The Tell-Tale Horse

CHAPTER 10

A sharp dry wind from the west sliced through boots and gloves. Hunters could keep their bodies warm, but feet and hands usually suffered—as did noses, which tended to run at inauspicious occasions.

Once mounted, Sister wanted to move off, but first cast, at ten, couldn’t be pushed upward. Once people receive a fixture card with place and time for the hunt, you can’t fool with it. People, many still on the ground, rooted for girths, searched for hairnets, struggled with stock pins.

Why don’t they tie their stock pins at home when their fingers are warm? Sister thought to herself. She wore the titanium stock pin Garvey Stokes had made for her. As far as she knew, she had the only titanium stock pin in the world. The slender dull silver pin was fantastic.

Ilona Merriman, hairnet in place, derby correctly placed on her head—which is to say, straight across the brow—rode up to Sister, reined in Tom Tiger, her handy small Thoroughbred, gave a pregnant pause, and then tattled. “Jennifer Schneider—granted she’s a new member—but she’s not wearing a hairnet, her gloves are black, and her stock pin has a fox’s head on it. She might as well learn sooner as later.”

Sister wanted to slap Ilona, whom she’d always tolerated but never liked, not that Ilona deliberately crossed her. Of course, turnout should be proper. Face danger with elegance is the foxhunter’s creed. But Jennifer, riding with Bobby Franklin, was green as grass. Sister gave each new member a copy of correct attire for JHC. She also gave them a year to pull it together.

“I’ll have a word with her.”

“I’ll do it, if you like. Then the onus is on me.” Like so many people, Ilona reveled in small displays of power.

“Thank you. It’s better that I do it because you ride in the field. In time, Jennifer may move up to first flight. Sometimes a correcting word, no matter how kindly given, can spoil a relationship. I wouldn’t want that to happen to you and Jennifer.” Before Ilona could indicate that Jennifer was beneath her, Sister adroitly mentioned, “She’s a Valentine on her mother’s side.”

The Valentine blood, an old Virginia family and one with steeplechase connections, would appeal to Ilona’s snobbery. She possessed little old Virginia blood but what she had had been magnified to gargantuan proportions.

“I didn’t know that.” Her cute little mouth became an O.

“Blood always tells.” Sister couldn’t resist. “Thank you for the heads-up. We do want our people to look perfect.”

Ilona, now in possession of news, made a beeline for Cabel, who was getting a leg up from Clayton.

Ilona heard him chide her. “Go to the doctor. You haven’t been to a doctor in twenty years, Cabel. There’s no reason your legs should be weak.”

Sister watched as Clayton huffed and puffed to lift Cabel, not particularly heavy. God, she thought to herself, he’s even fatter than he was two weeks ago.

Seeing her staring in his direction, Clayton winked, which made Sister laugh. Fat he might be, but he hadn’t lost his spark.

After a few welcoming words to guests from Sister and Walter, they moved off, hounds following, northward along Broad Creek. The wind buffeted them until they reached an area one mile from the Bancrofts’ covered bridge, where the ground began to fall away. Shaker knew sooner or later they’d pick up a line, faint perhaps, but something to run, since this portion of Broad Creek sank low, providing protection from the wind. Any fox worth his or her salt, if picked up, would scamper to high ground where their signature perfume would be blown away.

February 23, being a Saturday, meant a large field. Today, sixty-seven hardy souls rode forward. Jefferson Hunt could count on big Saturdays even after New Year’s, when fair-weather hunters kept to their fireplaces. Most of the Jefferson Hunt members truly wanted to hunt and took pride in facing conditions that would deter others.

Rickyroo, Sister’s seven-year-old Thoroughbred, dark coat glistening, enjoyed the brisk weather. A quick study, he’d learned so much last season that Sister felt he was made and could handle any possibility—and they were out there, from mountain lions to wild boar, the worst of the worst.

