those guys. And you were friends with them. You used to perform odd jobs with them, didn’t you?”

“Sure.” He shrugged.

“But you’re back. I mean, your senses are restored. You’ve got a good job. Why would anyone want to take you down?Think!” she commanded.

“My memory might return.” He stopped, leaned toward her. “But I didn’t do that much with Anthony and Mitch. I rarely worked for the same people they did. They were big guys or bigger than I am. I wasn’t going to be able to lift the stuff they could. The jobs I picked up were mostly janitorial or the odd tack cleaning and repair job. Mostly I tried to keep some horse contact going, even when I was down at the station.”

“You know that, but the killers might not. They might think that Anthony and Mitch told you a lot. Did they?”

“No. Every now and then they’d get money. Seemed like a lot then. Anything over fifty dollars was a lot to us. I never asked. Hell, Sister, I was too drunk or too hungover to care.”

“You’re sure?”

“I’m sure. And if these people are that worried about me, why don’t they just kill me?”

“Good question. I think I have the answer.” She folded her hands together on the tabletop. “They’ve done enough damage, taken enough chances. They either need to set you up as the killer or kill you with booze.”

He passed his hand over his eyes.“Christ.”

“You might want to pray to him because you’re in danger.”

“Did you tell Gray?”

“No. He’s worried enough as it is, and he thinks you’re back on the bottle.”

“I don’t blame him,” Sam’s voice lowered.

“Will you help me catch them?”

“Yes,” Sam said with conviction.

“It’s a funny thing, Sam. Call it loyalty to an old dance partner, but tattered as Anthony’s life was, no one had the right to take it away from him. He didn’t deserve to die like that. None of them did.”

“No. What do you want me to do?”

“I’ve drawn over our foxes, lying tight in a covert. They know I’ve drawn over them, and they think I’ve gone. With me?”

“Sure.”

“I’m going to swing back around and draw in the opposite direction. I think I can flush them out.”

“Who?”

“Dalton, Clay, and Izzy. I’m damned certain she’s in on this, if not behind it.”

He swallowed hard.“Oh.”

“And one of them was with you at that AA meeting, am I correct?”

“Yes.”

“Well, keep to your rules. I guess I don’t need to know exactly which one. What I want you to do is to get into a fight with Xavier.”

“That’s easy enough.” He laughed.

“Yes and no. It means you two must cooperate.”

“Have you talked to X?”

“I’ve come directly from his house. He agrees.”

“He likes to hit me.” Sam smiled ruefully.

“With good reason, but you know what I always say. Send the past into the ocean; let the waves take it away. He can’t change it, you can’t, Dee can’t. Done is done.”

“He doesn’t see it that way.”

“Not now. He might later. X is a good man. I love him very much.”

Sam sighed deeply.“And I once hurt him very much.”

“You did, but that’s over.”

“Why do you want us to pick a fight?”

“A diversion and a shake up. Next hunt. I’ll turn and lift my crop up over my head. I think of the three of them, Clay’s the shakiest. While you two put on your show, I’ll go for Clay. I think Dalton and Izzy will be mesmerized by your joint performance, and they won’t look to help Clay.”

“You’re taking a risk.”

“Life is a risk.”

“You must have loved Anthony once.”

She blinked, then slowly said,“He was the first man I ever slept with, and at eighteen, I thought it was love. Perhaps it was.”

“You’re something, Sister.”

“Know something? So are you.”

CHAPTER 41

“What’s the difference?” Xavier angrily countered Marty Howard.

“The difference is your life, the quality of your life,” she fired right back, secure in the righteousness of her cause.

“Marty, I like you. Understand that. I do.” Picasso’s reins were draped over his shoulder. “But I’m going to do as I damn well please. I’m smoking and that’s that. And don’t give me crap about filtered cigarettes or low tar. All that crap. All you do is inhale the tiny fibers from the filters or whatever they treat the tobacco with. I’m better off smoking straight cigarettes. The others are for wimps anyway.” Defiantly, he blew a puff of blue smoke.

“Then at least smoke good tobacco.” Crawford emerged from the trailer’s tack room. “Addictive personalities. You know. If they don’t do drugs, they turn to God. Forgive the cynicism. If they drink and give it up, they smoke. You’re an addictive personality.” He handed Xavier a pack of Dunhill Reds. Same cigarettes he bought for Sam, now lurking on the other side of the trailer since he didn’t want to get into a run-in with Xavier.

“Thanks.” X didn’t think he was an addictive personality.

“How could you?” Marty felt undermined.

“Honey, people will live as they see fit, and you can’t improve them. Besides, I’d rather have him or Sam smoothed out by nicotine than not, wouldn’t you? Life is too short to put up with other people’s irritations. Seems to me our efforts should be directed toward steering young people away from smoking. I don’t think you can do much to change older ones. X is my witness.”

“Lung cancer is hardly an irritation,” she snapped.

“His lungs.” Crawford shrugged.

“What’s Sam got to do with this?” Xavier was now irritated, edgy.

“I buy him a carton of Dunhill Reds each week. A bonus. Keeps him happy. Rather have him smoking than drinking.”

Xavier opened his mouth to say once a drunk, always a drunk, but he shut it, then opened it again.“I’m smoking again to lose weight.”

“There are better ways.” Marty was persistent.

“Tried them all.” He paused. “Although last night Sister mentioned HGH. I went home and looked it up on the Internet. Might work. I’m not going to the gym. Christ, I hardly have a minute to myself now. Foxhunting is my solace, and if I have time for only one sport, this is it.”

Crawford, familiar with strategies to stay young, had his HGH flown in from England, and no one was the wiser for it.“Xavier, get a stationary bike and ride it while you watch the news. Better than nothing. And try the Atkins Diet. I’m serious.”

A rustle from the kennel alerted them to the hounds walking out in an orderly manner.

“Damn.” Crawford tightened his girth.

As Crawford and Marty hurried to pull themselves together with Sam’s help, Xavier walked Picasso back to his trailer, mounting block by the side, and heaved up just as Clay and Izzy rode by.

“Didn’t hear you grunt that time,” Clay said.

“Shut up,” said X.

“What’s the matter with you?”

“If I hear one more lecture from Marty Howard about cigarettes or women’s rights or sugar or Free Tibet, I’ll spit in her face, so help me God.”

“Umm,” Izzy murmured as if in agreement, furtively looking for Dalton. She caught his eye. He smiled, then looked away.

Ronnie rode up.“If you all don’t want to ride in the back of the field, hurry up.”

“X is having a snit.”

“I’m not having a snit!” He breathed deeply, petted Picasso, and said, voice low, “I’m tired of being middle-aged and fat.”

“Nothing we can do about the middle-aged part, but fat, that’s fixable.” Ronnie walked on toward the kennels.

“Come on.” Clay rode next to Xavier. Izzy rode a little behind them.

This Saturday’s fixture was Roughneck Farm. Apart from being full of foxes, Sister and Shaker enjoyed hunting from home because they could luxuriate in an extra hour of sleep. Also, they could load up the pack with the young entry, since, if someone did take a notion, the young ones knew the way back to the kennel. This year’s class had made great progress since September’s opening day of cubbing. The fact that it had been a moist fall greatly helped them enter properly.

Sister figured the day would be start and stop, hunt and peck, since last night was a full moon. Contented, stuffed, most foxes were curled up in their dens, a tidy pile of bones and fur outside the opening. Inky had buried her debris, not an unusual habit, though most foxes kept their own open garbage pit.

A field of fifty-nine showed up, formal attire creating a timeless tableaux of elegance. Bobby counted twenty-three Hilltoppers. He asked Ben Sidell if he would mind riding tail along with Sari Rasmussen, who volunteered for gate duty today. Jennifer rode tail with First Flight. Sister liked having someone to close the back door, as she put it. Also, if the field straggled; it wasn’t good. They might turn a fox or, if the pack turned, hounds would have to run through horses. So Sari pushed up the Hilltoppers while Jennifer pushed up First Flight. Much as the girls liked being in First Flight, as close to the front as they could get without offending the adults, these days doing tail duty led to squeals of laughter back in the barn when they recounted what occurred. The tail rider sees everything: the misdeeds, the bobble in the saddle, the split britches, the bad fences.

When the field walks out, a hierarchy lines up behind the field master. For the Jefferson Hunt, this meant that Tedi and Edward rode in the master’s pocket. As the oldest members with colors, they were entitled to pride of place. Also, they rode divine horses, so they could keep up. As the hunt unfolded, this hierarchy altered. Whoever could really ride, whoever was well mounted, could move up without censure, although few ever passedthe Bancrofts. Occasionally Tedi would pull back if she sensed someone behind her who was antsy or who couldn’t control his or her horse.

During joint meets, the visiting master, if that master did not hunt hounds, rode with Sister. Guests then rode forward as Jefferson members graciously fell back for them. Again, once the hunt unfolded, if some guests weren’t well mounted, the Jefferson Hunt members could pass them without being considered rude.

The American way of hunting, most particularly in the South, involved manners, hospitality, and strict attention to the pleasure of one’s guests. Hunts in other parts of the country could be equally as welcoming, but the southern hunts believed they performed these services better than anyone. And of course, the Virginia hunts took it as an article of faith that they towered over all other hunts, a fact not lost on other states, nor especially admired.

Many was the time that Sister repented being a Virginia master when she hunted, say, in Kentucky. So keen were those masters to show their mettle that they gleefully rode out in twelve-degree snowstorms, taking three-or four-foot stone fences.

The“By God, I’ll show these Virginia snobs” attitude meant that the Virginians had to ride quite well in order to survive. Yet it was all in good fun. There is not a sport as companionable as foxhunting.

Sister looked over her shoulder at the line of well-turned-out riders snaking behind her as they briskly walked toward the peach orchard next to the farm road.

She remembered hunting in Ireland one fall after she and Ray had been married four years. The Irish rode right over them. She never forgot her first hedgerow jump with the yawning ditch on the other side. That night she thanked God for two things: One, she was an American. Two, she had rented a superb horse who took care of her.

Clay and Xavier whispered between themselves as hounds were not yet cast. Ronnie, riding just ahead, paid no attention. He’d listened to Xavier’s wails of frustration over his poundage every day. Just because X was his best friend didn’t mean there weren’t times when X bored him to tears. He always thought that Dee was a saint, and he envied X his partner in life. Funny, too, for of all the original fourfriends, X, average-looking, would have seemed to be the last one to attract a marvelous woman.

Ronnie liked Izzy well enough, but she was impressed with her beauty and impressed with money a bit too much for him. His eyes darted over the field today. He’d known some of these people all his life. The newer ones brought fresh ideas and energy, and he had to admit that he learned from them. Pretty much he liked everyone out there, although Crawford irritated him. He wasn’t overfond of Dalton Hill either.

Hounds reached the field across from the peach orchard, the low gray clouds offering hope of moisture and scent. The temperature clung to a steady thirty-nine degrees. The layer of fresh snow had had enough time to settle in, pack down a bit. The going might be icy in spots but mostly, if the horses had borium on their shoes, they should be okay.

A blacksmith charged $105 to shoe with borium, a bit of metal powder put onto the shoes. Some people put caulks in their horses’ shoes, a kind of stud. Some could even be screwed in and then screwed out. Sister hated studs, refusing to use them. Like most horsemen, she had strong likes and dislikes. She had visions of her horse tearing the hell out of himself with studs if he overreached or stumbled, then scrambled,hitting his forefeet with his hind or catching the back of his foreleg. It wouldn’t do.

As she watched Shaker cast hounds into the field, a wave of envy swept over her. Shaker was right. Once you hunt the hounds, you never want to go back. Still, she was a sensible woman. He was a gifted huntsman, and Jefferson Hunt was lucky to have him. She’d content herself with leading the field.

Trident picked his way over the snow. Trudy, Tinsel, and Trinity were out, along with Darby, Doughboy, Dreamboat, Dana, Delight, Diddy, Ribot, Rassle, and Ruthie.

Cora hoped the youngsters would keep it together. She, like Sister, felt good about their progress. A day like today could be tricky. The conditions seemed favorable, but the full moon last night generally made for a dull hunt. Cora hoped they could pick up a visiting red dog fox.

Nellie, Diana, Delia, Dasher, Dragon, Asa, Ardent, and the other veterans, like a scrimmage line sweeping forward, moved over the terrain.

Back in the house, Raleigh and Rooster were furious because Sister locked their dog door to the outside. Both dogs would shadow the hounds if they could, and they had no business doing that. Golly relished their misery.

“Maybe we’ll pick up Grace?”Trident said.

“Too far for her on a cold night like last night. She’s overthere at Foxglove by the water wheel.”Asa had a fondness for the small red.

“What about Aunt Netty?”Ribot inhaled rabbit odor.

“Figure that any scent you get will most likely be dogfox,”Delia instructed Ribot.“The vixens sit because theyknow the dog foxes will come to them. If you do get avixen’s trail, chances are she hunted a bit; you’re picking her up going back to her den, especially now.”

“Then why did we get long runs on vixens in late October?”Ruthie puzzled over this.

“The young fox entry, so to speak, left home to find theirown dens. Don’t you worry over that now,”Delia instructed.“I’m telling you what I’ve learned over the years,though if there is one thing I have learned about foxes, it’sto expect the unexpected. For all I know, Ruthie, a vixenwill show up and give us a ripping go today. They are peculiar creatures, foxes.”

Nellie, another old girl, giggled.“That’s what Shakersays about women: They’re as peculiar as foxes.”

“Hasn’t said much like that since he took a fancy to Lorraine.”Ardent laughed.

The hounds laughed with him. If the humans heard, it would have sounded as though they were letting their breath out in little bursts.

Dragon, although pushing up front, was subdued. He kept half a step behind Cora, off to her right. For her part, next time he challenged her, she’d kill him. She was the head bitch as well as the strike hound, and she was in no mood to put up with any more bad behavior.

They pushed through the field heading east, toward After All Farm.

“Not much.”Ardent caught a faint line.“It’s Comet.”

“Let’s follow it, Ardent. Might be all we’ll get today. Ifwe’re lucky, it will heat up.”Cora trusted Ardent completely.

The hounds moved with Ardent as he turned northward. The scent warmed but remained faint until they crossed over the thin ice, breaking it, on a small feeder into Broad Creek.

“Better. Better,”Asa called, and hounds opened.

Bare in the winter light, old silky willows, some fourteen feet high, dotted the path of the stream. Lafayette picked his way through the trappy ground, took a hop over the stream, trotting after hounds who were moving steadily but not with speed.

For twenty minutes, hounds pursued this line until they wound up at the base of Hangman’s Ridge. Scent turned back along the edge of the farm road, heading back toward the peach orchard. Hounds took the half leap off the road, sunken with time and use, up into the peach orchard.

Betty, out in the open field on the left of the road, wondered if the fox might be close by. She was in a good spot to see him break cover.

Sybil, on the right, was at the edge of the peach orchard. Hounds moved through, baying stronger, moving at a faster trot. They cleared the orchard, crossed the grassy wide path separating the peach orchard from the apple orchard, then plunged into the apple orchard. They began a leisurely lope, Cora square on the line, but she no sooner reached the halfway point in the apple orchard than she turned a sharp left.

Betty intently, silently watched.

Shaker, on Showboat, followed. The scent was stronger now.

Comet, bright red, crossed the open field, glancing at Betty. He moved to the easternmost edge, jumped on the hog’s back jump and from there to the fence line. Balancing himself, he carefully walked northward for one hundred yards, jumped off the fence line on the far side, and slipped into the woods.

Tempting though it was to follow the fox and have her own personal hunt, Betty patiently waited for the lead hounds to appear. Three minutes later, they broke from the apple orchard. Four minutes later, the bulk of the pack pressed behind Cora, Dragon, and Dasher. Betty could now see Shaker cantering through the snowy lane between apple rows. As the lead hounds drew even with her, she turned Outlaw and kept with them about ten o’clock off of Cora’s twelve o’clock. The field, slushy in parts, demanded a tight seat.

Hounds, much lighter than a twelve-hundred-pound horse, easily negotiated the terrain. They climbed over the hog’s back, then stopped.

“Hold hard,” Sister commanded.

The field reined in behind her, a few bumps here and there, a few curses muttered under someone’s breath.

“I can’t find him. All I have is the scent on the hog’sback,”Ruthie, excellent nose, barked.

“Keep calm, Ruthie. Foxes don’t disappear into thin airmuch as they want us to think they do,”Diana reassured her.

The field fanned out to get a better look, Clay and Izzy together—unusual because Izzy usually rode in the back with her gal pals. Sam Lorillard kept well to the rear and couldn’t see a thing. Gray, too, couldn’t see anything in the middle of the people, but he thought it unwise to go too far out in the field for a look in case the hounds turned. Those people craning their necks could be standing right on scent, ruining it for hounds if enough of them tore up the snow and the earth underneath.

Hounds milled about for two or three minutes.

Ardent suggested they move along the fence line in both directions with a splinter group going ahead from the hog’s back in case the fox had managed to make a big leap of it.

“Have to be really big,”Delia mumbled.

“Who is to say he didn’t hitch a ride. Target once rodeon Clytemnestra’s back,”Cora said.“That’s one story,anyway. None of us ever saw it, but he sure did lose us lastseason back in the apple orchard and we had him, had him fair and square.”

“We’d see tracks. We’d smell the vehicle.”Dragon had no time for speculation as he moved right along the fence line.

Tinsel, moving left along the fence line, eager, got a snootful of fox scent.“He’s here!”

Dragon, turning left in midair, raced to the young hound.“It’s Comet, all right.”Hounds opened, their voices a chorus of excitement.

Sister waited for Shaker to clear the hog’s back, then she took it as the field followed.

The scent line—a magic trail of pungent delight—curled just above the snow. The temperature, forty-two degrees now, allowed it to lift off, releasing the musky aroma.

The hounds passed through the woods as Sister found the old deer trail. Moving at speed, the dips and rises in the earth barely registered in Sister’s brain. Her only thought was to keep hounds in sight and not crowd Shaker, blowing as he rode, encouraging his pack.

A ravine cut crossways. The fox cleverly dipped down, using the rocks to foil his scent. He didn’t go all the way down into this steep cleft in the earth. Hounds overran the line, yelped with frustration, and then began the patient process of returning to where they first lost the scent to look again.

Darby surprised everyone by examining the first bunch of rocks, some large and smooth covering twelve square feet, little crevices packed with blue ice. He picked up the line, charging up out of the ravine. He was so intent on his task, he forgot to tell the others.

Ardent watched him, ran over to the rocks, checked it out, then he, too, picked up the line.“Here we are, buddies. Here we are.”He called up to Darby,“Wait for thepack, Darby. Can’t go off on your own like that, evenwhen you’re right. Steady there, fellow.”

Darby slowed as Ardent caught up to him. Within seconds Dragon, Dasher, and the lead hounds drew alongside.

“Good work,”Cora praised him.“Smart to wait.”

