Last Man Standing

31

Gwen was at the equestrian center with Baron when her husband asked her to show Web around the place. She led Web to the horse stalls.

“The best way to see the farm is on horseback. Do you ride?” she asked.

“A little. I’m certainly not in your league.”

“Then I’ve got just the horse for you.”

Boo, Gwen told him, was a Trakehner, a German breed, a warm-blooded horse bred to be superior warhorses and a cross between a hot-blooded, high-spirited and temperamental Arabian and a cold-blooded, calm and hardworking draft. The horse weighed about seventeen hundred pounds, stood almost eighteen hands high and looked at Web like he wanted to take a bite out of his skull as they stood next to Boo in the stall.

“Boo was a great dressage horse, but now his work is done and he doesn’t really like to move all that much. He’s gotten fat and happy. We call him ‘old grump’ because that’s what he pretty much is. But deep down he’s a sweetheart, and he’s very flexible too. You can ride him English or western saddle.”

“Yeah, I’m sure,” said Web as he stared up at the beast. Boo didn’t look the least bit happy that Web was in his personal space.

Gwen put the square saddle pad over the horse’s back and next had Web help her place the heavy Western-style saddle over the pad. “Now watch while I cinch the saddle, he’ll hold his breath and push out his belly.” Web watched in fascination as the horse did exactly that.

“When you think it’s tight, he’ll let out his breath and it loosens. Then you try and climb on and the saddle slides over his withers. The horse gets a good laugh and the rider gets a few bruises.”

“Good to know dumb animals are that smart,” said Web.

Gwen showed Web how to transfer from the halter to the bridle and how to slip the latter over Boo’s head, seat it correctly and then buckle it. They led Boo outside and over to a stone mounting block.

Web adjusted the chaps Gwen had given him to prevent the saddle from chafing his legs and to allow Web to get a better grip, stepped onto the block and climbed aboard, while Boo just stood there patiently.

“So what do you think?” asked Gwen.

“It’s a long way down.”

She noted the pistol in his holster. “Do you have to bring the gun?” “Yes,” Web said firmly.

They went to the riding ring and Gwen led horse and rider around the ring. Next Gwen showed Web neck-reining to brake, turn and back the horse up, and sounds and leg pressure to make the animal go and stop. “Boo’s been all over the farm, so if you let him, he’ll go where he’s supposed to. Nice and easy.”

Hired help had brought Baron around while they were working with Boo. Gwen mounted up on her horse. “Now, Boo is the patriarch of this place and he and Baron have never ridden together before. So Boo may try and establish his dominance over Baron to show him who’s boss.”

“Sort of like guys with too much testosterone,” opined Web. Gwen looked at him in a strange way. “Boo’s a gelding, Web.” He looked at her blankly, not getting it. “If he were a man, we’d call him a eunuch.”

“Poor Boo.”

The two horses seemed to establish a grudging truce, and Web watched as Gwen slipped a Motorola walkie-talkie radio out of her back pocket and turned it on. “Just in case there’s a problem,” she said.

“Smart to keep in communication,” said Web. “I’ve got my cell phone too.”

“After what happened today with Billy, I’m not sure I’ll ever use one again,” she said.

Web looked down at his phone and started having some doubts.

They started off, trailed by a golden retriever named Opie, and another compact but strongly built canine Gwen called Tuff. “Strait has a dog running around here too,” she said. “Calls him Old Cuss, and it’s an apt description because he’s nothing but trouble.” The sky was clear, and as they went up and down the small hills on the property, it seemed to Web that he could see almost all the way to Charlottesville. Boo was content to follow Baron and kept up a sedate pace that didn’t tax Web.

Gwen reined Baron to a halt. Web eased Boo next to her.

“As I said, East Winds has been around a very long time. The King of England gave Lord Culpeper a land grant consisting of millions of acres in the 1600s. A descendant of Lord Culpeper’s gave a thousand acres of this land grant to his eldest daughter upon her marriage to a man named Adam Rolfe. The central part of the house was started in 1765 and completed in 1781 by Rolfe, who was an expert builder and also a merchant. You’ve seen the outside of the main house?” Web nodded. “Well, it was constructed in the Georgian style. And the millwork, particularly the dentil moldings, are some of the best I have ever seen.”

“Georgian, that’s what I would have guessed.” Web was lying; he wouldn’t have known a Georgian style if it leapt up and bit him in his dentil moldings.