Walter Lungrun, in his second year as joint master, rode right behind Tedi and Edward Bancroft, who usually rode in Sister’s pocket. These two, always perfectly turned out, on beautiful horses, made Sister smile. They had more money than God, but even Ben Sidell, who made a modest salary as sheriff, looked perfect next to Bobby Franklin and the hilltoppers.

She prided herself on her field, their turnout, their hunting manners, and their hospitality to visitors. With the exception of Crawford, who had always been too flashy, she was rarely disappointed.

High Vajay was out, as was Kasmir, this time in a heavy frock coat, thicker gloves, and a sturdy derby attached to his back collar with a black hat cord.

Sister’s coat had faded to a hue admired by newcomers because it meant you’d been hunting a long time. Her coat, black, lined in wool tattersall, cut the cold. Her cap, ribbons down, had faded also.

Non-staff members, those wearing caps, wore the ribbons up.

She sighed as they walked along. High-pressure systems meant tough hunting although a fox could pop out at any time, its scent then red hot. Anything could happen. She fretted since she wanted to show good sport, but as yet Sister had not figured out how to control the weather.

She glanced over her shoulder. The Custis Hall girls rode at the rear as usual. Juniors ride at the rear, as do grooms. When the pace quickens and people drop back, often not having a fast-enough horse or enough horse, then a junior may move up. A groom should assist those falling behind if they need it. These days a groom often helped only his or her employer, but they were there to serve. Few true grooms existed anymore; pony clubbers often fulfilled those duties at various barns, but they had much to learn about protocol. Even Tedi and Edward didn’t take a groom out, although they did have stable help whereas Sister did not. She was so grateful to the Custis Hall girls for turning out her horses and cleaning staff tack on the days they rode that she had given each girl soft leather mustard gloves for Christmas presents. She was already wondering what to give them for graduation.

She stopped wondering when Cora spoke with high excitement. A large gray streak shot out to her left.

“Come!” Cora sang out.

The entire pack, honoring their strike hound and head bitch, closed in on the line and ran single file until they burst out of the woods, now running southwesterly. In three minutes, flat out amid the trees, the path narrow, Sister happily spied the old hog’s back jump, thrilled her knees had survived the close quarters. She could clearly see Comet, the gray fox, ahead now bursting through the wildflower field, the whole pack bunched together.

Bitsy, the screech owl, flew silently overhead. She must have followed them from the covered bridge at the Bancrofts. Bitsy, living in Sister’s stable, led an extremely active social life, enlivened by intense curiosity about everyone and everything. Sister was fine with that, so long as she kept her mouth shut, for her cry could wake the dead.

Comet faced into the wind, his scent streaming into flared hound nostrils. He zigzagged to break the flow but the scent was so hot the pack zigzagged with him. He’d run at a good clip but now he had to hit top speed. He’d been caught unawares, trying to court a new gray vixen living about a half mile from the small graveyard by the covered bridge. Romance clouded his senses.

He cut sharply right, leapt over the old fence setting off the wildflower field, some patches of snow still encrusted in small furrows here and there, like hard vanilla icing, then cut straight up toward Hangman’s Ridge.

Sister sailed over the jump in the old fence line, Rickyroo’s ears forward. He jumped a trifle flat, which helped old bones. A horse with a large bascule, the rounding of the back so prized in the show ring, could wear out even the Custis Hall girls after four hours of hunting. Better a horse that powered off hindquarters, reached out with forelegs, and then folded them up and kept that back just a little flat. A long pastern—the short bone just above the hoof—made the landing smoother too, but Sister didn’t worry too much about that. Many horsemen declared a horse with a long pastern would break down sooner than one with upright pasterns. After a lifetime with horses, Sister thought it was six of one, half a dozen of the other.

Hounds pounded down the frozen farm road, although sections were getting greasy as the sun rose higher. It was already ten thirty.

Behind her Sister heard a loud rap on the coop. Someone had rubbed it. Footing in front of it was getting cut up. Well, if someone endured an involuntary dismount, another bottle for the club traveling bar. She collected these bottles assiduously, though she was not much of a drinker herself. Single-malt scotch on a wickedly cold day would pass her lips and that was about it, or maybe a cold beer on a stinky hot day. But alcohol rarely figured into Sister’s socializing. She’d witnessed too many good people go down like Sam Lorillard.