Darby, grateful to Ardent for saving him a tongue-lashing from Cora, put his nose down, lifted his head, and let out a song of happiness.

Hounds ran back through the woods, back under the fence line while the field searched for the closest jump, then back through the large snowy field, back to the base of Hangman’s Ridge, where the fox disappeared. No scent. No anything. No tracks.

“This makes me crazy!”Tinsel wailed.

“He’s around,”Trident said with conviction.

Hounds milled about, confused. Diana noticed a thin trickle coming off the side of Hangman’s Ridge, a trickle spilling over black jagged rocks. Underneath that was a mass of elongated blue ice that looked like icicles had melted a little, then refroze, creating this imposing mass. The fox had gotten under the trickle, following it down, water washing scent away.

By the time she picked up his trail Diana knew Comet had put a half-mile ahead of her. But still, scent is scent. She opened. Hounds moved around the base of the ridge, moving southward and then turning west into the long floodplain that Soldier’s Road bisected.

The field became strung out, thanks to the footing, which had tired some horses more than their riders realized. They’d been pushing through the snow for an hour and a half now. Even Jennifer couldn’t keep them all together; Bobby Franklin soon overlapped the rear of the First Flight, which was their problem not his.

Sister raised her crop over her head then let it fall. Cloud Nine, quite fit and with a marvelous ground-eating stride, opened up, passing stragglers, passing through the middle of the field, finally coming up behind the knot of hard riders behind Sister. He passed Izzy, who was falling behind. Came alongside Marty and Crawford, both doing quite well. Cloud Nine stretched out, and Sam figured, why fight with the horse? He was moving out, loving it, and at least there were no bottlenecks. He hoped he could rate the big thoroughbred if he needed to. They had been working on that.

But Picasso had other ideas, flattening his ears as he heard Cloud Nine come up. Clay moved out of the way and up, hearing the hooves behind him. Ronnie, better mounted and really a better rider, asked more of his horse and got it, moving up until he was next to Edward.

Walter fell back a little, figuring Rocketman didn’t need to get into a race. Then, too, this was his first season with this horse, and he wanted to know him better.

As Cloud Nine came alongside X and Picasso, the paint let out an ugly cow kick. Kicking is bad enough, but a cow kick—which is to the side—is nasty. The hooves, packed snow dislodging in a squished clump, shone dully in the cloudy light. Picasso just missed his target.

“Idiot!” X, his face dark, looked at Sam. “You’re a groom. Stay to the rear!”

“You don’t fool me, you fat pig. I know you and Clay will cream the insurance money. Cream it like you creamed Mitch and Anthony,” Sam spat back, his voice loud.

“What the hell are you talking about?”

Sister turned, hearing the commotion.“Hark!”

This had no effect on the two as Sam bumped Picasso, like a ride off in polo, before the massive paint could kick out again. Then Sam moved ahead of Xavier, but not before X caught him around the neck with his thong, choking him, yanking him clean off his horse.

Clay, the strain too much, lost it when he heard Sam’s brazen challenge to X. He didn’t stop to separate the two. He blew past Tedi and Edward, came alongside Sister, reached down with his left hand, and grabbed Lafayette’s reins.

“Hey!”Lafayette hollered.

Sister, cool, dropped the reins.“I’m sorry it was you, but I thought you’d take the bait.”

Clay twisted in the saddle to hit her across the chest with his right hand, but he had to swing across his own chest. He couldn’t get a square blow. Sister squeezed Lafayette to go faster. He was a faster horse than Clay’s, but Lafayette, head turned toward Clay, couldn’t lengthen his stride.

“Steady, steady,” Sister spoke to her beloved horse.

Dropping her stirrup irons, she swung both legs back, then up for momentum, reached forward with her hands, using Lafayette’s neck for balance. She half stood, both feet now in the middle of her saddle. Then she leapt over behind Clay.

Clay dropped Lafayette’s reins, but the beautiful gray kept running alongside, calling to hounds,“Cora! Diana!Delia, Nellie, hounds, stop, stop! Sister needs you.”

Nellie, at the back, heard him.“Hold up, hold up!”She bellowed for all she was worth.

The hounds slowed. Cora turned to see Sister, behind Clay, one arm around his neck, the other straining forward for the reins, which she couldn’t reach.

Savagely, Clay elbowed her. Her legs were so strong she didn’t weaken her grip on his horse even though she had no stirrups.

Tedi and Edward, on fast horses, moved close to the battling pair. The field watched in horror as their master clung to Clay and the horse.

She jerked Clay hard around the neck; his hands came up, and his horse skidded, hind end going out behind him, sliding along the snow. The two humans rolled off, fighting.

At six feet tall and 150 pounds of lean muscle, Sister was a formidable opponent. But Clay was six two, middle-aged, and 200 pounds. He was getting the better of her, but she refused to let him go. He reached into his pocket with his right hand, brought out a trapper jackknife, and flicked it open. He rammed his knee in her back and then brought the knife to her throat with his right hand, clasping her with his left arm.

Before he could cut into the jugular, Dragon, the strongest hound, hit him sideways. Eighty pounds of fury knocked Clay off Sister. The knife slid across her throat, blood spurting over her white stock tie, sprinkling the snow as she sank down on one knee, hand to her throat.

“Kill him!”Cora screamed. The entire pack swarmed Clay, tearing through his breeches, biting clean through his expensive Dehner boots, gouging his hands as he instinctively covered his own throat.

Shaker blew them back. They refused to obey. He galloped up, dismounted as Betty and Sybil came in. He saw blood on the snow and wanted to kill Clay himself.

“Leave him.Leave him!” The pack obeyed with outraged reluctance.

Clay, although badly torn, lurched for his mount, who had scrambled to his feet and was standing still. As Clay vaulted for his horse, Gray, riding faster than he had ever ridden in his life, caught up to Clay, leaned over, and knocked him down.

Walter jumped off Rocketman before his horse even stopped, tearing through the snow to Sister, blood seeping through her fingers as she clutched her throat.

Betty and Sybil took their cues from Shaker, who was standing stock-still. Walter was a doctor. If he needed them, he’d ask. Meanwhile, the pack, snarling as they watched Clay stumble toward his horse again, needed to be held in check.

Gray turned. As he did, Edward rode up. The two men got off their horses and grabbed Clay. Without a word Edward put his crop across Clay’s throat, tying his hands with the long thong so that if he moved he’d choke himself.

Dalton Hill and Isabelle could be seen in the distance, riding for all they were worth to reach the trailers.

Ben Sidell didn’t bother chasing them. He plucked out his cell phone, giving his officers the particulars.

Sam and Xavier stopped beating the crap out of each other. They crawled up on their horses and rode up to the debacle.

Ben arrived.

“Surface cut, thank God,” Walter said to Ben as he tenderly untied Sister’s stock tie, rewrapping it around her neck as a bandage.

“Jesus Christ, Sister, you a rodeo queen or something!” Ben cursed out of admiration and relief.

She nodded, and Walter put his arms around her. She couldn’t speak.

Tedi, also on foot now, having handed her reins to Ronnie, came over to see if her dearest friend needed help. She stopped a moment, the picture of Walter embracing Sister filling her with emotion. Tears spilled over her cheeks.

To herself she thought, A son has come home. To Sister she said,“Janie, Janie, let me help you home.”

“I can ride back,” Sister croaked. Her throat hurt from the cut and from the fight. She half whispered to X and Sam, “Thanks boys, well done.”

“My God, you’re a hardhead.” Tedi threw back her head, laughing as the tension leached out of her, laughing because they were still alive.

“Good hounds,” Shaker’s voice trembled with emotion.

“We want to go to Mom,”Diana implored Shaker.

The pack inched toward Sister. Shaker, knowing them as he did, walked on Showboat to his master.

“I can still kill him!”Dragon sang out.

Cora came up to Sister, looking up at the woman.“Youokay?”

That did it. Tears flooded, and Sister knelt down as her hounds gathered around her, kissing her, rubbing up against her. Lafayette bowed his head as he, too, nudged her.

“The best friends, my best friends,” Sister cried, hugging and petting each hound.

By now everyone in the field was crying, even Xavier and Sam. Xavier looked at Clay. A lifetime friendship smashed, but another saved. He sobbed. He had at that moment realized how much he loved Sister, as did Ronnie.

“Sister, why don’t we walk back to the farm?” Shaker found his voice at last.

She replied in a loud whisper,“I can ride. Walter can fix me up later, right?”

“I’ll ride with her. Looks worse than it is, Shaker.” Walter cupped his hands for Sister’s left boot. Tedi held Lafayette, who nickered happily when he felt her familiar weight on his back.

Tedi turned to the field, her voice strong.“We’re calling it a day. Your master is determined to ride back, so we’ll ride with her.” She paused, searching out each concerned face, then broke into a smile even as the tears ran down her face again. “She’s bullheaded, but I love her.”

Everyone started talking at once as sirens could be heard roaring down Soldier Road.

By the time they reached the kennels, four squad cars had Dalton and Isabelle penned in by the trailers.

Walter insisted that Sister sit down in her kitchen. The girls took the horses even as Sister complained in a hoarse voice that she needed to count her hounds.

“You can do that later.” Walter took charge.

Betty kissed Sister on the cheek.“Shaker, Sybil, and I can handle it. I’ll be up when we’re done.Youtake care ofyou, Sister. There’s only one Sister.”

Tedi, Edward, and Gray followed Walter up as Sister grumbled that she didn’t need an escort, she was fine, et cetera, et cetera.

Once Sister was seated on the kitchen chair, Raleigh and Rooster, smelling her blood, whimpered and came over, sticking to her like glue.

“Go lie down,” she croaked.

“If I lick you, you’ll heal faster,”Raleigh promised.

“Ugh.”Golly jumped on Sister’s lap.“Dog licks, yuck. Ican do better.”She put her paws on either side of Sister’s neck as Walter unwound the stock tie.

“Golly, you need to get down,” Sister told her.

When Golly wouldn’t budge, Tedi reached over, picked up the cat, and placed her on the floor.

“I’ll get even,”Golly threatened as she joined Raleigh in his bed.

Edward, holding Sister’s black frock, realized the front was sopping with blood. He put the coat in the mudroom, making a mental note to take it to the dry cleaner’s.

Walter unbuttoned the front of her white shirt, also covered with blood.“Sister, you need to take this off. I want to make sure you don’t have other injuries. When your adrenaline gets high like that, sometimes you won’t feel a broken bone for hours.”

Sister looked at Edward and Gray.“I’m not really all that modest, but I do ask you men to remember that Britney Spears doesn’t have anything that I don’t have; I’ve just had it longer.”

They laughed at that, then Edward said,“Gray, why don’t we go to the library? Walter, if you need us, you know where we are.”

“I do.” Walter waited for her to remove her blouse, then gingerly pulled off the long-sleeved silk undershirt.

Tedi watched as Walter felt her ribs, the bones in her neck and arms.“Clay landed a couple of good ones.”

“Yeah, but the frock is heavy.”

“Mmm, you’ll have some bruises.” He pointed to red marks on her chest, a large one on her back where she hit the ground.

Tedi drew closer.“They’ll turn a fetching shade of black, then purple, then burgundy.”

“Peachy.” Sister felt her neck sting where it was cut.

“I’m going to wash this. You’ll feel it,” Walter warned her.

Tedi brought over a bowl of warm water, went into the downstairs bathroom and brought out a washrag and a towel. Sister closed her eyes when Walter washed it, the wound bleeding anew as the caked blood was rinsed off.

“Stitches?” Tedi inquired.

“No.” Walter checked to see how deep the cut was. “She was lucky. Keep it clean. It’s going to continue to seep blood. Wrap a soft gauze around your neck. You clot up quickly enough, but every time you take the gauze off it will seep a little. I’ll bring over some antiseptic.”

“What about Neosporin?” Tedi asked. “She’s got that upstairs.”

“It will help.”

“Oh, just slap Betadine on me,” Sister suggested.

“If you want to walk around with an orange neck, that’s okay by me.” Walter squeezed her shoulder. “Take a long hot bath once we’re all out of here. The sooner you get in the bathtub, the better. It will help the thumps and bumps,” Walter ordered. “And when you’re finished put some ice on that chest bruise.”

“I’ll stay with her,” Tedi offered.

“I’m not crippled.”

“Not yet,” Tedi replied slyly. “And while I’m here, we can indulge in girl talk. You can tell me why Clay attacked you. I’m assuming you knew more about that fire than the rest of us.”

“Couldn’t prove a thing. Clay just flipped his switch.”

“With your help, I’m sure,” Tedi replied. “I’m going upstairs to draw your bath.”

CHAPTER 42

She hurt in places she didn’t even know she had. Moving stiffly, Sister walked through the boys’ run at the kennels. They had been turned back out after eating in the feed room.

“Boys, thank you.” Sister touched each head, knelt down with a pang to rub their broad chests.

“I was ready to kill him.”Dragon pushed his head under her hand, moving his brother out of the way.

“You’re a bold fellow, Dragon.” She reached over the handsome tricolor to smooth the pate of Dasher. “Boys,” she addressed all her dog hounds, “you’re the loves of my life.”

She then returned to the feed room, where the girls were. She told them they were wonderful, but didn’t bother them as they were eating. Diana kept leaving the long orange metal feeder to touch Sister with her nose.

“Good girl, now go eat or Delia and Nellie will eat your share.”

“Delia’s the porker, not me,”Nellie replied.

“Thanks for washing my kennel coat. Must have done that last night,” Shaker said.

“Tedi stayed over, so we banged out a few chores. She tried to keep me in the tub, but I was turning into a white prune. Anyway, I can’t sit around.”

“I wish I’d seen you jump on Clay’s horse. I was up with hounds and didn’t know what was going on until the pack turned. Damnedest thing, the pack turning like that. Just left off the scent and came to you.”

“Thank God, they did. Lafayette whinnied, the tail hounds turned.” She leaned against the wall; her back hurt. “They communicate with one another. Once we could, too. Once we were part of nature’s grand conversation, but we got about our raisins. We lord it over all, but we’re alone, desperately alone.”

He folded his arms over his broad chest.“One way to put it. Mostly, I think we’re sick.”

“Sick and savage or sick and cowardly. Not much in between.” She ruefully nodded. “Tedi thinks more deeply than I do. Always has. We were talking last night, and she said people’s emotions were stronger in the Middle Ages. People expressed them. We’re muted. The farther we move away from nature, from our animal selves and from other animals, the more we vitiate our emotions. Actually, she was more eloquent than that; I’m recalling it as best I can.”

Shaker smiled.“Bet Gray would have gladly taken care of you last night.”

She quickly returned the smile.“Lucky me, but it was a night to be with my oldest friend, a night of two souls, if you know what I mean. I think that comes with deep friendship. Once sex gets into the picture, there’s a blast of lust, desire, magic. But that quiet, eternal love between best friends,” she said, lookinginto his eyes, “there is nothing like it in the world.”

“My brother,” Shaker replied. “Have that with my brother. Don’t get to see him much, though.”

“We’re lucky. We both have a strong circle of dear friends, and now it looks like we might have a bit of the other.” He blushed, and she continued. “The people who don’t have that love become bitter, or they dry out. Hateful. I think that’s what happened to Clay.”

“He had friends. Had a wife.”

“He was never honest. He lied since the time he was a kid. Always wanting to be something he wasn’t. Married for show, not for a deep emotional connection.”

“There’s no excuse for him.”

“No. But it’s funny some folks aren’t satisfied. More, always want more.”

“Ben call?”

“Briefly. Clay won’t confess to anything. Declaring mental anguish, breakdown.” She drew in her breath. “Some truth to it. Izzy’s clammed up, too, but Ben said the good Dr. Hill is singing like a canary.”

“And?”

“Drugs. Performance drugs. Like I suspected.”

“Too bad we didn’t get any.” Shaker stifled a guffaw.

“I know.” She laughed with him. “Course it’s one thing if someone my age takes HGH. Quite another if a fifteenyear-old high school kid shoots up, you know? And Dalton said their network covered the entire mid-South.”

“What did Mitch and Anthony have to do with it?”

“Delivered the drugs in the furniture. They never made the long runs out of state because Clay figured they’d go on a bender somewhere between here and Tennessee. Mitch figured it out and told Anthony. They decided to blackmail Clay. Remember, Shaker, those two might have had moments of lucidity, but they’d killed a lot of brain cells. Like dopes, they threatened Clay directly. He paid them, and they’d immediately drink it up. It was easy after a few months of this to put hemlock in two bottles of whiskey. Clay was a Pony Clubber, took the nature courses with me as a kid; he knew cowbane as well as I did. He could dig it up and not get sick. And there’s cowbane all over. We can’t get rid of it. That part wasn’t too hard for Clay. Jesus, it’s so bloody stupid.”

“Yeah, it is.”

“And Izzy sat down in the lap of luxury and didn’t want to get up again.”

“She was sleeping with Dalton, too. No surprise. She was perfectly ready to ditch Clay when the going got rough. Made me think of the hunt at Foxglove when Bitsy shadowed Uncle Yancy. Izzy and Dalton were sure looking out for each other. Poor Clay loved being rich. He loved it so much, he set aside right from wrong.”

“What happened to Donnie?”

“Made a dumb move. He saw Anthony and Mitch get extra money here and there. Anthony told him what they were doing, getting money out of Clay. Donnie wouldn’t have figured it out for himself. So Donnie got in the act, demanding a lot more once Anthony and Mitch were out of the way.”

“You’d think he’d know he was next.”

“You would, wouldn’t you? The human mind has a fabulous capacity for denial. Clay lured him to the warehouse; they had a brief struggle. Donnie lost consciousness, although not by a blow to the head. Gaston Marshall thinks Clay shut off Donnie’s air, hence the bruised windpipe.”

“He’s a good coroner. Had to be to figure anything out from that charred corpse.”

“And it was Clay who set the fire. The tip-off was the gas can being so close to Donnie. He wasn’t that woefully stupid, at least not about physical things.”

Yeah. Makes sense.” Shaker wiped his hand on his kennel coat. “Three people dead. For what? Three more will go to jail.”

“They lived high on the hog for a while.”

“Trinity.” Shaker walked over to the young hound.

“Over here.” He moved her to a less-crowded feeder. “Always wants to be next to her sisters, and they eat faster than she does.”

“She’s a lady about her table manners.”

“She’s the only one.” Shaker laughed.

“Well, I’m glad we switched to the higher-fat-content feed when we did, high protein, too. With this cold and the incredible runs we’ve been having, the children would have gotten down in weight quickly. I hate to see a weedy pack.”

“Once it goes off, it’s hard to get it back on until season’s over. They’re like people; some incline to weight and some do not. Most of our pack inclines to being lean.”

“Yes, they do. And I never praise you enough for your kennel practices and your attention to nutrition. Look at the shine on those coats.”

“That’s my job,” he modestly replied.

