Let Sleeping Dogs Lie

CHAPTER 28

In the old barn, Phil Chetwynd rolled old hay bales under Mercer’s body. Being tall, he stepped upon them, holding Mercer’s legs and, with great strength, lifted the body so the pressure was off the neck.

Ronnie Haslip, the most nimble, climbed up the rafters. Gray joined Phil. Gray knew Mercer was gone, but Phil, a man possessed, kept pleading, “We have to help him. Help me.”

And so the other men did. Ronnie, like most foxhunters, carried a pocketknife. He cut the rope and Mercer dropped down into Gray and Phil’s arms, the unexpected weight toppling them off the hay bales.

The two German shepherds, sitting down now, didn’t budge.

Kasmir, Shaker, and Xavier, also by the hay bales, did their best to break the fall, trying to prevent Mercer’s body from hitting the ground hard.

Xavier left the group to go back to the house and find Ben Sidell. Given the thick fog, he only found his way through the noise coming from the house.

Ben hurried out of the house with Xavier and Sister, groping their way to the Saddlebred barn. Once inside, the sheriff walked over to Mercer, carefully laid on the ground, on his back, bloodshot eyes staring upward.

Ben removed his leather hunting glove, placing his finger on Mercer’s neck. He said nothing, for it was obvious that Mercer was dead. He wanted to feel the temperature of the body. His guess was the body had cooled very slightly. Clearly the man’s neck was broken. Putting his glove back on so as not to leave more fingerprints, he gingerly tilted Mercer’s head to the side where his hair was matted with blood. He’d first been struck by a blunt instrument.

Phil leaned over on the other side of the body. “Let me perform CPR. He’s not dead. He can’t be dead.”

Ben rose, “I’m afraid he is, Phil.”

“No!” Phil knelt down to pump on Mercer’s chest.

Gray and Shaker had to lift Phil up, protesting.

With kindness but firmness, Ben said, “He’s gone. Anything any of us do to him will compromise this crime scene.” Turning to Sister, he said, “Will you go inside, tell everyone there has been an accident and no one must leave the house? Oh, Sister, when you get inside stay there until I get there, which will be some time. Don’t tell anyone what has happened, only that there has been an accident. I’m going to call the department right now and hope a team makes it out here in this miserable fog before too much time passes. Obviously, the faster we can go over all this, the better.”

“He can’t be dead.” Tears filled Phil’s eyes. “He can’t really be dead.”

“Phil, I’m going to ask you to sit down on one of the hay bales. Xavier, will you sit with him? Oh, Gray, perhaps you’d better go in with Sister. And whose dogs are these?”

Sister, before heading into the slashing weather, answered, “Vicki and Joe’s. The Middleburg folks.”

“Ah, well, they seem well behaved. They’ll have to stay here until folks are free to leave the house.”

Fortunately, Ben’s team arrived within forty minutes, a good time considering the deplorable conditions. Two law enforcement officers, both women, were sent into the house. Ben knew the women would be very good at calming people and getting statements. The new head of his forensic team went immediately to work and another young man carried a bright flashlight, as the electric power had long ago been cut off in this barn used only for hay storage and odds and ends.

No matter what happens in our life if you’re hunt staff, hounds and horses must be attended to. Sister, Shaker, O.J., and Tootie, due to the long delay at Oakside, finally reached Roughneck Farm at 6:00 P.M. The hounds, subdued, ate warm kibble, then quietly returned to their lodges and sleeping quarters. Rickyroo, Hojo, and Iota, Tootie’s horse, and O.J.’s mare, told everyone in the stable. Back at Oakside, Sister had asked Kasmir if he would take Phil’s horse and Mercer’s wonderful Dixie Do, to his farm. With Alida’s help, Kasmir loaded them up.

At Tattenhall Station, the Indian gentleman watched as Alida brushed the horses and comforted them.

“My man can do that,” Kasmir offered.

“They know something’s wrong. Sometimes a bit of attention helps.” Alida ran her fingers along Dixie Do’s neck.

Kasmir bedded the stalls himself thinking here was a woman not afraid of work and one who was sensitive as well.

Gray called Sam and told him the news. He met his brother as soon as Ben Sidell released him from Oakside. They both drove to Daniella Laprade’s. She took the grim news with steely calm, asked where her son’s body was, and wanted to know when she could see him. Gray called Ben Sidell, who called back in twenty minutes, saying she could see her son now. Mercer wouldn’t be sent to Richmond until tomorrow, assuming the weather improved.