“The estate remained in the Rolfe family until the early 1900s. During that time it was a true working plantation and crops were raised here: tobacco, soybeans, hemp, that sort of thing.”

“And slaves to work it, I guess,” said Web. “At least until the end of the Civil War.”

“Actually, no, the plantation was close enough to Washington that its owners were Northern sympathizers. In fact, East Winds was part of the Underground Railroad.

“In 1910,” Gwen continued, “the estate was sold out of the family. It passed through a series of hands until Walter Sennick bought it at the end of World War II. He was an inventor and made a huge fortune selling his ideas to the automobile manufacturers. He made East Winds into a small self-contained town, and at its peak he had over three hundred full-time employees here. There was also a company store, phone exchange, firehouse, those sorts of things.”

“Nothing like never having to leave home.” The whole time Gwen was talking, Web had been surveying the grounds, judging where possible attacks might come from and how best to defend against them. Yet if there was a rat on the inside, that sort of strategy might be futile. A Trojan horse worked as well now as it had thousands of years ago.

Gwen nodded. “Now there are sixty-eight buildings in total with twenty-seven miles of board fencing. Nineteen paddocks. Fifteen full-time employees. And we still farm here—corn, mostly— although our main interest is breeding Thoroughbreds. Next year we have twenty-two foals due. And we’ve got a great crop of year-lings going to sale very soon. It’s all very exciting.”

They rode on and soon came to a high-banked water crossing, where Gwen instructed Web on how to let the horse choose its own footing when going down into the mud. She had Web lean back very far, so that his head was almost resting on Boo’s rump when the horse was going down the bank. Then she had Web meld his body into the horse’s neck and grasp Boo’s mane when the horse was heading up the bank on the other side. Web successfully navigated the stream and earned high praise from Gwen.

They passed an old stone and wood building that Gwen told him was an old Civil War–era hospital that they were thinking of turning into a museum. “We’ve rehabbed it, put in central air and heat, it’s got a kitchen, bedroom, so the curator could live in there,” Gwen told him. “An operating table and surgical instruments from the time period are there as well.”

“From what I know of that, a Civil War soldier would’ve taken a minié ball any day over a trip to the hospital.”

They rode by a two-hundred-year-old bank barn, so named because it was two stories and built on such a steep grade that it had two entrances on separate levels. There was also a riding ring where horse and rider practiced their dressage. Dressage, Gwen explained, consisted of specialized steps and movements of a horse and rider, akin to a figure skater’s routine. They passed a tall wooden tower with a stone foundation that Gwen told him had been used for both observation of wildfires and also for the horse races that had been held here a century ago.

Web studied the place and the surrounding countryside. As a former sniper constantly on the lookout for the best ground, Web concluded that the tower would definitely be a good observation post, yet he didn’t have the manpower to utilize it properly.

They rode past a two-story frame building that Gwen identified as the farm manager’s house.

“Nemo Strait seems to do a good job for you.”

“He’s experienced and knows what he’s doing, and he brought a full handpicked crew with him, so that was a plus,” Gwen said with what Web perceived as little interest.

They examined entry and exit points in the rear grounds and Web made mental notes of each. Once, a deer broke clear of the tree line and Opie and Tuff took off after it. Neither horse reacted to this clamor, although Web was so startled by the deer flashing in front of him that he had almost fallen off Boo.

Next she led him into a little tree-shaded glen. Web could hear water running nearby and he was not prepared, as they rounded a short curve, to see a small, open building, painted white and with a cedar shake roof, that looked like a gazebo until Web saw the cross on top and the small altar inside with a kneeling pad and a small statue of Jesus on the cross.

He looked over at Gwen for an explanation. She was staring at the small temple as though in a trance and then she glanced over at him.

“This is my chapel, I guess you’d call it. I’m Catholic. My father was a Eucharistic minister, and two of my uncles are priests. Religion runs pretty deep in my life.”

“So you had this built?”

“Yes, for my son. I come out here and pray for him just about every day, rain or cold. Do you mind?”

“Please.”

“Are you a religious person?”

“In my own way, I guess,” Web answered vaguely.

“I used to be a lot more than I am now, actually. I’ve tried to understand why what happened could happen to someone so innocent. I’ve never been able to find an answer.”

She dismounted and went inside the chapel, crossed herself, took out her rosary from her pocket and then knelt down and started to pray while Web watched her in silence.

After a few minutes she rose and rejoined him.