“Hey, there’s people out there doing the same job, ’cept they don’t know what they’re doing. Boy, if you get a master who doesn’t know hounds and the huntsman’s not worth squat, the poor pack suffers. Another reason why we need the MFHA and district reps.” She mentioned the Master of the Foxhounds Association of America, which divided Canada and the United States into districts, each one with a chosen representative.

One of the duties of that representative was to make sure every hound pack in his or her jurisdiction was properly kept.

“They’re getting like the government, sending paperwork.”

“To me.”

“Then you give it to me!”

“Some of it.” She poked him with her forefinger.

“Think Clay could have gotten away with it?” asked Shaker, returning to the dramatic events.

“He snapped. But he was sloppy, too. Wouldn’t it have been smarter to keep paying off Mitch and Anthony and then dispose of them later, somewhere far away? Makes me believe the pressure was already getting to him. Maybe Izzy was greedier than we know, or maybe Dalton got cold feet. Sounds like Dalton’s the type.”

Shaker’s eyes twinkled. “Committing perfect murders now, are you?”

“Me?”

“You said Clay could have handled this better than he did.”

Her face reddened.“You’re right.”

“Maybe it’s easy,” he said.

“What?”

“Murder. Stealing, other stuff. Maybe you think about what’s right for you, and you don’t think about what’s right for the rest of us. What’s the difference between Clay Berry and Kenneth Lay? Sure, boss, Kenneth Lay didn’t kill anyone, but is the impulse different?”

“It’s tricky, Shaker. I break rules. I go over the speed limit if I think I can get away with it. Maybe that’s the same impulse you’re talking about: a self-centeredness.”

“Not the same,” he replied.

“Okay, take another kind of rule: sexual behavior. I broke the rules when I was younger. Maybe I’m breaking them now. What’s the difference between that, and, say, thinking you’ll sell OxyContin because people want it? Is it a fixed set of morals? Are they written in stone? Is sexual behavior on a different plane than financial behavior? If you start to think about it, you’ll run yourself crazy.”

“No, you won’t.” His voice was firm. “Sex is about our animal self. That’s nature. Money, that’s man-made. Animals defend their turf, but we’ve created elaborate owner-ships that pass from generation to generation. In nature, each animal has to be strong enough to defend his or herterritory, like the mountain lion we ran up or the badger. We’ve bent the natural rules and we keep bending them. It’s one thing to have an affair, it’s another to kill three people.”

“You’re right, but when I think about this stuff, I get dizzy. And when I started to figure out this really was Clay’s doing, it made me sick. It was under my nose, but I didn’t want to see it. I finally did, though.”

“Hard to look at an old friend in a new way.”

They chattered until all hounds were fed, yards picked up, runs cleaned and washed down.

Then they left the kennels, passing the paddocks, including the mare paddocks.

Secretary’s Shorthand stood in the snow, nuzzling a light bay foal who was wobbly, but nursing.

“Boss, what’s that foal doing in there?”

Sister, despite her bruises, climbed over the fence, Shaker right behind her. They walked up to the contented mare.

“She didn’t show!” Sister was amazed and thrilled.

“Hardly bagged up either.” He reached over and squeezed one of Secretary’s nipples; a stream of rich milk oozed out. “She’s producing okay.”

“Delivered the baby herself!”

Shaker laughed, face radiant.“They do it in the wild all the time, but I didn’t think she was in foal either. Sometimes they fool you.”

Sister nodded, slipping her arm around his waist.“Life. New life!”

4. THE HUNT BALL

C H A P T E R 1

A shining silver shroud covered the lowlands along Broad Creek, deep and swift-running. The notes of the huntsman’s horn, muffled, made his direction difficult to determine. Three young women, students at prestigious Custis Hall, followed the creek bed that bordered a cut hayfield. A gnarled tree, bending toward the clear water as if to bathe its branches, startled them.

“Looks like a giant witch,” Valentina Smith blurted out.

They stopped to listen for hounds and the horn. Smooth gray stones jutted out of the creek, the water swirling and splashing around.

“Can you hear anything?” Felicity Porter, slender, serious, inquired.

“If we move away from the creek, we’ll hear better.” Valentina, as senior class president, was accustomed to taking charge.

Anne“Tootie” Harris, one of the best students at Custis Hall, was just as accustomed to resisting Valentina’s assumed authority. “We’ll get even more lost. Broad Creek runs south. It divides the Prescott land from Sister Jane’s land. If we keep going we’ll eventually reach the big old hog’s back jump in the fence line. If we turn right at that jump we’ll find the farm road back to the kennels.”

Angry that she hadn’t paid attention at the jump to where the rest of the riders disappeared into the fog, and now angry that she hadn’t paid attention to the flow of Broad Creek, Valentina growled, “Well, shit, Tootie, we could go into menopause before we reach the hog’s back jump!”

“One dollar, potty mouth.” Felicity held out her hand with grim satisfaction.

“Felicity, how can you think of the kitty at a time like this? We could be lost for days. Why, we could die of thirst and—”

“Val, we’re next to Broad Creek,” Tootie deadpanned.

“You two are ganging up on me.” Val tossed her head; her blonde ponytail, in a snood for riding, swayed slightly.

“No, we’re not.” Felicity rarely ran off the rails, her focus intense. “The deal when we started hunting with Jefferson Hunt was that each time one of us swore, one dollar to the kitty. I’m the bank.”

Valentina fished in her tweed jacket.“You’ll probably end up being a banker, F. I can see it now when you make your first million. You’ll count the money, put it in a vault, and not even smile.” She did, however, hand over her dollar.

Felicity leaned over to reach for the dollar, their horses side by side. She folded it in half, neatly sticking it in her inside jacket pocket. Felicity knew she wasn’t quick-witted. No point in firing back at Valentina.

With Felicity and Valentina it was the tortoise and the hare. With Tootie and Valentina it was the hawk and the hare, two swift-moving creatures with opposing points of view.

“Come on, I’ll get us back to the kennels,” Tootie promised.

In the far distance the hounds sang, voices ranging from soprano to basso profundo, from tenor to darkest alto. The heavy moisture in the air accounted for the variation in clarity. The girls would hear the hounds moving toward them, then it would sound as though the hounds were turning.

“Coach will tear us a new one.” Valentina did not reply to Tootie’s suggestion, speaking about the coach’s wrath instead.

“Coach? What about Mrs. Norton?” Felicity thought the headmistress’s disapproval would be more severe than Bunny Taliaferro’s, the riding coach, although Bunny naturally leaned toward censure.

“Wonder if they know we’re not with the field? I mean, it’s possible they’re still in the fog, too. Sister Jane would get really upset if she thought we were in trouble.” Valentina inhaled deeply. “If they don’t know, let’s swear never to tell.”

“The Three Musketeers.” Tootie half-smiled.

“All for one and one for all.” Valentina beamed.

“But you always manage to be first among equals, Val. It’s not exactly all for one and one for all. It’s all for Valentina and then maybe Val for all,” Tootie said, shooting a barb.

“Tootie, you can really be the African queen when you’re in a mood. You know?” Valentina raised an eyebrow.

“Yeah, right.” Tootie, an exceptionally beautiful green-eyed African American, shrugged it off.

“Will you two get over yourselves? If we don’t find our way back, we’re in deep doo-doo. If we do find the field, we’re still in deep doo-doo but maybe not as deep.”

“Felicity, say shit and be done with it.” Val took out some of her discomfort on her sober classmate.

“One dollar.”

“I could learn to hate you.” Valentina fetched another crinkled dollar, fuming as Tootie hid a smile behind her gloved hand.

“Thank you.” This time Felicity snatched the money.

Hounds sounded as if they were swinging toward them; the notes on the horn played one long note followed by a series of doubled and even tripled notes, one long note, and the process was repeated.

“All on,” Tootie remarked.

Bunny Taliaferro drummed the basics of foxhunting into those students she selected as proficient enough to ride hard over big fences and uneven ground. The show-ring riders who panicked outside of a flat ring where they counted strides could never join the chosen few. This caused tensions because often the show-ring girls looked much prettier on a horse. Unfortunately, flying down a steep hill usually meant they popped off their horses like toast. The sound of“ooff” and “ohh” punctuated the hoofbeats on those occasions.

Valentina, Tootie, and Felicity performed well in the show ring—they’d made the school team—but they excelled over terrain, so had earned the privilege to hunt. Each girl could handle sudden situations calling for split-second decisions, and each girl could usually keep a horse between her legs even when the footing was slick as an eel. What Bunny prizedmost about them was they were bold, keen, go-forward girls.

“All on and heading our way.” Felicity recognized the horn call, straining to make sure her ears weren’t playing tricks on her.

“Christ, they’ll all see us!” Valentina worried more about saving face than getting chewed out.

“One dollar.”

“Christ isn’t swearing.”

“Christ isn’t swearing. You are.” Felicity in a rare moment of dry humor held out her hand.

“Not fair.” Valentina bit her lip.

“Oh, pay up. You’ve got more money than God anyway,” Tootie half-laughed.

“Sure,” Valentina said sarcastically.

All of the girls came from wealthy families, but Valentina received the largest allowance and was the envy of the other students. To her credit she was generous.

She forked over the dollar bill.

“Look, they really are coming this way. Let’s slip back into the mists. We can bring up the rear right after they cross Broad Creek,” Tootie suggested.

“Fox could turn.” Felicity considered the gamble.

“Yes, but if he doesn’t, the crossing is up past the trees. We’ll hear them. If they turn, we’ll keep going until we find the hog’s back and then head toward Sister Jane’s.”

The kennels were at Sister Jane’s farm, Roughneck Farm. Jane Arnold had been master of the Jefferson Hunt Club for over thirty years. Her late husband had also been a master.

“Vote.” Felicity thought this would short-circuit Valentina’s protest since Valentina hated agreeing readily with Tootie.

“You don’t have to vote.” Valentina turned toward Tootie, the mist rising a bit, swirling around the beautiful girl. “It’s a good plan.”

“I can’t believe you said that,” Tootie giggled. “F., we’d better remember this day.”

They would, but for quite different reasons.

They backtracked fifty yards from the creek crossing.

“Why?” Felicity asked.

“Because the other horses will smell ours,” Tootie sensibly replied. “Go on back a little more.”

“Tootie, we’ll lose them again.” Valentina was more worried about Bunny and Mrs. Norton, the headmistress, than she cared to admit.

“No, we won’t. Let me be in front this time.”

Tootie rode tail during the entire hunt, which is one of the reasons they got lost. Felicity, in front, didn’t have the best sense of direction. When the whole field jumped a black coop in the fog, they landed into a woods, ground covered with pine needles. Those needles soaked up the sound of hoofbeats. By the time Tootie got over the fence, Felicity had turned left instead of right with the others. It was too late to catch them. For ten minutes they couldn’t hear a thing, not the horses, not the hounds, not the horn. So Tootie led them south along Broad Creek since she could hear the water.

Neither Valentina nor Felicity argued, since both knew Tootie was a homing pigeon.

They quietly waited.

A splash sent the ears of all three horses forward. The humans heard it, too.

Comet reached their side of the bank, shook, then sauntered toward them.

“You three are as useless as tits on a boar hog,” the male gray fox insulted them.

“Tally ho,” Felicity whispered as though the other two couldn’t see the fox sitting right in front of them.

Tootie glared at her. One should not speak when the fox was close or when hounds were close. The correct response would be to take off your cap, point in the direction in which the fox would be traveling, and point your horse’s head in that direction also.

“Tally human.” Comet flicked his tail, tilted his head. He could gauge the sound of the hounds far more accurately than the three girls before him.“Well, chums, think I’ll motor on. You look ridiculous sitting here in the middle of the covert, you know.”

He vanished.

“He barked at us!” Valentina was thrilled.

“I’ve never been that close to a fox.” Felicity was awed and a little scared to look the quarry square in the eye.

The beautiful music of hounds in full cry came closer. The girls stopped talking, almost holding their breath.

Moneybags, Valentina’s big boy, started the chortle that leads to a whinny. She leaned over, pressing her fingers along his neck, which he liked.

“Money, shut up.”

He did just as the head hound, a large tricolor, Dragon, vaulted off the far bank into the water. Trident, Diana, and Dreamboat followed closely behind the lead hound.

Within a minute, the girls heard the larger splashing sound of Showboat, the huntsman’s horse, fording the creek, deep, thanks to recent steady, heavy rains.

Another four minutes elapsed before Keepsake, Sister Jane’s hardy nine-year-old Thoroughbred/quarter horse cross, managed the waters. After that the cacophony of splashing hooves and grunts from riders, faces wet from the horses in front of them, filled the air.

“Come on,” Tootie said as loudly as she dared.

The three crept forward just as the noise seemed finished. Crawford Howard suddenly crossed, though. He’d fallen behind. He was startled to see the three young women riding out of the mists, as was his horse, Czpaka, who shied, unseating Crawford right in the middle of Broad Creek.

“Oh, shit,” Valentina said low.

“One dollar.” Felicity truly was single-minded.

“Not now, F. We’ve got to get him up, apologize, and get with the field before we lose them again.” Tootie hopped off Iota, her horse, handing the reins to Valentina.

“Mr. Howard, this is my fault. I am so sorry.” She waded into the creek, cold water spilling over her boots down into her socks.

Swiftly, she grabbed Czpaka’s reins, still over his head. Czpaka considered charging out and leaving Crawford. A warmblood, big-bodied fellow, he wasn’t overfond of his owner.

“Whoa,” Tootie firmly said.

“Oh, bother. I hope he freezes his ass.” The horse did stand still, though.

“Then he’ll kick yours,” called out Parson, Felicity’s horse.

“I can dump him anytime I want,” Czpaka bragged.“The only reason I let him sit up there like a damned tick is I like following the hounds and being with all you guys.”

Tootie led Czpaka out. He stepped up on the bank. Crawford sloshed out. While he could be pompous on occasion he did see the humor of his situation. Besides, foxhunters had to expect the occasional opportunity to show off their breaststroke.

The mist rose slowly, the sun higher in the sky now on this brisk October day. But one could still only see fifty feet. Tootie looked for a place where Crawford could stand to mount his big horse. The huge knees of the gnarly tree wouldn’t do. They’d be slippery, adding insult to injury.

“Val, you hold Czpaka while I give Mr. Howard a leg up.”

Valentina, at six feet one inch, one inch taller than Sister Jane, was stronger than Tootie, who stood at five feet four inches.“You hold. I’ll give him the leg up.” She handed Iota to Felicity and Moneybags, too.

“Girls, I’ll be fine,” he demurred.

“Well, your boots are wet and the soles will be pretty slippery, sir. It’s only cubbing. No reason to risk an injury before the season really starts.” Tootie’s judgment belied her years. She’d always been that way, even as a little thing.

“Good thinking.” He reached up to grasp Czpaka’s mane with his left hand, resting his right on the pommel of his Herm?s saddle with knee roll. He bent his left leg as Val cupped her hands under it, lifting him as he pushed off with his right leg.

The tall blonde was grateful he pushed off. Some people, like sacks of potatoes, just stand there and you have to lift all of them up. Hernia time.

Tootie held the right stirrup iron to steady the saddle, releasing her hand and the reins once Crawford was secure.

Both young women gracefully mounted up, except that water spilled from Tootie’s right boot when she swung her leg high and over.

Hounds, screaming, were moving on at speed.

“Let’s put the pedal to the metal.” He clapped his leg on Czpaka, who shot off like a cannonball.

Moneybags, Iota, and Parson gleefully followed.

Within a few minutes they came up behind the field of twenty-five. As it was a Thursday hunt, the number of riders was smaller than on a Saturday. The mists kept lifting like a slippery veil.

Marty, Crawford’s wife, turned to see her wet husband as they galloped along. She said nothing because hounds were speaking, but then, even if at a check, she would have remained silent.

In some ways, the checks separated the sheep from the goats for foxhunters. It was a far better test of one’s foxhunting etiquette than taking a whopping big fence in style. Though one had to admit, the latter was far more exciting.

They thundered on. Water spritzed off Crawford’s coat, his cap, and Czpaka’s sleek coat.

They checked hard. Hounds bolted up toward a thick overgrown hillock. By now the riders could see, as the mists hung above their heads.

Sister waited for a moment. She didn’t want to crowd hounds or her huntsman, Shaker Crown. As field master she kept the riders together, tried to keep hounds in sight yet stay out of the way.

Shaker hopped off Showboat as Dr. Walter Lungrun, the joint master, trotted up to hold the horse’s reins.

Down low in the hayfield they’d just ridden across stood Betty Franklin, longtime honorary whipper-in. An old apple orchard was on the left by the deeply sunken farm road leading up to Hangman’s Ridge.

Although she couldn’t be seen, Sybil Bancroft, waiting in there, caught her breath after the hard run.

She, too, was an honorary whipper-in, which meant she wasn’t paid for the tremendous time and effort she put into Jefferson Hunt.

Both paid and unpaid staff routinely perform heroic duties. Even if paid for it, no one enters hunt service without a grand passion for the game. You can’t handle it otherwise. It’s much too tough for modern people accustomed to the cocoon of physical comfort.

Comet had a den on the other side of Soldier Road, a two-lane paved ribbon, east-west, two and a half miles from this spot as the crow flies. As it was, St. Just, the king of the crows, was circling. He hated foxes and wanted to make sure he knew where Comet was.

Shaker took a few steps upward but couldn’t get through the pricker bushes and old still-blooming pink tea roses. The remains of a stone foundation could be glimpsed through the overgrowth.

Comet dashed into an old den there that had been vacant for four years. The original tenant, a large red dog fox, had been shot and killed.

No foxhunter can abide anyone who kills a fox in such a manner.

Few American foxhunters want to kill a fox. Even if they were vulpicides, they wouldn’t murder too many. The land, the crops planted, and the ethos of American foxhunting mitigated against the kill.

Once in the old den, Comet immediately saw room for improvement and decided he’d abandon his den at Foxglove Farm for this one. He’d be hunting in his sister’s territory, but he was sure he and Inky could accommodate each other.

Like all fox dens, this one was cleverly placed, drainage good, fresh water close by. The original tenants had created many entrances and exits, strategically placed.

“Dig him out!” Trident’s paws flew in the soft earth.

Hearing the frenzy, Comet laughed.“You can dig all the way to China, you nitwit. You’ll never get me.”

“Did you hear that?” Little Diddy couldn’t believe her ears.

“Blowhard.” Dragon dug harder than Trident.

“Not as bad as Target. That’s the most conceited fox that’s ever lived.” Diana mentioned a red dog fox who lived over at the Bancrofts.

“Good hounds, good hounds.” Shaker blew “gone to ground,” praised his hounds a bit more, then took the reins from Walter, lightly lifted himself into the saddle, and blew hounds away from the den. “Boss?” He looked to Sister Jane even though Walter had been joint master for a year now.

Walter took no offense because Sister was in charge of breeding the hounds, training them with Shaker. His responsibility revolved around taking territory duties off her shoulders. They both handled landowners, usually a pleasure.

