The Hounds And The Fury. The Tell-Tale Horse

“I don’t know. It’s possible.” He couldn’t help telling her.

She sat back up, putting her right forefinger to her temple.“I hate Jason Woods. If this is true, I hope you can make it stick.”

“Like I said, I don’t know. I shouldn’t have told you. It’s not professional.” He stammered for a moment. “I find it difficult to refuse you.”

“Then I’d better ask for something big.” She smiled broadly.

Heart pounding, he blurted out,“May I take you to dinner Saturday?”

“How about Sunday? College games are Saturday. There’s bound to be at least one torn ACL.”

“Sunday it is.”

He left the hospital far happier than anyone going into it. After stopping by headquarters and assigning another officer to direct traffic at a particularly obnoxious intersection, he drove out to Roughneck Farm, where Sister awaited him.

Rapping on the mud room door, he heard,“Come in.”

“There you are.” She took his coat, hanging it on a peg as Raleigh and Rooster sniffed him.

“What a day today. And hey, what a big field for Thursday.”

“Was good.” She’d made sandwiches, which she put on the table. “You probably didn’t eat enough at the breakfast.”

“Actually, I didn’t. Usually I make a pig of myself, but I was trapped between Ronnie, Walter, and Jason all telling war stories. You’re always feeding me.” He inhaled the rich coffee aroma. “You make the best coffee.”

“Thank you.” She poured him a cup, sat down, and picked up her sandwich so he’d pick up his. “I rarely eat at the breakfasts. For one thing, I can’t eat standing up. I mean, I can, but I don’t like it. For another thing, I usually don’t reach the table.”

“Must be hell to be popular.”

“I suffer.” She laughed.

They ate, chitchatting about the drop between the two ponds where Ronnie had broken his collarbone, the swirling wind currents down in the ravine, and the footing that alternated between hard ground and packed snow.

“Weatherman says three inches.” Ben dabbed his mouth with the napkin.

Golly, on a kitchen chair, head above the table, watched every move.“I’ll accept a votive offering, given that I denned a fox.”

“No fair. You get to sit on the chair,” Rooster complained.

“You get enough treats. In fact, Rooster, diet time.”

“Nasty—you can be so nasty.” Rooster put his head on his paws as he lay by Sister’s feet.

Raleigh, silent, sat on her other side. If he looked noble and patient, she might weaken.

“Here.” Sister tore a bit of ham for Golly, then gave some to the dogs. Raleigh’s ploy had worked.

“I’m closing in, Sister. If I make one wrong move, I’m going to lose our killer.”

“Yes. He’s highly intelligent. I suspect most killers aren’t.”

“Actually, most people in jail, men and women, are what’s called low-normals. Some are borderline retarded. A few truly are evil, but most of them can’t control their impulses. No sense of delayed gratification on any front.”

“Pity. We can’t afford the cost of incarcerating them, but we can’t afford them on the streets, either.”

“They’ll do it again.” He accepted a brownie. “That’s not what some people want to hear, but that’s the way it is. And always was.”

“I suppose so, but our killer doesn’t fall into that category.”

“When did you figure it out?”

“It’s been building. I had a vague feeling once we found Iffy. He never figured on a coyote. He’s not country.” She paused. “Today, we started on a bobcat. Think of Iffy. She’s your bobcat. Legitimate game and guilty as sin. Naturally we’d follow the scent.”

“Yes.” He realized he was holding the coffee cup to his lips but hadn’t drunk some, as he was intently listening.

“Then down in the thickest part of the covert, our true quarry crossed the line of the bobcat. Some second-year entry didn’t come right to the horn when Shaker swung the pack onto the fox. Betty pushed them back, and we had all on and a terrific finish. Our killer is the fox. We’ve got to swing onto his line. We can’t let him go to ground. He’s fooled us by using a bobcat to divert our attention.”

“I don’t have enough to convict him.” He appreciated her insight. “Do you think we can turn our fox?”

Occasionally a whipper-in will turn a fox. This takes a smart whipper-in because one can turn the fox back into the hounds, a dreadful thing to do. Usually, a fox should be turned if it, too, is heading for a major highway or if it is running out of the country. Betty Franklin could do it. The trick is to turn the fox at an angle, but not back to hounds. Then the whipper-in has to stay on the outside of the fox until the danger has passed. It’s extremely difficult to do because the fox isn’t trained to obey, whereas the hound is.

By turning the fox, you save your fox, your hounds, and your master, who might be facing an irate landowner.

“We can try,” said Sister. “Do I have your permission to inform Shaker, Betty, and Sybil?”

“Yes.”

“May they put .22 in their pistols instead of ratshot—just in case?”

“Yes.” He paused. “Who will be the bobcat?”

“I will.”

“Sister, I should do it. It’s dangerous.”

“So is foxhunting. Please don’t take this as an insult, Ben, but I ride better than you do.” She paused for a moment, then reached over to cover his hand with hers. “I take my chances. It’s the only way to live, and I really want to get this bastard. Forgive my French.” She added, “I suppose I should tell Gray. They meant to kill him, you know.”

“Don’t. I appreciate your concern, but the more people who know, the more chances for our fox to pick up the tension. Shaker, Betty, and Sybil are out there as staff. Gray will be in the field.”

“I understand.” She breathed in. “Saturday’s fixture is Paradise.”

“Funny, isn’t it?”

CHAPTER 29

Seven river otters played early Saturday morning on the feast of St. Agnes, January 21. Their philosophy of life contrasted sharply with that of the virgin martyr of Rome, dying in 305 AD. She refused marriage, for at thirteen she had consecrated her body to Christ. Her reward for such a gift was a sword straight through the throat. Like a lamb,agnus in Latin, pretty Agnes met her Maker.

The otters felt life should be frolic with a bit of sex in early spring. Mating, delightful as it could be, paled before running hard, flopping on one’s belly before reaching water’s edge, then sliding down at top speed to crash into the swift current, riding the little waves.

Bruce, the largest of the otters at thirty pounds, father of the brood, hit the cold water with a boom, sending two waves up at his sides. He bobbled along for fifty yards before swimming and scrambling out at an easy place.

“Whee!” One otter after another squealed as he or she roared toward the large creek’s edge then down the steep, slick slide they’d made.

Out they scrambled, each one hurrying to reach the starting place only to barrel down, hit the side of the bank, and fold forelegs next to the body. Down they’d go, furry toboggans loving every minute of life.

Crayfish, rockfish, all manner of delicious edibles swam in the deep, wide creek. Then, too, a berry now and then aided the digestion. The family, in splendid condition, had little competition for the food they prized.

Earl, a gray fox in his second year, sat on a log, the orange half moons of fungus protruding from the snow, more light snow still falling.

Trite though the phrase may be, it was a winter wonderland. As everyone sported thick fur coats with dense undercoats, the temperature was bracing.

Also watching the nonstop otter celebration were Athena and Bitsy, sitting high in a majestic spruce. Flying from Sister’s took them twenty minutes. For humans, hauling horses and dealing with roads that weren’t straight, the time from Roughneck Farm took forty minutes.

“Come on,” Bruce invited Earl.

“No, thanks. I only swim when I must,” the handsome fellow replied.

“You don’t know what you’re missing,” Lisa, the mother, revving her motors, called out.

“Do you think they’re simpleminded?” Bitsy asked Athena.

“No, just silly.”

“You’d think they didn’t have to work for a living,” Bitsy, fond of stirring the pot, remarked.

“They don’t. This place is one big supermarket for them.” Athena opened and closed her beak with a clicking sound.

Squirrels in the tree scurried along the boughs, snow falling off as they ran. They were not overly fond of Athena, who could kill and eat them if she wanted to. But they knew she was full, since she’d given everyone within earshot her menu. They leaped to the oak where they lived.

“Flying rats,” Bitsy giggled.

“Come on!” Bruce called Earl again.

“Nah, I need to save my energy.”

“You looking for a girlfriend?” Bruce thought keeping a mate the better course.

He thought a minute.“If I find the right vixen I have to help with food. I guess I can do it. I’m finally ready.”

“And a healthy young fellow you are,” Bruce complimented him, turned a flip, and reached the runway, speeding to zoom over the side.

Athena, eyes half closed, opened them wide. Swiveling her head, she listened closely. Bitsy, her ear tufts at full attention, mimicked the big owl.

“Trotting,” Bitsy said.

“Short stride, but hooves, yes, hooves. Every now and then you’ll hear the hooves hit a stone. The wind blows some places clean.”

“Deer.” Bitsy fluffed.

“No. Different cadence.” Athena thought hard, then said,“Haven’t heard that in many a year.”

“What is it?”

“A wild boar. A big one,” Athena replied.

“I thought wild pigs traveled in herds,” Bitsy commented.“Not that I’ve run into any, mind you.”

“Sow and her young, they do. They join up with other sows; but no, this is one boar alone. It’s mating season. Actually, it’s mating season for just about everyone. I heard you threatened to lay an egg or two at the end of the month.”

“It’s so much trouble. Laying the eggs isn’t so bad, it’s feeding them.” Bitsy, having never been a mother, thought it might be an enchanting experience and then again, it might not. She had bragged to Target and Inky that she intended to lay two eggs. She wished she’d kept her beak shut.

Athena chortled, a raspy sound.“True, so true.” Her deep voice filling the snow-covered woods, she informed the animals below,“There’s a boar heading this way at a fast trot. One boar, so I expect it’s a male.”

“He’s not going to eat us.” A saucy little otter raced for the slide.

“Root, hog, or die,” Earl remarked.“Guess it’s hard to root in the snow.”

“He can smell what’s underground, snow or no snow. He likes potatoes, turnips, and acorns.” Athena respected wild pigs, finding them highly intelligent—not in her class, but intelligent.

Way in the distance, two miles away, the piercing note of Shaker’s horn sounded “Gone away.”

Athena swiveled her head again, eyes black and full.“Foxhunters.”

“You mean they’ll shoot me?” Earl asked, horrified.

“No, you silly twit. They’ll chase you with hounds, American foxhounds to be exact. Very logical animals, but you’re far more clever. Runabout, use water, foil your scent. If hounds get close, zigzag. And above all, don’t run into deep snow,” Athena counseled.

“In fact, you can crisscross this otter scent should hounds come this way. They’re on a fox now.” Bitsy loved the chase.

“How come I don’t know about this?” the young gray asked, troubled.

“Haven’t used this fixture for years. Problems with the DuCharme brothers. Foxhunters were here two weeks ago, but way on the other side of Paradise. You haven’t been prepared by cubbing. That’s when the humans in charge train the young hounds and young foxes, too. But if you do as I say, you should be fine. Duck into a den, any den, when you’ve had enough. Oh, hounds will dig and sing and curse you, but they can’t do squat. The huntsman will dismount and blow a funny, wiggly sound, and then they’ll leave. It’s harmless, really,” Athena reported.

Bitsy, eager to dispense information, told the gray fox,“There’s a tall, slender lady who rides up front. She leads the humans. Silver hair, even more silver than yours, and if you make friends with her, she’ll feed you.”

“How can I make friends with her if she’s chasing me?” Earl sensibly asked.

“She’ll be back, now that they have this fixture. She’ll probably be on horseback or in an ATV, and she might be with the huntsman, who has dark red curly hair, or she’ll be with her friend, Betty, who rides on the edges. It’s complicated, this foxhunting.” Bitsy puffed out her little chest.

“It’s a sacred thing to the humans.” Athena opened wide her fearsome beak.“Holy. You do your part and Sister will care for you.”

Way off, all the animals could hear hounds, a ghostly sound at this distance.

“Sounds like they are coming our way.” Bruce glanced at his family.

“Will they hurt us, those nasty hounds?” a youngster inquired.

“Hounds stick to fox scent. They won’t fuss you up.” Bitsy used a colloquial expression.

“It’s not the hounds you need to worry about; it’s the humans.” Athena burst out laughing.“The horses will be slipping and sliding. The humans will be lurching around up there, and you might even see a few go splat.”

“Oh, my, my, yes,” Bitsy seconded her heroine.

Hounds moved closer.

Lisa called to Bruce, who was still bodysurfing,“We’d better go home.”

“One more slide!” He quickly climbed out, graceful in his fashion.

“No, I don’t want to take any chances,” she insisted.

“You’re right.” He genially agreed, having learned it’s better to agree with your spouse.

Earl watched as the happy group walked to their den, which had overgrown entrances near the base of a large tree hanging over the creek. Thick roots, eight to twelve inches in diameter, burst through the banks where the water had eroded the soil. Entrances and exits were hidden under the roots on the bank side, too.

“You might want to head toward your den or a den you’ve seen along the way. The hounds track your scent. They don’t need to see you,” Athena told Earl.

“How far away do you live?” Bitsy asked.

“Mile and a half, southwards.”

The horn sounded closer now, perhaps a mile away.

“If you’re lucky they’re on a vixen, and she’ll duck in somewhere between here and where she is now. Then you won’t have to go far to find her.” Athena looked on the bright side.“But Bitsy is right; you’d best be going.”

“Thanks for the advice.” Earl used the otters’ slide and swam across the creek. Given the current, he climbed out thirty yards downstream.

“Worried about him?” Bitsy asked.

“A little.” Athena frowned, opened her wings, dropped off the branch, and with one downward sweep of her enormous wings glided over Earl.“If you encounter problems, run with deer. Use any other animal. You can’t mask your scent. It’s a good day for scent.”

Bitsy, needing many more flaps, caught up with the great horned owl.“Maybe we should stick with him?”

“Might bring those damned crows. You know how they like to mob foxes. Of course, I’d be happy to kill a few.”

Bitsy, saying nothing, stayed with Athena. She’d not forgotten her close call at pattypan forge.

Athena and Bitsy passed over a gray vixen, who raced through a large expanse of running cedar, much of it partially exposed from last night’s wind. Although it was calm enough now, with gentle flakes coming down, the scent would be true, not blown yards off. The vixen made use of the terrain, then ducked into a den, a few bones on the low pile outside announcing her gourmet tastes.

Cora reached the den first, and within half a minute everyone else crowded around.

Betty, on the right, stayed over in the meadow to the edge of the woods where the den was located. Sybil, on the left, stopped on ground level with the den as Shaker rode up.

The field, seventy people, enjoyed the spectacle of thrilled hounds, the blowing of“Gone to ground,” and the happy knowledge that hounds had accounted for their fox.

Sister, on Aztec, smiled.

The Custis Hall girls rode in the rear with Walter. Sister had asked Tedi and Edward whether they would mind if Jason rode behind her. She wanted to observe him to see whether he knew as much as he said he did. If nothing else, she’d be seeing his hunting manners close up.

Knowing that the club always needed money, the Bancrofts graciously rode behind Jason. As one of the main benefactors of the club, the Bancrofts hoped others would come through, especially now that Crawford had bagged it.

Sister nodded to Shaker when he remounted to go forward, then quietly turned to ask Jason behind her,“What do you think, red or gray?”

“Gray,” he replied, a smile crossing his handsome face.

“I do, too.” She smiled back.

If one studied fox tracks it didn’t take too much to discern the difference between a red’s foot and a gray’s, especially in winter. The red’s prints could be about two and a half inches long. The hindprint might be smaller, but the heavy fur around the paw would register on the ground or on snow. The toe marks and lobe ofthe pads would be a little indistinct.

The gray’s prints were an inch and a half long for a mature fox, the print sharper. The toes dug in deeper, it seemed, and if it weren’t for the toe marks, one could mistake the print for an overfed, much-loved pet cat like Golly.

She gave Jason credit for making the right call, but if he had studied prints all he had to do was look down at the snow. Still, thousands foxhunted and couldn’t recognize footprints or fox scat. He had done some homework.

She twisted all the way round to see if the field was together. They were, thanks to Walter and the girls pushing them up. If someone straggled, Walter sent them back to Bobby. No one in the field would disobey a master’s command if they wanted to keep hunting—not just with Jefferson Hunt but with any hunt. The masters would pass on who was a butthead as readily as they passed on who was a true foxhunter.

Bobby, hands full with green riders, green horses, and occasionally treacherous footing, just joined them as Shaker moved off. It seemed to go in spurts, the numbers of green riders or green horses, but shepherding them always fell to the hilltoppers’ master, the most unsung staff position in foxhunting.

Few would dream of going first flight if they couldn’t ride, especially at Jefferson Hunt. Sister enjoyed a formidable reputation—and who wanted to look a fool under her eyes?

The whippers-in usually rode hardest, but they were alone, an advantage under the circumstances. If they weren’t riding hard or trotting forward, they’d be immobile at a prime spot, and that spot always seemed to be the coldest damned place on earth.

The huntsman stayed with hounds as best he could. He, too, rode hard, but he rode straight behind the pack. Chances were, the whippers-in covered more territory than he did. This wasn’t to say he didn’t do things that Sister and the field would not. He did, but often no one saw him take a four-foot drop off a creek bed into the water. He stayed with his hounds if possible.

While Sister could do anything on a horse, her first responsibility was the field, not the hounds. Very few fields today were well mounted enough, with fearless riders, to do things that were routinely done thirty years ago. The reason was that so many people had taken up foxhunting who hadn’t grown up with horses. It wasn’t that they couldn’t clear the four-foot jump if they had the right horse, but only a few had the right horse. The right horse, nine times out of ten, was a thoroughbred or a thoroughbred cross, depending on territory. Those arriving late to the glories of riding often feared thoroughbreds. If you knew the animal, you loved its sensitivity and forward ways. If you didn’t, you thought you were on a runaway that would spook at a white stone pebble. The change in the field was as big a shift in foxhunting as the rise of the automobile, the sickening encroachments of suburbia.

As hounds searched for fresh scent, Sister looked behind again, noting that Gray was in the middle of the field, Ben back with Bobby. She was glad Ben had asked her not to tell Gray. He was right; Gray would have inched forward, sticking too close to Sister.

Athena and Bitsy peered down from a leafless sycamore, its distinctive multicolored patchy bark noticeable in a palette of white, gray, beige, and black.

“They’ll pick up Earl’s scent soon enough if they keep going in this direction,” Bitsy fretted.

“M-m-m.” Athena noticed Diddy tossing snow with her nose, then leaping up for it.

“This isn’t playtime,” Asa reprimanded the happy girl.

“Sorry.” Diddy reapplied herself to the task.

The treetops waved slightly as they dropped down a steep path to walk along the creek bed, flat and wide, the rushing water drowning other sounds.

“If we fly with the hounds, we won’t signal Earl’s position.” Athena was more worried than she cared to admit.“The crows will stay put. If Earl does need direction, we can move up to supply it.”

“Yes, yes.” Bitsy agreed, then lifted off to slowly fly along. No need for speed at this point.

A quarter mile down the creek bed they reached the otter slides.

“Gray, dog fox.” Dasher inhaled.

The otters, peeking out from under the big roots in the bank, listened as the hounds chimed in after Dasher.

They watched the whole pack go down their slide and hit the water, swimming across the frothy creek in one body.

“Bet they’ve made the slide bigger and slicker.” Bruce couldn’t wait to return to his game.

Darby, at the rear of the pack, heard Bruce’s voice and turned to see the otters looking at him.“You’re funny-looking,” the young hound blurted out.

“Not as funny as you are,” Lisa smartly replied as Shaker on Gunpowder jumped off the bank six feet away from the slide, where the grade was better for a horse.

The pack in full cry flew through the flatland on the other side of the creek and climbed up the gentle rise to higher ground to run southwards, wind at their rear, scent blowing away from them.

Earl knew enough to use the wind, but scent was strong and hounds were closing.

He kept on straight through the woods, but the pine needles, under snow, couldn’t help dissipate his scent. Hounds moved faster than he thought they could.

Nothing looked promising, so he picked up the pace, his brush now carried straight out. A rotted log ahead provided a break in his scent. He ran inside, straight through to the other end. He kept going.

A pocket meadow needed to be crossed quickly before he could escape into denser woods on the far side. He knew a few dens in there that could be used. If someone was in them, too bad. They’d be crowded for a time.

Snow lay eight inches in parts on the pocket meadow. He didn’t relish going across. At the last minute Earl skirted back into the woods, heading northeast, at a right angle to his former line of scent.

Old deer bones protruded from the snow. He ran into the middle of them, then sped away, turning again toward the meadow.

Hounds checked briefly at the bones.

Sister picked her spot and her moment.

“Jason, come up here beside me for a minute.”

He rode next to her, then stopped.“This corpse helped our fox, the reverse of Iffy’s corpse, which points her finger at you.”

Jason shrugged, laughing.“Sister, you have a good imagination.”

Hounds sped away. Sister followed. Jason fell in behind. Had she gotten it wrong?