They rode on and finally came to a large building that had clearly been abandoned for some time.

“The old Monkey House,” said Gwen. “Sennick built it and kept all sorts of chimps, baboons, even gorillas there. Why, I don’t know. Legend has it that when some of the animals would escape from their cages they’d be chased through the trees by beer-drinking local yokels with shotguns, who didn’t want the monkeys around anyway. For that reason they called the forest around here the monkey jungle. The thought of those poor animals being gunned down by a pack of drunken morons makes me sick.”

They dismounted and went into the building. Web could see through the roof where large holes had been worn in by time and the elements. The old cages, rusted and broken, were still lined up against the walls, and there were trenches presumably for catching animal waste and other disgusting things. Trash and old broken machinery littered the concrete floor, along with tree branches and rotted leaves. Tree roots clung to the outside walls and there was what looked to be a loading dock. Web tried to imagine what an inventor of auto accessories would want with a pack of monkeys. None of his theories were pleasant ones. All Web could think of was animals strapped to gurneys, electrical lines capturing the power of lightning bolts and old man Sennick in surgical garb ready to do his dirty work on the terrified simians. The place had a distinct feeling of melancholy, of hopelessness, of death, even, and Web was glad to leave it.

They continued their ride and Gwen dutifully pointed out all the buildings and their associated history until Web was having a hard time keeping track of everything. He was very surprised to look at his watch and see that three hours had passed.

“We should probably head back,” said Gwen. “For your first ride, three hours is plenty. You’re going to find yourself a little sore.”

“I’m good,” said Web. “I really enjoyed it.” The ride had been peaceful, tranquil, relaxing, everything he hadn’t been experiencing for practically all of his life. However, when they got back to the equestrian center and Web climbed off Boo, he was surprised to find that his legs and back were so stiff he could barely walk upright once his feet hit the ground. Gwen noted this and smiled wryly. “Tomorrow it’ll be another part of your body that hurts.”

Web was already rubbing his buttocks. “I feel what you mean.”

A couple of hired help came out and took the horses from them. Gwen told Web that they would take off the gear and scrub and wash down the horses. That was usually the job of the person riding the horse, Gwen said. It helped you bond with the animal. “You take care of the horse, and the horse takes care of you,” she said.

“Kind of like having a partner.”

“Exactly like having a partner.” Gwen looked over at the complex’s small office and said, “I’ll be back in a minute, Web, I want to check on a few things.”

As she walked off, Web started taking off his chaps.

“First time on a horse in a while?” Web looked up and saw Nemo Strait heading his way. A couple of other guys in baseball caps were sitting in the cab of a pickup truck that had large hay bales in the back. They were watching Web closely.

“Damn, how could you tell?”

Strait came up next to Web and leaned against the stone mounting block. He looked off in the direction where Gwen had gone.

“She’s a good rider.”

“I’d say she is too. But then, what do I know?”

“She pushes the horses sometimes further than she should, though.”

Web looked at him curiously. “She seems to really love them.”

“You can love something and still hurt it, now, can’t you?”

Web had not anticipated this sort of mental process from Strait. He thought he had the big, dumb Neanderthal figured out, and here the guy was being thoughtful and maybe even sensitive. “I take it you’ve been around horses a long time.”

“All my life. Folks think they can figure them out. You can’t. You just have to go with the flow and never make the mistake of thinking you have them pegged. That’s when you get yourself hurt.”

“Sounds like a good formula for people too.” Strait almost smiled, Web noted.Almost.

Strait glanced over at the truck where his men still were watching the two closely. “You really think Mr. Canfield might be in danger?”

“I can’t be a hundred percent sure, but I’d rather be safe than sorry.”

“He’s a tough old cuss, but we all respect him. He didn’t inherit his money like most folks around here; man earned it with his sweat. Got to respect that.”

“Yes, you do. You have any ideas on how that phone might have got into his truck?”

“Been thinking about that. See, thing is, nobody drives that car ’cept him and Mrs. Canfield. We all got our own vehicles.”

“When he got in it, it was unlocked. And do they keep their vehicles in the garage at night?”

“They got lots of cars and trucks, and the garage at the house is only two bays, and one of them is filled with supplies.”

“So somebody, particularly at night, could have accessed the Rover, left the phone and probably nobody would have seen him.”

Strait scratched the back of his neck. “I guess so. You got to understand, out here lots of folks don’t even bother to lock the doors to their homes.”