Walter, however, studied bloodlines, preparing for that distant day when the weight of this would fall on him. He prayed the day would be very distant because she knew so much, and also because Jane Arnold was beloved by most, hated by few.

Walter believed you can judge a person by her enemies as well as her friends.

“Let’s go in, Shaker. No point in getting the hounds footsore, and we’ve been going hard for most of two hours.”

“All right, then.” He blew a note evenly, then lifted it with a lilt so his hounds knew they were walking in, as did his two whippers-in, sweating although it was forty-nine degrees out.

The horses blew out of their large nostrils. Everyone was glad to be turning back toward the trailers and toward an impromptu tailgate.

Bunny, riding with Mrs. Norton, her boss and dear friend, pulled off to the side, then fell in with Crawford, Marty, and the three girls, whom she called“The Three Amuses.”

“Where were you?” She stared accusingly at Tootie, wet from the knees down. Her eyes passed to a very silent Valentina and Felicity.

Crawford quickly answered.“I fell behind and the girls stayed with me and then I had the bad luck to slip in Broad Creek. If it weren’t for Tootie, Czpaka would have run off. You’ve trained your girls well, Bunny. I’m certainly grateful.”

She beamed at the praise. Bunny’s ego rested close to the surface. “I’m so glad they could be of service to you, Crawford.”

“Yes, thank you, girls.” Marty smiled broadly at the three kids, each pretty in her own way, although Tootie’s green eyes just jumped out at one.

As Bunny turned to ride up to Charlotte Norton, Crawford winked.

“Mr. Howard, she would have torn us a new one,” Valentina sighed. “Thank you.”

“Yes, I owe you one, sir. It’s our fault Czpaka spooked.” Tootie truly was contrite.

“This is foxhunting,” he said and winked again. “All for one and one for all.”

Each Custis Hall student made note that she’d heard that earlier. They would find out soon enough how critical and testing that philosophy was: simple, true, and to the bone.

C H A P T E R 2

After the tailgate, the rigs pulled out and Sister returned to the kennels. Her house dogs—Raleigh, a Doberman, and Rooster, a harrier—bounded along as the mercury climbed to the low sixties, the mists dissipated, and the dew sparkled on the still-green grass.

Golliwog, the calico, longhair cat, sauntered behind, not wishing to appear to be part of the group.

Sister opened the kennel door as Shaker was walking toward the office.

“Good day, really,” he beamed.

“Indeed. The fog gets disorienting but—” Sister didn’t finish her sentence as Betty, wearing her ancient Wellies, trooped toward her.

“New den.”

“Old one, new fox.” Sister smiled.

“Spooky out there for a little bit, wasn’t it?” Betty, having lost twenty pounds, now back to her schoolgirl weight, burst with energy.

“Clammy damp.” Shaker heard a yelp. He walked back down the wide aisle. “All right now.”

“He started it,” Dreamboat, a hound, tattled.

“I did not. All I did was step on his tail,” Doughboy defended himself.

Shaker sternly peered into the young boys’ run, as they called it. “You all did very well today. Don’t spoil it.”

The youngsters wagged their tails, eyes bright. They’d put their fox to ground, working right along with the “big kids.”

Shaker returned to his master and whipper-in.“Sybil said her ears played tricks on her at the base of Hangman’s Ridge. She thought she heard a truck motor up there.”

“Sound bounced like a ball.” Sister liked Sybil. Her mother, Tedi, was a friend of fifty years.

“Where is Sybil?”

“Had to hurry home. Board meeting in town. Marty Howard convinced her to serve on her literacy campaign group. Say, before I forget, Shaker, Halloween night, the boys from the Miller School will be doing something up on Hangman’s Ridge. I said I didn’t care as long as they cleaned up their mess. They’re going to the big dance at Custis Hall and then Charlotte has allowed the girls to go to the ridge, chaperoned, of course, for an hour of fright after the dance. Guess it will be big beans.”

Betty grimaced.“Too many hanged ghosts. Aren’t there eighteen or something like that?”

“Think so.” Shaker rubbed his chin. He’d missed a spot, fingered the stubble.

Sister thought of the souls wandering on the ridge as well as the souls of all those they harmed in life.“Well, the world’s full of anguish. Let’s keep it at bay.”

“I’ll go start on the tack.” Betty wiped her hands on the coveralls she’d slipped over her britches. “That’s my contribution to keeping anguish at bay.”

“The Custis Hall girls already did it.”

“They did?” Betty smiled.

“Their own idea. Neither Charlotte nor Bunny pushed them to it.” Sister, a board member of Custis Hall, was pleased at the young women’s thoughtfulness. “Good job, too.”

“Bunny Taliaferro makes them break down the tack and clean it with toothbrushes,” Betty laughed. “Not every day, of course.”

“She’s a hard nut, that one.” Among these two friends, Shaker could freely express himself.

“Yes, she is. A good-looking woman, but stern,” Sister agreed.

“Sure knows how to turn riders into horsemen. Got to give her that.” Betty folded her arms over her chest, then noticed a cobweb up in the corner of the office that she had to attack immediately with the crop Shaker had placed on the desk. “Gotcha.”

“Spider will haunt you,” Sister laughed.

“I didn’t kill her. I’ve only invited her to spin her web elsewhere.”

“I sure miss Jennifer and Sari,” Sister changed the subject. “Not just because they cleaned tack. Those two were a tonic.”

Jennifer was Betty’s youngest daughter. Her oldest, Cody, languished in jail, having fallen by the wayside thanks to drugs. Sari Rusmussen was Jennifer’s best friend and the daughter of Shaker’s girlfriend of one year.

“Well, she loves, loves, loves Colby College. I tell her, you keep loving it, honey, wait until that Maine winter settles in for eight months. She and Sari talk to each other every day via e-mail even though they’re roommates.”

“Why in the world do they do that?” Sister, although a fan of her iMac G5, still considered using it drudgery.

“They have one other roommate,” Betty said and burst out laughing. “And they can’t stand her, of course.”

“What do you hear?” Sister asked Shaker.

“Thriving.” He paused. “Lorraine’s not. In the last month she’s sent four care packages, one a week.” He smiled a warm, engaging smile.

A knock on the door turned their heads in that direction.

“Come on in,” Sister called out.

Marty opened it and stuck her head inside.“You didn’t forget our meeting, did you?”

Betty and Sister looked at each other, because they had.

“Oh, Marty, I’m so sorry. I saw Sam drive away with Crawford in the passenger seat and I blanked out. Betty, come on.”

“Let me get out of my coveralls and Wellies.”

“You make a fashion statement,” Marty teased her.

“The aroma of horse manure is a bonus. Be right up.”

As Sister left with Marty, the two dogs fell in behind and Golly brought up the rear.

“Black bottom, you got ’em.” Golly sang a few notes from the old 1926 song.

“She’s referring to you.” Rooster’s pink tongue stuck out between his teeth.

“I’m not paying any attention to her.” Raleigh lifted his noble head higher.

“How much is that doggy in the window?” Golly moved forward in time to Patti Page’s 1953 hit song.

“Golly, what’s the matter with you, going mental on us again?” Rooster loved to torment the cat. It was mutual.

“Death to all dogs!” she screamed, shot forward, jumped off the ground, and hit Rooster on the side with all four paws. She bounded off like a swimmer making a turn in a pool, then she scorched ahead of the dogs, blasted past the humans, and climbed up the old pawpaw tree, where she immediately struck a pose on a large branch.

“You’re very impressive,” Sister drily commented as she and Marty passed under the pawpaw tree.

“I am who I am! I am the mightiest cat in all Christendom. Dogs shudder at the mention of my name, Killer Kitty!”

“I’m going to throw up,” Rooster coughed.

“Roundworms,” Golly taunted.

Raleigh, on his hind legs, tried to reach the branch.

Betty, hurrying to catch up, called out to the sleek animal.“Your mother will give you such a smack.”

Sister turned and beheld Raleigh, Rooster waiting at the bottom of the tree.“Boys, leave her alone.”

“You’re lucky she protects you or I’d be throwing up a big hairball: you,” Rooster barked with mock menace.

Sister called over her shoulder,“Boys, she’s not worth it.”

“Ha!” Raleigh dropped to all fours and pranced toward the three women as Betty caught up.

Rooster followed.

“She doesn’t protect me. I can blind you with a single blow. I can tear out your whiskers one by one. I can bite your tail in two.”

“Ignore her,” Sister said in a singsong voice.

“You’re afraid of me. Admit it!” Golly ratcheted up the volume. She huffed, she thrashed her tail. No response. The two dogs didn’t even turn to watch her. Disgruntled, she backed down the tree, grumbling loudly, so loudly that Cora, the head bitch, could hear it in the big girls’ run.

“Golly, pipe down, I need my beauty rest,” Cora said as she stretched out.

“Face it, girl, you need plastic surgery,” Golly fired back again at high volume. She then dug her claws in the grass, wiggled her behind, and tore off, flying past the dogs and humans. She soared over the chrysanthemums filling richly glazed pots by the mudroom door. She then sat down to lick her front paws as the people approached.

“Golly certainly has a high opinion of herself,” Betty laughed.

“Don’t they all?” Sister laughed in turn.

C H A P T E R 3

As Sister, Betty, and Marty walked toward the house, Comet was enlarging the den in the stone ruins. His den across Soldier Road on Cindy Chandler’s farm appeared shabby to him compared to this. The other motivation for switching dens involved his housekeeping skills. He had none. His old den was filling up with bones, feathers, and fur. Some foxes are good organizers, others aren’t.

He cheerfully lined the main section with grass, made note of good places for extra entrances and exits, and was particularly pleased that the creek gurgled one hundred yards below him. He was close to water but in no danger of flooding. To make the site even better, the pricker bushes and rambling old tea roses would keep out the nosy.

The hands that cut and placed the stone vanished from the earth in 1787. The small house was eventually abandoned as the next generation prospered to build the first section of Roughneck Farm, the simple but large, graceful house that Sister and her husband, Raymond, bought when young marrieds. It had a roof and walls but the staircases had collapsed. It was a ruin. Together they restored the place, doing much of the work themselves. In good time, Raymond began to make a lot of money. By the time they reached their midthirties they could pay for any repairs or improvements.

While Sister knew of this old, well-built foundation, she never cleared it. She recognized a splendid site for a den as well as Comet. She wanted Roughneck Farm to appeal to foxes the way Murray Hill appeals to a certain kind of Manhattan resident.

Comet carried in more sweetgrass and suddenly dropped to his belly, hearing a light flutter of mighty wings. These wings were silent until it was too late.

A pair of huge balled-up talons raked his back.

He snarled, then bolted for the main entrance. He heard a large bird walking around the opening to his den and cursed that he hadn’t time to dig out more exits.

“Oh, come on out, you big chicken,” a deep voice chortled.

“Athena.” He popped his head out as the two-foot great horned owl turned her head nearly upside down to stare at him.

“Scared you,” she laughed again.

“Nah, I wanted to make you feel good,” he lied.

She blinked, her large golden eyes both beautiful and hypnotizing.“You are too clever by half. Take care, Comet, that you don’t come to a bad end. You put me in mind of Dragon, that arrogant hound. He’s another one who pays no heed to good sense.”

Comet emerged from his den. Arguing with Athena could bring reprisals. She wasn’t just the queen of the night, she was the queen, period, but her authority irritated him. On the other hand, foxes and owls were allies and it was best not to disturb the equilibrium.

“Isn’t death always a bad end?”

“No.” She unruffled her feathers, the sunlight warming her.

“H-m-m. I don’t want to go anytime soon.”

“Who does unless they’re suffering?” She paused, turned her head around almost backward to behold Bitsy, the screech owl, flying toward them.“God, I hope she isn’t going to sing to us.”

Bitsy lived in Sister’s barn. A little thing, but her voice could wake the dead. She so wanted to be like the great horned owl whose voice, sonorous and low, filled the forests and meadows with melancholy beauty.

As hunting had been good for all the prey animals, they lingered in the soft early-morning light before retiring to their nests and dens. The foxes, on such a warming autumn day, would find flat rocks on which to sunbathe.

“Guess what?” Bitsy also lived for gossip.

“What?” Comet humored her.

“You scared the bejabbers out of those Custis Hall girls. I heard them talking at the tailgate.”

“This pipsqueak scared them?” Athena asked, which thrilled the screech owl, who felt she had important information.

“They were separated from the others, wandering about in the mist. Comet popped out right in front of them, uttered a few unkind words, and took off. It’s a pity humans have such poor senses. Those girls, when they first took the wrong turn, couldn’t have been more than a hundred yards from the other humans, yet they couldn’t smell horse or human. They rode left, everyone else rode right. It’s a wonder humans have survived.”

“Herd animals. They can’t survive without one another,” Comet astutely noted.

“That doesn’t explain their inability to smell. What’s the difference if there’s one human or one thousand? They still don’t know what’s under their nose, literally.” Bitsy puffed out her plump breast.

“Now, Bitsy, every creature on earth has figured out what it must do to live. Humans are day hunters, we’re night hunters. Their eyes aren’t too bad in the light. Nothing like ours, naturally, but they’re perfectly serviceable. They can climb trees, build things. They are so successful now that most of them don’t realize how weak they are. Ah, well, it will all come to a bad end,” Athena said and sighed.

“That’s what you said about me and that snot, Dragon.”

“Really!” Bitsy’s huge eyes grew even larger as she listened to Comet. She then turned to her heroine.“Did you say that?”

“I did. And now, of course, you want to know why.” Athena raised her right eyebrow.“Because both of them are too clever by half. Sooner or later, they’ll reach too far.”

Comet smiled.“Is that an observation or a prophecy?”

“Both,” Athena succinctly replied.

“Any other prophecies?” He unfurled his long pink tongue.

“Here’s an observation before a prophecy. You’re in Inky’s territory. You’d better reach an accord.”

Inky, a gray fox whose coat was so dark she shone glistening black, was a beloved friend of most of the other animals as well as Sister and the hounds. Everyone knew Inky. She visited the kennels nightly as she made her rounds. The only animal who didn’t like Inky was Golly.

“There’s so much game this season. I don’t think Inky will mind.” He considered Athena’s advice, though.“But you’re right. No point getting on her bad side. And I can’t take her for granted even though we are littermates.”

“Her cubs are leaving the den. They’re making their way in the world. What if one of them wanted this den?” Bitsy kept tabs on the neighborhoods.

“I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it.” Comet had no intention of surrendering his new apartment.“Athena, your prophecy?”

“We’re a week from All Hallow’s Eve. Propitiate the dead.”

“Some dead can’t be satisfied.” Bitsy believed in ghosts. She’d seen them.

Comet, like most animals, was sensitive to what humans especially couldn’t explain. They often felt spirits around them, but the species was hag-ridden by logic. Few would admit to the experience.“Not a good time to go to Hangman’s Ridge.”

Athena’s voice lowered.“And it will be black as pitch on All Hallow’s Eve, beware.”

C H A P T E R 4

The bricks of Custis Hall’s original four buildings around the quad had faded over the two centuries of their existence into a glowing paprika. Mt. Holyoke, founded on November 8, 1837, boasted being the first institution of higher learning for young ladies. But Custis Hall, a preparatory school, predated Mt. Holyoke by twenty-five years. It masqueraded as a finishing school. The girls learned management, mathematics, Latin, French, embroidery (a good hand was considered one of the gracious arts), a smattering of history, and a bit of literature, although the reading of modern novels was discouraged by the administration. Novels were considered racy. A copy ofMoll Flanders orLes Liaisons Dangereuses could park a pretty bottom on a hard bench in front of the headmistress.

Charlotte Norton smiled to herself thinking about the history of Custis Hall as she eased off the accelerator, turned right onto the campus, passing through the monstrously large wrought-iron gates, the morning sun hitting the buildings so they shimmered. She never tired of seeing the restrained architecture. She loved her work and felt not one pang of jealousy when her former graduate school classmates moved ever closer to becoming presidents of universities, a few already presidents of smaller colleges. Her passion was secondary school.

She noticed, as she coasted into her parking space, a van with the local TV station’s call letters and number on it. It was parked illegally alongside the main campus road and she had no idea where the campus police might be.

The only vehicles allowed beyond the parking lot were service vehicles. The door to her new Volvo AWD VC70 station wagon closed with a comforting heavy thud. She heard chanting.

Her boot heels clicked as she hurried along the stone path, worn from use, toward the back of Old Main Hall. She’d intended to dash into her office, change clothes, and get on with her day. She’d left her cell phone to charge on her desk and now regretted that decision. Usually she called Teresa Bourbon, her assistant, at least once before reaching her office.

The chanting grew louder. She pulled open the back door to Old Main, the long polished wooden corridor before her.

“Plantation! Plantation! The Custis Hall Plantation.”

“What the hell?” she muttered to herself, noticing, as she raced to her office, that no one was in theirs.

She skidded to her open door, Teresa commanding the anteroom.

“Mrs. Norton, we’ve got a situation.” Teresa met her boss’s gaze levelly as she used the old black expression.

“Jesus, what is going on?”

“There are fifty girls in the Main Hall, one TV reporter, and one print reporter. They have just discovered that Custis Hall was founded by a slave owner.” Teresa, African American, held up her hand, her silver rings shining. “And they are deeply upset by the artifacts displayed in Main Hall.”

A long stream of air blew out of Charlotte’s delicately shaped nostrils, her nose slightly upturned. “I can’t go out there in riding habit.”

“Oh, why not?” Teresa wickedly smiled. “You’ll confirm their idea that you’re the Miss’us.”

Charlotte loved Teresa. They’d worked cheek by jowl for nine years. The thirty-six-year-old woman knew exactly how to handle her. Charlotte flew into her paneled office, ran to the bathroom, shed her jacket, vest, and shirt, grunting as she pulled off her boots with the stand-up boot pull. She yanked a deep carmine cashmereturtleneck sweater over her head. This was followed by a pleated black skirt. She used her coveted staghandle boot pulls to pull up a pair of soft Italian leather boots. She took a very deep breath, then calmly walked out of her office as Teresa winked.

“Don’t you want to witness this?”

“No. Gotta mind the store. If it gets really good, I’ll lock the door and come fetch you home.”

“Oh, Teresa,” Charlotte smiled softly, “I think I’m about to be called a racist pig.”

“Could be worse.”

“I suppose it could.” With that, Charlotte squared her shoulders, lifted her head, and strode to the great entry hall at the front of Old Main.

At the sight of her, students renewed their vigor and volume. Dwayne Rickman, fiftyish, a local celebrity as a TV reporter, moved toward her with the microphone.

She saw the two overwhelmed security fellows, men way past their prime but still wearing a uniform, swing toward him.

Knute Nilsson, treasurer, looked relieved as she took over, as did Alfonso Perez, the director of alumnae affairs. They’d been holding the girls at bay, assisted by Amy Childers, the head of the science department, and her brother, a board member, Christopher Stoltenfuss. Knute, a natural leader, quick-thinking, told the other teachers to stay with their routine, don’t leave the classroom. Amy happened to be coming in for an appointment with Charlotte and simply got caught in the middle. Her brother had come for a meeting with Knute so they felt like deer in headlights.