This time Earl did go into the meadow, and it was his bad luck to founder in a deep spot that lay deceptively flat on the meadow. Struggling to extricate himself, he heard hounds draw closer, much too close. He could see them bursting into the meadow, clouds of snow churning up in front of their forelegs.

He finally clawed out of the hole, but the going was deep.

Athena and Bitsy flew over him now.

Athena saw the boar, all four hundred and forty pounds of him, yellow tusks long and sharp, arrive in the little meadow at a trot in the opposite direction.

“Go right!” Athena called down.

Earl, running for his life, pounded through the snow as the huge boar trotted straight at him.

“Duck around him. He’ll swing his head in that direction. Make a wide circle, then run like hell, Earl!” Athena commanded.

Shaker, up behind his hounds, saw the danger and blew three long notes to call hounds back, but not before half the pack was face-to-face with one ugly brute.

The boar lowered his head. He stopped. He paid no attention to Earl, who circled him, reaching the woods and freedom.

“Go back!” Ardent boomed, barely managing to pull back the pack.

Shaker, blowing his hounds to him, galloped away from the boar, pulling hounds back into the woods from whence they had come but far to the right of the field, who did not know what lay ahead. The field did, however, pull up at woods’ edge.

Jason rode up to Sister, already in the meadow, before she could turn to follow Shaker. He wedged his knee under hers, throwing her over the saddle. Aztec trembled in front of the boar, then turned, racing back through the field. He was only six, but even a seasoned horse would be scared once it got a whiff. Horses were blowing up behind Aztec.

Jason then bellowed,“Reverse.”

The field, not able to see over the meadow’s rise, obediently turned in the woods.

The only person who had a clear view of what had happened was Betty, on the right at the edge of the woods.

Aztec stopped at the rear of first flight. Walter reached over and grabbed his reins.

Tedi and Edward turned, but Edward stopped turning back.

“Jason passed us—but where’s Sister?”

They waited a moment, their horses becoming more restive.

Betty bolted out of the woods toward Sister.

Luckily, Sister had fallen on her right side. Her .38 rested in a holster on her left side under her jacket.

Slipping in the snow, she tore open her coat, black horn buttons popping off, to reach for the gun as the boar charged. No time.

“Roll, then run!” Athena directed, hoping the human might understand.

Betty, hurtling toward the boar, said to Magellan,“We might get hurt, but we have to do this.”

“I will,” the thoroughbred replied, all heart.

The boar turned his big head for a moment upon hearing Magellan.

Sister had rolled. Then she ran as fast as she could. The snow slowed her.

She turned while Betty occupied the brute by circling him. Betty’d drawn her gun. Sister at last drew hers.

Betty, cool, didn’t fire. “Get to the woods, Janie. I’ll pick you up there,” she hollered.

“No. What if you fall?”

“Dammit!” Betty rode in the opposite direction of Sister, the boar charging after her. Then she wheeled and spurred Magellan. The horse flew past the beast, who though large had quick reflexes. Betty reached Sister, who stuck her gun back in the holster.

Slowing Magellan, Betty leaned down, her left arm straight.

Sister grabbed Betty’s arm, ran alongside Magellan for two steps, gained speed, and swung up.

Thank God, Betty was strong. She held Sister’s weight as the older woman flung her right leg over Magellan’s hindquarters. Mounted, the two galloped into the woods. Tedi and Edward followed on seeing them.

Walter was moving forward with Aztec. He had no idea what was up ahead, since Jason hadn’t told anyone. Most had turned to follow Jason, thinking he was temporary field master.

The boar had no desire to chase the horse or the people. His mission was to find the female whose perfume had reached him a half hour ago.

Sister, not dismounting, slid from Magellan to Aztec, who had calmed down next to Clemson, Walter’s bombproof older hunter.

“Where’s the field?”

“I don’t know,” Walter said.

“Jesus!” Sister’s face reddened. “Listen!”

Hearing Shaker’s horn, Sister said, “Tedi, kick on. Edward, too. Take the field. Don’t listen to Jason.”

Walter turned to the horn, but he waited a moment for Sister and Betty.

Sister reached over to Betty.“It’s not over.”

“I know.”

With that, both women left Walter in the lurch. Angry, he squeezed Clemson to catch up, but their horses were younger and faster, so he followed Tedi and Edward, also moving fast.

Sister reached the hilltoppers first as Betty pulled away to go to Shaker, who didn’t know anything had happened.

“Ben, he got away,” Sister said, voice low.

Ben reached into his pocket and plucked out his cell phone to call the deputies on the road.

“Bobby, you have one hell of a wife.” Sister then blew by the rest of them, calling out, “Tedi and Edward will lead you. They’re coming up behind. Wait for them.”

She rode up to Shaker and filled him in. Betty had not done so, feeling it was more important to take her position at ten o’clock from the hounds. She was right in this, as there was nothing any of them could do about Jason at the moment.

“Let’s pick them up. He’ll kill anyone or anything in his way, and we don’t know where he is.” Sister told her huntsman, “Hold hounds for a moment.”

Trudy sat on her haunches.“What was that ugly thing?”

“Big old fat wild pig, that’s what,” Asa informed her.“He would have cut us up like flank steak.”

“Quicker than you think, those pigs,” Cora commented.

“How come we haven’t smelled them before now?” Diddy asked a good question.

“They keep to themselves except during breeding season.” Ardent hated boar.

“And they’re in the mountains. Paradise runs into all that billy-goat land we hunted last week. You won’t find them at Tattenhall Station or Tedi or Edward’s.” Diana studied game just as Sister and Shaker did.

“Well, they’ll come down if food is scarce. They’ll trot fifty miles and not think a thing of it.” Ardent thought it odd that a wild pig will hurry along to a foraging spot, then, when close, slow way down.

“Hope I don’t see another one.” Trinity had been scared out of her wits.

“Gather round.” Sister waited as the field made a semicircle around her. “Ben, do I have permission to announce our suspicions, which I believe are now confirmed? Everyone’s safety is at stake.”

“Yes.”

The sheriff’s one-word answer riveted everyone’s attention.

“We believe that Dr. Jason Woods killed Iphigenia Demetrios.” She waited while that sunk in. “He is armed, extremely dangerous, and highly intelligent. I want everyone to stick together on the ride back. In those places where it’s tight and you go single file, look to the person in front, then back. If anyone falls out of your sight line, holler. Loud.”

“Why won’t he just ride back to his trailer and take off?” Henry Xavier asked.

“Since he now knows that we know, he’ll assume I have officers at the trailers and on the crossroads in every direction. He’s going to keep clear,” Ben replied. “I will ride tail for the hilltoppers. I’ll be the last person in the line. I think we’d better move along.”

“Shaker…” Sister meant to tell him to move on. Then she suddenly exclaimed, “Where’s Sybil?”

“Still on the left, I hope,” Shaker, worried, replied.

“Did you blow her in?” Sister asked crossly.

“Of course I did.”

“I’m sorry, Shaker. I know better. I’m on edge.”

“If I’d nearly been gored by a boar, I’d be on edge, too, and we don’t know where that bastard is—the human, I mean.” Shaker removed his cap to wipe his brow, the cold air sharp on his sweating head.

“Blow again.”

Shaker put the brass horn to his lips and blew the notes that sounded like“Whipper-in,” two medium notes followed by one shorter one.

Nothing.

“We need to move on, Sister,” Ben firmly told her.

“I can’t leave her there, Ben.” Sister’s voice was low, soft.

Shaker spoke up.“I’m going with you.”

Tedi and Edward came to them, realizing their daughter had not come back to the horn. Walter also rode up.

“Tedi, you stay with the field. I’ll go,” Edward gently ordered his wife.

“No. This is my fault. He was quicker and more ruthless than I thought. I should have known better.”

“He was lucky,” Shaker said.

“Yes, but smart. He used the boar.” Sister respected her foe. She had underestimated him and desperately prayed that Sybil wouldn’t pay for it.

“I’m going. I’m a doctor.” Walter spoke firmly. “Edward, please help with the field in case someone makes a mistake.”

“What if he comes back to snag a hostage?” Betty had ridden in, since hounds rested.

“Ben’s with them.” Edward wanted to go.

“We’ll have too many people. We can’t risk him shooting all of you. You, too, Shaker.”

“I’m not letting you go!” Shaker noticed Gray riding toward them.

“We can’t risk the pack because I was stupid. He’ll shoot my hounds. No. You, Betty, go back. Edward, get Gray, and get him turned around before he knows what’s happening. Go back. I can outfox this son-of-a-bitch.”

“I’m going with you.” Walter, accustomed to command when necessary, faced her.

“I’m an old woman. If I die, so what? Walter, you’re young. Go back with the others.”

As the others turned, Shaker called the pack, and Betty floated out to the side.

Walter said,“I’m going.”

“I’ll see you back at the trailer, Betty. I owe you.” Sister realized that Walter would not be dissuaded.

Betty, deeply distressed, fought back the tears and nodded.

“Walter, unbutton your coat. You’re wearing a shoulder harness. Make sure you can get to your gun fast.”

He did as he was told. They cantered to where the riders were pulled up and circled until they found Jason’s tracks.

“I’m worried sick,” Walter confessed as they followed the tracks.

Sister replied,“With good reason. This is my fault.”

Before he could protest that it could have happened to anyone, she picked up the pace.

The deer paths were wide. She slowed at one point where fox dens were near a thread of a creek.

She noticed a glob of frozen blood, footprints.

She pushed Aztec from a canter into a gallop, pointing at the blood with her crop.

Walter looked down as he passed. A grim determination filled him. Sister had been caught off guard. He’d been duped by a colleague. He wanted to strangle Jason for that as well as for the harm the other doctor had done.

Jason, moving south toward Chapel Cross, slowed after a half-mile gallop. A sense of direction wasn’t his strong point, so he carried a small global positioning device, which he checked from time to time.

He knew the closer he got to Chapel Cross the more wary he needed to be. There’d be cops everywhere, but he thought he could elude them by dismounting and smacking Kilowatt on his hindquarters. That might divert them long enough for him to cross the road. Once on the other side of Chapel Cross he knew he could steal a car or truck from a farm as the county became more populated.

He’d change cars along the way. Arrogant, he felt he was smarter than everyone. He believed he could lay low, angling toward the Canadian border. He had his passport with him, a habit he’d learned when overseas. He also had a forged Belgian passport. He thought ahead. In time he figured he’d fly out of Canada. The money was safe in a bank in Zurich.

Jason hadn’t thought it would reach this point, but he always had backup plans. Iffy had screwed up the original plan by panicking and, worse, insisting they run away together. She’d paid for it.

He walked along, not realizing that Sybil shadowed him a quarter mile behind. She could have shot his horse when he galloped past her as she sat on a ridge.

She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t kill a beautiful animal who happened to have a criminal on his back. She knew she was wrong in terms of human justice, but she felt in her heart that she was right.

She knew Jason wasn’t a country boy, smart though he was. Tracking him would be easy enough. If she had a chance for a clear shot at him, she’d move up and fire. Her advantage lay in surprise.

The thick undergrowth forced them both to stick to deer trails. She stopped abruptly as Bombardier snorted when a deer approached downwind, their usual approach when their curiosity was aroused.

The doe stopped, looked at the horse, then bolted into the brush.

She had heard Shaker blowing for her. She wondered how Jason had gotten away. She told herself that one great thing about being a whipper-in was you became resourceful.

A soft flutter of wings startled her. She looked up to see, right over her head, Athena, low, followed by Bitsy, flying silently as only owls can do. Bombardier didn’t flick an ear. The owls were so close that the variations in feather colors showed clearly.

Jason, senses straining, also did not hear the owls, who gained altitude while staying behind him. The thick forest gave way to a rolling hay field. The only route to Chapel Cross was over that field. Fortunately, it was far off a state road—but still, how long before the helicopters would be looking?

Jason figured Ben had called in all the resources he had, but it would take the helicopter team at least forty-five minutes to reach him because the small airport was thirty-five miles away, and the team would need to suit up, mount up, then fly to Paradise.

He had a comfortable window of time to reach Chapel Cross. Even in his black frock coat he’d stand out crossing the white hay field, but if he skirted the edges he’d tack another fifteen minutes onto the ride.

He pushed his horse into a trot and risked it.

On reaching that same spot, Sybil pulled out the cell phone Sister insisted she carry in case of injury. She punched in Sister’s prerecorded number, which was 7.

At the vibration, Sister grabbed her phone out of her pocket.

“Sister, I’m at the edge of Binky’s southernmost hay field. Jason’s crossing it at a trot, heading for Tattenhall Station, I expect,” said Sybil in a low voice.

“Thank God, you’re all right. Don’t take any chances, Sybil. Walter and I are behind you, moving up. Half mile. Tops.”

“Right.” She clicked off the phone.

Jason heard a human voice, very faint. He turned to see Sybil at the edge of the woods. He wheeled Kilowatt, pulled out his gun, and rode hard straight for her.

Sybil slipped back into the thick woods. She rode off the deer trail to dip down into a swale. It would take him a minute or two to find her. She noticed boot prints at the edge of the swale.

Conventional wisdom would have dictated she run, but her entire back would be exposed. Steeling herself, she clicked off the safety of her .22, six bullets in the chamber instead of ratshot. Small though the caliber was, in the right place that .22 could stop a person cold.

She held the reins in her left hand, her right arm extended. All she needed to do was swing her arm to her target.

Jason assumed she would run away. Kilowatt, fast, would get so close to her that he could drop her. Then he would turn and race like mad across the hay field. He couldn’t lose more time.

He stopped to listen for the sound of her hoofbeats. Silence. Then he heard the rustle of leaves as Bombardier moved a little. Walking deliberately toward the sound, he, too, readied his .45.

Athena quietly flew ahead of him. As she passed over the lip of the swale she called,“Hoo, Ho Ho, Hoo.” Athena saw Donny Sweigart Jr. in camouflage fatigues, crouched in the bushes by the edge of the swale.

Bitsy, on the same vector, emitted one screech, her little beak agape. They circled and landed in a treetop.

Sybil looked in the direction from which they had flown. Three seconds later, Jason appeared at the edge of the swale from that same direction.

He had a smirk on his face that said,“Like shooting fish in a barrel.”

Donny pushed through the brush and startled Kilowatt, who took a step back. Jason steadied himself and turned as Donny threw a round ball of frozen blood. It hit Jason hard in the chest. His right arm jerked up. He squeezed the trigger.

Sybil fired as the blood hit Jason, that split second saving her.

Hit in the shoulder, feeling the sting that soon followed, Jason had to decide who to shoot first. Donny, a country boy, knew that running made him a target. If he stayed and fought, he’d have a chance. So would Sybil. Donny grabbed Jason’s leg.

Jason fired, just missing Sybil.

This time she rode toward him as he attempted to smash the butt of his gun into Donny’s face. Sybil patiently took a deep breath, making certain of her target since she knew two lives depended on her—or three lives: Jason might shoot Bombardier.

She fired, squeezing the trigger gently. Jason slipped backward off Kilowatt, who didn’t move, oddly enough. Nor did Jason.

Sybil reached him. His eyes stared up at the sky. A neat hole over his right eye testified to her marksmanship.

“Thank God for you, Donny. Thank God.”

She fired in the air three times, the universal signal of distress. Then her heart pounded and she shook.

“Steady girl, steady. We did it.” Bombardier nickered as he nuzzled Jason’s marvelous horse.

Three minutes later, flying through and over all obstacles, Sister and Walter reached the two humans and two horses.

Seeing the round frozen ball of blood, Sister understood.“Donny.” She half smiled.

Sheepishly, he smiled back, for Sybil had dismounted and was hugging him fiercely, a most thrilling feeling.

CHAPTER 30

Personal cataclysms take many forms. All provide the same result: you’re tossed into the air. Some people fall hard, others hit the ground but rise and learn, a few land on their feet, and fewer still bounce back higher than they had been cast down.

Sister usually fell into the last category. Yesterday’s event, though distressing, energized her.

“People are like teabags. You never know how strong they are until you put them in hot water,” she said to Shaker as they finished power washing the feed room. “Betty and Sybil are strong.”

“Hell of a way to find out,” Shaker grunted. “I should have been with you when he first knocked you off Aztec.”

“First of all, honey chile”—she used the Southern nomenclature with warmth—“how could you know? You pulled the hounds from danger. You did the exact right thing. From the safety of the woods, there’s no way you could know. It all turned out right.” She paused. “He used an old dirty polo trick, actually. He put his knee behind mine and kicked my leg up high and hard. Over I went.”

“No polo where’s he gone—unless they play with pitchforks.”

“By the grace of God.”

“I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills from whence cometh my help,” Sister smiled. “Sybil, Betty, and I are lucky, lucky women.” She shrugged, tears filling her eyes.

Shaker misted over, too.“You never know, do you? You never know what’s around the corner.” He rolled the power washer back to the corner. “We could eat off the floor.”

“That’s a thought.”

“Boss, I didn’t get a chance to really talk to you yesterday, what with the police and all. I did pop my head in last night to see that you were okay.”

“Three-ring circus, wasn’t it?” She rolled up a hose.

“How did you know?”

“At first, I didn’t. Iffy’s behavior kept me focused on her. I’m convinced she tried to shoot Gray. Wasn’t a hunter catching the last days of deer season. Can’t prove it, but I believe it to be so.”

“Gray was on to her.”

“Well, he was on to someone cooking the books. He couldn’t discuss it, but I knew something was amiss. I thought maybe Garvey was stealing the cream. That idea soon faded, but Iffy could have worked with Garvey and discovered she was going to take the fall. A lot of thoughts flitted through my peabrain.”

“But she was guilty?” His thick eyebrows moved upwards.

“Yes, she was—and what’s even more disgusting is she killed Angel. Jason gave her the scopolamine, the stuff that’s used for motion sickness and arthritis.” She walked into the kennel office, Shaker following. “Tell you one thing, Ben Sidell is good. He put his nose down and followed every scent trail.”

“Thorough.”

“That he is. He figured out the insurance scam. I had no idea about that. Ben and his staff interviewed every living patient on Jason’s roster. Jason did save lives, but there were people on his roster who feigned symptoms, including Alfred DuCharme. They were never sick in the first place. Jason wrote up treatment in collusion with the phony patient, and the money rolled in. When Ben went through his patient roster, since some called Jason, that tipped him off to the fact that he was under suspicion, but he was confident he’d covered his tracks.”

“Two crimes?” Shaker dropped in the chair by the desk, turning it so he could face Sister as she sat behind the desk.

“More than that. One attempted murder. I’m counting Iffy shooting Sam. One murder: Angel. Then Iffy’s murder. A brilliant insurance scam, two million dollars pilfered from Aluminum Manufacturing. The insurance companies will get involved with their own investigation, but Ben’s estimate is that Jason sucked up about nine million dollars.”

“Nine million!” Shaker exclaimed.

“It’s obvious you haven’t seen a hospital bill in a long time. Jason specialized in cancer. The diagnostic tests, the chemo and radiation if needed, the operations if needed, the aftercare, the pharmacy bills. It’s insane. Really, it’s easier to die. It’s certainly cheaper.”

“I’ll remember that.” His wry smile was engaging.

“Here’s the thing I don’t understand. By all accounts Jason was a good doctor. Why wasn’t that enough? Doctors make a good living. But he must have had some kind of instinct, some sixth sense of who could be corrupted. Someone might have a few cancer cells on the skin. He’d talk them intoletting him invent a major cancer, and they’d split the insurance money. He even went so far as to perform some operations, not cut-open-the-chest stuff, but still, in-office procedures on healthy people. Mostly he threw patients into a fake radiation and chemo program and raked in the money. Walter—who is tremendously upset, by the way—said it’s not that hard to acquire x-rays and records. He thinks Jason took those of deceased people. He’d x-ray his ‘patient’ later, and lo and behold, the tumor or the cancer would be in remission. The cleverness of it, the attention to detail—it’s almost admirable.”

“Nine million dollars.” Shaker fixated on the loot.

“Think what we could do with that money?” Sister sighed, then glanced out the window. “Sun’s up.”

“Clearing up.” He rose and walked to the hot plate. “Tea? Coffee?”

“Tea.”

“Angel loathed Iffy. How could Iffy kill her without Angel knowing? I mean, Angel wouldn’t take motion sickness stuff from Iffy, I don’t think.” Shaker returned to the main subject.

These two, working cheek by jowl for decades—for Shaker had been hired as a young man to whip-in—had long ago divested themselves of connecting every sentence to the one prior.