“Well, until this is over, tell everybody to lock everything they can. You have to understand that threat can come from everywhere, inside and out.”

Strait stared at him for a long moment. “This Free Society thing, I’ve heard of it.”

“You know anybody who might be a member or a former member?”

“No, but I could ask around.”

“Well, if you do, keep it low-key. We don’t want to spook anybody.”

“We all got a good gig here, don’t want to see nothing happen to the Canfields.”

“Good. Anything else you think I need to know?”

“Look, if somebody here is in on this, you got to understand that a farm can be a real dangerous place. Big tractors, sharp tools, propane gas tanks, welding equipment, horses that’ll kick your brains out if you let down your guard, snakes, steep slopes. Lot of ways to get killed and make it look like an accident.”

“That’s real good to know too. Thanks, Nemo.” Actually, Web didn’t know if that was advice or a threat.

Strait spit on the ground. “Hey, you keep up that riding, you’ll be Roy Rogers in no time.”

Gwen rejoined Web and showed him through the equestrian center. There were eleven buildings in total.

The foaling stalls were their first stop and Gwen showed Web how they were equipped with closed-circuit television to monitor the expectant mares. The floors were rubber-matted and had a covering of straw to keep the dust down.

“We have really high hopes for some of the foals coming next year. We had several mares bred out in Kentucky by stallions with remarkable bloodlines.”

“How much does that stuff run?”

“It can run six figures a pop.”

“That’s expensive sex.”

“There are a lot of conditions attached to that payment, of course, the most important being that the foal is actually born alive and can also stand and nurse. But a great-looking yearling sired by a successful racehorse can bring enormous amounts of money. It’s a very picky business, though. You have to think of every contingency, and yet simple bad luck can still ruin your chances.”

Web thought that sounded very much like being an HRT man. “Yeah, the way Billy described it to us, it doesn’t sound like a business for the faint of heart.”

“Well, the money is nice, Web, but that’s not why I do it. It’s the rush you get from seeing a horse you raised, nurtured and trained thundering around that track; the most beautiful, the most perfect racing machine every created. And seeing the finish line, watching this truly noble animal prance into the winner’s circle, knowing that for at least a few minutes everything in your life is absolutely perfect. Well, there’s no other feeling quite like that.”

Web wondered if the nurturing of horses had replaced the lost son. If it had, he was glad that Gwen Canfield had found something in her life she could feel good about.

“I guess you probably feel the same way about your work.”

“Maybe I used to,” he replied.

“I didn’t put two and two together before,” she said. “I didn’t know you were part of what happened to those men in Washington. I’m very sorry.”

“Thanks. It’s a pretty sorry situation all around, actually.”

“I never really understood how men could do that sort of job.”

“Well, I guess the easiest way to look at it, Gwen, is that we do that job because there are people in the world who make us do it.”

“People like Ernest Free?”

“People just like him.”

As they finished at the center, Gwen asked him what Strait had wanted.

“Just some friendly neighborly advice. By the way, did he come with the farm or did you hire him?”

“Billy did. He and his crew came with good references.” She looked around. “So what now?”

“How about the main house?”

As they drove up to the mansion in an open Jeep, Web heard a roaring overhead and looked up. A small chopper was coming in low and fast. It flew past and disappeared over the treetops.

Web looked over Gwen. “Where is that going?”

She frowned. “The neighboring farm. Southern Belle. In addition to the chopper pad, they also have an airstrip. When their jet comes over, it scares the horses to death. Billy’s talked to them about it, but they go their own way.”

“Who are they?”

“What are they is more like it—a company of some sort. They run a horse farm too but a pretty strange one.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean they don’t have all that many horses, and the men they have working for them don’t look to me to know the difference between a colt and a filly. But they must be doing something right. The house at Southern Belle is even bigger than ours.”

“I guess they have a lot of buildings, like you.”

“Yes, although the ones we have came with the spread. They’ve built a bunch of new ones there, massive ones, almost like warehouses, though I don’t know what they’d be storing in that sort of quantity. They only came here about two and a half years ago.”

“So you’ve been over there?”

“Twice. Once to be neighborly and they weren’t. The second time to complain about their low-flying aircraft. We weren’t thrown off the place, but it was pretty awkward, even for Billy, and he’s usually the one making people feel uncomfortable.”

Web sat back and thought about all this even as he glanced in the direction where the chopper had disappeared.