Al Perez had walked out of his office the minute he heard the chanting. He and Knute worked well together. They had things, more or less, under control. Everyone adored Al, a sunny personality in his early thirties, a new baby at home, career on the upswing. To date, he was the only Hispanic faculty member, and he adamantly pushed for hiring more Hispanic faculty.

“Mrs. Norton, what is Custis Hall doing to accommodate its African-American students?” Dwayne asked politely.

“Custis Hall’s mission is to give each young women a superior education, a grounding for life. Her race, her religion, her class background are irrelevant to that task but relevant to our knowledge of her. We have the highest number of scholarship students of any preparatory school on the East Coast.” As she spoke her eyes swept over the fifty-odd girls. Perhaps one-third of them were students of color; the others, white, appeared even more impassioned than the African-American students. Her Hispanic and Asian students were conspicuous by their absence.

“Custis Hall is the plantation,” Pamela Rene, the ringleader, began the chant.

The others took it up but quieted as Dwayne asked more questions. He signaled his cameraman to cut the lights.

“Mrs. Norton, thank you.” He nodded to her.

Dwayne liked Charlotte Norton. She did a lot for the community. Her husband, Carter, head of neurosurgery at the local hospital, was another tremendous asset. Dwayne had been around long enough to know a setup when he saw one. He’d do his best with the footage he shot to make sure Custis Hall and Charlotte came out ahead.

The print reporter evidenced no loyalty to Custis Hall or Charlotte. He was new to the area and this story held about as much appeal to him as covering brush fires in the county.

“Ladies,” Charlotte addressed the assembled, who did give her the courtesy of silence, “I’d be untruthful if I didn’t tell you I’m surprised. I had no idea you were uneasy about our founder, our beginnings, but as you can see, Mr. Nilsson, Mr. Perez, Mrs. Childers, and our board of directors member, Mr. Stoltenfuss, are in front of you. We’ll listen, but we can’t listen in this setting. A charged subject demands cool heads and a better place in which to discuss the issues.”

Pamela spoke out, pointing to the locked glass cases that contained artifacts of Miss Custis’s life: George Washington’s epaulettes; a dress worn by his wife, Martha; pots, iron skillets, plowshares, old bits. A marvelous carriage, impeccably equipped, sat on a dais in the center of Main Hall. All objects represented the life of Martha Washington’s niece. “Slaves made these thingsbut they get no credit! That’s wrong.”

Charlotte had to bite her tongue because the dress had been fashioned in Paris. This was clearly spelled out in the hand-painted cards identifying each item. However, Pamela was correct about the other artifacts. She neglected to mention that there was a brief gloss on slave labor. Didn’t matter. It wasn’t enough and it wasn’t what Pamela wanted: attention.

“Ladies, I’m willing to meet with you one by one or in groups. But this calls for quiet thinking and a great deal of research.”

Knute stepped in and spoke, for which Charlotte was grateful.“So much was destroyed between 1861 and 1865. We’ve lost a lot, including information about the Custis family. No one paid much attention to slaves or women. Their lives weren’t well documented. Miss Custis merited attention because she was related to George and Martha Washington. We’ll address your concerns as Mrs. Norton said. But let’s take this one step at a time, calmly and deliberately.” Knute felt no need to apologize for Custis Hall’s founder. The past was the past. It certainly was open to reinterpretation, but he couldn’t change a damned thing about it.

The situation cooled. The adults herded the girls out of the Main Hall. They promised to set up individual appointments. Also, this issue would be addressed at November’s convocation, the first of the new school year. The all-school assembly was held the first Monday of each month.

Just as the girls moved out of Old Main, walking across the quad were Tootie, Valentina, and Felicity.

In a booming voice, Pamela shouted at Tootie,“Traitor!”

Tootie blanched but did not reply.

Valentina did.“Pamela, you aren’t happy unless you’re unhappy. Go sit on it.”

Charlotte stepped forward. The three riders could now see her, as she’d been obscured by the crowd. “Ladies, that’s quite enough for one day.”

No one said a word, not even contentious Pamela, who stared daggers at Valentina.

When Charlotte reached the anteroom, Teresa looked up over Charlotte’s head before she could open her mouth. Hard on Charlotte’s well-shod heels tumbled Al, Knute, Christopher, and Amy.

Turning, Charlotte said in a sweet voice,“Come in. Let’s sit down and have a cup of coffee.”

“Coffee, hell, I want a drink,” Knute good-naturedly said.

“I second the motion.” Christopher wiped his brow with a Brooks Brothers linen handkerchief.

Knute, at forty-eight, maintained a boyish look and a trim body, his hair blond, lightly salted with gray.

Christopher, a few years older, carted around a potbelly that even his expensive suits couldn’t totally conceal. His complexion was florid, his manner brusque, which suited him as a prosecuting attorney aiming to run for governor. He bagged the high-profile cases and he won more often than not, even against the highly paid attorneys defendants hired. Christopher was a man to be reckoned with, to watch.

His sister evidenced the same incisive mind, although her field was the natural sciences. But like her brother, she had a combative nature. Being female, she tried to hide it, with mixed results.

Charlotte pointed the men to the bar, and Amy joined them. She stuck her head out of her office.“Teresa, call down to Dorothy and ask her to bring some sandwiches, more hot coffee, and hot tea; you know the drill.”

Dorothy directed food services.

“Will do.” Teresa, observant, keenly intelligent, and a touch shy, picked up the phone to buzz Dorothy.

Knute filled in Charlotte about the protest, for she’d missed only the first ten minutes. He said it appeared to be well organized.

“I’m open to all suggestions.” Charlotte sat in a wing chair as the others, drinks in hand, settled themselves in leather chairs or the comfortable leather sofa.

Al waited for tea. He wasn’t much of a drinker.

“Charlotte, the girls do have a point. We never gave much thought to what’s in those cases except to dust the stuff.”

“He’s right.” Amy gulped a gin and tonic, a bit of lime pulp catching in her teeth. She flicked it down with her tongue and bit into it—the tang of lime tasted wonderful. “Always looked like junk to me.”

“Amy, if it isn’t a mastodon’s tooth, you aren’t interested,” her brother teased her.

Knute ignored them. He addressed Charlotte.“I’ll help you call the board of directors if you like. We should schedule an emergency meeting.”

“Good thinking, but I don’t see how we can do that until Tuesday. It’s hard to get people together quickly at the end of the month, and there are only four more days left in October, two of those being Saturday and Sunday. Also, I want to meet with some of these girls before I meet with the board.”

“Good idea,” Al agreed. “Want me to call our largest contributors?”

“No,” Charlotte quickly said. “Not yet, Al. This may all blow over.”

“M-m-m, let sleeping dogs lie.” Knute held his shot of Johnnie Walker Blue under his nose for a moment.

Charlotte kept a well-stocked bar that she paid for herself. Knute would never open his wallet to buy such an expensive blended Scotch, but he was quite prepared to drink hers. Teresa locked the bar when she left each night if Charlotte didn’t do it first.

“You’ve got to hand it to the kids who planned this. They didn’t get destructive and had the forethought to call the media.” Christopher wanted another drink but waited for the coffee and tea. It really was too early.

“How could all those kids keep their mouths shut?” Knute wondered out loud.

It crossed Charlotte’s mind that Tootie may have known but refused to participate. Still, she, too, remained silent. Charlotte wanted to talk to Tootie, Valentina, and Felicity. Better to catch up with them after a hunt. As for the other girls, it was going to be a true sit-down.

“It’s a strange time in life.” Amy had now fished out the wedge of lime to suck on it. “They have good powers of thought, most of them, but they are emotionally retarded.”

“I take issue with that,” Al bristled. “Not every young person lacks experience. Nor is every girl blinded by her hormones.”

“Al, you make excuses for them,” Amy said, but not in an accusatory manner.

“I’m glad you care about them as you do.” Charlotte hoped to defuse the ever-present tension between Al and Amy, oil and water.

“What do you think?” Christopher asked Charlotte.

“We can handle it. And we do need research. We need a new light on everything in those cases. That’s an excellent task for all our history classes. The English classes can rewrite the descriptions. History classes can present the background of the time. Of course, this senior class will be out of here by the time all the evidence, if you will, is in. Still, it’s a start and it ought to smooth things over.”

“As in pacify them?” Al raised an eyebrow.

“Well, not exactly. Smooth things over is the wrong expression. Having the English and history departments involved means the girls really will be participating. Try to remember, Al, as headmistress I’d like this to be a harmonious place. As director of alumnae affairs I expect you’d like that as well.”

“I do, I do, but I don’t think we should trivialize their concerns.”

“Oh, bull, Al, Pamela Rene has been a pain in the ass since her sophomore year. I’m surprised she hasn’t thought of this before. She’s furious because she wasn’t elected class president. You will recall she accused Valentina of voter fraud. A bad apple,” Knute said.

“She has a mother who was once the highest-paid model in New York and still wants the limelight, and a father who has built one of the largest trucking companies in America. There’s not much time for Pamela.” Amy knew the Rene family well. “As for those treasures in the cases, do we really want the kids handling them?”

“I hadn’t thought of that.” Al glanced quickly at Amy.

Dorothy and two assistants rolled in a table of sandwiches, cakes, freshly cut vegetables, dipping sauces, a large pot of coffee, and a large pot of tea.

“I didn’t know how hungry I was,” Knute said, waiting for Charlotte to stand.

“Please”—she indicated they should fill their plates.

The two assistants poured coffee, helped with plates. Dorothy returned to her office over the dining hall, a room right out of Oxford, stained-glass windows shining bits of color on mahogany panels.

“Amy, Knute, Al, if there are any students you feel close to, talk to them. I’ll ask our other faculty to also be on the alert for anyone who might need extra attention or guidance. Sometimes the girls need to vent.” Charlotte couched her orders as thoughts while the others ate. “Christopher, I know you’re overburdened, but perhaps you could put an assistant on researching any suits that have been pressed over similar issues.”

“You know, that would be interesting,” and he meant that, too.

“Knute, one more time,” she smiled, “go over our budget and see if there’s any fat that can be squeezed to send some of the girls on research trips, say to Poplar Forest or Mount Vernon.”

“They can use the Internet,” Amy replied before Knute could.

“They’ll do that anyway,” Charlotte answered. “If they go to places Miss Custis knew as a child, as a young woman their age, it will make it much more vivid.” She turned to Knute. “Take a peek.”

“All right.” He settled in to a club sandwich.

They batted around more ideas. Charlotte discreetly kept her eye on the time.

“You know, we were lucky no one smashed a case,” Al said. “How could we ever replace Washington’s epaulettes? We were really lucky.”

Knute replied,“That’s exactly why I think the cases should stay locked, and I agree with Amy, the kids don’t need their hands on those things.”

“Do we have a value on that stuff?” Amy was curious.

“Well, we really don’t.” Charlotte wrinkled her brow for a second. “I guess we could hire an appraiser, but how would you value a page from George Washington’s diary or his wife’s hunting crop?”

“That’s just it, Charlotte, someone has to, because those things are irreplaceable. National treasures.” Christopher’s pleasant voice filled the room. “Course, if the girls smash the cabinets, I’ll have to get them on breaking and entering.” He smiled.

“Would you like me to find an appraiser?” Al asked. “I’m sure many of our alumnae have valuable items and would be a source for recommendations.”

“Al, with all due respect, I don’t think we should go that route until the waters are becalmed.” Knute sailed in his spare time and dotted his conversations with sailing terms.

“That’s a thought.” Charlotte leaned toward Knute. “If we discuss what we have in our care in terms of cold cash, at this moment, we may invite more reprisals. But I definitely think this is necessary for the near future and we must find someone whose credentials are impeccable.”

“You know, if I’d known it was going to be this much trouble, I’d have picked the cotton myself,” Amy commented and languidly sipped her coffee.

“That is so insensitive! Amy, you astonish me.” Al’s face reddened.

“For Christ’s sake, get a sense of humor.” She stared at him.

“But that’s always it, isn’t it?” He bore down on Amy. “The oppressed are supposed to laugh when the oppressor makes fun of them. How can you laugh at your own suffering? I mean, do you think it’s funny if someone white wears blackface? Used to be a scream. Do you think it’s funny if a man gets up in drag?”

“Watch it, Al, you’ll kick off the transgender discussion.” Christopher, unlike Amy, chose his words with some care.

“Oh, balls!” Al put down his coffee cup with force.

An assistant quickly took it away, replacing it with a filled one that hadn’t spilled.

“Al, Amy is direct. Perhaps she is insensitive sometimes, but give her credit for being honest.” Knute wearied of these two sparring.

“You can be honest and dead wrong,” Al replied.

“I suppose you’d like to emphasize the dead.” Amy did have a sense of humor.

“With all due respect, this has been a trying morning. I value each of you for your contributions, but I’m not up to being a referee for my faculty and staff at this exact moment.” Charlotte’s voice was firm. “Everyone here has appointments. If you haven’t had enough to eat, take a sandwich, we can put a drink in a carry mug for you. But let’s get back on course.”

Charlotte cleared her office in ten minutes. She thanked the assistants, then she walked out to Teresa.“Can you believe those two?”

“I tune them out.” Teresa glanced over a list of calls she’d taken while Charlotte met with the group. “Your husband called. He’ll be home by six. He said he has a surprise.” Teresa looked up and smiled. “Bunny called. Said call her back when you have a minute. Nothing urgent. Um, Sonny Shaeffer called, you’ll receive an invitation for the bank’s Christmas party but he wants you and Carter to put it on your calendar now, um-m, December sixteenth, Friday.”

“Teresa, what do you think of all this?”

“I don’t know.”

“Are you saying that because I’m white?” Charlotte didn’t hold back.

“After all we’ve been through? Now you’re getting as sensitive as Al Perez.” She waited a beat. “If I’d had reporters in my face and Pamela Rene, you know, I’d be a little touchy myself. I don’t know what I think except—”

“Except what?”

“I have a strange feeling. I can’t pin it on anything. I know you hate clich?s but, Charlotte, I think this is the tip of the iceberg.”

C H A P T E R 5

“Lights, camera, action!” Marty Howard threw up her manicured hands, one magnificent marquise diamond catching the light. “Every year every hunt club puts on the standard, three-speed hunt ball. We’re breaking out.”

“As long as break out doesn’t mean break bad,” Sister slyly inserted into Marty’s eruption of ideas.

“Oh, Sister, how bad can it be?”

At that, Betty roared,“You have no idea. Get a mess of foxhunters in their best duds liquored up, all that cleavage suddenly in view, and fistfights and running off with other people’s spouses seems normal.”

Marty exclaimed,“Nothing like that ever happened in Indiana.”

“That’s why you moved here, dear,” Sister said in a silken voice.

Marty, while bright, missed the gradations of Virginia humor. She blinked.“Well, we came because Crawford wanted to retire at forty and get into the horse business, but I guess we got more than we bargained for. He’s built the hunter barn, the steeplechase barn, and now he wants to breed Herefords, the kind with horns. He’s either researching bloodlines on that computer he had built—to the tune of fifteen thousand dollars—or he’s reading stock market quotes on it.”

“Back to this hunt ball. Marty, I so appreciate you taking on this task. Getting Bill Wheatley and the theater students to help with decorating was a master stroke,” Sister praised Marty. “And I know even if you don’t make it public that you and Crawford have given a generous donation to Custis Hall for the theater department’s services.”

“We were happy to do it.” Marty glowed, for she did like being useful, and after eleven years she was finally feeling like part of the group.

“Betty as vice chair—and I accentuate thevice—really does know where all the bodies are buried and she can take care of the table sittings.” Sister smiled at Betty. “What else? Forgive me, by the way, for not being better organized. Over the years our social chairs have kept the Jefferson Hunt hopping and popping. I didn’t have to do but so much. Also, I’m not too good at this kind of thing.”

Betty was scribbling on a notebook Sister had given her.“Your job is to show sport. Our job is to show we’re sports.”

“What a good way to put it,” Marty agreed. “Well, this will be the hunt ball to end all hunt balls.”

“Key position: head of the silent auction. Hunt balls can’t pay for themselves. The silent auction is your one hope to get in the black.” Betty reminded them of the ever-present need for money. “How’s Sorrel Buruss doing on getting items?”

“So far so good. She’s gotten the usual stuff—framed prints, weekend getaway spots, and dinners. What we’re lacking are the big, flashy items,” Marty answered.

They chatted awhile longer, drew up lists, again picked through the budget.

They experimented with different days over the years, throwing the ball the evening of Opening Hunt, or the evening of Closing Hunt. They found December to work the best. Everyone was in a holiday mood, people could get off work, and the bills had not rolled in to spoil everything. This year’s ball was set for Saturday, December 17.

The venue, the Great Hall at Custis Hall, had been used by Jefferson Hunt for over one hundred years. The vaulted ceilings added a medieval air to the many celebrations, concerts, convocations that took place there.

Ten years ago the whole facility had been rewired, refurbished. A rock band could play without frying the electrical system.

The serving kitchen had also been updated.

The Great Hall supplied Custis Hall with bonus money, as groups would rent it to the tune of thirty-five hundred dollars before food, service, linens, tables.

Given the long relationship with Jefferson Hunt, the club need only pay for the food, service, and tableware.

Their century-plus relationship was the reason Jane Arnold sat on the board of directors. The senior master of the hunt club had served in this capacity since 1887.

As the ladies finished their coffee and biscuits, wrapping up details, Marty’s cell rang.

“Hi, honey,” she answered. “You’re exactly right.” She listened some more. “I’ll be home shortly. At least you and Sam could hunt this morning before all this happened.” More listening. “You know best.” She made a big smooching sound. “Bye bye.” She pressed the off button. “His computer blew up again. I use my Dell, got a good deal, and I have a real nice printer. Whole thing about nine-fifty.” She laughed. “But Crawford hires some geek from New York, builds the whole deal, has to have an ASUS motherboard, this bell and that whistle. And now my dear, darling husband is on the phone once a day to this computer whiz because he can’t figure out how to work the expensive piece of junk.” She sighed dramatically. “Men.”

“Boys and their toys,” Betty laughed.

“I can’t pick on them. I’m just as bad. If there’s a gadget in the hardware store that promises bliss, I buy it.” Sister’s workshop bore testimony to this small passion.

“Before I forget. Are you going to make an appearance at Custis Hall’s Halloween party?” Betty asked the master.

“No, are you?”

“We’ll be there,” Betty replied.

“Crawford and I will be going, too. That’s our second stop that Saturday. Halloween is a major party night.” Marty smiled. “Full moon on the seventeenth. There won’t be enough light to cast an eerie glow.”

Halloween fell on Monday this year, but all the parties would be on Saturday, naturally.