“Angel had some arthritis, common enough in someone eighty-four. Walter suggested an over-the-counter remedy. Remember, Ben had questioned him thoroughly when the news about Angel came back from the labs. First he visited Margaret DuCharme. Later, after he saw me he questioned Walter, and Walter said he’d recommended cream with scopolamine in it. No big deal; we could go down to Rite Aid and buy a jar. Iffy mentioned to Angel that much faster relief could be had by putting a patch behind her ear.” Sister gratefully accepted her tea, the bag steeping. “She said this in front of Garvey.I mean Iffy was smart, and she was bold. Garvey told Ben that Iffy told him to try it if he stiffened up, and also to take shark cartilage pills.”

Shaker blushed.“I take them. Glucosamine and chondroitin, too. Works.”

“The things I find out.” She put the teabag on her teaspoon and wrapped the string around it to squeeze out the excess water, then dropped the spent bag into the wastebasket.

It landed with a plop.

“Try it.”

“Long as it isn’t a lethal dose.”

“Doesn’t it have that stuff in, soopy—”

“Scopolamine.” She pronounced each syllable. “There’s no way to know, but the logical conclusion is that Iffy brought in a patch loaded with the stuff and told Angel to put it behind her ear. If she didn’t, no one would know it was murderous. Who else would use it? Iffy would have to findanother way to kill Angel as Angel’s suspicions of Iffy’s stealing intensified. But Angel did put the patch on. Iffy timed it, walked into Angel’s office forty minutes later—remember, Angel’s age played a part in the speed of this stuff—and she removed the ear patch.”

“But where’d the two million go? Iffy was tight as a tick.”

“Went to Jason, who obviously wasn’t.”

“Jesus. She killed for that bastard?”

“She was in love with him. We’ll never know what he promised her. Marriage?” She shrugged.

Shaker absorbed this.“Iffy in love.”

“Hard to imagine.”

“He must have really played her.” Shaker shook his head in disbelief and disgust.

“We can all be fools in love. I guess it just proves that Iffy was human.”

“I guess.” He sipped his tea. “Lorraine’s got me off coffee completely now. She says tea is better for me.”

“Reckon it is.” She rose and looked outside the window up to the house. “Gray’s still asleep. Light’s not on upstairs. Poor guy; he’s exhausted. First he finds the coverup at Garvey’s. Then Sam gets shot. Then he’s in the dark until I nearly bought the farm yesterday. I was lucky Jason didn’t shoot me. He was slick; I’ll give him that.”

“Why wouldn’t he shoot you?” Shaker quickly amended that. “Not that I wanted him to.”

“Ha. You say.” She teased him and sat back down. “Ben only had him on insurance fraud. Iffy was the embezzler, not Jason. He received the proceeds of her ill-gotten gains, but he was technically innocent. If he’d shot me yesterday he’d have had a much tougher time in court.”

“He shot Iffy.”

“We know that, but Ben still would have to prove it. And it wouldn’t be easy. Jason’s big bucks could have hired a lawyer that would make Sherman’s march look like trespassing.”

“That’s a fact.” Shaker appreciated the wiles of high-paid lawyers, thanks to a divorce many years earlier.

“That was my first clue that Jason was our man.”

“Damn. I sure didn’t have any idea. All I knew was that Iffy had been planted over Jemima Lorillard. How do you get to Jason from that?”

“He thought he was clever, but he was no fox. He didn’t know squat about hounds. I mean the man hunted with us and not once during the season did he really study the hounds at work. No, he was a run and gun.” She held up her hand as if holding off a protest. “I know, I know, they pay their dues and I am grateful so long as they don’t interfere with hounds or staff, but really, how can you foxhunt and not study hounds? I will never understand it. If they want to run and jump all the time they should take up three-day eventing.”

“That’s not easy.”

“Didn’t say it was.” She sat back down. “But it’s not foxhunting. You need to appreciate hounds a wee bit. Wouldn’t hurt to know something about quarry.”

“How did that get you to Jason?”

“The fox knows how fabulous hound noses are. You and I know. Jason didn’t. He stupidly buried Iffy over Jemima, but he only dug down about three feet. He knew Sam and Gray’s schedule. He was smart about that. And he was smart enough not to just throw her over a ravine somewhere because the vultures would circle round soon enough. His one bit of luck was the twenty-four-hour thaw. Guess he would have kept her in the freezer until there was one otherwise.”

“Ugh.”

She laughed.“I know; that was mean. Anyway, he was lucky there. But hounds can smell six feet down. Not even snow is going to stop them if the ground isn’t frozen deep. I suspect by planting Iffy at the Lorillard graveyard he thought to throw suspicion on Gray should Iffy come to light—which she did, a lot earlier than Jason expected. Since Iffy didn’t like Gray, the reverse could also be true. It’s not locked down, but I do think Jason was shrewd enough to do something like that. He had to get rid of the body somewhere; might as well create confusion with it.”

“He showed he couldn’t be trusted when he whipped-in to Crawford, pardon the expression.” Shaker meant that Jason’s performance couldn’t be called whipping-in.

“Oh, and wasn’t that a moment?” she gleefully recalled. “Crawford called Ben last night to say he knew nothing about Jason’s crimes. Ben called me, and we had a good laugh.”

“He didn’t. I mean I hate his guts, but I don’t think he was part of it.” Shaker grimaced.

“Never underestimate the greed of the rich.” She drank a large gulp. “But I agree. I don’t think he knew anything. Couldn’t really be part of it, anyway. Too busy chasing hounds all over Jefferson County.”

They both laughed.

She got up again to check the bedroom light.“Still out. I’m glad he stayed last night.”

“I was shook up. You really must have been rocked.”

“Jason thought the boar would kill me. He would still be clean of murder if he was caught. Like I said, I was lucky. It’s funny; you know, it didn’t really hit me until I finally got home. Gray came with me, and I walked into the kitchen. Golly ran up with Raleigh and Rooster. Hit me like a brick.”

“That would be a hard way to die, gored to death.”

“Even if I didn’t die; imagine the damage?” She exhaled. “Scares me, those pigs. Always has.”

A pair of headlights shone into the windows.

Shaker stood up, holding his heavy cup.“Betty.”

“What’s she doing out here? She should be primping for church.” Sister stood up, too.

Betty cut her lights, got out, hurried through the cold, and knocked three times on the kennel door, which she then opened.“I couldn’t sleep.” She threw herself on Sister. “We almost lost you.”

Sister hugged Betty.“Honey, we might have lost you, too, or that beautiful Magellan.”

They were all crying again, wiping each other’s tears, then laughing.

“Big girls don’t cry,” Shaker laughed as he reached in his pocket for a clean handkerchief and handed it to Betty.

“You need it as much as I do,” she sniffled as she laughed.

“I’ll be manly and use the back of my hand.”

This sent them into fits of laughter—the laughter of relief, companionship, and deep love.

Betty hugged them both, then clicked the hot plate back on.

“You really came for tea,” Shaker kidded her.

Betty sat on the edge of the desk.“My legs are still shaky.”

“Know what you mean,” Sister confessed.

“Gray asleep?”

“Yeah. Rory stayed with Sam last night. It will be another three weeks before he can lift his arm up to get a shirt on. Wound stopped draining, though.”

“Absence makes the heart grow fonder. At least that’s what they tell us.” Betty hopped off the desk to rummage through the teabag box, filled with odds and ends of tea. “What’s this?” She held up a gray packet.

“Pickwick. Strong. Don’t sell it in America,” Sister informed her.

“Are you going to miss church?” Shaker asked.

“I left Bobby a note to go without me.” Betty poured hot water into the cup, the Pickwick bag already releasing dark color. “Wasn’t Sybil incredible? Cool as a cuke.”

“Two toughest whippers-in in North America,” Shaker bragged.

“I’ll remind you of that when you tear me a new one out there.”

“Now, Betty, it’s been a long time since I cussed you.”

“I believe when we return you refer to it as a blessing.” She smiled. “But it has been a long time.”

“I’m lonesome,” Dragon howled from his sick bay quarters.

“I’ll see to him.” Shaker left.

“I spoke to Sybil last night,” said Sister. “She’s all right. She said what ran through her mind is that her boys no longer have a father, and she didn’t want to leave them motherless. She knew she had to aim true.”

“You know some women give up foxhunting when their children are small. Too dangerous,” Betty mentioned.

“Why would you want your child to grow up seeing you shy off from a little danger now and then? Teaches them to be wimps.” Sister had firm opinions about these things.

“Come on, you big baby.” Shaker opened the door to the feeding room, Dragon at his heels.

“You’re healing up nicely,” Betty complimented him.

“I want to hunt.” Dragon sat down.

“And I hear you ate some of Iffy’s bones.” Betty gravely pointed a finger at him.

“Dry as toast.”

Betty didn’t know what he’d said, but he made her laugh.

“I almost forgot. Gray gave me a titanium stock pin!” Sister said, excited. “Garvey had it made.”

“No kidding.” Betty was impressed.

“I’ll wear it next hunt.”

“Whose feast day is it? If I’m not going to church I want to know in case anyone asks.”

“You’re an Episcopalian,” Sister dryly replied. “However, it’s the day of St. Vincent of Saragossa, who was roasted on a gridiron, among other tortures, and died in 304 AD.” She thought a moment. “Awful way to go.”

“Think of Angel. Although it wasn’t awful. Peaceful really—but still, she was murdered.”

“She was, but when it’s your time, it’s your time. Iffy was the agent of her murder, and were she alive, she could be punished. But still, it was Angel’s time.” Sister took a deep breath, then handed her cup to Betty for more tea.

“Wasn’t Donny Sweigart a surprise?” Betty returned to yesterday’s drama. “When I heard back at the trailers I was surprised. He’s not but so smart, and I never took him seriously. I was wrong. He has courage. He helped save Sybil.”

“True enough. He could have stayed hidden. After all, he had two strong incentives.” Sister reached for the refilled cup.

“To save his life, you mean, since Jason didn’t know he was there. If he’d known there was a witness he would have shot him.”

“Good reason.” Shaker blinked.

“The other reason being that our dear Donny has been baiting foxes. He hasn’t set traps yet. He’s been putting out frozen globs of blood,” Sister told them.

“What good does it do frozen?” Shaker snorted.

“Well, that’s just it, but he figured the fabled January thaw has to happen. They enjoy the treat. He’ll put out more in the same place, but in a trap. Voila.” She paused. “He’s even using the discarded blood he picks up from the hospital. To save money buying chickens.”

“Sister, what the hell is he doing trapping foxes?” Shaker sat upright.

“Crawford,” she replied, one eyebrow shooting upwards.

“But he’s supposed to keep an eye out on dens for us!” Betty found this almost as scandalizing as Jason’s crimes.

“After I profusely thanked him, after Ben took a statement, I walked him away from the group and asked him. He said Crawford was paying one hundred dollars a fox.”

“Highway robbery.” Shaker’s voice rose.

“So what, now we buy back our own foxes? The ones originally in our coverts?” Betty’s face was flushed.

“Had a little talk with Donny. I said I’d give him a monthly stipend, find more work for him, but he absolutely must never remove one of our foxes.”

“Where will we get the money?” Betty knew the inner workings of the club.

“I have no idea, but I’ll find it somewhere,” Sister said with resignation.

“Dammit, he has a job at Sanifirm,” Shaker cursed.

“Which Crawford is trying to buy,” Sister replied.

“Oh, that’s great, just great.” Shaker rolled his eyes.

“But Donny likes us. If we give him regular part-time work, I think all will be well.”

“How regular?” Betty stared at her teacup.

“Reading the leaves,” Sister laughed.

“I’d have to tear open the bag.”

“One thousand dollars a month,” Sister announced.

“Christ.” Shaker, although not bearing the weight of financial need, since he was a club employee, nevertheless cared for Jefferson Hunt and identified with it in every respect.

“Like I said, I’ll find it somewhere. And it won’t be this minute. The other thing”—she smiled—“he wants to go to court to change his name.”

“He wants to be called Jude,” Betty giggled.

“Brad,” Shaker laconically added with a twinkle in his eye.

“No. He wants to drop the junior. He said he hated being called Junior as a kid. I said I’d help.”

“Funny what affects people,” Betty mused. Then she changed the subject. “Forgot to ask you. I remember, then it slips out of my mind.”

“Old age.” Shaker lifted one eyebrow.

“Balls. We’re the same age. Too much going on,” Betty fired back. “How many spoons?”

“Sixty-one,” Sister immediately answered.

“What are you two jabbering about?” Shaker raised his eyebrows as Betty handed Sister another cup of tea.

“Every New Year’s I count all the spoons in the house. Mother used to do it. Now I do.”

“Aren’t you supposed to have an even number of spoons?” Betty pretended this was serious.

“Yes, you nitwit. Haven’t you ever lost a spoon?”

“Never,” Betty lied, face angelic.

“Spare me.” Sister laughed.

“It’s someone’s time. Sometimes I believe that and sometimes I don’t.” Betty looked from her master to her huntsman, returning to the deeper subject.

“Somerset Maugham wrote this in one of his books. I like Maugham,” Sister smiled. She was an avid reader. “A master and his servant were riding toward Mecca, and they met Death with a surprised expression on his face. The master turned his horse away from Death and raced to Samarra. The servant said to Death, ‘Why were you so startled to see my master?’ Death said, ‘I was surprised to see him here, as I have an appointment with him tonight in Samarra.’”

Both Shaker and Betty thought about this.

Shaker finally said,“You can’t outrun Fate.”

“Or old age,” Sister remarked. “’Course, you can slow old age down, throw marbles under his feet.”

Another set of headlights shone on the wall. The sun now cast long beautiful shadows over the snow. The stable and farm buildings glowed.

Dragon stood up.

Two doors slammed, although the second one took longer than the first.

A knock on the door soon followed.

“Come in,” Sister beckoned.

Tootie, Val, and Felicity trooped in.

Betty naturally assumed they were still upset over yesterday’s events.

“Sister, can we talk to you?” Val asked, ever the leader.

“You can, and you can talk in front of Shaker and Betty. Whatever you say stays here. We’re full of secrets.” She smiled.

Tootie looked at Shaker, then Betty, then Sister.“We need your advice.”

“We have a problem,” Val jumped in.

“No, we don’t.” Felicity showed a new, rebellious streak.

“Felicity, I can’t believe you’re saying that.” Val was ready for an argument.

“It’s not exactly a problem, it’s”—Tootie struggled—“new information.”

“It’s a goddamned problem,” Val blurted out, forgetting she was in the presence of adults, then quickly realizing it. “Sorry.”

“You owe me one dollar.” Felicity’s jaw set as she held out her hand.

“I can’t believe you.” Val pulled money out of her pocket, peeled off a dollar, and slapped it in Felicity’s hand, hard.

“Girls, it’s first light. This must be important.” Sister gently pushed them along.

“Felicity has lied to us.” Val seemed stricken.

“I didn’t lie. I didn’t know until I went to the doctor.” Felicity defended herself.

“Sure. You said you were allergic to flour!” Val’s face turned crimson.

“Val, put yourself in her shoes,” Tootie counseled.

“I’d rather not.” Val crossed her arms across her chest, then noticed that Dragon was observing every move.

Felicity finally said, in a calm voice,“I’m pregnant.”

Shaker stood up and offered Felicity his chair. That surprised her, for she hadn’t thought through all the consequences of her condition.

Betty, motherly, put her arm around Felicity’s shoulders.

Sister also stood, put her arm around Tootie, and pulled Val to her for a hug. Then she gave Felicity a big hug.“Everything will be fine.”

Sister burst into tears not because of Felicity’s news, not because of yesterday’s drama, but because deception, truth, death, and life were happening all at the same time. It was exactly as it should be.

6. THE TELL-TALE HORSE

CHAPTER 1

Dots of brightness sparkled in the night from electric fairy lights shaped like tiny candles on the denuded dogwoods lining the driveway. Slashes of yellow light spilled onto deep snow from the high windows in the ballroom. The brick Georgian building had settled into the landscape over the years, so that people viewing this scene from outside might have thought themselves in the eighteenth century. The faint music would have put an end to that reverie. No Mozart, but everything else a hunt ball could wish. The swirl of elegant people inside added to the beauty of the scene. It was Saturday night, February 16, and the Casanova Hunt Ball was in full swing. Only stars and tiny glittering lights offered relief from the blackness of a new moon, and it was bitterly cold. Perhaps that, too, fed the frenetic energy inside, for the moon always pulls on humans whether visible or not.

Jane“Sister” Arnold, Master of Foxhounds of the Jefferson Hunt, her escort, Gray Lorillard, and a large contingent of Jefferson members had come to the Casanova Hunt Ball. The two clubs enjoyed warm relations as well as a touch of competitiveness. The Jefferson Hunt members, whose own ball had beenmarred by a drunken scuffle and torn bodices, relaxed here. Surely nothing so tacky could happen at Casanova.

Seated at the master’s table were Bill and Joyce Fendley, joint masters of Casanova; their daughter, Jeanne Clark, now also a joint master; and her husband, John. Sister and Gray, Marion Maggiolo, and the entire Bancroft clan filled out the rest. Every table on the ballroom floor hosted at least one couple from JHC.Libations flowed, the dance floor was jammed, and Sister danced every dance as the gentlemen in attendance lined up to squire the master. Being Virginians, they performed this duty without thinking about it. No lady should ever sit out a dance unless she chooses to do so. Age, looks, and bloodline certainly improve a lady’s chances of further engagements, but all belles have to be treated as great beauties. It’s the custom.

In Sister’s case, the gentlemen truly enjoyed dancing with her. Seventy-three, a trim six feet, with shining silver hair and buoyant spirits, she had the gift of making a man feel like a man and she was a wonderful dancer.

Joyce Fendley, passing her on the floor, called over her partner’s shoulder, “Don’t you ever wear out?”

Sister laughed.“If I did, I wouldn’t tell you.”

As the music ended, High Vajay, head of the Vajay family and a stalwart of the Jefferson Hunt, held out his gloved hand for Sister. His family called him Lakshmi, but the Virginians, fearful of murdering his given name, had nicknamed him High. It suited him, for he was tall and reed-thin, with salt-and-pepper hair, a handsome man who reveled in the high life. His wife, Madhur, now Mandy, had been Miss Cosmos in 1990; at thirty-nine, her stunning beauty had only intensified with age. Their children, eight and ten years old, were tucked in bed at home, two hours southwest of Fauquier County, where everyone was gathered.

“Master, you move like a panther,” High purred.

“Means I have claws.” She smiled up at him, a pleasure for her since she often looked a bit down at a fellow.

“I’ve seen them.” He held her tighter.

He had, too; there were moments in the hunt field when she had to wield her power, lest a hound, horse, or human be endangered, usually in that order.

After their waltz, High walked Sister back to her table, where she and Gray sat down at the same moment. The band took a break.

“What a party.” Gray grinned, his military mustache calling attention to his white teeth.

“Anytime I’m with you, darling, it’s a celebration.”

He kissed her on the cheek. For a year and a half they’d been keeping company, as Sister’s generation politely called it. They drew closer each day, but neither one was prepared to sayI love you.

But they did love each other. In fact, many of the people in this room loved each other, but they may not have recognized the feeling. Americans focus on romantic love, particularly the pursuit stage, glossing over the sustaining bonds of friendship, a condition Sister often thought of as love made bearable. She enjoyed the members of her club and loved a few with all her heart. There were Tedi and Edward Bancroft, friends for most of her life. She loved Betty Franklin, her first whipper-in, a prized position and sometimes a dangerous one. Betty Franklin, in her forties, stood talking to a group of people while Bobby, her husband, returned from the bar with her tonic water and lime.

Sister cast her eyes about the room and smiled, perhaps not realizing how very much she did care for many of those assembled but realizing she was happy: blissfully, rapturously happy.

Marion Maggiolo, owner of Horse Country, the premier emporium for foxhunting needs and other equestrian pursuits, swept back to the table, her thick gray hair, once liver chestnut, offsetting her perfect complexion. No woman could look at Marion without envying her incredibly creamy skin. The rest wasn’t bad either, for she knew how to put herself together, displaying the creative eye so evident in her store displays. Ladies may wear only black or white gowns to a hunt ball. Marion’s elegant white dress, clearly custom-made because it emphasized all of her best parts, was no exception tonight.

“This ball is a triumph,” Marion told Casanova’s masters, now back at the table.

Joyce, eyes sparkling, demurred.“We didn’t do a bad job.”

Bill, square-jawed, draped his arm over his wife’s back. “Joyce and the committee planned this better than the invasion of Iraq.”

“I don’t wonder.” Sister raised an eyebrow and the others laughed.