It took them a while, but they covered the stone mansion from top to bottom. The lower level held a billiard room, a wine cellar and a dressing area to change into swimsuits. The pool itself was thirty by sixty feet and made entirely of steel from a World War II–era battleship that had been decommissioned, she said. There was a lower kitchen with a Vulcan stove that had a big chrome hood dating from 1912, working dumbwaiters and a laundry room. In the boiler room Web got to see big McLain units kicking out radiant steam heat, and there was a room containing nothing except wooden bins for storing firewood. Each woodbin was labeled for a particular room.

The main-level dining room had the heads of English stags on the walls and an antler chandelier. The kitchen was impressively large, with delft wall tile and a genuine silver closet. There were three ballrooms, assorted studies, parlors and living rooms and an exercise room. On the upper floors there were seventeen bathrooms, twenty bedrooms, a library that seemed to have no end and numerous other spaces. The place was truly enormous, and Web knew he was incapable of making it totally secure.

As they ended the tour, Gwen looked around with a wistful air. “I’ve really come to love this place. I know it’s too big and grandiose in parts, but it’s also very healing, you know?”

“I guess I can see that. How many staff do you have in the house?”

“Well, we have three women who come and clean and do laundry and look after things and then they leave, unless we’re having a lot of guests of dinner and then they’ll stay and help. They’re all local folks.”

“Who does the cooking?”

“I do. It’s something else I enjoy. We have a handyman of sorts. He looks like he’s a million years old, but he’s just lived life really hard. He comes most days. Nemo and his men run the rest of the farm. Racehorses have to be exercised every day, so we also have riders, three young women and one man. All of them live at the equestrian center.”

“And there is a security system. I noted the alarm pad as we came in.”

“We never use it.”

“You will now.”

Gwen said nothing to this. She showed Web into the last room. The master bedroom was vast but curiously sparsely furnished. Web also noticed the anteroom off the master bedroom that also had a bed.

“Billy works late a lot and doesn’t want to disturb me when he comes to bed,” explained Gwen. “He’s always considerate that way.”

The way she looked when she said this made Web think Billy wasn’t all that considerate.

She continued, “Most people only see the hard side of Billy, and I guess there were more than a few people that were a little skeptical of our getting married. I guess half of them thought I was marrying Billy for money and the other half thought he was robbing the cradle. But the fact is, we just clicked. We enjoy each other’s company. My mother was in the last stages of lung cancer when we started dating, and Billy came to the hospice every day for four months. And he didn’t just sit there and stare at my mother dying. He brought her things, talked with her, argued with her about politics and sports and made her feel like she was still living, I suppose. It made it a lot easier for all of us and I’ll never forget that. He’s had a rough life and he’s rough around the edges because of it. But he’s been everything in a husband that a woman could ask for. He left Richmond, a place he loved, and gave up the only business he’s ever known to start over on a horse farm because I asked him to. And I think he knew we had to get away from it all, too many bad memories.

“And he was a wonderful father to David, did everything with him. He didn’t spoil him because he thought that would make David weak, but he loved that boy with every ounce of his being. If anything, I think losing him destroyed Billy more than it did me because, while he had children from his first marriage, David was his only son. But if he considers you a friend, there is absolutely nothing he wouldn’t do for you. He’d spend his last nickel to help you. There aren’t many people like that left.”

Web noted the photos on the wall and on a built-in cabinet. There were many pictures of David. He was a handsome boy who had taken after his mother more than his father. Web turned and found Gwen at his shoulder looking at her son.

“It’s been a long time now,” she said.

“I know. I guess time really doesn’t stop for anyone or anything.”

“Time’s also supposed to help. But it doesn’t.”

“He was your only child?”

She nodded. “Billy has grown kids from his first marriage, but David was my only one. Funny, when I was a little girl I was certain I’d have a big family. I was one of five. Hard to believe my little boy would be in high school now.” She suddenly turned away and Web saw a hand go up to her face.

“I think that’s enough for now, Gwen. I really appreciate your taking the time.”

She turned back to him and he could see her damp cheeks. “Billy wanted me to invite you and your friend up for drinks and dinner tonight.”

“You don’t have to do that.”

“Well, we want to. You saved his life, after all, and if we’re going to be spending time together, we probably should get to know each other a little better. Say five-thirty?”

“Only if you’re sure.”

“I’m sure, Web, but thanks for asking.”

“Just so you know, we didn’t bring any fancy clothes.”

“We’re not fancy people.”