“Well, I know Charlotte will be glad you all are attending. I can’t go. Delia might whelp that night. I don’t want to leave her because I told Shaker he could go to the party with Lorraine at the firehouse. He was going to sit up with Delia. He hardly ever gets out. He is the most conscientious man. We’re lucky to have him.”

“Hear. Hear.” Betty adored the huntsman.

“This thing with Lorraine might just work out,” Sister winked.

The phone rang. Sister got up. Caller I.D. showed the number was Charlotte Norton’s.

“Excuse me, girls.” Sister picked up the phone. “Charlotte, hello.” She listened. Then she listened intently. “I see.” She was quiet again, then said, “Well, it can’t be ignored, but perhaps it can be contained.” More listening. “A special meeting Tuesday afternoon.” She checked her wall calendar. “I’ll be there. We’ll be finished hunting. Actually, you might need the exercise to get your blood up for all this.” She scribbled on the calendar with a 0.7 thickness of lead mechanical pencil. “I’ll be there and let me know if there’s anything I can do.”

As she hung up, Betty’s eyebrows raised, she pursed her lips. “What?”

“There’s been a protest at Custis Hall. About fifty girls, black and white, called the school a plantation. They appear to be particularly upset over the displays.”

“What, a bunch of dresses and hair ribbons?” Betty threw up her hands.

“The girls feel there has to be better recognition of slave contributions. That’s what I’ve gotten out of this so far. Charlotte said she’ll be meeting with the girls to dig underneath.”

“The girls may have gone about it the wrong way, but we do need to recognize slaves’ work. History, at least the way they taught it in Indiana when I was in school, was and probably still is about great men and wars.” Marty, a liberal in most respects, instinctively sided with the protesters.

“Who will ever know the truth?” Sister shrugged as she sat back down. “Whoever wins writes history. The truth has nothing to do with it.” She stopped herself. “Well, I doubt this protest will dampen the Halloween dance.”

“Oh, it will all blow over,” Betty predicted.

C H A P T E R 6

The ivy climbing over the brick buildings of Custis Hall swayed gently in the light breeze.

This October 29 the twilight surrendered to darkness after a sunset of flame gold and violet.

The air already carried a bite to it. Revelers slipped through the various quads. The parking lot behind the Great Hall was filled with faculty cars, administration cars, and one white Miller School bus disgorging the boys in costumes. One fellow came dressed as Queen Christina of Sweden, an interesting twist since she often dressed as a man. The other young men wore clothes reflecting manly images: pirates, cowboys, spacemen, Batman, Spiderman, a robot, generals from all epochs, Richard Nixon, and a few desultory ghosts.

William Wheatley, head of the theater department, prided himself on the high level of teaching in his department.

Tonight, the girls specializing in set design made him proud. Bill was nearing retirement. This year would be his last hurrah.

Al Perez, one of the chaperones, dressed as Zorro, stood outside the massive front doors to greet the partyers. Valentina Smith, as senior class president, stood next to him. Charlotte Norton flanked her. The other uncostumed chaperones—Amy Childers, Knute Nilsson, Bunny Taliaferro, and Bill Wheatley—moved through the crowd, stopping to talk to students. From time to time, Knute would slip out back to check the parking lot. The kids were ingenious in sneaking weed and booze.

Green light bathed the outside doors. Inside, three-foot wall sconces flickered with fake flames, while the other sconces were held by dismembered hands? la Cocteau’sBeauty and the Beast. The girls had done good work.

The light from both the permanent and the theater-built sconces infused the Great Hall with splashes of light in ponds of shadow.

A giant spiderweb hung overhead with a large black widow, her red eyes complementing the red hourglass on her body. She slid up and down the main strands of her web, causing shrieks from the costumed humans below. Smaller spiderwebs, dusted in various colors, blacklit, added to the scary decor. Witches flew about on brooms, the whir of motors distinguished as they passed over. The moan of a werewolf swelled into a howl and blended into the screams. A fake moon rose behind the stage constructed for the band.

Outside, the darkness contrasted with the false moon inside the Great Hall. Betty and Bobby as well as Crawford and Marty left at ten-thirty, bidding Zorro, who guarded the front doors, good-bye. The kids would dance until midnight, then load up on school buses, go to Hangman’s Ridge, then back to the dorms after an hour there.

The Miller School boys were dazzled by the technical display.

At midnight, the sconces were extinguished. The spider’s eyes glowed in the blackness. She slid down to the center of the web, and from her silkjets came a stream of little sparkly flashlights, which clattered to the floor. The girls who built all this picked them up first and turned them on. Tiny blue lights, red lights, white lights beamed. The other students, now down on their hands and knees, scooped up the lights. Dots of light danced as the spider moved back up to the corner, the witches flew about one last time, jack-o’-lanterns cackled, and the ghosts groaned.

Charlotte and her husband, Carter, stood by the doors to send the revelers off while Bunny Taliaferro and Bill Wheatley rounded them up. Al Perez and Amy Childers, squabbling at low volume, shepherded everyone out to the parking lot.

School buses painted in school colors awaited the kids. The Custis Hall bus was parked immediately behind the Miller School bus. Bill Wheatley was already on the Custis Hall bus.

“Honey, I should be home by one-thirty,” Charlotte said as she kissed Carter on the cheek.

“Oh, what the heck, I’ll go with you.” He grabbed her hand, and they walked to the station wagon as Zorro waved and sprinted by to his car.

As Charlotte settled behind the driver’s seat, she leaned over, kissing Carter on the check. “Thanks, honey.”

She turned on the motor and slowly backed out. As they drove out the winding, tree-lined road they noticed Zorro walking in the opposite direction.

“Al must have forgotten something,” Charlotte smiled. “If he ever lost his Palm Pilot he wouldn’t know his own name. As it is, he usually forgets something. Makes me laugh. At least he can laugh about it, too.”

They glided through the large stone gates, turning onto the state road. Within five minutes they’d turn onto Soldier Road.

Given the darkness of the night and the few cars in front of them it took twenty minutes to reach Hangman’s Ridge from the Soldier Road side. The dark, dank mists hung in the lowlands, covering the last wild roses of the year. Cumulus clouds, gathering in the west, were moving toward the ridge.

“Sister said she’d clean up the bushes on this old road off Soldier Road.” Charlotte held the steering wheel firmly as they bounced in the ruts. “She’s a good sport about this. We didn’t want to come in from the other direction. We’d disturb the hounds.”

“Bet the boys have the usual—spaghetti in pots masquerading as brains, grapes as eyeballs. The boys aren’t as imaginative as the girls. Course, they might surprise me.” Carter watched the clouds move in swiftly, black against black.

“Guts, gore, screams,” Charlotte laughed.

Carter peered up at the sky.“You know, honey, I really do think the damned ridge is haunted.”

“It will be tonight,” she agreed.

Inky, on the far side of the ridge, heard the school buses laboring to climb up the twisting dirt road. Usually she avoided Hangman’s Ridge, but the grinding of gears intrigued her. Who could be negotiating that road this time of night?

As the black fox picked her way through the underbrush, she felt a dip in temperature, a bit of breeze from the west. Hangman’s Ridge ran southeast to northwest and winds would rake its long flat expanse.

The girls jostled behind the boys’ bus.

“How did women wear these things?” Tootie kicked up her skirt. She was dressed as Madame du Barry and made a note never to do that again.

Valentina looked sleek in her Catwoman outfit and Felicity settled on being a witch.

Pamela, two rows back, as Little Bo Beep, touched Tootie on the shoulder with her shepherd’s crook. “You’ll answer to me, you little black sheep.”

Her devotees giggled.

Bill, sitting behind the driver, was unaware of the exchange.

“You’re so tiring,” Tootie called back.

“You’re so chicken,” Pamela replied.

“Shove it.” Valentina, next to Tootie, turned around, speaking over Felicity, immediately behind them.

The buses finally made it to the top, cars behind them. The boys poured out first, darting to the girls’ bus.

“Close your eyes!” Terry Durkin, one of the leaders, told them. There was no need to close their eyes as they were plunged into unrelieved darkness. Charlotte and Carter parked behind the Custis Hall bus. Amy parked behind them. Knute pulled up behind Amy.

As the girls approached the tree they began to peek and turned on their little sparkly flashlights from the black widow.

Felicity screamed as she drew closer. All the girls opened their eyes and screamed at the sight of two corpses hanging from the tree. One was dressed as Lawrence Pollard, the first man hung, in 1702, because of a real estate swindle. The other corpse was dressed as Zorro, wearing the mask.

Only Tootie refused to scream.“Mannequins.”

Valentina peered up.“Yeah.”

Felicity remained frightened.“Zorro looks real.”

“Oh, he does not,” Valentina said. “You are so—”

“Who strung up the second victim?” Terry asked another boy, who shrugged.

Tootie walked under the corpses, followed by Valentina. They pressed their tiny lights upward. The Miller School chaperones assumed the boys had gilded the lily. The boys also assumed one of their number had done so.

Inky stuck her glossy head out from under the mountain laurel. She was fifty yards from the huge tree. The effluvia of a freshly hung human assailed her nostrils. Fresh death. The small muscles that go into rigor mortis first hadn’t even tightened up.

Tootie, directly underneath, could smell him, too. She gazed up into bloodshot eyes bulging through the openings in the silk mask. This was no fake.

C H A P T E R 7

Delia delivered seven healthy puppies. Sister had fallen asleep sitting on a low chair next to the brood box; a long heat lamp, overhead, glowing with dimmed light.

The dog hounds gave cry when the first screams were heard flying down from Hangman’s Ridge like an arrow of fear.

Sister opened an eye, then closed it again, smiling. She imagined the girls spooked up on the ridge, the Miller School boys proud of their accomplishment. The next set of screams aroused the gyps sleeping out in the toasty large boxes on stilts in the large runs. The boxes had porches, the interiors filled with fresh straw. All the outdoor runs, dotted with spreading old trees, provided room to play or sleep. Younger hounds lived inside the main brick kennels. The arrangement gave each hound plenty of personal space so tempers didn’t flare from overcrowding.

The continued screams awakened everyone.

Again Sister opened an eye, sighed, then opened both eyes. The sound of two sirens in the far distance presaged something terribly wrong. She patted Delia on the head, hurried to the small bathroom off the office, splashed water on her face, dashed outside, hopped into her pickup, and drove up Hangman’s Ridge.

She reached the back side of the ridge just as the sheriff’s squad car crested the Soldier Road side. The blue lights washed over the two hanging corpses. She knew immediately that one of the hanged men was real. Swaying slightly, his back to her, the angle of his neck gave it away. The young people, some crying, stood at their respective buses, the chaperones attempting to comfort the more obviously distressed. Tootie, Valentina, and Pamela also did what they could to help others. Felicity shook like a leaf but was in control of herself. Sister noted the remarkable poise of the three young women. Charlotte and Carter greeted Sheriff Ben Sidel as he stepped out of the car.

The rescue squad van pulled up behind the sheriff’s car.

Sister waited until Ben, Charlotte, and Carter walked toward the tree, the rescue squad following at a discreet distance.

Ben spoke to Sister,“Hell of a Halloween.”

She simply replied,“Yes, it is hellish.”

Charlotte, the muscles in her face tight, met Sister’s gaze as the older woman walked toward her.

Sister now faced the corpse, Zorro. She registered disbelief.

“Al Perez,” Charlotte whispered to Sister.

Ben carefully checked the ground underneath, motioning for a deputy, Ty Banks, to come over. Deputy Banks, flashlight in hand, listened intently as Ben Sidel, in a quiet voice, gave him instructions.

Sister noted Inky still as a stone.

“What happened?” Ben asked Charlotte.

Briefly she explained the after-party plan by the Miller School boys, how at first they thought this was part of their night of fright, as they called it.

Ty examined the bark on the tree, and, like the sheriff, he inspected the ground underneath the corpse. Four imprints from a stepladder pressed into the earth.“Sheriff.” He wordlessly pointed to the ladder footmarks, scanning to see if footprints were visible. The earth, fairly dry except for the light dew that would turn to frost, yielded no sign of footprints.

“Yes, I noticed that, too. Was he dead before he was hanged or was he killed by hanging?” Ben thought out loud.

“He couldn’t have been dead longer than half an hour,” Carter opined. “Warm, no rigor even in the small muscles.”

When the students were walked back to the buses, Carter carefully touched Al’s leg to feel for body temperature. He did not touch any other part of the hanged man’s body for fear of damaging evidence.

“My husband wanted to make sure Al was, well, dead. If by any chance he wasn’t, we would have cut him down and done our best to revive him. I mean, Carter would,” Charlotte spoke.

“I understand,” Ben said sympathetically.

“Will you need to question the students?” Charlotte thought first of her flock.

“Not now.” Ben knew that some of the kids were aflutter from hysteria, despite the efforts of Knute, Bill, Amy, Bunny, and the other girls. “Did any of them see anything unusual?”

“No.”

Charlie Thompson, chaperone for the Miller School, quietly approached.“Sheriff, three of my boys strung up the mannequin. They were alone. I guess you’d like to interrogate them.”

“Well, that might be too strong a word. Mr. Thompson, take them back to school. I’ll ring you first and then talk to the boys. Right now, these kids need your attention. You can all leave. I’ll be in touch.”

Charlotte looked to her husband, then back at Ben.“Should we tell his wife?”

“No, I’ll do it. I hope no one has called her,” Ben responded.

“No, I made that clear to all,” Charlotte firmly replied.

“It’s the worst part of this job,” Ben flatly stated. “You all can go as well.”

As the Custis Hall people and the Miller School people left, Ben asked Sister,“Hear anyone come up on your side of the ridge?”

“No, nothing. I was in the kennel whelping room. I would have heard a car or truck.”

As the buses and cars dipped over the ridge onto the rutted road, Ben’s eyes followed the receding red dots of light. “You have an opinion on Al Perez?”

“He was pleasant, competent, very upbeat. I knew him from serving on the board of directors.”

“Enemies?”

“I don’t know. Charlotte would know better than I. Custis Hall is her bailiwick.” She hesitated a moment. “He didn’t get along with Amy Childers—old romance—but we all have a few of those. We don’t usually hang for it.”

“One hopes.”

Ben, not a country boy, learned to ride when he came to Jefferson County four years ago. He discovered that riding wasn’t easy, but he enjoyed the challenge. He’d reached the point where he rode with the Hilltoppers. He was working toward riding up with first flight, taking all those exciting jumps.

He had keen powers of observation, trained powers. He also had a sense of people’s character, having heard every lie known to man, so he particularly valued an honest person. Sister Jane was rock-solid honest. Her powers of observation were also highly trained. She proved a shrewd judge of character, too, where humans were concerned.

Sister raised her eyes to Al’s darkening face. “Hanging is a definite form of suicide. Anyone who hangs himself truly wants to die, but you’ve seen the stepladder prints, as did I. Al Perez didn’t hang himself. Whoever killed him wants to tie the past to the present, to scare the hell out of all of us. This is the place of public execution.”

Ty, twenty-nine, in thrall to his work, drank in every word. He’d not thought of that.

“A warning?” Ben thought out loud.

“Yes, but to whom? This is just a feeling, but the warning involves the school.”

“Why do you say that?”

Sister paused.“If this person only wanted to warn and warn publicly, he could have hung Al somewhere else, or shot him, dumping him in a public place or a well-traveled spot. But it seems you’ve got a fevered imagination at work.”

Ben felt the cold slice of breeze from the northwest. He reached in his pocket for a small round hard candy. He offered Sister one, then Ty.“In charge of alumnae affairs. Important post. Financially critical.”

Sister folded her arms over her chest.“I doubt very much Al Perez is an innocent victim.”

“M-m-m.” Ben was thinking the same thing.

As Sister walked back to her truck, Inky shadowed her. Inky liked Sister. It was mutual.

Sister put her hand on the door handle, stopped to call back to Ben.“Shrouds have no pockets.”

“What?”

“Shrouds have no pockets. I don’t know why that popped into my mind, except that a lot of money flowed through his hands.”

C H A P T E R 8

Hounds ate at six-thirty this Sunday to the sound of the power washer cleaning the kennels. The jets of water hit the walls and floors with such force, every speck of debris and dirt was dislodged, swirling into a huge central drain, a big trap underneath it. Shaker cut off the washer.

Sister, who had slept fitfully, walked into the feeding room. Raleigh and Rooster remained in the kennel office. They got along with the hounds but it wasn’t wise to allow them into the feeding room. They hated being separated from Sister, grumbling whenever they were left.

Shaker walked back into the feeding room just as Sister did. He took one look at her face.“What’s wrong?”

“Al Perez was hanged last night at Hangman’s Ridge.” She gave him the details as she knew them.

“Jesus, there are sickos out there. Why didn’t you call me?”

“You rarely get time to yourself. I figured after the firehouse party you spent the night out.”

“Yep.” He paused. “Gruesome end, gruesome. I liked Al. He was a nice guy.”

“It wasn’t clear whether he was hung to death or dead before he was hung. I studied the body as best I could under the circumstances. I didn’t smell blood or powder burns. And my nose is pretty good.” She then apologized to her hounds. “For a human my nose is good, but no one is as good as you all.”

Trident, a lovely young hound, smiled at Sister before diving back into the feed trough.

“Why’d you go up there, or did Ben come for you?”

“Forgot to tell you that. I heard the screams. Woke me up. I didn’t think too much of it since I knew the boys had planned their Halloween surprise. Then I heard the sirens.”

“You would have heard someone drive through here.”

She replied,“No one did.” She switched gears. “How are the puppies?”

“Nursing. Delia’s a good mother. Even if you’d been sound asleep next to her, she would have warned you if someone drove through the farm. You would have known. It’s a crazy thing, isn’t it?”

“It is.”

“Sooner or later, they’ll catch ’em.”

“One hopes.” She reached for a gallon of corn oil.

Shaker opened the door for the fed group of young hounds to return to their runs. He then washed out the troughs, refilling them with kibble. Sister poured a line of corn oil over the feed as Shaker opened another run door for older hounds to enter. They rushed up to Sister in greeting, then dove for the chow.

“It’s supposed to rain Tuesday, temperature’s supposed to drop, too.” Shaker checked with the Weather Channel constantly.

“Yeah, I saw that, too. But I’m betting the rain will come in after we wrap it up at Mud Fence.” She named that day’s fixture, an old estate whose fences in the mid-eighteenth century were made of mud. The first settlers lacked the money for nails. They could fell trees and plane boards butnails were very expensive. Eventually they built snake fences once the work of clearing began in earnest. One didn’t need nails for that. Some folks had to make do with a mud fence until they could clear more land, get more timber.

“Want to bet?”

“Five dollars.”

“Bet.” He held out his hand and she shook it. “Boss, ever consider murder?”

“You mean me killing someone or someone killing me?”

He laughed.“Ever consider what drives someone to it?”

“Sure.”

“I expect any of us can kill. Just need the right or wrong circumstances.”