Slinking under the weight of black bugle beads, Trudy Pontiakowski, chair of the ball, made her way to Sister’s table.

Her face, tight around the eyes and mouth, bore testimony to her determination to look young; the plastic surgeon did the rest.

“Marion, no one is hopelessly inebriated. See?” She swept her hand to include the room.

“Not yet, Trudy.” Marion noted that Trudy herself was one drink away from the state she had just described.

“You could have lent us Trigger. He would have been perfectly safe.”

Trigger was the life-sized horse that Marion and her staff rolled out in front of the store each morning, usually reversing the process at night.

Joyce intervened.“Trudy, Trigger’s got an abscess.”

This made everyone laugh. Trudy, tipsy though she was, knew her master well enough to know this really meant,Shut up and leave Marion alone, so she left with a gracious nod.

Marion leaned toward Joyce.“Thanks.”

Joyce waved her hand in dismissal.“She’s a great social organizer, but not always as tactful as one might wish.”

Sister laughed.“At least she’s not a bulldozer.”

“Oh, well, we have a few of those, too,” Bill noted. “How can people open their mouths without thinking? The stuff that falls out!”

“Cost George Allen his Senate seat.” Gray referred to a popular Republican Senator who lost his reelection bid in 2006 thanks to loose lips.

“How do you keep from blurting out,You’re too dumb to have been born?” Sister asked Joyce.

“Count to ten. Ten again.” She added quickly, “Failing that, I do multiplication tables.”

“Wise.” Sister sipped from her champagne flute. “I bite my tongue because I really want to say,You asshole.”

They all laughed.

High returned with a portly middle-aged gentleman from Pune, a city two hours southeast of Mumbai, set amid rolling green hills, and addressed Sister.

“Master Arnold, this is Kasmir Barbhaiya. He just arrived.” He introduced Kasmir to Marion and the others.

“So sorry to be late.” Kasmir bowed. In white tie and gloves, his gold foxhead studs with ruby eyes twinkled.

“Welcome to Casanova.” Bill stood and shook hands. Kasmir, educated at Eton, Oxford, and finally MIT, spent a fortune on his clothes. Not only were they bespoke—specially made just for him—he patronized the same sartorial establishments as did the Prince of Wales. He and High had met at Oxford, their friendship ripening over the years until now they were as close as brothers.

“I will repent of my tardiness by condensing pleasure in fewer hours.” His dark eyes shone.

As they left the masters, High looked over his shoulder to wink at Sister.

“That High, he’s cooking up something,” Sister said, and winked back. Then she noticed Marion suddenly break into a forced social smile. Since Ilona Aldridge Merriman was approaching, she understood Marion’s frozen countenance.

“Why, you Casanova darlin’s have outshone us, yes, you have, and I am so pleased to be here.” Ilona deposited the Cristal she’d been toting onto the center of the table.

“How extravagant,” Joyce murmured appreciatively.

“Thank you, Ilona.” Bill lost no time in motioning a waiter to uncork the liquid treasure.

Two incredibly expensive facelifts over the decades did give Ilona a youthful appearance. Looks mattered to her perhaps more than to most women. She dieted with pathological precision, exercised religiously, and, to her great credit, hunted with abandon with Jefferson Hunt.

Turning her light blue eyes to Marion, Ilona flashed her own false smile.“Those marvelous earrings set off your thick hair. I still can’t believe you haven’t started to color your tresses, darlin’. Your natural sorrel color drove men wild. It’s harder to have that effect when one fades, so to speak. Not that you could fade, darlin’.”

“Your taste is impeccable, Ilona. Cristal.” Marion sidestepped the backhanded compliment.

“Master.” Ilona beamed at Sister.

“The rest of us get older. You get younger. You must have a painting in your attic.” Sister was alluding to that novel of psychological insight,The Picture of Dorian Gray.

“You flatter me.”

“Someone has to.” Marion fired a shot across the bow, enjoying Ilona’s struggle to keep her false bonhomie.

A flicker, then a cold reply came from lips shining with fresh lipstick.“Ramsey does nicely on that account.” She opened her arms to the table as the cork popped. “Enjoy your bubbly, and thank you, Masters Fendley, thank you.”

She slid from their table to the next, making her rounds.

“Guess she didn’t like your ball.” Marion arched an eyebrow.

“Balls.” Sister was fed up with Ilona, who showed up at meets behaving like the fashion police.

“Balls, said the queen. If I had two, I’d be king. If I had four I’d be a pinball machine.” Bill poured the champagne into flutes the waiter brought.

They laughed at the old chestnut, touching glasses.

Joyce leaned toward Marion.“She will never forgive you.”

“Balls.” Marion echoed Sister, causing more laughter.

“Speaking of balls, Ramsey operates on the use-them-or-lose-them principle.” Bill was in good form tonight, his broad smile accenting a strong masculine face.

Gray touched glasses again.“True enough, but if a man has taste and is fortunate enough to win the hand of the right woman, best to use them in one location.”

“My philosophy exactly.” Bill grinned.

“It was a good thing you said that, honey.” Joyce smiled like the Cheshire cat.

“Here’s what sets my teeth on edge.” Marion delighted in the sensation of exquisite champagne sliding down her throat. “My affair—brief, mind you, brief—occurred before Ilona married Ramsey. Twenty-five years ago! Get over it, lady!”

“Then what would she do? Ilona is loyal to her tragedies—intensely loyal, since they’re so small and she’s so spoiled.” Sister, among dear friends, could speak her mind. “But she is also loyal to her friends. She’s remained devoted to Cabel Harper, so loyalty obviously cuts both ways.”

Jeanne, in her thirties, the youngest at the table, looked at her husband, John, and asked,“Is this a generation thing? No one forgets anything?”

“Forget? Hell. They make half the stuff up to be important. A lot of people just love to suffer,” Bill said to his daughter, while John laughed.

“Perhaps the example of the two Marys at the foot of the cross inspired them.” Gray’s mustache twitched upward.

“I say give up the cross. Other people need the wood.” Sister laughed, then stopped abruptly, whispering, “Here comes my Mary. Deliver me!”

“Too late.”

Her Mary was Venita Cabel Harper, still hovering at forty-two although that age had been current for the last ten years.

Given the social catchet of Jefferson Hunt, she’d die before she’d resign but, like Ilona, Cabel had never forgiven Sister for a fling with Clayton Harper, her husband some eight years her senior. Sister and Clayton both considered it harmless, since it couldn’t last, and they knew it.

Because Clayton was married, Sister was cast as the evil vixen, and not just in Cabel’s mind either. Sex was Sister’s Achilles’ heel. Most times she could discipline herself, but every now and then she broke bad.

This being Virginia, discretion only went so far. Sooner or later you were found out. Some busybody, gender irrelevant, was forever scanning the horizon for gossip. But Sister had had ample time to repent her earlier indiscretions.

“Thank you for a lovely evening, Joyce…Bill. Clayton and I will take our leave.” Cabel nodded pleasantly to Sister. “Beautiful gown, Master.” The joke was that Cabel never rode with Clayton, given his fondness for drink. She’d make sure they left together, but she would drive her own car.

“You look splendid as always, Cabel.”

“See you in the hunt field.”

As the frosted-blonde lady returned to her table to pick up her purse and her husband, Sister said sarcastically,“Venita happens to be an unusual, even lovely name. But her grandmother was a Cabell. Have you ever known a Virginian, even if related to that family only by once delivering flour to them, who can resist parading the name front and center?”

Joyce considered this.“Come to think of it, no.”

“Even the Randolphs don’t do that. They allow you to discover their grandeur over time.” Bill, like most state history buffs, appreciated the many advancements both Cabells and Randolphs had bequeathed to the state by their foresight and energy.

The surnameCabell contains twol’s but Cabel’s mother, choosing it as her daughter’s middle name, dropped one of them. Or so she said. Her enemies said she couldn’t spell.

“You know what I am.” Gray smiled conspiratorially.

“Famous for horsemen, beautiful women, a piercing mind, and a fondness for liquid refreshment.” Joyce diplomatically refrained from saying the Lorillards produced drunks generation after generation.

“True,” Gray agreed.

Marion’s naturally high spirits rose with the champagne. “Well, the Maggiolos are Johnny-come-latelies on the paternal side. They came from Genoa. Mother’s family arrived on theMay-flower. Theirs is an interesting match. Dad moved us to Fauquier County in the sixties. Glad he did.”

“We’re lucky to have you. We WASPs can be”—Sister searched for the right word—“too restrained.”

“Is itrestrained orconstrained?” asked Joyce, WASP herself.

“Constipated,” Bill interjected.

“Ah, still too restrained.” Gray laughed and then shrugged. “I should know. I’m a black WASP.”

It sounded contradictory in that WASP, of course, stands for white Anglo-Saxon Protestant, but Gray had absorbed the Lorillard culture minus the color. What he had that the others did not were the stories of his great-grandmother’s grandmother and grandfather, stories from another continent handed down along with a very large helping of grit.

“Retreating.” Marion noted that Cabel, her arm through that of the unsteady Clayton, appeared to be led out the door, the time being ten thirty. Actually, Cabel was leadinghim.

“It’s hard to believe, but once upon a time Clayton was gorgeous,” Sister mused.

“Too much lasagna.” Marion giggled.

“Do you think Cabel knows how to make lasagna?” Sister found this incongruous.

“Why not? She helped Clayton build his business. He had the idea; she had the energy. She can learn to do anything.”

Clayton installed unbelievably expensive sound and telephone systems in cars and trucks. The punch numbers for the radio, like a keyboard, also worked for the phone. A tiny speaker above the rearview mirror allowed the driver to talk while keeping both hands on the wheel.

“Exactly when did you favor Clayton with your person?” Bill put it delicately, knowing Sister wouldn’t be angry with him.

“Nineteen ninety-eight,” Gray answered.

For a moment, conversation stopped.

Finally Sister said,“You’ve done your homework.”

He took her hand in his.“I want to learn everything there is to know about you.”

“Not everything, please,” she replied. She’d only sipped half a glass, but the champagne had put her one step from giddy, since she rarely drank.

“Oh?” Gray’s eyebrows rose.

“A girl has to have some secrets.”

“Here, here!” Joyce raised her glass, as did the other ladies.

“You could give us a hint,” Bill said.

“Dad, then it wouldn’t be a secret,” Jeanne responded.

“One hint. I’ll divulge one. No man in this room has any idea of the time it takes to remove the hair on your body, do the hair on your head, polish your nails, apply makeup, and so on.” Sister lifted her hand.

“Shaving takes time,” Gray said, “especially if you have a mustache.”

“Hope I never do.” Sister laughed.

The rest of the evening continued in this vein, laughter, dancing, marvelous food, good liquor, and Cuban cigars for those gentlemen and a few ladies who donned their coats, repairing to the pristine outdoors to puff contentedly away, all the while cursing an embargo in effect since the presidency of John F. Kennedy, who had humidors packed with Cuban cigars, enough to last decades if he’d lived, poor fellow.

Finally the clock struck twelve. The band played on, but Gray rose and kissed Sister’s hand. “Honey, I’d better be going.” He had a meeting in Washington, even though it was Sunday, with the number-two man in the IRS. Gray, retired from the most prestigious D.C. accounting firm, was often called quietly, away from prying eyes, to counsel on tax matters. Capital gains was his specialty. He didn’t mind performing regular audits for businesses, though. Gray lacked haughtiness and, much as he had flourished among the powerful, he was equally happy sifting through the records of a small local company, working with the owner. He truly loved accounting, hard as it was formany people to understand, because it gave him insight into different types of businesses. It also made him an extremely shrewd investor. There was a time when a rich and powerful African-American excited comment. These days, fortunately, success was becoming more evenly distributed.

After Gray left, Marion touched Sister’s shoulder. “Ready?”

“Of course.”

Not wishing to drive the whole way back to her farm, Sister had accepted Marion’s invitation to spend the night in Warrenton. Marion lifted her spirits, making her laugh until the tears rolled down her cheeks. Also, she liked seeing Marion’s house. Whatever Marion touched became colorful, dramatic, splashed with a hint of flamboyance like Marion herself. Sister’s house,by contrast, was subdued, anchored in the eighteenth century.

Driving back to town, roads packed hard with snow despite the snowplows’ steady work, the two chattered about the ball and about politics.

“You should run for office,” Sister counseled.

“Never,” came the swift one-word reply.

“Marion, you have uncommon good sense. You’d never squander the taxpayers’ money.”

“That’s not what people want these days. They want false glamour, a smooth liar, and, above all, a pious hypocrite.”

“There are a few good people in the game.”

“I know, but I couldn’t do it. Could you?”

“Actually, I think I could. Would I enjoy it? No.”

“You know what? I forgot to bring Trigger in. Do you mind if we swing by the store? Won’t take but two minutes. I didn’t want to say anything in front of Trudy when I realized I’d left him outside. She would have run her mouth all over the ballroom. And I did say I was worried he’d be damaged. Got so busy trying to get out of the store on time that Trigger slipped my mind.”

“Let’s put Trigger in his stall,” Sister agreed.

“It’s not hard for two of us to move him inside.”

“It will be a treat, in high heels and snow.” The older woman laughed, although she didn’t mind getting her feet wet. It wouldn’t take long.

Driving in from the west, they turned onto Main Street, then right onto Alexandria Pike, moving slowly down the steep grade. There were two parking lots, one larger than the other; Marion pulled into the smaller one out front.

Both women stepped out, heels sinking into the packed snow, and did a double take.

“Those damn kids! This is what happens when I forget to take Trigger in.”

A beautiful naked model sat astride the life-sized statue.

Sister paused before wrenching her heel from the snow.“Looks real.”

“Trigger’s been saddled with gorillas and with witches for Halloween. And it always makes the newspaper, the photograph. They’re so slick, those kids. They do it right under my nose when the store’s open.”

The snow made a small popping sound as the two be-gowned women worked their way toward the horse statue, now burdened by the naked woman.

Sister grabbed Marion’s arm just as she was about to unlock the chain that anchored Trigger to the building. “Marion, don’t touch anything!”

“Why?”

“This isn’t a model.”

“What?”

The rider, ravishingly beautiful, jet-black hair and dark eyes, had her hands on Trigger’s neck as though holding his mane. Her mouth was slightly open. A tiny hole was visible over her left bosom, where her heart would be. Sister walked behind the dead woman to behold a small exit wound.

“She’s real!”

Marion followed Sister’s finger. “Oh, my God!”

“Whoever did this had plenty of time.” With the sangfroid that was typical of her in dangerous and difficult situations, Sister had already quickly absorbed the details.

“What makes you say that?”

“When a person dies they void themselves. She’s clean as a whistle.” Sister stepped back to study the body. “What a beautiful, beautiful woman, in the first flower of life.”

Marion, voice low, whispered,“Lady Godiva.”

CHAPTER 2

Marion called on her cell phone, and the two women waited for the sheriff in front of the store. The door was still locked.

“That’s one good thing. At least nothing is stolen.” Sister wrapped her arms around herself and kicked snow off her shoes.

“I hope not. There’s a downstairs door that the public doesn’t use but we do. It’s storage.”

Without another word, the two women carefully negotiated the steep steps down to the lower level. Despite being plowed two days ago, the area was packed hard again, thanks to the recent snowfall. The February sky glittered with stars so bright some shone blue-white.

Marion fetched her car keys from her pocket, pressing the tiny LED light on the chain. A narrow bright-white beam illuminated the doorknob.

Relief filled Sister’s voice. “Nothing is smashed.”

Marion placed the key in the lock, but the door swung open without a click.“That’s odd.”

Sister knelt down.“It’s cut clean through. The tongue of the lock is in the door.”

Marion, face ashen now, grabbed Sister’s forearm. “Maybe he’s still in the store.”

“Do you have a gun in there?”

“No.”

Sister spied a box of twitches, a device used on the lip to make horses stand still for things they might not like, such as getting their mane pulled. A small loop of chain was embedded in a three-foot heavy wooden dowel. She grabbed one.“I’ll go first. If he’s in there, I want to get him.”

“It’s my store. I should go first.” Marion plucked a twitch out of the box too.

“I’m six feet tall and a master. I’m used to physical…” Sister’s voice trailed off as her foot touched the first stair. She flicked on the light, feeling incredibly alive. Danger was her element.

Marion recognized the truth in Sister’s words. Sister Jane Arnold was tough as nails and surprisingly quick on her feet. Marion figured if Sister did whack someone, she could then help bring him down. Prudent and wise, not a woman to take an unnecessary chance, Marion was no coward. She thought Sister was reckless, heedless, but then most foxhunters are.

Sister hesitated at the top of the stairs that emerged into the tack and equipment room. The only sound was the slightwhir of the heating system, set at sixty at night to keep pipes from freezing. Marion reached up behind her to click on the lights for the first floor. Nothing seemed disturbed at first glance, but if the killer was also a savvy thief, he or she would head for the saddles, some of them $4,000 a pop.

They stepped into the next room, which contained liniments and other odds and ends crucial to horse people. In the distance Marion heard a siren.“Thank God,” she whispered.

Sister nodded.

They moved to the north wall, where the gorgeous English leather bridles hung, the saddles on racks before them. Not one had been moved. Carefully, they inspected every inch of the store, including the two dressing rooms and the smaller storage room next door. Everything was in order, except that the phone lines had been sliced through.

Marion checked the locked case where antique jewelry, Essex crystals, and foxhunting china was kept. Again, untouched. So were the cases by the cash register, which housed specially cast hunting horns, the size of whose bells helped to determine the tone. They could cost $300, give or take; a specially ordered silver one was truly expensive. All was in order here as well.

Red lights reflected through the windows at the front door.

“Why would someone go to all the trouble to cut that lock and leave this place intact?” Marion sank to the front counter.

“I don’t know.”

Both women instinctively scanned the long shelves right above the cash register, where items of extraordinary value were often displayed. These shelves ran at a right angle to each other, the longer of the two terminating not far from the front door. The bronze sculpture of a fox above the register stood, gorgeous as ever, awaiting a buyer with very deep pockets. Just as the sheriff reached the front door, Marion and Sister gasped.

“It’s gone!”

The John Barton Payne silver bowl, weighing thirty-five pounds with a two-foot diameter and engraved with past winners of the Warrenton Horse Show, had vanished along with the companion thirty-pound silver tray and the close to two-pound silver ladle. Its value was unmeasurable. The Warrenton Horse Show, owner of this impressive perpetual memorial trophy, would be disconsolate. Donated to the show in 1935, the sentimental value exceeded its monetary value.

It was two-thirty in the morning before Sister and Marion, finally in pajamas, collapsed in the living room, a fire roaring near their warmed feet. Though exhausted, neither could sleep.

During the ordeal, Sister had noted that Marion did not cry, whine, or complain about how awful this was. The younger woman had kept to the facts and answered the sheriff’s questions clearly. She showed him the cut lock and even had the presence of mind to hand him a detailed photograph pulled off the computer showing all sides of the punch bowl.

Given the hour, no one from the local paper was monitoring the sheriff’s calls, so they were spared the press, at least for now. No one recognized the slain beauty. The forensic crew and the ambulance struggled to remove her, tearing some skin in the process. Using warm water from the store bathroom, they carefully soaked the leftover patches until they could put the unstuck flesh into little plastic bags. Somehow, this process upset the two friends as much as discovering the body in the first place. The initial shock had been wearing off, but now the terrible event was becoming more real.

“Odd that a woman so stunning is a cipher. Beautiful women are generally noticed,” Sister mused.

“She could have been murdered somewhere else and then brought here by whoever killed her and cleaned her up,” Marion replied.

“But why would the murderer want to steal a punch bowl? You know there’s a photograph of me in the punch bowl, age two, along with a foxhound puppy?”

“All the more reason to find it.” Marion stared into the fire, every fiber of her body tired, her mind overwhelmed but still functioning. “Why my store?”

“Your store is central in town. Most everyone goes past it.”

“What if this is meant for me in some way?”

“Unfortunately, Marion, we can only wait and see.”

“I need to warn Wendy. This will blast her right out of bed, but she’ll forgive me.” Wendy Saunders had worked in the store with Marion for years. “I suppose I should call my brother too, even though it’s closing in on the hour of the wolf.” She meant between three and four in the morning.

“The Romans had a saying, ‘Man is wolf to man.’”

“In this case, woman.” Marion punched in the numbers, then listened with a flash of disgust. “Damn these things. They never work when you need them.” She hurled the cell phone into the fire, where it began popping within seconds.

It was the one outburst of emotion she had allowed herself.

Sister nodded approvingly.“God, I wish I’d done that. Half the time my damn cell phone doesn’t work either.”