So Gray and Sam drove their aunt to the county morgue. Using only a cane, Daniella stood firm as the large file cabinet, for that’s what it looked like, was opened and the body slid out, feet first on the slab.

Both nephews stood on either side of her in case she collapsed.

“He was a good son.” She then looked up at Gray. “Who did this?”

“Aunt D, we don’t know.”

“You’d better find him before I do. And it was a man. Women don’t kill like this. Hear me?”

“Yes, ma’am,” both brothers said.

Then she turned and walked out, barely using her cane.

Later, Sister, O.J., and Tootie, in the library at Roughneck Farm, discussed the remaining weekend.

O.J. leaned on soft cushions on the sofa. “I understand if you cancel Saturday’s hunt, Sister. Perhaps you should.”

“Mercer loved hunting. You all drove all the way from Kentucky. I think he’d want the hunt to go on. You know I’m a stickler for things being done properly. I wouldn’t do this if I thought it would be slighting him.” Sister stood up. “Let me call Walter. Best to discuss this with my Joint Master.”

Walter had by now been informed of everything. As Sister sat at the desk, Tootie mulled over the awful happenings while talking to O.J.

“It’s a strange coincidence,” Tootie said. “The first pogonip and now this one and both—well, awful.”

“Two murders.” O.J. felt suddenly very tired.

“Three.” Sister had hung up the landline. “You didn’t know our local vet, Penny Hinson, but three. It can’t be a coincidence. It can’t be.” She then returned to her chair, falling into it, also exhausted. “Walter agrees with me. Mercer would want the joint meet to continue and Saturday is the big day at the Bancrofts’. Always a beautiful fixture.”

“Yes, it is,” O.J. agreed.

They heard the back door open. The dogs ran to the kitchen, where Gray walked in from the mudroom.

“Gray.” Sister rose to greet him. “Let me get you a drink.”

He kissed her. “Thank you, honey.”

Neither O.J. nor Tootie said anything until Sister handed him his drink and he was comfortably seated in an armchair. She held up an empty glass toward O.J.

“I believe I will.” O.J. joined Sister at the bar. “I don’t know why but I want an old-fashioned.”

“Let’s make two.” Sister asked Tootie, “You’re twenty-one. Anything?”

“No, thanks.”

Once they were all seated and Gray had some restorative scotch in him, Sister asked, “How did it go?”

“No tears. No raised voice. She’s really a terrifying old woman.” He took another deep sip. “But I feel for her. She looked at him and said he was a good son. Then she wanted to know who killed him and told Sam and me to find the killer before she did.”

O.J. frowned. “Like a Greek tragedy.”

“In a way, yes.” Gray set his drink on a coaster. “You know, I keep thinking about that old barn, the House of Horrors barn. Whoever killed Mercer had a kind of sick sense of humor.”

O.J. murmured, “I guess.”

“And whoever killed him knew the place,” Sister added.

Tootie curled her legs under her. “And the killer took advantage of the rotten weather. It doesn’t seem like a planned murder.”

“No, it doesn’t,” Sister agreed. “You’re right about there being something spontaneous about this. The pogonip provided the chance and he or she was tremendously bold.”

“He. Aunt D says women don’t kill like that.” Gray spoke, having picked up his drink again.

“She’s right,” O.J. agreed.

The phone rang, Sister got up to answer it. After listening to Greg for a bit, Sister asked, “Eclipse? Eclipse, not Matchem?”

“Yes.” On the other end of the line, Greg Schmidt’s voice was positive.

“Eclipse.” She then recited. “Pot-8-Os, Waxy, Whalebone, Camel, Touchstone, Orlando, the second Eclipse, Alarm, Himyar, then Domino. That line. That Eclipse line?”

“Yes,” he repeated.

“I suppose you’ve heard by now all that’s transpired?” said Sister.

Greg replied, “Tedi Bancroft called me. I’m so very sorry.”

“Yes, I am, too. Greg, does anyone else know this, know Midshipman’s line back?”

“I couldn’t rightly say.”

“Thank you.” Sister hung up the phone, turned to the others and stated definitively, “Benny Glitters.”