“We might be mad enough to kill yet we don’t. We don’t step over the line.” She listened to the hounds chewing their kibble, a comforting sound. “If one of these hounds kills another hound, why does it happen?”

“Sometimes they know a hound is weak, sickening. They take him out. Maybe that’s canine mercy killing. Doesn’t happen often.” He thought a bit more. “If there’s a fight, it’s a challenge, a top-dog thing.”

“Same with horses. They rarely kill but they can sure kick the powder out of one another if they take a notion.”

“You’re saying we murder, they don’t.” Shaker kept an eye on Dragon, growling. “That’s enough, Dragon, shut up.”

“Apart from war or self-defense, if we kill it’s revenge, that’s straightforward. Sex killing or serial killing is men against women. Sickness and anger, I reckon. Then there’s money. Always that.”

“And a challenge to authority. The top-dog deal.” Shaker’s auburn curls caught the light.

“Right. For the life of me I can’t figure out how Al Perez, a mild fellow, fits any category. Can’t see him as a sex criminal taken out by an enraged victim or father of same.” She noted Shaker’s expression. “Well, Custis Hall bursts with girls becoming women. That’s a potent cocktailfor a certain kind of man. Money? He raised millions for the school. But he didn’t work on a percentage basis. Yes, he received a big Christmas bonus. Being on the board, I’m privy to the financial life of the school, but I can’t divulge details. He could have gotten resentful and figured he should get more given all that he raised for the school. It’s possible.”

“Yep.”

“As to the challenge idea. I can’t even imagine him challenging a dog.”

“People can fool you.” He whistled low to Asa, an older hound, who had finished his breakfast.

Asa walked over, put his head under Shaker’s hand.“Isn’t it a good morning?”

Sister smiled when Asa crooned.“You’re a gentleman, Asa.”

“Now, Boss, your curiosity getting up, is it?”

“Isn’t yours?”

“Some.”

“In a community as tight as ours, any death touches the rest of us eventually. I’m afraid of what we don’t know.”

C H A P T E R 9

“When the Good Lord jerks your chain, you’re going.” Sam Lorillard brushed Easy Able, one of Crawford Howard’s steeplechase horses, a big rangy fellow who was winning the brush races.

Rory Ackerman scrubbed down the wash stall with disinfectant. Sam, in charge of the’chaser stable, was fanatical about cleanliness, although this sense of organization was not reflected in his own house. “I don’t know.”

“Think about it,” the wiry African American said. “You die when you are supposed to die. Now, we can all be horrified at Perez’s murder, but if he didn’t die that way, he would have gone to glory another way. It was his time and no one can change that.”

“Then how do you explain that I was just about dead when you hauled me down to Fellowship Hall? You saved my life.” Rory, an alcoholic like Sam, both recovering, thought fate no substitute for free will.

“You’d have stunk up heaven with Thunderbird. God prefers better fragrances.” Sam laughed, for Rory used to reek of cheap liquor.

The square-built dark-haired man cut off the hose while he scrubbed the wash stall walls with a long-handled brush.“Whatever the reasons, I’m glad I’m still here and I’m glad Crawford hired me.”

“He’s a funny guy.” Sam ran both hands down Easy’s forelegs. “Doesn’t know squat about horses. Likes to make a big noise, you know, be the man, but he’s all right. He’s fair. How many of our fine-born Virginians would have given you or me a chance? He did.”

“That’s the point. He didn’t grow up with us.” Rory laughed as he turned the water back on, squirting down the yellowish foam on the walls.

“Well—” Sam didn’t finish as Crawford strode into the barn.

Inhaling the scent of cedar shavings, ground to a fine grade, Crawford rubbed his hands, for this Monday morning was overcast, quite cool.“Hell of a note.”

“Perez?”

He nodded his head, yes.“Charlotte’s called an emergency board meeting tonight. Ought to be interesting.”

Rory, quiet, continued washing. Not a horseman, but he was strong, liked physical labor, happy to do whatever Sam told him. He watched Sam because he wanted to learn, not to ride, but to learn on the ground how to properly care for a horse.

“Who do you think did it, Mr. Howard?” Sam politely asked.

“Damned if I know. I can’t see that Alfonso Perez was worth hanging. Milktoast. A man’s got to have balls. This ‘the meek shall inherit the kingdom of heaven’ is exactly right because they won’t inherit a damned thing on earth.”

“Right.” Sam stayed on the good side of Crawford by keeping most of his personal opinions to himself. He’d tell the boss what he thought about horses, tracks, running conditions, other trainers and horses but he kept his mouth shut otherwise, if possible.

“Unless this emergency meeting goes into the wee smalls,” he meant late into the night, “I’m going to hunt tomorrow. Might not be a bad day to bring out a young horse.”

“What time, sir?”

“We ought to pull out of here by six-thirty. Gives us time just in case.”

Since the country roads, two lanes, bore all traffic, one could crawl behind a timber truck hauling logs to the sawmill or a school bus that stopped every fifty feet. You stopped with it when the lights flashed. The other early-morning hazard was the paper delivery lady, who flew along the roads like an amphetamine-crazed maniac.

“Mrs. Howard hunting tomorrow?”

“Yes.”

“We’ll be ready to roll,” Sam said. “Six-thirty.” Crawford reaffirmed the time and then left.

Fairy Partlow worked Crawford’s hunters while Sam managed the whole equine operation at Beasley Hall. In a way, Fairy had been demoted since she worked for Crawford before Sam’s arrival. If she minded, she didn’t show it. Sam thought Fairy was happy not to have too much responsibility. All she wanted to do was make and ride the hunters. So far things were smooth as glass.

“Can’t picture Al Perez,” Rory said as he finished the scrubdown.

“You’ve seen him plenty of times.” Sam rubbed a little Absorbine on Easy’s back, gently massaging the long muscles by the spine. Easy groaned in pleasure.

“Those guys make the best crooks.”

“What guys?”

“The ones you don’t remember.”

That evening, the board of directors convened in the large conference room on the second floor of Old Main. A huge painting of the first headmistress, the founder herself, hung behind the headmistress’s chair. Paintings of subsequent headmistresses surrounded those seated at the oblong walnut table.

The faculty representatives—Amy Childers, William Wheatley, and Alpha Rawnsley, notebooks in front of them—sat on one side of the table, along with Christopher Stoltenfuss.

The administration was represented by Knute Nilsson and Jake Walford, in charge of maintenance, along with Charlotte, of course.

Apart from Christopher, the other community members were Sister Jane, Crawford Howard, Darla Coleridge, a stockbroker in her early forties and an alumna, and Samson“Sonny” Shaeffer, president of Farmers Trust Bank, married to an alumna, Liz, now in her early sixties.

With dignity, Charlotte opened the meeting. She assured the board that counselors were available for the students and that an assembly had taken place that morning to comfort them.

“—get to the bottom of this. I know you want this as devoutly as I do and I ask your help in solving this terrible crime, in restoring balance at Custis Hall.”

Behind her, Teresa Bourbon took notes in shorthand, rarely raising her head.

Sonny spoke first.“Charlotte, board members, this is a profound shock to us all and I can’t look at the empty seat without thinking of Al, who efficiently and with no fanfare accomplished all that was asked of him. It doesn’t seem real, yet when I look at his seat, I know it is.” He looked at Knute, the treasurer, then back to Charlotte. “We can expect some students to be withdrawn, I’m afraid.”

“We’re doing all we can to reassure the parents,” Charlotte forthrightly added, “but until whoever committed this heinous act is brought to justice … what can I say to you,” she looked at Alpha, Amy, then Bill, her faculty members, “to reassure parents and students. Also, at this point there is no motive,” she paused, “and that’s deeply disquieting.”

Bill Wheatley, voice equal to the occasion, thanks to decades of training, said,“There are some things we can say that might help allay these justifiable fears. One is that this is not a crime against women. Obvious as that may seem, it may need to be expressly stated. This is a girls’ preparatory school. They are becoming young women, and sexual predators are a sad fact of life. But this is not such a crime. The other thing we can do—and I know, Charlotte, that you and Knute have already taken measures—is we must hire additional security. It will greatly help all, even ourselves, to see a protective presence until this dreadful thing is behind us. Our campus police are too few in number.” Diplomatically, he did not mention that the campus police were not up to the job.

Knute spoke up,“We’ve hired Abattis Security and Jack has oriented them, given them maps, whatever they need. They are already on the job.”

“Strong beginning,” Crawford said as he folded his hands. “Charlotte, I want to congratulate you on how you handled the television interviews. Being able to present yourself is an advantage. It’s print reporters like Greg Baghout who ought to be horsewhipped. His article in the paper was inflammatory, irresponsible. He insinuated that Al’s murder is connected to the issue of slavery in Custis Hall’s heritage. He’s a menace.”

“Menace he may be, but until more facts are brought to light, menace he will continue to be.” Alpha Rawnsley, wise, watchful, and now worried, carefully chose her words.

A silence followed. Charlotte asked almost plaintively,“Does anyone here have any idea how this could happen? What is going on?”

“I can tell you what is going on,” Knute, face now red, said. “Someone hated Al.”

“Or hates Custis Hall,” Amy Childers replied. “Wants to make us look racist.” When everyone stared at her, she added, “He was Latino, you know. We’re in the middle of this, um, slave labor stuff.”

Charlotte looked at the attractive science teacher and thought how nine years ago, when she became headmistress, Amy had been a fresh, enthusiastic woman eager for life. She was turning into an embittered woman, entering the lists of early middle age.

“For God’s sake!” Knute threw up his hands. “That’s far-fetched.”

“We do represent the old WASP ways,” Bill intoned.

“We have the best diversity program on the East Coast”—the color rose to Charlotte’s cheeks—“second to none.”

“But not in terms of faculty hiring,” Amy bluntly stated.

Sister, her voice deep, soothing, finally spoke.“Stereotypes die hard: the money-grubbing Jew, the lazy black, the Mafia-connected Italian, the sex-crazed homosexual. Even though this institution has reached out to the community, done a wonderful job of attracting the best students of all races, the general perception is still that Custis Hallserves rich, spoiled white girls who will go on to Mt. Holyoke. Sorry, Alpha,” she nodded to Alpha, a Mt. Holyoke graduate from the early 1970s, “Smith, Radcliffe, Wellesley, and marry a rich white boy from Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Dartmouth. Now, untrue as that stereotype may be, I doubt it is cause for murder. And I doubt the lack of Hispanics or a better proportion of African Americans on the faculty or administration is cause for murder.”

“Well, what then?” Amy was upset, shaken, and frustrated.

“One kills out of passion, greed, or self-protection. Normal people kill. Abnormal people hear voices or whatever and they kill for quite different reasons, it seems to me. Hanging Al Perez from Hangman’s Tree, if you think about it, was brilliant.” Sister held up her hand to forestall comments. “It’s hard to give credit to such a repulsive act when everyone is grieving, but here we are focusing on the repercussions of that act. A great deal of energy and money will be spent to calm students, parents, and the faculty. The killer has us all focused, worried. I have learned from my quarry, the fox, that things are not always what they seem. Al’s killer has distracted us from his scent.”

“What exactly do you mean?” Bill leaned forward, eyebrows quizzically raised, since he hunted when he could.

“I mean our fox has fouled his scent. The public nature of the act stunned all of us. He’s scooted away for now.”

“But he’s close?” Charlotte understood the language.

“Charlotte, board members, forgive me for using foxhunting terminology,” Sister gravely said. “He is close, he is part of this community, and he obviously has powerful reasons to kill. He’s a fox in the henhouse.”

Crawford bit his lips.

Knute blurted out,“Good God. But I still can’t see why anyone would take out Al. We all worked with Al. He was so good-natured, so good with the alumnae. You had to like him. Everyone liked him.”

Bill twiddled his pencil.“Maybe he was running drugs that came in through Mexico. Amy made a point about his background. Well, he’d be able to talk to people in a way we couldn’t. It’s not impossible, you know, that he may have been involved in something criminal.”

“Oh, Bill, really.” Alpha’s eyelids fluttered.

“We have to think of everything no matter how absurd,” Bill defended himself.

“He’s right, Alpha. Much as we all liked Al, we can’t neglect the possibility that there may have been unsavory aspects to Al’s life.” Knute slumped a bit in his seat, weary from the weight of the hours. “But I can’t think of a one.”

“Sister, you divided killers into normal and abnormal categories. Hanging a man from a tree at the place of former public executions the night of a Halloween party in front of children, that doesn’t seem normal to me,” Amy remarked.

Christopher answered his sister,“Maybe that’s just what the killer wants us to think, that he’s some nutcase.”

“Sick as it is, I don’t think our killer is a nutcase. What we do know,” Sister’s voice was hypnotic, “is that he or she is strong, strong enough to string up a grown man. Bold. The killer was on that ridge not fifteen minutes before the girls and boys arrived. He knew the territory, never forget that. He knows us, and he understands symbolism.”

A long silence followed her assessment.

Charlotte pulled back her shoulders, saying,“Sister, there’s a reason you’re master of foxhounds, and I thank you for bringing us back on the line.” Her eyes swept the room. “Allow me to amend something Sister Jane said. Yes, he thinks he knows us, but what he doesn’t know is that nothing is going to destroy this school. Custis Hall survived the War of 1812, the War Between the States, two world wars, the Great Depression, Korea, and Vietnam. We will survive this, which is a different, personal threat, but we are more resourceful than this disgusting human being can know. He will be found, he will be brought to justice for what he’s done to Al, and we will come through this stronger.”

Knute Nilsson started to open his mouth but closed it. He was going to say,“We might be stronger, but we’ll probably be poorer for years. It will affect alumnae pledges.” Under the circumstances this very real concern seemed a little crass. He’d discuss this with Charlotte in private.

C H A P T E R 1 0

At sixteen pounds, Target qualified as a major fox. In the fullness of maturity, his coat fluffed out deep red, but his mask betrayed a few gray hairs near his dainty nose. Indian summer returned to central Virginia so he blew off the fact that the Jefferson Hunt Club would be at Mud Fence. With the mercury happily showing in the mid-fifties, skies of robin’s-egg blue, and, even better from his point of view, a stiff breeze from the west, scent would be awful.

So he dillied and dallied, rooting around the cornfields bordered by rows of tall fir trees to break the wind. Corn tasted delicious. Why burn calories chasing rabbits, mice, moles, and small birds when all he had to do was nibble kernels off the ears lower on the plant, for this was left as a silage field and wouldn’t be cut for months. He paid no attention to the mice chattering in their high voices when they got a whiff of him. He heard their tiny claws clatter over the husks fallen to the ground, stiff and brown now. He’d eaten so much he felt a little drowsy, but considered that it was a long way homeand he ought to begin walking, as his den was on After All Farm, perhaps five miles as the crow flies. Target hated crows, which is not why he didn’t always travel in a straight line. Given his high intelligence there were so many enticements. He noticed a nest of digger bees, so he watched them fly in and out of their underground nest. Bears liked bees, but he avoided eating them. His aunt Netty would sometimes pick up what bears had left after they ripped open a tree, the side of an old building filled with honey. She liked the bee taste. He hated eating bees, although he liked honey well enough.

Target craved sweets.

He left the cornfield. The digger bees made their nest in a row and he strolled across the farm road onto the field of mown orchard grass, rolled up and tied. Goldfinches hurled a few rude remarks, as did the purple finches, cardinals, and blue jays. He paid them no mind. He listened to the loud tapping of the pileated woodpecker. He was tempted to go into the woods to seek out the very tree and have a discussion about grubs and wood-boring insects, too, but decided the dew was thick and might hold scent for a brief time.

The sound of Shaker’s horn pricked up his ears. Why didn’t the damned man cast into the wind? He was casting crosswind and Target hadn’t considered that. Well, he was far enough ahead. He decided not to linger even if he passed other foxes or the many bobcats who had taken over this part of Mud Fence Farm. Thisyear crops flourished, as did game. There was enough for all and tensions among the hunters lessened. Usually the fights erupted over territory disputes. No one fought over water, as there was so much of it.

As Target walked northward, Shaker cast wide as he headed for the silage corn. If he was going to hit it today he had to hit it soon, for once the dew evaporated all scent would rise with it. Of course, being a man who loved his work, Shaker would draw along western banks where the sun hadn’t warmed the earth or he’d look for cold wind currents, but scent would be spotty even then. With such warmth at nine-thirty, he figured they’d be cooked by ten-thirty. But there was always the chance of pushing out a fox sunbathing minus bikini and sunglasses and stretched in full glory like any bathing beauty on the sands of Miami Beach. Foxes adored a good sunbath.

The field of thirty-nine riders was out for a few reasons. The real foxhunters on green horses figured it would be a slow day and therefore perfect for a green horse. The fair-weather hunters wanted to trot around in their lovely ratcatcher kits, so the sunshine appealed to them. The real foxhunters on made horses who loved hound work especially enjoyed watching hounds go to it on the difficult days. Any pack looks good on a good day; the great packs are the ones who do all they can on the hard days. Truth be told, one sees more good hound work on a“bad” day than on a good day.

Then again, as the red foxes always bragged, it doesn’t matter how great a pack of hounds may be, it’s foxes that make foxhunting.

Target was about to prove this, however unwillingly, because Cora, the strike hound, edged a little forward, springing into the cornfield. Shaker didn’t call her back as he trusted her. She wouldn’t shoot off. Her phenomenal drive salvaged many a so-so day.

The grackles in the corn flew up like pepper, black dots against a blue sky. Their irritation was evidenced by the curses called down to the pack, now all in the cornfield. They circled since they knew the hounds wouldn’t be in there long. The mice simply scurried out of the way of the hounds, diving into little bundles of corn husks if necessary.

“It’s Target!” Cora triumphantly inhaled a remnant of his scent.

The other hounds flew to her. Cora made very few mistakes.

Young Doughboy, in his second year out, yelped with excitement.

“Lower your voice, you twit,” Dragon growled.“You’ll sound like you’re on deer.”

“Sorry,” the chastened youngster replied.

“Dragon, you can be such an ass.” His brother and littermate, Dasher, picked up a lovely stream of fading scent.“Heading north.”

The hounds opened, honoring Cora’s initial voice. Shaker blew three quick notes in succession, waited a second, blew the call again.

Hounds were away.

Sister, on Rickyroo, a seven-year-old Thoroughbred, grinned. What could be better?

Behind her a few riders slipped their hands down to check their girths. Crawford had dropped his reins during the cast and when Czpaka bolted forward he fished frantically for them. Riders hadn’t figured on such a quick hit, but that’s the beauty of foxhunting: expect the unexpected.

Bunny brought six students today. Charlotte agreed when Bunny asked to go. They both thought keeping everyone in their routine, rewarding those who were making good grades and improving as riders, would be for the best; anything to dissipate the claustrophobia of nervousness.

The Custis Hall girls might be nervous, but it was not over Al Perez at this moment.