A bit of tension ebbed away as the plastic cell phone melted, taking all the information Marion had encoded there into the fire.

CHAPTER 3

Leg-breaking weather, Sister thought to herself. Just a few inches of slick mud masked frozen ground underneath.

The bite in the air kept hounds, horses, foxes, and humans alert. It was Tuesday, February 19, three days after the Casanova Hunt Ball, and the victim remained unidentified. Marion’s store had closed one day to accommodate further forensics but was now open. When Sister went home Sunday afternoon, her friends had rallied around, the bizarre circumstances of the murder having made the news stations. The corpse stayed cold and covered at the morgue, so there were no photos of her, but Trigger flashed across local television screens and made the newspapers.

Foxhunting, thank the gods, swept away the cares of this world, even cares as disgusting as murder. A lapse in concentration could mean missing the fox or, worse, the jump. A fall on this greasy mud meant a cleaning bill at the very least and perhaps a broken bone. It was called leg-breaking weather for good reason.

The fox cared little for this. A stout field of twenty-five people was gathered on a hill overlooking old Tattenhall Station, an abandoned white board-and-batten building still exuding a forlorn charm. Hounds had picked up the perfume of a young red dog fox looking for a girlfriend behind the abandoned station.

Courting season usually started in mid-January for gray foxes, while reds took up the siren call of love in February. This bright, cheerful youngster, new to romance, was still learning the ways of the female. He’d run a beautiful six-mile loop, leading them right back to their starting point. Sister reflected impishly that all the higher vertebrates took their time with this process, and some males never did figure it out.

Shaker Crown, huntsman, dropped his feet out of the stirrups and wiggled his toes, praying for circulation. Sister, observing her longtime hunt servant and friend, kicked her feet out of the stirrups as well, a tingle occurring in her toes immediately, followed by mild pain. Cold took its toll but hunting is a cold-weather sport. They were used to it, even if they did sometimes shiver. She couldn’t feel her fingers. Sister believed foxhunting toughened you up. Rarely did she or other club members suffer the full effects of flus or colds; their immune systems were cast iron.

Horses stamped their feet, splatters of mud and snow squishing out from shod hooves. Tedi and Edward Bancroft rode immediately behind Sister. Four talented high school seniors from Custis Hall, a private girls’ academy, rode in the rear as was proper. Joining first flight, the jumpers, as a capper was Kasmir Barbhaiya in black tails (also called a weaselbelly coat), top hat, white cords, and custom-made boots. Riding one of the Vajay’s Thoroughbreds, Kasmir proved impressive. Behind them, grateful for the check and breathing time, stood second field, Bobby Franklin in charge. Everyone’s cheeks glowed with high color.

Dragon, a bold fourth-year hound ever impatient of leisure—and he considered a check leisure—grumbled.“There’s a fox behind the church at the crossroads. Why doesn’t Shaker take us there?”

Asa didn’t bother to look at the upstart hound.“Trust the huntsman.”

“We’ve only run for an hour.” Dragon stood.

“Shut your trap,” Cora, strike hound and leader growled.“Shaker will think we’re babbling.”

Dragon’s littermate Diana wondered how her brother could be so blockheaded when her other brother, Dasher, overflowed with good sense.

Even the first-year entry, taken out two at a time so as not to overload the pack with youngsters, displayed more good manners than Dragon.

A light breeze had picked up since first cast at nine o’clock. It blew from the west with a bite and the riders, sweating from the long hard run, felt a slow chill seep in.

Sister turned around.“Scent will hold, don’t you think, Tedi?”

“Stick like glue.” Tedi and Ed were perfectly turned out, as usual. Sister scanned the horses. None looked blown. While it is the riders’ responsibility to see to their mounts, an awful lot of riders were not horsemen. They really didn’t know when a horse had had enough and should be taken in. Sister would politely tell such persons that their horses were tucked up and they should return to the trailers. While she never rejoiced in a human being hurt, the mistreatment, even through ignorance, of a horse upset her more.

A trickle of sweat rolled down her backbone. She’d half turned from the wind. Her undershirt now felt like a cold compress against her skin.

The layers of clothing a foxhunter wears, tested by centuries of use, protects the rider, but sooner or later, a wet cold will creep in. The mercury, hanging at 40 degrees Fahrenheit, intensified the dampness. A snow, even though the temperature would be 32 degrees or colder, often felt warmer than these conditions.

Thick pewter clouds hung low. It surely was a good scenting day.

Flanking Shaker on the left was Betty Franklin on Magellan, tested and tried as a whipper-in; Sybil Bancroft Fawkes was on the right, riding Postman, still as a statue. Sybil, owner of two Thoroughbreds, loved the breed for their heart and stamina.

Horses adore this kind of weather. Since they originated in cool savannahs, forty to the low fifties feels like heaven to them. Humans prefer the low seventies, which feels too warm to horses, but they manage it.

Shaker, Betty, and Sybil counted heads.

“All on,” Shaker said, which meant all the hounds were together. “Let’s walk down toward Chapel Cross. We might pick up something along the way, and we’ll be heading cross wind.”

Both whippers-in nodded and moved a bit farther away from the pack. There was no need to speak, since a whipper-in does not question the judgment of the huntsman or the master. Oh, they may do so in private, but when hunting the protocol is much like that in battle: You obey your superior officer and get the job done.

Sister smiled when she observed Shaker turning the beautiful pack, a balanced and level pack, north toward Chapel Cross. It had taken her decades to create a level pack. Whatever some blowhard may say to the contrary, there is no shortcut to a great pack of hounds. A master breeds for nose, cry, biddability, good conformation, and, of course, drive. What’s the point of having a fabulous-looking pack of hounds, with voices like the bells of Moscow, if they don’t want to hunt?

Dragon was a smart-ass but his drive was exhilarating. He shot ahead of the pack.

“Back to ’em.” Betty spoke sharply to him, her crop held on the pack side of Magellan so hounds could see it.

“He’s a lot of work, that twit.” Magellan snorted, two streams of air shooting out from his flared nostrils.

Betty, somewhat understanding her fellow, patted him on the neck. After two years, they’d finally become a team, trusting each other.

The board-and-batten of the railroad buildings, white with Charleston-green trim, stood out from the muddy background, streaks of snow gleaming in crevices and the north sides of hills. Norfolk and Southern, the railroad company, had provided the point as a courtesy to local residents. Although Tattenhall Station had been abandoned in the 1960s, the locals maintained it and even decorated it for the holidays.

The pack had reached the railroad track and crossed it, with the small station, a little gingerbread on the eaves, now behind them, when Cora opened,“Here!”

The other hounds, noses down, honored her, and the whole pack, in full cry, flew over the lower meadow on the eastern side of the station and turned northward, again cross wind.

Sister, on Aztec, a young horse but quick to learn, kept at an easy gallop, behind the pack but not close enough to crowd them. They crossed the tertiary two-lane road and vaulted over a row of trimmed hedges, which made for a lovely jump, slippery on the other side.

The pace quickened. Aztec lengthened his stride and took a long three-foot-six-inch coop, which sagged a bit in the middle; perhaps it was only three-two there. His hind end skidded on the other side, but he quickly got his hooves under him and pushed off. Behind her, Sister could hear thesplat of hooves as they sank into the mud and then gathered steam to surge forward.

The fox, whom no one could see, since he had a considerable head start, ran a huge serpentineS. Hounds had to work very hard to stick to his line, thanks to the wind changes, and in one low swale the wind swirled. Sister could see the little wind devil, small snow sparkles in the air, which then disappeared as she rode straight through it.

The fox headed toward Chapel Cross, no evasions now. A neck-or-nothing run saw hounds stretched flat out, sterns behind them, long sloping powerful shoulders illustrating the wisdom of good conformation, as the animals could reach far out with their front legs. Deep chests allowed plenty of heart girth and, behind, powerful loins and quarters, like a big engine in a Porsche, pushed them seemingly effortlessly forward.

The music filled the countryside. In the far distance, Sister saw Faye Spencer hurry out onto her front porch, pulling on a parka. Faye, widowed young when her husband was killed in the second Iraq War, waved. Sister took off her cap, two short ribbons streaming, and waved back. She made a mental note to stop by Faye’s for a visit; she hadn’t seen her since the hunt Christmas party. Where did the time go?

Faye, quite good-looking, hadn’t lacked for suitors once a year passed after Gregory’s death. She appeared in no hurry to favor anyone.

Valentina“Val” Smith, one of the students from Custis Hall, caught Cabel Harper shooting Faye the bird and raised her eyebrows.

A double fence line between two pastures loomed ahead, a coop in each fence and a bounce in between which meant no stride; the horse must clear one coop and then immediately launch to clear the second. Sister liked bounce jumps so long as she remembered to keep her leg on her horse. Sometimes she would become so enthralled with the hound work that she took a jump without realizing it. Thank God, her horses were fabulous and loved to hunt. They could think for her.

Aztec, a bit younger than her other hunters, did need more attention, so as he launched smoothly over the first coop she clucked when he landed, giving him a hard squeeze, hands forward, and if he thought to hesitate he gave no sign of it. He took the second coop a little big; she lost her right stirrup iron on the muddy landing. No matter. Foxhunters learn to pick up stirrup irons on the run, and it’s a poor trainer who doesn’t teach his or her charges such valuable lessons. This isn’t dressage at Devon. This is survival. Ride without if you must.

Fishing for the stirrup iron longer than she would have wished, Sister finally slipped her boot into it—couldn’t feel her toes anyway—and turned her head for a moment to see how her field was negotiating the bounce jump.

Ilona Merriman, riding a half-Thoroughbred half-warmblood mix, hit it perfectly. Behind her, Cabel Harper bobbled on the second jump but hung on, laughing when she righted herself. Saturdays their husbands hunted too. Good thing this was a Tuesday, because neither Ramsey nor Clayton were good riders. Chances are the bounce jump would have unhorsed them.

Interesting as the sight was, Sister turned away from the spectacle as hounds now roared like an organ, full throttle.

The pack ran close together, Cora and Dragon fighting for the lead, Diana, anchor hound, steady in the middle front. If hounds overran the line, Diana usually brought them back. If she failed, the tail hounds, older, a touch slower but very wise, called the pack back to rights. All young entry—Peanut and Parson of the P litter, Ammo and Allie of the A litter—acquitted themselves with honor.

No overrunning today for this young red. Tricks exhausted, or too young to know more, he now flew for all he was worth. Well, he sure was worth a great run. Fifteen minutes later, the pack dug into his den behind the tidy Episcopal Church at Chapel Cross. Shaker dismounted, blew“Gone to Ground,” and got back up. He couldn’t feel his feet either. It was a happy huntsman that turned for home. Sister, too, felt exhilarated at how beautifully her hounds had worked.

Wind at their backs made the twenty-minute ride a trifle more pleasant. Close to Tattenhall Station, the tertiary state road, stone and crushed stone now mud, made the going slower.

A field master can ride in front alone when the hunt is done or allow people to come up and chat. Three years ago, an old lover of Sister’s, who had long become a precious friend, passed away. She and Peter Wheeler had so often ridden back together that she’d spent the first half of the season after his death holding back her tears and riding alone. She’d gotten herself together a bit by the second half and begun chatting withfolks again on the ride home. She could now remember Peter with warmth and gratitude for his gifts to her.

Today Tedi, Edward, and Gray all came alongside.

Bunny Taliaferro, riding coach at Custis Hall, rode right behind. Anne“Tootie” Harris, Val Smith, Felicity Porter, and Pamela Rene, all students, had earned the privilege to go out with Jefferson Hunt. After each ride they were required to write about their experiences, bringing in geography, topography, plants, animals, weather conditions, and history. They’d be able to fill pages today, since Tattenhall Station mirrored the history of America’s railroads, particularly the spur lines.

Back at the trailers, most people checked their horses, removed bridles and martingales, took off saddles, and threw rugs in their stable colors over their horses’ backs. Sister loosened the girth of her saddle but didn’t take it off. She worried about the cold on that big sweaty spot even with a nice heavy blanket on the horse.

Tootie came up.“Master, Val’s taking care of Iota”—she named her horse—“so I can take care of Aztec.”

Sister handed her Aztec’s bridle, squeezing Tootie’s shoulder. She just loved this kid. “Thanks, honey.”

Jennifer Schneider, a new member, already had the table set up, and people brought their dishes to it. Jefferson Hunt tailgates flourished in sleet, snow, or rain. Occasionally they had the use of a building, but no matter what this group could eat.

High Vajay, talking to Garvey Stokes, owner of Aluminum Manufacturing, nodded when Sister approached them.

“Master, what a wonderful hunt. Thank you.” High’s manners added to his considerable appeal. “I want you to have a chance to talk to my college friend. Once Garvey and I resolve the economy, I’ll bring Kasmir to you.”

Sister didn’t even try to untangle the caste system of India, but she knew whatever High was it was at the top. He’d started out in the diplomatic service but quickly realized he’d be at the whim of changing administrations, so he took a job at Craig and Abrams, a large multilayered electronics corporation. Intelligent and driven, he had steered his division toward wireless phones twenty years ago and retired at forty-five. He’d learned to love Virginia when working in Washington, D.C., for half a year for the company. He’d vowed to return, and two years ago, a free man, he did. Once nestled in the Blue Ridge foothills, none of the Vajays ever looked back.

“How are you doing?” Garvey took Sister’s gloved hand in his.

She’d been his master when he was a child, and earlier this year she had helped him through a dreadful time. He thought of her as a second mother but wisely did not say so. Most women in the company of handsome younger men do not wish to be considered motherly.

“I’m all right, but what a jolt.”

“How’s Marion?” High inquired.

“Watchful but okay. Obviously, we’re all worried for her. The sheriff still doesn’t know who the woman is—I mean, was.”

“He’s thorough. He called my wife and then me. I guess he figured anyone from India would know someone else from India.”

“Doesn’t India have over a billion people?” Garvey asked, his thick eyebrows rising upward. “And six million of them have AIDS?”

“True.” High couldn’t resist reaching for a tiny cinnamon bun, although he resisted commenting on the AIDS explosion, which could undermine, in time, much of India’s recent gains. “But that wasn’t as na?ve as it might seem, because expatriates in any country often find one another. He e-mailed me photos. I didn’t recognize her.”

“It’s possible she’s an American citizen of Indian descent,” Sister opined.

Garvey smiled.“We have everything here.”

“You have us.” High slapped him on the back.

Valentina and Felicity waited for Sister to leave the men.

“Girls.”

“No one fell off. With this footing. A miracle.” Val got to the point, part of her direct character. “No bottles.”

If someone came off, a bottle was owed to the club.

As senior class president, the tall lovely blonde exuded a natural air of authority. She was one inch taller than Sister, which made Sister smile, since rarely was she topped by another woman.

“You didn’t get one bottle.” Felicity smiled shyly, a young lady of unforced reserve yet warm.

“I know, and the bar is getting low.”

“If we come off you only get a six-pack of soda.” Val turned. “Here comes the African queen.”

She teased Tootie, diminutive at five foot four and lavishly gorgeous. Tootie was African-American, hence“African queen.” Tootie was high yellow, a term only old folks, black and white, would have used. Tootie’s skin, creamy, shimmering like light caf? au lait, signified someone of high blood from way back. Tootie didn’t give a damn about any of that in any case; her generation hadn’t suffered from racism to the degree that their parents had. Good as this was, it didn’t mean there wasn’t a reservoir of stupidity out there for which these youngsters were often unprepared.

“If I were Tootie, I’d hit you in the mouth,” Felicity said quietly.

“Ef you.”

“Val, one dollar. Actually two. That was ugly.”

The three girls had made a pact at the beginning of their senior year that when any one of them swore they had to give Felicity, the banker, one dollar. At the end of their senior year, this ever-growing sum would go to a party.

Pamela Rene, also African-American, walked with Tootie. The two didn’t much like each other, but most times they managed a truce.

Pamela smiled at Sister.“Thank you, Master.”

“You’re most welcome.” Sister was pleased that Pamela’s hunting manners were up to form, for one should thank the master.

“The pack”—Tootie paused, eyes shining—“you could have thrown a blanket over them.”

One of the many reasons Sister so loved this seventeen-year-old was the girl loved hounds. She rode to hunt as opposed to hunting to ride.

“I was proud of them. The four young ones in there ran like old pros,” Sister agreed.

She’d seen these girls grow up in their years at Custis Hall as she’d seen so many juniors in her over thirty years as master. All people under twenty-one were usually styled juniors for foxhunting clubs and the dues were much lower than for those of voting age. When a young person came back aftercollege, more likely returning to hunting in their early thirties, she was wildly happy. She hoped these girls would find their way back to her or, if not to her, then to another master at another hunt.

“Sister, I’ve gotten an early acceptance at Ol’ Miss.” Pamela beamed.

“You didn’t tell me.” Val shot her mouth off before Sister could reply. “Oops, sorry.”

“Congratulations, Pamela. I know you Custis Hall ladies will receive other acceptances. Any college would be fortunate to have you.”

“I really want to go to Ol’ Miss.” Pamela truly was excited.

Anything to put distance between her super-rich magnate father and her critical former-model mother. Oxford, Mississippi, was a long whistle from Chicago, where the Renes lived.

“Her mother will kill her,” Val said offhandedly.

“Well, Pamela, you’ll make the right decision.” Sister considered her words carefully. “No one wants to disappoint her parents, but you have to follow your heart, you know.” She winked. “Takes a Yankee girl with guts to go down into the Delta.”

Pamela’s face registered the compliment. “Thank you, Master.”

Val giggled and said to Sister in a low voice.“Mrs. Harper shot the bird at Mrs. Spencer.”

Sister’s eyebrows raised. “Whatever for?”

Val shrugged, and Sister shook her head at this odd deed.

Ronnie Haslip, club treasurer, a boyhood friend of Sister’s deceased son, called out, “Master, we need you.”

She turned to see Ronnie, her joint master Walter Lungrun, Betty, Bobby, and Sybil and wondered what it could be. Well, they were smiling so it couldn’t be too bad.

“Excuse me, girls.” As she walked toward the adults she wondered what she could do to help Felicity, two months pregnant. Her parents didn’t know; Charlotte Norton, headmistress at Custis Hall, didn’t know. The hunt season would be over in less than a month. Sister had the feeling that a lot was going to happen between now and then, and not just to Felicity.

“Are you all ganging up on me?” Sister put one hand on Ronnie’s shoulder, another on Walter’s, drawing the two men near her.

They slipped their arms around her small waist.

Betty, hand on hip, shook her head.“You are shameless with men.”

Ronnie, who adored Betty as most members did, said,“She’s tall, gorgeous, and rides us all into the ground. You’re shorter, pretty as a peach, but so-o-o married. All that virtue”—he clucked—“so dull, darling.”

Betty laughed.“It’s true. Should I have an affair just to prove I can do it?” She paused, glancing at her husband, overweight and suffering on another diet. “Can’t do it. I’m still crazy about the guy.”

Walter, still on an adrenaline high from the chase, squeezed Sister closer to him.“Ronnie, let her go. She’s mine.”

“Never,” Ronnie replied. “Let me cut to the chase, Master. As you know, Kilowatt is available.”

Kilowatt, a fantastic Thoroughbred, was formerly owned by a physician now deceased. His estate evidenced little desire to pay board bills. The executor, Cookie Finn, a lawyer of unimpeachable reputation, had approached Walter.

Sister nodded.“I see. He’s a fine horse.”

“Your bench is deep enough, but Shaker has only Showboat, Hojo, and Gunpowder.” Ronnie pushed on. “Showboat is fourteen. Hojo is eight, plenty of good years there, but Gunpowder, great as he is, is eighteen. We should buy Kilowatt for Shaker.”

“Ronnie, I can’t believe you’re suggesting we dip into the treasury. You’re usually tight as a tick, plus we’ve lost the wonderful monetary gifts Crawford used to make. That really hurts.”

Crawford Howard was a wealthy member who had resigned from the club in a huff.

“I know, I know.” Ronnie let go of her waist and held up his hand to stay protest. “What I would like to do, with your permission, is pass the hat. It is the responsibility of the club to mount professional staff. We aren’t rich enough to perform this service via our much-called-upon treasury, but if I can canvass the elected”—he used the word Calvinists use for those with a ticket straight to heaven—“might could.”

Betty put in her two cents.“Sister, everyone knows we took a big hit when Crawford pissed off. Forgive my French.”

“Guess they do,” the older woman agreed.

“I’ll put up five hundred. I’m sure Mom and Dad will be generous,” Sybil volunteered.

“Honey, your mother and father give so much to this club I’d be embarrassed to ask for more.”

“I’m not.” Ronnie smiled.