Before they knew it they flanked the cornfield, rumbled across the farm road, and blasted into the orchard grass field distinguished by the fir trees on one side to break the wind and southern hawthorns on the eastern perimeter, a gift from visiting birds. The owner of Mud Fence three generations back so admired the southern hawthorn, also called green hawthorn, with its bright red berries now in evidence, that he imported enough to line this forty-acre hayfield. In spring the trees delighted with showy white flowers.

“Bother,” Target grumbled to himself. He picked up an easy lope heading straight for home.

Three coops in a row marked off another farm road and a small pasture off that. Hit them right and they were a piece of cake, hit them wrong and you’d lurch over or worse, get stuck between them, the rest of the field balled up behind you trying not to cuss you out.

Sister cleared them all, noting that the footing, thanks to the dew still on the northern slope, proved slippery. Pine needles and leaves would be slippery, too, if they were still dewy.

Not much time to think about that because Target picked up the pace, now making a beeline for After All Farm. Within fifteen minutes they’d covered two miles of uneven terrain, jump after jump, and were now fording the lower branch of Broad Creek. Silt built up on the far bank and Rickyroo struggled to get through it.

Sister stopped. She called back to Tedi, in front.“Tedi, find another crossing. By the fourth horse this one will be impassable.”

“I’ll head up toward Tattenhall Station.” She mentioned an abandoned tiny white clapboard train station a half mile away. It once served a spur line for Norfolk and Southern. The railroad had built a serviceable bridge across the creek so employees could get to work. The railroad track ran parallel to the creek at that point.

“I’ll stay with the hounds,” Sister called back as Tedi touched her cap with her crop. They’d have a hell of a gallop to catch up but what a way to spend the morning.

As the sound of hoofbeats disappeared, Sister squeezed Rickyroo. Shaker, in sight, was flying flat out across a millet field, another coop, and into second-growth woods.

With his Thoroughbred speed and great heart, the young horse was soon within fifty yards of the huntsman.

The winding trail through the woods opened onto another hayfield, unfenced. They thundered across the green expanse, the hounds before them, then crossed a thin ribbon of a creek, over a log jump and into a peach orchard.

Sister assumed she’d not see the field again, but by the time they reached the old metal windmill put up in the 1930s, still turning, she could see Tedi, riding hard toward the sound of the horn and the hounds.

“She’s good,” Sister thought to herself and then laughed, since Tedi, at seventy-one, like Sister, could have ridden most anyone into the ground.

Target, wishing he hadn’t stuffed himself full of corn, hit top speed, twenty-five miles an hour. He knew this pack and somehow they’d managed to stick to his scent despite conditions. Five more minutes and his odor would have risen over their heads. He knew how fast the American hound can be. Still, he stayed straight as an arrow until he turned to see Dragon and Cora perhaps one hundred yards behind. He turned hard right in midair, ducked down low, and shot for the state road. The asphalt would help him since the tar smell would kill his scent. It was an old two-lane highway and he reached it—no cars as it was in the back of the beyond, so he tiptoed across it—then blasted into the pine plantation.

Dragon and Cora were flying so fast they overshot the line. Diana, a bit more deliberate, turned hard right.

Before she could open her mouth, Trinity, a third-year hound, a brilliant child, bellowed,“To the right.”

Dragon whirled almost as gracefully as Target to rejoin the pack. Cora breathed on his heels. Cora hated any hound getting in front of her. She was jealous of her position to the degree that Dragon was arrogant and wanted it for himself. The two would never get along.

The Custis Hall girls hung tight. Tootie had never been on a run this fast. The thrill of it diminished the hazards. Valentina, too, proved tight in the tack. Felicity, even though Parson was good as gold, experienced butterflies at some of the stouter jumps. Pamela Rene, not to be outshone by Tootie or Valentina, didn’t bat an eye. She rode right up, for the girls had begun to pass some of the field members whose horses were slowing in the heat.

The etiquette was that the girls should ride in the rear, but once a run unfolded the rule became whoever could keep up should. So if a younger member passed an older member or if a person without their colors passed someone with their colors (even though this was cubbing, everyone knew who had colors and who did not), it was acceptable. Yes, it irritated, sometimes, those who were passed, but at this level, with this distance being covered at warp speed, whoever had the best horses moved to the front. The Custis Hall girls, thanks to the wealth of their families, rode top-flight horses. Nothing instills confidence like a great horse. Nothing shakes one’s nerves like a second-rate one.

Sister felt the sweat roll between her breasts. The back of her shirt stuck to her. Her mouth felt parched. Thank God, she’d clipped her horses. She pitied any animal today with the beginning of its winter coat. Surely its rider would have brains enough to pull up and spare the horse.

The hounds, too, felt the heat, but their drive was so great, later on they’d fling themselves into a creek or even a water bucket—but only after they’d accounted for Target.

The heat affected the big red, too. He began to sink with one mile to go. He zigged, he zagged. Finally he noticed a large tree that had been uprooted in a windstorm. He nimbly leapt up, ran all the way up, then dropped fifteen feet below.

The hounds threw up, or lost the scent, for a moment at the huge old sycamore. Sycamores grow in moisture, often by creeks or river branches. This one had been uprooted thirty yards from Broad Creek so Target plunged straight down into the creek, swimming up toward After All Farm. The water felt good.

Gingerly, Ardent, an older hound, tried and true, sniffed the tree trunk.“He went up the trunk.”

Most of the Jefferson hounds, fast but sixty to seventy pounds, were too big to attempt to follow the line. Little Diddy, the runt of the whole pack, only in her second year, surprised everyone by hopping onto the trunk, pieces of bark flaking off, exposing the lighter color underneath. Carefully she picked her way up, the angle at thirty degrees.

“He made it to here,” she called down, the branches obscuring her, for she’d gone up quite far.

“Thanks.” Diana and Trudy walked under the end of the tree, jumped in the creek, swimming to the other side. The others followed, noses to the ground, once on land.

“Here!” Trudy called, the other hounds flocking to her.

They spoke at once, then came up against a bend in the creek. Trinity jumped in and swam straight across but he found no scent there.

“Work both sides of the bank,” Diana ordered.“He’s heading back to his den so he went north.” She figured he crisscrossed the creek again at the bend to throw them off.

It took four minutes of intense searching but finally Doughboy came up with the line, very good work for a second-year hound.

They opened. Shaker blew them on.

Target reached the spot where Snake Creek feeds into the larger, fast-moving Broad Creek, he turned left, staying on the left side of Snake Creek; He was now on After All Farm.

He reached the covered bridge, ran across it, then made a loop, coming back to Snake Creek, where he recrossed it. It was an obvious ploy but it would buy him just enough time. He could hear the hounds closing and he prayed they were as hot and tired as he was. If only he hadn’t been such a damned pig.

He traveled right over Nola Bancroft’s grave, Tedi and Edward’s daughter, who died in 1981 at twenty-four. She was buried with Peppermint, her favorite horse. He outlived her, making it to thirty-four. A beautiful stone fence enclosed the plot.

The hounds tore across the bridge. The field clattered over it, hooves reverberating inside, the noise deafening.

“Reverse!” Sister quickly turned when she saw the hounds jump back into Snake Creek.

Shaker knew he’d get balled up in the bridge because someone wouldn’t be able to turn their horse around. He jumped down the steep bank, into the water, grabbed mane, stood up, and leaned forward on HoJo. A young horse who didn’t make it on the steeplechase circuit struggled to find purchase.

Tootie, thinking ahead, turned her horse’s head and slid by everyone else as soon as Sister called “Reverse.”

The Custis Hall girls and Bunny followed.

Marty Howard stuck a minute, but she finally got herself around. Her horse spooked at some goblin seen only by himself.

Sister knew better than to try to pass them all, so she waited, tried not to bitch and moan, then hurried through as Tedi finally managed to get them out of the way.“Good job, girl.”

Tedi smiled and quickly fell in behind her old friend. The hounds leapt over the stone wall, ran over Nola and Peppermint’s grave.

Far from aggrieving Tedi, the sight of hounds running over her firstborn made her happy. For a fox or hound to cross a foxhunter’s grave is a sign from heaven. It’s to be wished for, not avoided.

With a maniacal burst of energy, Target skidded through fallen leaves, hoisted himself over a larger stone wall, this one separating fields closer to the main house. The outer fields had three-board fencing.

His den in sight, he soared into it like a basketball that doesn’t touch the rim.“Thank God!”

Dragon, Cora, and Doughboy reached the den first. Little Diddy had had a bit of a time getting off the tree and had needed Walter’s help. They brought up the rear as everyone tried to pile into the opening.

The remnants of a nice pattypan squash as well as a pumpkin littered Target’s den. He’d meant to clean it out but the morning, fresh with hope, lured him outside.

“Come on out!” Dragon dug.

Target kicked pumpkin seeds at him.

Betty rode up, as she’d come in from the left, took HoJo’s reins. She knew they were all on, no point in staying out there. Wouldn’t be a second cast in this heat.

Shaker blew and praised his hounds. As he withdrew them from the den, he watched pumpkin and squash seeds spew out like a tiny white and orange Vesuvius.

Sister saw it, as did those closest to her.

He paused. More seeds were tossed into the morning light.

“He thinks he’s so cute.” Ardent smiled.

Shaker laughed until the tears rolled down his cheeks. Betty, too.

They thought they’d seen it all but this reminded them, foxes do have imagination.

Shaker didn’t mount up but walked over to Snake Creek. HoJo was too hot at that moment to drink but he called all the hounds into the creek. They gratefully plunged in, cooling off and drinking.

“I have never seen anything like that in my life.” Sister rode up, laughing.

“I bet if we opened up dens we’d find missing watches and old love letters.” He laughed along with her.

“None of mine, I hope,” Sister giggled. “I can’t write a line.”

“Ha.” Betty rolled her eyes heavenward as Magellan, her second horse and a Thoroughbred, drank. “You probably have a stack of envelopes tied up with powder blue ribbons.”

“Sure.” Sister wiped her brow with the embroidered handkerchief she’d stuck in her pocket. “You know, we’re so close to the farm, let’s hack over. I’ll see if someone can go back to Mud Fence and bring the rig and my truck. I need two warm bodies.”

“Only two?” Shaker finally remounted.

“What did you have in mind?” she asked.

“Actually, after this run, a long drink of anything cold.”

“Oh, I wish you hadn’t said that.” Betty was parched and she didn’t want to drink from anyone’s flask as it would only make her thirstier.

Sister turned Rickyroo toward the field, sweat running down their faces and in some cases mascara as well.“Folks, let’s hack back to Roughneck Farm. It doesn’t make any sense to ride all the way back to Mud Fence. Some of your horses are spent.” She noticed that Sam Lorillard’s horse was in splendid condition. The man could train and ride. “If anyone wants to let their horse drink in the creek, go ahead. Use your judgment. Back at the farm you can untack them, we’ll put them on a tie line if they can get along, you can wash them down or whatever, and then we’ll figure out a way to get everyone back to their trailers.”

This process took two hours but it went off without a hitch. Sister brought down drinks for everyone as they washed their horses. Tootie took care of Rickyroo while Valentina washed HoJo. Then the two girls washed their own horses.

Using the old farm truck as well as Sister’s new truck, they piled everyone in the beds. This took three trips, but all went well.

Tootie and Valentina squeezed into the cab with Sister on the last run out since she invited them, too.

“Well, ladies, what’d you think?”

“I’ve never had so much fun in my life,” Valentina effused.

“Me, too,” Tootie concurred.

“For the record, if you need someone to talk to, I can listen. I know things are crazy right now. And if your parents will allow it and Mrs. Norton, if you want to stay here some night before hunting, I’d love to have you. Now, I can’t take everyone in the riding program so we’ll have to discuss numbers.”

“I’m not telling. I don’t want to share,” Valentina honestly blurted out.

“Sister, we don’t all get along. I mean, we can’t stand Pamela Rene.”

“Ah.”

“She’s a good rider and all, but she’s, uh—” Valentina paused.

“Off the chain,” Tootie said.

“I see. Well, let’s just keep it between us, and when you’re ready, let me know. I’ll talk to Mrs. Norton. It’s a nice way to know the hounds better.”

“It’s a nice way to know you better,” Tootie said and meant it, and it pleased Sister.

“We don’t want to sound negative, I mean, about Pamela. She’s real competitive and she’s always trying to buck us off, you know,” Valentina whispered. “She said to Tootie that Tootie thinks she’s better than her, Pamela, I mean. She said Tootie thinks she’s part of the Niggerati.”

“She didn’t say that!” Sister was surprised.

“When I called her on it she told me to shut up because I’m white.” Valentina’s voice returned to normal.

“Well, Tootie, what do you think?” Sister wisely asked the beautiful young woman.

“I think that word in any form ought to be banished from the English language,” Tootie replied without rancor. “She’s mad at me because I wouldn’t be part of the protest. You know, Sister, I do think Custis Hall ought to pay more attention to its history. Those buildings were built, the early ones, by slaves. But I don’t think confrontation is the way to do it. I mean, that is so sixties.”

As they neared the entrance to Mud Fence, Sister slowed even more since the bed was jammed with people.“Anything weird at school? Anything that makes you kind of take notice, apart from what just happened?”

“Like sex perverts?” Valentina put her arm around Tootie’s shoulder.

“Val.”

“I’m not the pervert. I’m in the middle, Tootie, and I’m squishing up next to you on the turn.”

“Oh, sure, Val, I bet you say that to all the girls.”

They made Sister laugh. She felt like a schoolgirl in their presence. She couldn’t say they made her feel young again because she didn’t feel old despite what the calendar said. She had no idea where those seventy-odd years went and she had to remind herself that she had had a birthday in August. Seventy-two! She kept thinking she was seventy-one, as if it much mattered.

“Well, you know,” Tootie said as the remaining trailers came into view, “Mr. Wheatley always finds an excuse when we’re trying on costumes.”

“The old devil!” Sister blurted that out.

“He likes big boobs.” Valentina added that juicy tidbit. “That’s why he likes all those plays from the eighteenth century. He can put everyone in low-cut dresses. I swear it’s the truth.”

“Do you think he touches anyone?” Sister was more than curious, she was slightly worried.

“If he did, we’d know. Really. I mean, we know who’s sleeping with whom,” Valentina bragged.

“I can hardly wait for our slumber party.” Sister laughed but she was beginning to feel that Custis Hall sheltered many secrets. Why had she not thought of it before?

C H A P T E R 1 1

Had circumstances been otherwise, Sister would not have contacted Charlotte Norton. She met her at seven that evening, the campus paths illuminated by the ornate, graceful cast-iron lights installed in 1877.

Teresa had gone home. They sat in Charlotte’s office eating a shepherd’s pie that Sister had made, knowing Charlotte probably hadn’t eaten much that day.

“—three.”

“Well, if that’s all, you’ll weather this storm.” Sister reassured her as three students had immediately been withdrawn from Custis Hall.

“Then Knute came in wringing his hands about the potential for lost alumnae funds and what were we going to do about the position of director of alumnae affairs? I told him we could at least wait a few weeks, then appoint a temporary person. This is no time for a search committee.”

“Wise choice. I’m surprised Knute would be insensitive.”

“Doesn’t mean to be. He’s worried because hiring a security firm put a big dent in his carefully wrought budget and we need so many things above and beyond simple maintenance. Well, I don’t have to tell you. Think of all that goes into running the Jefferson Hunt. It’s the same meat,” she smiled, dark circles under her eyes from exhaustion, “different gravy.”

“I like the decisions. I like the problems even. Not sure I’d like your current problem, but anything, even something as bizarre as Al’s death, does give one a chance to ferret out weakness in the organization.”

“That’s one way to look at it. How we will replace him I don’t know. He had the right personality for the job. And he was so much fun to be around. I miss him more each day as it sinks in that he’s really gone.” Charlotte poured Sister another cup of steaming Constant Comment tea, then one for herself. “Did you want something stronger? Forgive me for not asking sooner.”

“No, thank you. Charlotte, you have so much on you. If there’s anything I can do to help, call me.”

“Well, what I heard today was a barn burner. If I’d been out, that would have restored my spirits.” Charlotte placed the silver teapot on the intricate brass Custis Hall cypher.

The cyphers, placed beneath hot pots, were made at Virginia Metalcrafters in Waynesboro. Beautiful cyphers for William and Mary, or Washington’s initials, or Jefferson’s made one realize how aesthetically advanced that superb generation was, far more advanced than current generations.

“Try to make Opening Hunt this Saturday even though it’s usually a big parade.”

“I’ll try. We’ve organized a special parents’ meeting beginning Saturday afternoon. There’s no point in ignoring this. We’ve got to take the bull by the horns. Knute opposed. So did Amy. They think it keeps the problem in front of everyone. Alpha’s for it. The other board members are for it and I hope you are, too.”

“You have to meet the issue head on. What people need more than anything is contact with you, the administration, and faculty. They need to be heard and of course they need reassurance. You’ll be exhausted. Can Carter help, at all?”

“He’s canceled his appointments, even his beloved Sunday golf game. Bless him.”

“Good for you, good for the parents. Carter has that wonderful bedside manner. How are the girls taking it?”

“The assembly helped. The students have all met with their faculty advisers. They can come see me, too.”

“Anyone taken you up on it?”

“Pamela Rene.”

“Of course.” Sister smiled. “She’s an angry child.”

“I suppose if I had a mother who told me how to walk, talk, dress, and that I’d never be the woman she was, it would wear me down, but,” she paused, “her situation isn’t unique. So many children of wealth are psychologically abused. Let me amend that, many children are abused, period. Theodd thing about Americans is that we seem to think that money cures all things. There’s sympathy for the middle-class child, outpouring of concern for the poor one, but for the rich, well, people have little. You know, Sister, I don’t care how much money a person inherits, you can’t buy yourself a loving mother or a loving father.”

“No, you can’t. That’s one reason why I try to include the girls who can ride into hunting. We can’t make up for what is lacking at home, if it is—obviously not all rich kids are ignored or bedeviled—but we can make them feel valued. Many a young person has flirted with trouble, and thanks to hunting, pulled themselves out of it.”

“Horses help. I truly believe horses are healers.” She smiled a true smile. “And the club members are very warm.” Charlotte continued on a sterner note. “It’s horses or drugs. Whenever I hear a parent complain about the cost of buying and keeping horses I say to myself, ‘You’ll pay it in wrecked cars, plunging grades, and drug rehabilitation.’ I’ve seen too much of it.”

“In a way, that brings me to why I came in tonight. After today’s hunt we had to shuttle people back to Mud Fence.”

“I heard. The girls loved it! Another adventure.”

“On the last trip I had Tootie and Valentina in the cab of the truck with me. They told me that Bill Wheatley comes in during custom fittings and he, well, I don’t know how to put this. He’s not grabbing them, but according to the girls, he likes to catch them in states of undress and he is particularly fond of girls with big racks.” Sister leaned toward Charlotte and touched her hand. “I hope I haven’t added to your troubles, and this is hearsay. Given what has happened, anything and everything may be important.”