“We know that.” Sister smiled back at him. She looked to Walter.

“I don’t see any other way.” Walter slid his hand from her waist to hold her right hand.

“Before I say yes, how much?”

“Fifteen thousand. He’s been vetted sound, by the way,” Ronnie added. “Cookie started at twenty-five. Really, Kilowatt would be snapped up at that price if he were shown at the northern Virginia hunts.”

“That’s the truth.” Sister acknowledged the deep pockets riding in those fabled hunts, as well as the fact that Kilowatt was supremely talented as well as beautiful.

“I give my blessing with one caveat: Go to the Bancrofts last. See if you can’t secure the sum before leaning on Tedi and Edward.”

“I promise.” Ronnie inclined his head, a polite bow to his superior.

“All right, then. Let’s do the shake-and-howdy.” Sister kissed Ronnie on the cheek, then Walter.

“What about me?” Betty pretended to pout.

“All right.” Sister made a face, then kissed Betty. “Sybil, I have enough for all.” She kissed the much younger woman’s cold cheek. “Now come on, we’ve got to mix and mingle. We have cappers.”

Cappers were guests, people who joined the hunt for the day, paying a cap fee. They always added a little dash of paprika to the stew.

Ben Sidell, sheriff, drove up in his squad car slowly, the road being slick.

“You missed a good one,” Sister said in greeting him.

“I’ll be out Saturday. I was in the neighborhood so I thought I’d drop by.”

“Trouble?”

“Someone shot out Faye Spencer’s barn light. Nothing major.” He waved to Val, who noticed him.

“Give everyone the benefit of your personality,” Sister teased him.

High Vajay bounded up, wearing his dark navy frock coat, top hat, and cream string gloves, then slipped on the ice, going down on one knee.

“That’s how you should address your master.” Sister made light of his predicament and reached out her hand, which he grasped for balance to stand.

“Mandy looked out the window this morning and declined to brave the elements. She’ll be sorry when she hears how good it was. I’m delighted I came out.” He paused. “People think India is hot, but we come from the north by the mountains. Snow and ice descend upon us, but I must confess I never hunted in cold weather before moving here.”

“High, it was a lucky day when your family came on board.” She meant it; their buoyant spirits and natural warmth lifted everyone up.

Kasmir, stepping much more carefully, joined them.“A most delightful day. Thank you, Master.”

“Mr. Barbhaiya,”—she breathed an inward sigh of relief that she had remembered his name correctly—“we are honored to have you. Your turnout is perfect and, sir, you can ride!”

Pleased, he smiled, his teeth sparkling under his bushy mustache.“I find myself in London often. I do believe the best tailors for gentlemen are on Jermyn Street.” Indeed, the street he named was famous for such establishments.

“No doubt, although should you ever find yourself in Lexington, Kentucky, there is a tailor on Red Mile Road, Le Cheval, who does a credible job. I have my vests and coats made there. And you must go to Horse Country. That’s where I buy everything else, plus the really heavy winter frock coats are just the warmest. The clothing is ready-made but alterations can be effected.”

“Ah, yes, I stopped into that enticing establishment.”

High laughed.“He made Marion very happy. Three thousand dollars happy.”

Kasmir lifted his eyes to heaven.“Ah, I am a weak mortal. When Miss Maggiolo took me under her wing I became distracted by her skin, her mane of steel-gray hair, her very graciousness.”

Bemused, Sister asked,“Did you convey these sentiments to my dear friend?”

“I conveyed a bottle of Mumm de Cr?mant via messenger after I left the store. This was the Saturday morning of the ball. I was favored by two dances that evening and a t?te-?-t?te stroll down the hall.” He paused. “I am not a handsome fellow like High here. I am middle-aged, portly, and awidower. It will take a long siege, I think, to gain favor with Maid Marion.”

“Mr. Barbhaiya, Marion is not superficial, I can promise you. A good kind heart will count heavily in your favor. And, sir, you underrate your looks.” She thought to herself how subtle he had been to send Mumm de Cr?mant and not a flashy brand.

This especially delighted him. For all his sparkling personality, he was a lonely man in the small hours and wondered if he would ever again find a woman to truly love him and not his money.“Please call me Kasmir. I would be honored.”

“Kasmir, the honor is mutual.”

“He’s going to settle here,” High declared matter-of-factly. “Leave Mumbai forever. Kasmir says his late wife came to him in a dream and told him he would find happiness here.”

Kasmir blushed.“It is true.”

“If there is anything I can do to help you, please allow me to do so.” Sister genuinely meant this. She understood how it felt to lose your spouse and force yourself to go on.

“I am most obliged. Good evening, Master.” He bid her farewell correctly, even though it was just noon.

Sister was thrilled Kasmir gave the proper address of“Good evening, Master.” As the two men started to walk away, she stepped forward. “Kasmir, excuse me.” The two men stopped. “Norfolk and Southern will sell Tattenhall Station, three hundred acres surrounded by commanding views and some gorgeous building sites.” She paused. “And as High owns Chapel Cross”—this was the estate named for the crossroads—“you would be country neighbors. I can give you the number of the person to call. The company has at long last decided to sell these small stations, while still retaining rights to the spur lines, the actual tracks. The only reason I know this is because the decision was made just last week. A friend of mine is a corporate officer and knows how much Tattenhall Station means to us. It will be publicly offered next month.”

After writing out the number, Sister made her way to the tailgate but was waylaid by Cabel Harper.“I was so sorry to hear what happened to you and Marion after the ball. It must have been a terrible shock.”

“It was.”

“Makes you wonder.”

“Does,” Sister agreed. “By the way, Ilona mentioned how wonderful she thought the Casanova Ball was.”

Both women looked to Ilona, now conversing with Kasmir and High.

“The decorations exceeded my expectations. Did Trudy Pontiakowski come up with the theme? She was the chair, you know.” Cabel rubbed her cold hands together.

“Trudy never does anything halfway. I expect the theme was voted on by the ball committee and passed by the masters.”

“Why don’t we try a theme next year? Our decorations are too predictable.”

“That’s a good idea.” Sister waited a moment, smiled, and then sprang, just like a fox leaping on an unsuspecting mouse. “Please accept the honor and the hard labor of being next year’s ball chairman. You’re so creative.”

Cabel, knowing she was caught but rising to the challenge, said,“I will. And I know beforehand it will be one long agony with Ronnie over the budget.”

“That’s possible, but given your persuasive powers I’m sure you can get things donated. You have a wealth of contacts.”

“I’m going to start right this minute. Ilona doesn’t know it, but she’s donating a winter’s supply of bottled gas for the auction.”

The Merrimans owned a local gas company, selling natural gas and oil to heat houses. Their reputation for service was spotless. Ramsey ran the company, the third generation of Merrimans to do so, while Ilona successfully played the stock market.

Sister watched as Cabel spoke to Ilona, who seemed to brighten during the conversation.Praise a fool, Sister thought to herself.

Later, back in the kennels, horses put up, rubbed down, and very happy, Sister went over the list of hounds who had hunted that day.

Shaker fed everyone, checked them for cuts and soreness, and then put the girls back with the girls, the boys with the boys.

Both humans were grateful for the quiet time together in the functional office, filled with photos of Jefferson Hunt dating back to 1887.

“Good idea today, swooping down to Chapel Cross.”

Shaker rubbed some cream into his hands, now sore and chapped.“Thanks, but on fine scenting days any huntsman looks good.”

“True, it’s the in-between days that show up a good huntsman. On the bad days, Jesus H. Christ himself couldn’t get a fox up.”

Shaker smiled.“Maybe he could.”

“Well, all right. Say, I heard they got the roof on Crawford’s chapel. St. Swithin will be pleased.”

“Asshole.”

“St. Swithin? He’s a good saint.”

“Crawford.” Shaker laughed. “Good he got it under roof, though. He must have three crews working there.”

“Sam says he’s possessed.”

Sam Lorillard was Gray’s brother, a talented horseman and recovering alcoholic.

“Whose day is it today?” Shaker asked.

“Empty.”

“Really?”

“According to myOxford Dictionary of Saints it is,” Sister replied.

She possessed an odd talent for dates and kept the saints’ days for herself, feeling those former figures deserved to be remembered. She’d consult her saints’ book if she couldn’t recall whose feast day it was. February 19 was the day Henry the Fourth defeated the rebels at Bramham Moor in 1408, and the beginning of the battle of Iwo Jima in 1945, which lasted until March 17.

“Hmm,” was his reply. “I’ve been thinking.”

“I’m scared.” She tapped him with the clipboard with the hound names on it.

“No, really. About what happened in Warrenton.” His craggy face, serious, briefly made him look older than his forty years. “Do you think that woman was put there for Marion to see as a warning?”

“I don’t know. She was meant as some kind of warning. Whether it was for Marion or not, who knows?”

“And that huge punch bowl was stolen, right?”

“Yes. That thing is heavy. I lifted it once to help Marion clean it.”

“You and Cabel keep competing for it in the Corinthian Hunter Class. Actually, a lot of our members want their names inscribed on that bowl. Worth a fortune.”

“Worth a lot, that’s for sure. But you know, Shaker, it doesn’t add up.”

“No, it’s like one of those in-between days you mentioned for scenting. You have to find a line, and even when you do, it breaks. Hounds cast and find again. The day is like that, hard close work between huntsmen and hounds, but you can turn it into reasonably good sport if you and hounds keep thinking, keep feeling temperature changes and wind currents. Why am I telling you this? You know.”

“True.” She nodded.

“Well, what crossed my mind is maybe Lady Godiva is a clue.”

A car pulled up outside. They heard the door slam.

Ronnie Haslip burst through the kennel office door, waving a check.“Kasmir paid for the whole thing!” He slapped the check on the big square schoolteacher’s desk.

Sister, eyes wide, stared at it, picked it up, and uttered the old expression:“Jesus H. Christ on a raft.”

Shaker looked at Ronnie, then Sister.“What’s up?”

“Kasmir Barbhaiya bought Kilowatt for you. Gunpowder’s getting age on him, Showboat’s no spring chicken.” Ronnie glowed.

“That’s a great horse!” Shaker clapped his hands together.

Sister hugged Ronnie.“How’d you do it?”

“I didn’t do anything. High and Kasmir came up to me. Kasmir said, his exact words,Please allow me the pleasure to help your most excellent and beautiful master.”

“He saidbeautiful?” Sister felt a flush.

“He did!” Ronnie puffed out his chest, his victory making him giddy.

Sister smiled.“From now on, February nineteenth is St. Kasmir Day.”

CHAPTER 4

Crawford Howard slapped down his copy ofBarron’s, which he read cover to cover, as he did theLondon Financial Times, The Wall Street Journal, and a host of specialized financial reports. Not that he swallowed whole what was written therein, but he liked to have an overview of world markets. He invested prudently in stocks, bonds, and land. Once he’d tried platinum but found that metals, like corn futures, demanded highly specialized knowledge as well as impeccable timing.

His waistline had expanded in his middle years, as had his concept of himself. Crawford, who unlike Edward Bancroft did not start this life with a silver spoon in his mouth, made his first fortune building strip malls in Indiana and Iowa. After that, he steamrolled his fortune with brilliant land acquisitions and deep forays into blue chip stocks. Moving to Virginia thirteen years ago appeared to be retirement. Instead, he began purchasing small pharmacies and medical supply companies, and just last week a company that disposed of biohazardous waste from hospitals and doctors’ offices. He invested in a few high-tech stocks, not many. But he did invest in a local start-up company, Warp Speed, run by Faye Spencer.

Crawford irritated people. Sam Lorillard, Gray’s brother, ran his steeplechase barn. Rory Ackerman, another recovering alcoholic and friend of Sam’s, also worked there. Crawford treated them well. He also treated his wife well. Marty truly loved him, something he learned only after she forgave his affair with a young tart whose breasts were so enhanced she struggled to remain upright. The bimbo with the big rack had only loved his money.

Perhaps his greatest vanity was when he lost face at the last Jefferson Hunt Ball. Earlier in the season, he had deserted Jefferson Hunt Club and bought a pack of hounds just like you’d buy a loaf of bread. He couldn’t hunt a hair of them. Big English hounds, Dumfriesshire, black and tan and good-looking. He made a fool of himself among the foxhunting community. This tormented him like a thorn that breaks off in the lip. Determined to show up Sister Jane at her own game, he’d been casting about for a huntsman. Marty soothed his ego by saying he didn’t have the time to hunt hounds. He really should be field master. That was a joke too, but one step at a time.

Marty hoped she could eventually lead her proud, bullheaded, but adoring husband back into Jefferson Hunt. She missed her friends, and she missed the bracing runs too. Knowing Crawford, she guessed about two years would do it if she was patient and careful.

She stood behind him in the den he had paneled in rich deep rosewood as he pointed to his enormous computer screen.“See, I can follow the market in Japan”—he hit a button—“or Germany or London.” He inhaled. “London always bears watching, you know.”

As London is the financial epicenter of the world, this was an understatement.

“Well, what little I’ve learned about money moving around the world, I’ve learned from you,” Marty said. She placed her hand on his shoulder, and he reached up with his left hand to cover hers.

“Honey, this computer does everything but go to the bathroom for you.” He smiled. “I know, don’t say it. I can’t resist toys. What I’m studying now is how a surgeon in, say, Edinburgh can operate while a surgeon at Johns Hopkins in Maryland consults with him. Actually, the surgeon from Johns Hopkins could be fishing out in Chesapeake Bay, watching the operation on the latest incarnation of a cell phone.”

“Amazing, isn’t it? Do you ever wish you’d hopped on the dot-com bandwagon?” She knew the answer, but he never tired of telling his story.

“Sure I do, but now is a better time to invest in technology. Okay, maybe not nanotechnology because that hasn’t shaken out. I mean, scientists can figure out molecular engineering. The trick is profit. Just because something is high tech doesn’t mean it will turn a dollar.”

“I know you.” She ran a finger over the back of his neck. “Buying these small pharmacy companies and Sanifirm; you’re working up to something. You’re learning the business side of medicine. Once you see where the holes are, you’ll plug them and hit another big home run right out of the park. You have a genius for reading the tea leaves.”

He beamed.“It’s what I learned after I knew it all that gave me the edge.”

She laughed.“Me too.” She looked out the tall paned windows. “Looks like another front coming in.”

He ducked his head around the big screen.“Does look nasty. Three fifteen. Hmm.”

“I was so hoping we could take the hounds out tomorrow.” Marty had discovered she liked being around the hounds. She’d been spending two to three hours a day in the makeshift kennel.

Crawford planned to build a true kennel come spring, once the heaving and thawing stopped. Fortunately, St. Swithin’s was framed up so the workmen could continue despite weather. The stone chapel, another vanity but an appealing one, was dedicated to the very late Bishop of Winchester, who died in 862. Those early Wessex Christians believed heavy rainfall was a manifestation of his power.

“We’ll just see when we wake up. That’s what’s great about having our own pack of hounds. We go when we please.”

He neglected to say that his was an outlaw pack, since he refused to have truck with the MFHA, the Master of Foxhounds Association of America. This meant that no recognized hunt could draft him a hound, and no members of a recognized hunt could hunt with him without getting suspended from their own hunt. At this juncture, that helped him. No one would see what a dreadful mess he made of it. Although once his pack ran right through the Jefferson pack, and he’d likely never live it down.

“Heard they had a good one today.”

“Who told you that?” A flicker of irritation crept into his voice, a rather nice baritone.

“Sam. Gray called him about one thing or another.”

“Oh.” He paused and looked over at his wife, now standing at the window, the sky darkening. “Bizarre about Lady Godiva.”

“Still don’t know a thing.”

“Even though she sets my teeth on edge, if anyone can handle that situation, it would be Sister.”

“Actually, honey, you could have handled it. I thought you and Sister got on quite well. She valued your every word when you sat on the board. She told everyone you brought a rigorous approach to projects, and your financial acuity was amazing.”

“Well….” His voice trailed off. “You know the legend of Lady Godiva.”

“It’s true. It’s not a legend. I looked it up.”

He smiled sheepishly.“I did too.”

“Funny, isn’t it, how the past keeps grabbing us around the ankles?”

“The past is prologue.” He was a keen student of history. “She was a Saxon lady married to Leofric, earl of Mercia. He taxed his people mercilessly and she pleaded for them for years. One day I guess he got tired of the nagging. He told her he’d lift the taxes if she’d ride through Coventry naked. That was about 1040, give or take a year. Anyway, she did it and he kept his word.”

“He must have loved her.”

“Perhaps. He certainly loved his reputation. How would it appear if he broke a vow after her sacrifice?”

“And that’s where we getPeeping Tom.” She laughed.

“Not much wick inhis candle, stupid oaf.”

The townspeople, knowing full well how great an act this was for such a grand lady, withdrew, shutting all their windows. Tom, a tailor, drilled a hole in his shutter so he could see the beautiful woman, her body shielded only by her long hair. Some folks said back then he was struck blind. Others said that one of the two soldiers walking with the lady to guard her thrust his sword in the hole when he saw the white of Tom’s eye. However it happened, the namePeeping Tom has stuck in the English language to this day.

Godiva had a good heart, for she convinced her husband, a rich and powerful man, to found a monastery at Stow, Lincolnshire. In 1043 Leofric built and endowed a Benedictine monastery at Coventry, thanks to her urging. She became a benefactress of monasteries at Leominster, Chester, Wenlock, Worcester, and Evesham. Surely she possessed energy as well as beauty.

“Her brother, Thorold of Bucknall, was sheriff of Lincolnshire.” Crawford stood up, stretching. “Seems the family were all doers, for lack of a better word.” He walked up to her, standing next to her at the window. “When you hear of something like that murder at Horse Country, you can’thelp running scenarios through your mind.”

“Such as?”

“Was this a sex killing?”

“Wouldn’t we know by now? I mean, that would show up during the autopsy. The papers said nothing about it.”

“You’re right.” He inhaled deeply. “Unless the police are withholding information. Sometimes they’ll hold something back to provoke the killer.” He paused. “I wonder if this has something to do with taxation?”

“Or some unjust practice. But Crawford, why make a beautiful innocent pay for it?”

“Maybe she wasn’t innocent.”

CHAPTER 5

The old apple orchard rested a quarter of a mile from the kennels located on Sister Jane’s Roughneck Farm. Many hunt clubs purchase land for a clubhouse and kennels, but in the early sixties Sister and her husband, Ray, joint masters of the Jefferson Hunt, thought to save money by refurbishing the old kennels first built in 1887 that were standing on the land.

The financial effort of JHC focused entirely on hunting, so land for a clubhouse was never purchased, although the club did own show grounds on land donated by the Bancrofts. Since other organizations would rent the attractive venue, it provided about seven thousand a year in income, a help to be sure. Occasionally, not having a clubhouse proved a burden, since any indoor activity needed a host willing to allow throngs, sometimes in muddy boots, to tramp through their house. Sister vowed to herself that the day would come when she would find or build a clubhouse. She began to hope this would happen before her century if God would grant her one hundred years.

In spring, when the gnarled apple trees blossomed, the fragrance wafted through the kennels and through Sister’s wonderful unpretentious house, centuries old and centuries loved. A clubhouse in the apple orchard would raise spirits, but somehow it seemed the wrong location for Sister’s secret dream.

This evening, the twilight shrouded in low clouds cast a gloom over the orchard. Georgia, a young gray fox, nearly black, lived there in a tidy den. The setting pleased her. Water was close by, thanks to the kennels and barns, if she wished to walk in that direction. If she headed east, a tiny stream crisscrossed the end of the orchard, as well as the farm road that divided the pastures on the eastern side. Broad Creek, a swift-running rock-strewn stream, lovely to behold in any season though occasionally difficult to cross, was on the far side of those pastures running into the Bancroft place, After All Farm.

Sleet rattled against the tree bark. Georgia, cozy in her den, some corncobs and treasures with her, lifted her head sharply as her mother, Inky, a jet-black fox, entered.

“Going to be a night of it.” Inky sat down on the sweet-smelling hay that Georgia changed often, being so close to the barn.

Inky’s den, farther down the farm road in a pasture north of the apple orchard, was in an old ruin under a powerful walnut tree. Fox families often stay close to one another, and Inky and Georgia were no exception. Many times a young female won’t breed in her first season but will help her parents.The boys usually move farther away from the home den, but foxes have a family feeling, one that most humans never seem to notice. Sister and Shaker were exceptions.

“I came in early.”

Inky pushed an orange golf ball toward her daughter.“You’re going to get as bad as Target.” She named a red fox who collected things, the shinier the better.

“Uncle Yancy is worse.” Georgia smiled, naming an old fox whose mate, Aunt Netty, nagged at him constantly. Uncle Yancy, fed up, would move out. She’d find him and move in, to the amusement of the others. He’d left Pattypan Forge on After All Farm just a few weeks ago to return to his old den half a mile west of Georgia’s den in the apple orchard. Aunt Netty declared she loved Pattypan Forge, built in 1792, so roomy now that she’d cleaned out Yancy’s mess. How long would that last before she bedeviled him again?

“Far as I know among our neighbors, only Charlene bred. It’s going to be a bad spring and summer. Funny, how the humans can’t tell. They keep on breeding regardless.”

“You know, Georgia, I often wonder if they used to know things as we know them and somehow, way back when they started living in cities, they began to lose the ability. Now it’s gone. I mean, they can hardly tell what the weather will be from one day to the next. On their own, I mean. It’s sad and dangerous.”

“Why is it dangerous?” Georgia asked.

“An animal that violates or forgets its own nature eventually dies, I think. Trouble is, they’ll take a lot of us down with them. Well, I won’t be solving that giant problem anytime soon.” Inky batted the orange golf ball back to Georgia.“At least Sister Jane is more like us. More animal.”

“I like her scent. Piney.”

“Oh, that’s her perfume,” Inky smiled.“She’s never smelled any other way, whereas you’ll notice the other humans change perfumes and colognes. I mean, we still know who they are, but they must like changing odors kind of like changing clothes. It’s peculiar.” She paused.“Bitsy bred.”

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“No!” Georgia’s whiskers drooped.

“Maybe Golly will kill some little owlets.” Inky named Sister’s grand calico cat, brimming with overweening pride.

“Bitsy will peck her eyes out.”

“Well, we can hope.” Inky laughed.

“Mom, more screech owls? It would be one thing if Athena bred.” The great horned owl, the Queen of the Night, was a creature to be feared and obeyed.“Her voice is beautiful, but Bitsy?” Georgia grimaced.

“Maybe we can steal some earplugs out of the barn.” Inky laughed.“Or maybe we can leave a note for Sister to buy some. Ha. Wouldn’t that be the day, when a fox writes a note!”

“But we do.” Georgia was confused.

“No, I mean write like them—you know, scribble on paper. They can’t read our messages. Even Sister misses the subtle ones. She gets the scat, the urine markings, and even the little caches, but she misses other things. If I rub against a tree with smooth bark, she won’t smell it. If it’s rough bark, maybe she’ll see some fur, but they can’t read us like we can read them. Actually, they can’t read one another too well, either. I mean, without writing.”

“Must be truly awful to live with such poor senses, apart from their eyes, which are only good in daytime. I mean, really good.”

“Ignorance is bliss, dear. They don’t know what they don’t have.” Inky circled, then lay down gracefully.“Sister’s upset.”

“That outlaw pack again?” Georgia knew about the Dumfriesshire hounds.

“That’s not going to go away. He won’t hunt our territory, but since he can’t control the pack that doesn’t mean they won’t run our way sometimes, and we don’t know them. We’ll have to be very alert.” She flicked her tail, no white tip on the end like a red fox.“No, she and a friend found a murdered woman Saturday night—well, I guess it was Sunday morning by then.”

“How do you know?”

“She brought some turkey over to my den and sat outside. She gets a little chatty sometimes if she smells me in there.”

“Turkey? You got turkey?” Georgia, like all Jefferson foxes, had recourse to a five-gallon bucket filled about once every three weeks with kibble drizzled with corn oil.

Sometimes the kibble had Ivermectin in it to clean out the parasite loads, except when vixens were bred. No more Ivermectin until August then, because it’s too dangerous for fox cubs to ingest. It took two days to feed at all the fixtures. People, even foxhunters, rarely know what it takes to manage wildlife properly: the territory, the kennels, the horses, and, of course, the vital landowners, without whose support there would be no foxhunting. One had to manage hunt staff too, if you were a master. Fortunately, Sister had an easy time there.

“You didn’t get turkey?”

“Got my kibble with cheese. But I would have liked turkey.”

“She probably ran out. She’s good about passing around the treats.” Inky loved Sister; it was mutual.

“Well, what about the murder?” Georgia’s curiosity was pricked.

Inky told her all she knew. Sister’s account had been graphic. The two foxes curled up in silence for a while after the story.

Finally Georgia said,“Pretty stupid to kill a beautiful female at the height of her breeding powers.”

“Could have bred to the wrong person. Humans are funny about that.” Inky thought out loud.“Or refused to breed.”

“Did Sister have any ideas?” Georgia found most human behavior extraordinary, and being young she had much to learn.

“No. That’s what worries her—well, that and the shock of seeing a naked body on horseback right in front of her friend’s store.”

“But you said a silver punch bowl had been stolen, big enough for us and a litter of cubs. So maybe the woman got in the way or maybe she was part of it and then got in the way.”

“Could be, although wouldn’t it be easier just to kill a person and leave her? That horse stuff was elaborate.”

“I’m sorry Sister’s upset. I think it’s crazy, but it really has nothing to do with us.”

As Inky and Georgia caught up on events, Sister and Gray, in bed under the covers, watched a basketball game. Sister kept nodding off even though she liked college basketball.

Gray, his arm around her, smiled.

Golly, flopped on Sister’s legs, purred slightly as she slept. Raleigh, the Doberman, and Rooster, the harrier, snored on the rug alongside. Each had a thick fake fleece dog bed but they liked being right by Sister.

Sister was awakened by the beep of her cell phone on the nightstand. She reached for the phone, looked at the caller ID, and punched the button.

“Betty.”

“Hey, girl. Did I wake you up? It’s nine. You must be worn out.”

“Well, I dozed off watching Kentucky.”

“Bobby’s watching that too.” Betty liked football much better than basketball. “Forgot to tell you that X”—she used the nickname for Henry Xavier, forty-six, a club member and another of Sister’s son’s childhood friends—“will bring the liquor to Mill Ruins on Saturday.”

“If we can hunt. This sleet could mess up everything if we get a deep freeze with it.”

“Well, it looks that way. God, remember five years ago when just about every hunt in Virginia lost the last half of the season because it was one ice storm after another?”

“I’d rather not.”

“Thishas been a long winter, though; it started early in November. Doubt that spring will arrive on time this year.”

“It’s been a hard winter. We’ve been lucky to get hounds out. The snow’s not bad, but a day like today—well, you know.”

Before Betty could reply the line went dead.

Sister punched the button to redial and got a busy signal.“What’s the point of paying a monthly bill if these phones cut out every time there’s a little bit of weather?”

“I know.” Enthralled by the game, a close one, Gray replied blandly.

The cell rang back and Betty started talking.“Lost you. I’ll make it fast. News bulletin on Channel Twenty-nine. The woman’s been identified.”

“Why didn’t you tell me that first?”

“Because it just came across the bottom of the screen. She’s Aashi Mehra, twenty-two, from Bombay. Wait, now we call it Mumbai.”

“It’s a long way from Mumbai to Warrenton.”

CHAPTER 6

At six in the morning on Wednesday, February 20, Sister stepped outside, having gulped a cup of Colombian coffee liberally laced with half-and-half. Golly, fed first, refused to follow, but Raleigh and Rooster tagged at her heels, their claws clicking on the thin veneer of ice.

The frozen grass, coated with ice, awaited sunrise to glitter. Each time Sister took a careful step, the ice cracked under her work boots. A jet of vapor escaped from her mouth, and steam poured from Raleigh’s and Rooster’s mouths too. The mercury at 22 degrees Fahrenheit might climb, but how much? If it nudged over 32 degrees, the ruts in the old farm road would thaw and driving would test a person’s reflexes.

Gray, asleep upstairs, would awaken at seven. He rose early on hunt mornings but, like most people of a certain age, he was set in his habits. She didn’t mind that by her standards he was a sleepin. He more than made up for it the rest of the day, for Gray, active in mind and body, liked projects. They were alike that way, yet she had found herself thinking of Big Ray lately. They had kept the same rhythm. Sure, they had had their various discreet affairs, but they were two people deeply in tune. Her lover, Peter Wheeler, older than she by close to seventeen years, while not close in the diurnal sense, had inflamed her mind like no one else she ever met. Sister had been well served by the men she loved. Wise in the ways of the world, shekept her mouth shut, allowing other people to mouth the hollow pieties that seemed to ward off whatever fears gnawed deep inside. The human animal is not monogamous, although men, at least before DNA testing, desperately tried to imprison a woman’s sexuality to ensure that her offspring were theirs. She knew this subject caused explosions even in simple discussions so she shut up about it, but Jane Arnold had always taken her pleasure where she found it, and she would march under that banner for the remainder of her days.

She loved Gray but hadn’t told him. Why? Words always came back to haunt her. But she knew she loved him, and she felt he loved her. Different from Big Ray or Peter Wheeler, both of them robust, extroverted, physical men, Gray soothed her but kept her alert mentally too. Handsome, descended from Lorillard slaves and therefore taking the Lorillard name, Gray possessed all the brilliance of that line, which ran in both white and black pedigrees. Of course, every true Virginian knew there was no such thing as an all-white or all-black pedigree, but that was another subject best left on the table. People could be wildly irrational about race from all quarters. Race and sex set up more shrieking and flying feathers than a cockfight.

On a cold crackling morning like today, Big Ray would have been walking with her, both of them with arms outstretched for balance, hands touching, trying not to fall on their keisters and laughing; God, how she could laugh with that man! A stream of ideas about hounds, horses, territory, and whippers-in, liberally spiced with both invective and praise, would awaken the birds, who would grumble about it. She would laugh to hear a disgruntled cheep from a hole high inside a tree or the censorious click of a beak from the owl in the barn. Owls make so many different sounds. She’d learned to recognize them; Sister had a rudimentary sense of most animal communication. People often wondered how she knew where the fox was or when a storm was coming. She’d say, “The red-tailed hawk told me” and they’d laugh, never realizing she meant it.

This morning, all silent except for her breathing and the ice crackling, her eyes lifted to the east. A thin light-gray line gave hope the sun would rise eventually, and perhaps the cloud cover would disperse too.

The lights were on in the kennels. Shaker, like Sister, kept to his routine. He loved his work.

“How’s Delia today?” she asked, as she walked into the large feeding room, nodding at the boys with their noses in the trough.

“She’s gaining weight, but her hunting days are over, boss. She’s slowed down, and it’s hard to keep weight on her. I can see it melting off during a hard run.”

“You’re right. She can stay in the Big Girls pen until the day comes when they start to roll her. Won’t be for a year or two. I’ll take her up to the house then.”

A master from Maryland had once upbraided Sister with the taunt,“You don’t live in the real world,” because Sister refused to put an old hound down as long as it was healthy. The other master was right in that this kept expenses higher. But damned if Sister would put down a hound who had served her well. She was the same about horses. Okay, it did run up the bill, but let them live out their final days in peace, comfort, and love. It was the least she could do for the devotion they accorded her.

Once a hound was rolled in the kennel by the younger ones, she’d see if a member would have it for a house pet or she’d move it up to her own house. It pained her that people didn’t understand what good pets foxhounds make. The longest it ever took her to potty train an older hound was two weeks. Most get it before then. Whip-smart, those hounds are fanatically clean. Perhaps it was vanity, for they knew how majestic they were.

She left Shaker and walked to the special run for hounds who needed extra attention or who had been injured during hunting. Now it was just sweet Delia, eating a warmed mash of kibble and canned food.

“Aren’t you the lucky girl?”

“I am,” Delia replied, and stuck her nose back in the aluminum bowl.

“Love you, baby girl.” Sister smiled at her old friend and returned to the feeding room.

“Boss, what saint’s day is it?”

“Wulfric and Eustochium Calafato.”

He laughed.“Those teachers at your Episcopal girls school certainly drilled information into your head.”

“Latin too.” She grinned.

“Okay, what did Wulfric and Eusto—you know—what did they do?”

“Wulfric was from Somerset, a contemporary of Lady Godiva, actually.” They’d both done their Godiva research. “He hunted with hounds and hawks, so he should be dear to us. Maybe not as dear as St. Hubert, the patron saint of hunters, but important nonetheless. We can use all the celestial help there is. He lived as an anchorite and supposedly possessed second sight. He healed a knight with paralysis. Mmm, bound books. Visited by Henry I and then his son, Stephen, when king. That’s about all I know.”

“I’ll read up on him. What about the other guy?”

“Girl. Abbess of Messina, Franciscan order. She seems to have been strict and devout and died at thirty-five. Her body did not decay. She died in 1468, and when she was dug up from her grave in Montevergine in 1690 she was fresh as a daisy.” Sister shrugged. “Nonetheless, dead as a doornail.”

Shaker laughed.“Do you believe this stuff?”

“I take it with a grain of salt. Do I believe these people were extraordinary? Sure. A lot of saints behaved miserably before seeing the light. Just the fact that they redeemed themselves is worth emulating.”

“So there’s hope for me?”

“Hope for both of us.”

“Must I vow poverty and chastity? I’m not good at either.” His lopsided grin was infectious.

“Me neither. Both are overrated; I doubt they’re really virtues. Getting someone to give up their worldly goods was an early form of income redistribution. Of course, the communists raised it to new heights.”

“Another kind of religion gone bust.”

“I’ll say, and think of the millions that died because of it on both sides of the fence. Don’t you think it odd that human beings will die for ideas? I’d die for a living creature but not for an idea. Too cold for me.”

“Yep. Come on, boys. Look at how those coats gleam. That corn oil in the winter just works a treat.”

“It does, and I don’t care what the analysis is on the back of those big feed bags, nothing puts a shine on their coats like corn oil.”

Shaker, wellies squishing on the concrete floor, which he washed obsessively, opened the door to the Big Boys’ run, a quarter of an acre.

All the hounds enjoyed huge runs with grass, trees, and boulders as well as condos to supplement the beds inside the kennels. They liked being out and about. It certainly cut down on bad behavior, since everyone had plenty of room.

Once the boys trotted out, door closing behind them, Shaker refilled the troughs, poured corn oil over the high-protein kibble, and set the gallon jug high up on a shelf, along with the twenty-four others stored there. They bought in big lots to save money. Sister might carry hounds longer than another master, but with her practical mind she saved in all other areas.

“All right, my fast ladies,” Shaker called, and the bitches shot into the feed room, tails high.

“We’re excited this morning.” Sister smiled at the hounds. “Shaker, I’ve been thinking about Dragon. When he was in sick bay after being torn up by that coyote early in the season, the pack was more cohesive.”

“Yeah, I’ve been thinking about that too. He’s only been back in for the last three hunts, and I can feel the difference. For one thing, he distracts Cora.”

“He challenges her. We can’t have two strike hounds, and Diddy might develop into a good one when we most need her, when Cora retires. But Dragon is ready now.”

“Draft him?”

“No. Not yet. What if we use Dragon on Tuesdays, Cora on Thursdays, and toss a coin for Saturdays? We’ll see how the pack performs. If they go equally well, no need to change anything or draft him out. If not, then we should draft him to a hunt needing a good fast strike hound.”

“We’ve got plenty of the blood,” Shaker replied.

“Yes, but you know how that goes.”

He did. A hunt might have a litter of six really good hounds. One would get stolen, another lost in some fashion. One might develop an unexpected illness. Before you knew it, not much of that blood was left.“It’s a strong line, that D line. Delia put some wonderful puppies on the ground over the years. Cross with Asa was the best, I think.”

“Archie.” She named a hound killed by a bear, a hound dipped in gold, he was so superb.

“Right. Tell you what, we’d better never lose that Archie blood.”

“You know it goes all the way back to Piedmont blood through old Middleburg. Quite a journey through time, those bloodlines.” She cited two great northern Virginia hunts, each having made contributions to the upgrading of hounds and each still hunting outstanding packs of hounds to this day over some of the most beautiful country in the world.

One of the great things about Virginia was the depth of the hunting bench. Old Dominion, Fairfax, Loudoun, Warrenton, Casanova, Orange with their ring necks of Talbot tan, Deep Run, Farmington, Keswick, Rockbridge, Bull Run, to name a few ripping good hunts. A person could fall out of bed and land near a thunderous hunt.

“Plan’s a good one. Try tomorrow.”

“You bet.” She left the kennels and looked in at the stables where Tootie, Val, and Felicity worked.

“Good morning, Master,” all three sang out.

“Good morning, ladies.” She closed the barn doors behind her. “Aren’t you glad your father bought you that Jeep?” She addressed this to Valentina.

“Yes, ma’am. Otherwise we’d have to walk and it’s a hike.”

“We could hitch rides.” Tootie winked.

“Sure.” Felicity was filling the water buckets.

After a brief chat there, Sister walked back to the house. She invited the girls up for breakfast each day specifically, because they would not come on their own. Charlotte Norton drilled manners into her students. And many of them had endured the drill at home too. It would be presumptuous simply to arrive in Sister’s kitchen—although their presence was a daily delight to her.

“Good morning, darling.” Gray beamed at her.

“Back at you. A fresh pot.”

She poured her second cup.“The girls will be up in about forty minutes. I’ll start on cream of wheat now. I’m assuming you’ll want some.”

“Yes, ma’am. With orange-blossom honey.”

He continued to read the paper. No need to pull out honey and jams just yet. He’d set the table too. Gray liked small chores as well as big ones, and he wasn’t fussy about what was supposed to be women’s work or men’s. Work was work.

“I’ve been thinking.”

“Oh?” She ran water in a large saucepan.

“I’m not cut out for retirement.”

“You’re hardly retired, honey. You ran a special audit at Aluminum Manufacturing last month, and you just had a meeting with the Number Two guy at the IRS, most hated government agency in America.”

“For a while the Defense Department was running neck and neck,” he remarked. “I’ll always do consulting. But you know, accounting is what I’ve done all my life.”

“You’re the best. Why else would you receive the calls you do?”

He shrugged.“Thanks.” He paused. “I thought I’d start a small restoration business. Since Sam and I have been working on the old home place, I’m reminded of how much I love construction, especially historical places. Even one as simple as ours. The work is outstanding. Those heavy hand-hewn beams, does anyone do that anymore?”

“Well.” She considered this as she set the flame underneath the cream of wheat. “You have an eye. I guess finding a crew of artisans—I mean, they’d have to be more than construction workers—will be critical.”

“Will.”

“What about Sam?”

“What do you mean?”

“Would you go into business with him?”

“No.” The reply was swift but not loud.

“Oh.”

He folded the paper in quarters, longways.“He’s a horseman. He should stick to horses.” He picked up his coffee cup, then put it back down. “He’s been really good at the house. We’re doing okay but, but Janie, I don’t know as I will ever trust my brother one hundred percent.”

“He’s been sober a year and a half—”

“I know.” Gray ran his forefinger over his salt-and-pepper military mustache. “He’s my brother. I love him but he’s an alcoholic. They slip back.”

“Gray, he drank Sterno down at the railroad station when he couldn’t get Thunderbird. He hit bottom. Showing him the way to Fellowship Hall was a great kindness on your part. He came through. Like many in recovery, he’ll probably never touch another drop.”

“I know.”

“Why am I standing up for him?” Sister pulled homemade bread from the breadbox. “He might not want to run a business.”

“That’s the other thing. I don’t know how much stress Sam can handle. Trying to make payroll during a lean month or two makes you sweat. I wouldn’t want to put him in a position where he might weaken.”

“Makes sense. So you’d do this by yourself?”

“Right now that’s my plan, but I’m still thinking it through. Tell you one thing. I’ve been researching software, cell phone contracts, and the like; my God, how does anyone cut through the bullshit?”

“I stick to my iMac and Alltel, which works except for some pockets and some days.”

“That works for you, but for a business I need something more sophisticated. Something different from what I use for accounting jobs. For reconstruction I need to see things in three dimensions; I need graphic capabilities as well as engineering.”

“Don’t look at me.” She laughed, then stopped herself. “You know who might know? Marion. She has a store computer system, but she bought a different one at home. She’s arty, you know, so I bet she can draw and do everything on her home system. Just an idea.”

“Good one.” He plucked out the news section. He’d been reading the sports page. “Look at this.”

A photo of our beautiful Lady Godiva was in the middle column.“My God, she was stunning.” Gray whistled. “She worked for Craig and Abrams, Washington office.”

Sister put her hand on his shoulder.“Craig and Abrams. That’s High Vajay’s old firm.”

“Wonder if he knew her. He’d be upset.” Gray continued to read the column.

“Does the paper say what her job was?”

“Research.”

“That covers a multitude of sins.”

“That’s just it, isn’t it?”

CHAPTER 7

No.” Felicity clamped her lips tight.

Val, irritated, scrubbed harder at the bit, fine English steel, with a toothbrush.“You think they won’t find out.”

Tootie, weary of Val’s badgering, answered for Felicity. “She won’t see them until spring break. By then she’ll have it figured out.”

“By then she’ll look like she swallowed a pumpkin,” Val shot back.

“Shows what you know.” Felicity smiled slightly. “I’ll have a little bulge, but it won’t be bad. I need time to think.”

“You need to get to the doctor in the first trimester, I know that.” Val thought having a baby at seventeen was the most ridiculous, stupid, backward act in the world.

Tootie thought otherwise, although what mattered was what Felicity thought.“She’d need parental consent for an abortion.”

“We can forge their names. Show me a letter from your mother and father and I’ll start practicing. I’m good at art; this can’t be so different.”

“Val, you can’t mean that.” Felicity was scandalized.

“Of course I mean it. We’re all three going to Princeton together, and that’s that.”

“We have to get in first,” Tootie replied dryly.

“We will. With our grade point averages, athletic points, and extracurricular stuff? Zip.” She swooped her hand flat and away like something flying.

“Who knows?” Felicity shrugged. “Pamela is going to Ol’ Miss. Speaking of parents, bet she hasn’t told hers yet.”

“Her mother will go mental.” Tootie giggled.

Pamela’s mother harbored exalted dreams for her daughter even while she upbraided her for not being as beautiful as she herself was and thought she had remained. This lethal combination made Pamela wary, sullen, and even overweight in defiance of her mother’s constant harping on looks, looks, looks.

“Early admission cuts the anxiety.” Felicity sidestepped the abortion discussion. “Maybe we should have asked for it with Princeton.”

“Some colleges are ending early admissions after this year.” Tootie refilled a small water bucket to continue cleaning tack, her fingers aching a bit when the warm water hit them, for the barn was cold. “They’re making a mistake.”

“Look.” Val rounded on Felicity again. “Talk to your parents. They’ll agree to an abortion. Don’t tell Howie.” This was Felicity’s boyfriend, star quarterback at the Miller School. “Just get it over with. Go to Princeton. Graduate. Do what comes next, probably graduate school, then marry well. Get it? The children follow.”

“That’s your path, not mine.” Felicity, though mild-mannered, was proving stronger than Val had anticipated.

“Felicity, be reasonable. Your mind is so good. I mean, you have such a business brain. You’re the only one in our class who ever makes money when we have projects, plus you come up with the ideas in the first place. Who would have thought to sell bandannas in school colors?”

“Or Mardi Gras beads in school colors before the big day, Fat Tuesday. Don’t you love that name? It’s like Boca Raton. Sounds good until you remember it’smouth of the rat.” Tootie complimented Felicity but wisely did not tell her what to do. After all, it wasn’t her body. “We’re finished. Let’s go to breakfast.” Tootie hung up the bridle, neatly making a figure eight around the headband, noseband, and cheek pieces with the throat latch. “We’ll turn out horses after breakfast.”

“Gives everyone time to eat and relax. I’ve learned more about horses from Sister than from Bunny,” Val said.

“Different things to learn. Bunny’s good about basics—barn management stuff—but as a riding coach her main job is to win at horse shows. Alums like ribbons and trophies. The more silver the team brings home the more checks the alumnae write.”

“True,” Val agreed. “Our soccer team helps too.”

“Some of our alumnae foxhunt. Hey, why don’t we ask Sister about that?” Felicity brightened.

Sister had been keeping an eye on the stable, every now and then stepping into the cold mudroom to glance out the backdoor window. When she saw them close the big double doors behind them, she poured the coffee.

“Felicity has this great idea!” Val, first through the door, walked to the pantry without being told, returning with four bowls.

Tootie followed, bringing jams and honey. Felicity brought the daily silverware.

“I’m all ears.”

“Let’s have a Custis Hall alumnae-and-student foxhunt.” Felicity smiled.

“That’s the best idea I’ve heard all year.”

“It’s only February twenty-first, there’s time for more ideas.” Val sat down at the sturdy farmer’s table.

Sister ladled the cream of wheat into five bowls. Felicity and Tootie carried four to the table. Tootie placed Gray’s in front of him, then put down Sister’s. Before sitting down, Tootie scooted back for the fifth bowl, hers.

The brass teapot whistled. Sister poured herself hot water, flipped in a plain old Lipton’s teabag, and joined the girls. If she drank one more cup of coffee she’d levitate.

“Master, may I have apple butter?” Felicity asked.

“Of course, honey, you know where it is.”

“Girls,” Sister said quietly, as they finally sat together.

“Oops.” Val, starved, had just dipped her large spoon in the bowl.

They held hands and Sister prayed.“Heavenly Mother, for this which we are about to receive, we thank you. Amen.”

“Amen,” the girls echoed.

“Heavenly Mother. When did you start saying that?” Tootie smiled.

“Wanted to see if you were listening.”

“We were.” Val, grateful, picked up her loaded spoon.

“What do you think, ma’am?” Felicity hoped Sister would like her idea.

“Splendid, that’s what I think. You’re very creative in your way. Takes time to organize something like this. You all will have to come back as alumnae next fall. There’s only a month left, give or take a day, for this season.”

“I’ll be here,” Felicity replied, without fanfare.

Val deliberately put down her spoon.“You’ll be coming back with Tootie and me from Princeton.”

“I’m going to stay here and find a job. Howie will go to Piedmont Community College for two years, and then if he can pull his grades up he’ll go to UVA or somewhere.”

Face red, Val opened her mouth but Sister, next to her, put her hand on Val’s hand. “Sweetheart, she has to find her own way. You can’t live everyone’s life for them no matter how intelligent you are.”

“But Sister, she’s throwing her life away! And furthermore, Howie Lindquist is dumb as a box of rocks. If anyone goes to UVA it should be Felicity.”

“He’s not dumb!” Felicity flashed anger, rare in her.

“Ladies, we have to support Felicity, no matter what. Is she throwing her life away? I don’t know. What I do know is that it’s her life. I also know that love is rare. She loves Howie.”

Felicity melted in gratitude.

“But she’s so young.” Never having experienced even a twinge of love, Val couldn’t grasp any choice not involving progress on a social, material, or intellectual level.

“Yes,” was Sister’s one-word reply.

They sat in silence for a minute; then Tootie, God knows why because it was so unlike her, just as Felicity’s anger was a surprise, blurted out, “How do you know when you’re in love?”

“Anne Harris!” Felicity laughed, calling Tootie by her full name. “You just know.”

Val rolled her eyes.“Spare me. I’m eating.”

Gray, amused, said,“You can’t stop thinking about the person. Your heart beats faster when you see her. Sometimes you feel dizzy. You’ve never felt such energy, like electricity in your veins.”

“Sounds like the flu.” Val grimaced.

“Chills and fever. It’s a good flu.” Sister smiled at Gray.

“Can you avoid it?” Tootie asked.

“No,” Gray responded firmly. “You can refuse to engage but you can’t really avoid it.”

“I am never falling in love,” Val declared.

“Of course not. You’re too in love with yourself.” Felicity shocked everyone; normally she was so mild.

The statuesque blonde’s face reddened. Then she, too, surprised everyone. “Iam pretty self-centered.”

Everyone put their spoons on their plate at the same time to stare at Val.

Finally Sister lifted her spoon.“You’re at the time of life when one is relatively self-centered. The real sin is not outgrowing it.”

“Like Crawford Howard?” Felicity asked.

“Mmm, he’s egotistical, but I’ve seen worse.” She paused. “Anyone ready for seconds?”

They were, so she refilled all the bowls.

Felicity devoured her second bowl. She was eating a lot these days.

Sister smiled at Felicity.“You’re very young. You and Howie will grow up together, should you marry.”

“We will. We have to tell both our parents. I thought I’d wait until spring break so I could do it face-to-face.”

“On the one hand, I do understand your wanting to sit down with them. On the other hand, Felicity, you might want to tell them now and give them time to adjust. I’m assuming you and Howie don’t wish to wait too terribly long before you marry, and I think you need parental consent for that,”Sister said.

“He’s eighteen.”

“You’re not,” Val said, a hint of rancor. “Furthermore, has he asked you to marry him?”

“I’ll be eighteen in June.” Felicity ignored Val’s question.

“Honey, time’s a-flying.” Sister gently prodded her.

Felicity looked down at her empty bowl.“You’re right.”

“Does Mrs. Norton know?” Sister felt Charlotte Norton was an excellent headmistress.

“No,” Felicity answered.

“Sit down with her first. She has a good head on her shoulders. She cares deeply for her students, especially you three.”

“I won’t get thrown out?”

“No. However, you might want to keep this between the three of you. Sometimes girls can—well, dramatize. You’re not that way, of course, but who is to say some freshman won’t take a fit? Graduate, then tell the world; at least that’s what I would do.” Sister paused. “But you really must talk to Charlotte—Mrs. Norton. You can trust her.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Felicity’s shoulder squared.

“If you’re here, if you don’t go off to college, will you organize the alumnae foxhunt?” Tootie was curious.

“She has to go to college!” Val tossed her blonde ponytail, unable to contain herself.

“I agree with you, Val, I do. Felicity may have to take some time off or—” Sister turned to her—“you could take night courses. Mary Baldwin offers very good ones. Actually, all the schools do.”

“I’ve thought about that.” Felicity had been thinking about a lot of things, one being how she could afford her beloved horse, Parson. “Sometimes”—she chose her words carefully—“I wonder if I can do all that needs to be done. Howie really has to go to college.”

“He can be a coach.” Val had no time for the well-built likable Howard.

“He still has to get his degree.” Felicity had steel in her backbone when her beloved was criticized. “And I hope he has the chance to play football at a big college. He just has to get his grades up, that’s all. He’s not stupid, despite what you think, Val. It takes him longer to learn than it does for us but once he knows something it’s in his head forever. He’s not stupid.” Her voice raised slightly.

“He was smart enough to fall in love with Felicity.” Sister lightened the moment.

Tootie liked soaking up everything about hunting.“Not to change the subject, but when we were coming up over the hill at the old Lorillard place the other day—you know, graveyard at our backs—I smelled a fox but hounds didn’t.”

“Oh, Tootie, when we can smell it, hounds can’t. It’s over their heads.” Val actually had learned about hounds, scent, and foxes, unlike many who hunt.

“I know that.” Tootie continued patiently as if talking to a child, which she often considered Valentina. “But the ground was frozen. I didn’t think scent would lift until it warmed a bit.”

“You’re right, Tootie. I’m impressed you noticed.”

“What did happen then, Sister?” Felicity, with a good mind, lacked game sense and hound sense, but she was willing to learn as best she could.

Nature gives each of us various gifts. Some things can’t be learned; you’re born with the knowledge, but a reasonably intelligent person can still learn the fundamentals of any activity.

“Well, only the fox understands scent. Right?” Sister looked around at the girls.

“Right,” they replied.

“Therefore, I can only make intelligent guesses. This is my guess: The ground was tight as a tick. Have you noticed how some horses almost wince when they land on the other side of a jump? Stings when it’s this frozen. Any scent that hounds might find would have to be fresh, hot. If the scent was, say, an hour old or more, the ground would need to warm a bit, perhaps in sunlight, to lift it. I’m not saying hounds can’t smell a frozen line, but I don’t think they can run it very efficiently. Again, this is guesswork. You might find another master or huntsman who would contradict me. But I think what you smelled, Tootie, was a hot line, fresh as could be, but the bit of wind lifted it up, moved it, and it rose as well. By the time we reached the old Lorillard graveyard, hounds began to feather.” Sister mentioned how hounds move their tails a bit when finding a light line, the feathering seeming to increase with intensity of scent. “As we moved on, though, heading west, the wind already had done its work.” She held up her hand, palm outward. “Again, guesswork. And some spots carry warm air currents that help lift the air.”

“Do grays and reds ever live close to one another? You know, like neighbors talking over a fence?” Val wondered.

“For years I thought not. That’s what I’d been told as a child, and I saw no reason to disbelieve it. But I have noticed, when there’s plenty to eat, they occasionally do live near one another. The problems always come during the lean years. That’s when coyotes become especially lethal.”

“Shoot ’em.” Val felt no affection for this predator.

“You do and it helps until you kill the head bitch.” Sister sighed. “Then all the females go into heat and you have more coyotes. They’re here to stay. The issue is, can we manage them and protect our foxes?”

“Why not?” Felicity leaned forward, reaching for toast.

“I don’t know. The coyote is relatively new to Virginia. We don’t know the animal the way someone from Wyoming does, nor do we know how this efficient predator will affect our balance of nature. Coyotes adapt. Conditions here are different from the West. All I know is, I mean to protect my foxes.”

“They’re fun to chase.” Val loved riding hard.

“Not for me.” Sister smiled so as not to sound critical of Val. “It’s a straight shot. I love the fox, all the ruses, doubling back, walking on top of fence lines, all the incredible things a fox does to fool us. I enjoy being pitted against God’s most intelligent creation.”

“Don’t you think coyotes will change? It won’t just be us.” Tootie, ever thoughtful, was miles ahead of the other girls on this.

“Lynn Lloyd”—Sister named the master of Red Rock Hounds in Reno, Nevada—“says she has observed coyote running more like foxes with the population pressure out there in the high desert. She can see for fifty miles and, on a ridge, one hundred. We can’t watch our quarry like Lynn can, so I believe she’s observed a crucial adjustment in the coyote, proof that the animal is flexible. We know they’re smart.”

The phone rang.

“I’ll get it, ma’am.” Tootie hopped up. “Hello, Arnold residence. This is Anne Harris speaking.”

“Tootie, how are you?” Marion Maggiolo’s lilting voice rang out. “I’m fine, Miss Maggiolo. How are you?”

“Recovering.”

“Yes, ma’am. That must have been horrible.”

“It was. When are you coming up to see me?”

“When I get some money.” Tootie laughed.

“You don’t have to buy a thing to visit. I’m always glad to see you. Is Sister there?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Tootie said. “Sister, it’s Miss Maggiolo.”

“Ah.” Sister put her napkin on the table and rose to take the receiver from Tootie. “Marion, darlin’, how good to hear your voice.”

“I called you the minute the sheriff called me.” Marion’s voice dropped a few notes. “Did you know that the woman we found was High Vajay’s mistress?”

“What?”

“Her first job at Craig and Adams was as High’s secretary.”

“That doesn’t mean the affair continued when he retired.”

“Doesn’t mean it didn’t either,” Marion replied.

“Mandy will kill him.” Sister put her hand on her hip.

“Unless he kills her first.”

“Marion, how can you say that?”

“How do we know he didn’t kill Aashi? Maybe she was blackmailing him. Maybe she was in love with him and pressuring him to leave Mandy. Happens every day.”

“Marion, I just thought of something. High said your sheriff sent him a photograph of Aashi over the computer. He said he didn’t recognize her.”

“What?”

“That’s what he said.”

“Liar,” Marion breathed out. “I’ll tell the sheriff.”

“Could be it wasn’t a good picture. High’s smart, he’d know they’d find out she was once his secretary.”

“Could be High Vajay had a strong reason to kill her too.” Marion felt no need to find reasons why Highdidn’t kill Aashi. As far as she was concerned, he was the prime suspect. Having a prime suspect gave her some comfort, no matter how illusory.

Thursdays, after two thirty, Sister ran her feed store errands. Her friends and hunt club members knew her schedule. If you wanted to see her at the stable or kennels you didn’t drop by Thursday afternoons.

She returned by five, happy to miss what passed for traffic in their part of the world. After dropping off specialty feed bags, body builder for the older horses, in the stable, she walked in the mudroom back door, dogs at her feet since they’d made the journey too.

There on a shelf sat a dozen pure-white roses with drops of blood on them. The symbolism gave her a shudder.

She searched for a card, not expecting to find one.

“Kids,” she spoke to Raleigh and Rooster, “I’m in the crosshairs.”

She decided not to mention this to anyone, not Shaker, Betty, even Gray. Word can get around and her instincts told her that whoever did this wanted to shake her up. Sister wasn’t going to act like prey. Yes, she might be in the crosshairs but she was a hunter to her core. She’d sniff this wretch out, somehow, someway.

CHAPTER 8

The sky, a brilliant blue, glittered overhead. Crawford Howard, spirits rising, drove his big S Mercedes just for the fun of driving. He needed a break. Not that things weren’t clipping along, but sometimes he’d let small problems nag him and spoil his day. Although he had come a long way in developing his foxhunting sense, he was only beginning to appreciate Sister’s and Shaker’s gifts with hounds, horses, and foxes. Exercising, feeding, breeding, maintaining a pack of hounds proved far more difficult than he had anticipated.

Foxhunting is art, instinct, and a dash of science.

He cruised past the stately home-fired brick country club. In the long slanting last rays of sunset, the faithful whacked away on the driving range. It was February 22, and the light was moving closer to the equinox.

He parked his car and waited until High Vajay finished his swing.“What are you doing out here in the cold? You’ll tear a muscle.”

High, one of the few who actually liked Crawford, nudged the bucket of balls with his Number Four driver.“I’ll get better at this game if it kills me.”

As it was not public knowledge that High was under suspicion for murder, he thought it best to keep cool and stick to his routine.

“It just might.” Crawford peered down into the bucket, counting eight left. “When I saw you out here I had to stop. These other people are as crazy as you, I guess.”

“Look who’s talking,” Cindy Chandler, a stalwart Jefferson Hunt member and a good golfer, called out to him. She said this with good humor so he smiled back.

“She’s right.” High needled him. “Any man who buys his own pack of outlaw hounds defies convention.”

Crawford smiled. He liked that he was the talk of the town. He just wished he hadn’t lost his pack at Paradise—a humiliating consequence of his fragile ego, and the result of his having deserted the JHC.

“Crawford, come back. We miss you.” Cindy was sincere. “Surely there’s a way to patch this up. Your Dumfriesshire hounds would flourish, and you’d save the money of building a kennel.”

“Shaker has to apologize first.”

Shaker had decked him at the last hunt ball.

“Unusual circumstances.”

Crawford, on the dance floor, had collided with Shaker and Lorraine Rasmussen, which somehow pulled down Lorraine’s strapless top, her glories exposed.

“Well-built woman.” Crawford had lived long enough in Virginia to know understatement worked better than overstatement.

Cindy shook her club at him.“You men!”

High bowed slightly to her.“As a beautiful woman, you know exactly how we are.”

She shook her head, returning to address the golf ball, which said not a word in return.

“I’ve had enough.” High picked up the bucket and walked back to his mud-splattered Range Rover. He prized all things British, and in truth the hideously expensive SUV could go through anything.

Out of earshot, Crawford asked,“You knew the Craig and Abrams woman who was killed, didn’t you?” Crawford had no way of knowing that High had denied such knowledge to the sheriff when first queried.

High lowered his voice as he opened the back door of the Rover.“Ben Sidell called on me, once they knew who she was and where she worked. Yes, I knew her. She was very sweet.”

“Sorry.”

“Me too. Her whole life was in front of her.”

Satisfied, Crawford switched to his favorite subject, business.“Do you still own Craig and Abrams stock?”

“I do. I bought Hutchison Essar stock too. That’s how much I believe in the industry. Eventually one or both of those companies, currently in competition, will build WiFi systems to blanket all of India. It’s happening here; it will happen there. WiFi is the real golden pot at the end of the rainbow.”

“Vodafone wanted to take a controlling interest in Hutchison Essar?”

Vodafone, a British mobile phone company, realizing that the European market was stagnating, had bid for a controlling interest in Hutchison Essar, India’s fourth largest mobile operation.

The street value hovered at $13.5 million. Vodafone wanted a 67 percent stake. India’s mobile phone market was booming, with customers signing up at the rate of 6.6 million subscribers a month.

This pushed Reliance Communications Ltd., the Mumbai-based second largest operator, and Blackstone, a private equity group, into bed to see if they couldn’t buy 100 percent of Hutchison Essar. A dollop of national pride also sparked this effort, since the Indians wanted to keep the British out, having been rid of them only for about sixty years.

“Vodafone is well managed, has foresight.” High pulled off his skin-tight golf gloves.

Warp Speed, Faye Spencer’s company in town, was working on a device that would translate basic language. So an English speaker could understand a German, a Chinese, and vice versa. At present the circuitry had proved complicated and unreliable. The goal was to reduce the complexity, get to market first. This device could revolutionize business worldwide.

Warp Speed had the wisdom to concentrate on English, German, Chinese, Japanese, Spanish, and“government Indian” as there were so many dialects. They’d add French, Russian, and Portuguese later.