Another rap followed. Yes, the ground was getting cut up but the smart riders would rate, slow down a little, then squeeze hard at the takeoff spot to compensate, or not rate their horse’s stride and leave early. So often, and not on purpose, people would follow too closely at the jumps. Some plain couldn’t hold their horses. One of the great things about the Custis Hall girls riding in the rear was that Sister received a full report. As field master, her job was to stay behind the hounds without crowding them. What happened behind her, in a sense, was not her concern.

“He’s going to Hangman’s Ridge,” Dasher called out.

“Damn,” Asa growled.

Damn was right, because the moment Comet reached that high flat expanse exposed to fierce winds, even in summer, he knew he could relax. He crossed the long axis of the ridge and paused at the hanging tree, haunted by those who died there, earning their dispatch thanks to severe transgressions. Comet didn’t like hearing their whispers. Occasionally he could see one of the hanged. Under the circumstances, let the hounds deal with it. He waited. They came onto the ridge and he slipped down the back side toward Roughneck Farm. His den was not far from that of his sister Inky. His scent would be long gone by the time the hounds reached the tree, so he just ambled on home.

“I hate this place,” Diddy, a young female hound, whispered.

“Me too,” Tinsel, another young hound, agreed.

“Drat!” Cora circled the tree, ignoring the whispers from the large branch formerly used to secure the rope.

Hounds milled about. Shaker rode up. He too disliked this spot. He urged them to cast themselves wider, which they did, but the damage was done, as was the day. He considered going down the narrow path to the farm road in hopes of rousing another fox, but he figured this was it. Couldn’t complain. It had been a bracing run.

The fifteen-minute walk down the trail to the farm road produced squabbling in the bushes from two male cardinals who had been squabbling anyway. The goldfinches, chirpy as always, turned their backs to the redbirds, wishing the cardinals would fly up to tree limbs and stay out of their bushes. Cardinals pretty much did as they pleased, but at least they weren’t as offensive as the blue jays, who would walk right up to a goldfinch on the ground to utter a stream of avian obscenities.

Returning to the coop, Sister paused. “Shaker, let’s take hounds back to their kennels. Then we can drive back to After All and pick up the trailer and the party wagon. No point in walking all the way back there when the kennels are ten minutes away.”

“Fine.”

She turned to the field. “Folks, we’re walking hounds back to the kennels and we’ll meet you at After All. Walter will lead the field.”

Walter nodded, happy that he was chosen by the senior master to do this. His riding was improving, as was his hunting knowledge. Usually Tedi or Edward led the field when Sister, for whatever reason, did not.

Tedi smiled at Sister. She liked seeing Walter move up.

The two whippers-in rode beside the pack at ten o’clock and two o’clock. Shaker rode at six o’clock, and in this way the pack was kept together. Their discipline was good. They wouldn’t bolt, but both Sister and Shaker thought better safe than sorry.

Back at the kennels, hounds cheerfully walked in, eager to discuss the day’s hunt and to lord it over those not drawn to go out today, Dragon being one.

“Pretty good day in difficult conditions,” Cora called out, as she went into the kennel.

Dragon, face pressed against the chain link fence around the boys’ run, heard her loud and clear before she disappeared into the kennels for warm water to drink, a check over, and some kibble warmed with heated-up gravy, a special mix of Sister’s.

Sybil helped Shaker with the hounds. Dragon growled with envy.

Sister and Betty led the four horses back to the barn. Both Betty and Sybil would drive over later to pick up their horses. In the meantime, each animal would be wiped down, checked, a blanket thrown over, put in a stall with fresh water and flakes of sweet hay.

Since the Custis Hall girls needed to ride back to After All, the two old friends happily performed the after-hunt horse chores alone.

“Should we clean the tack?” Betty asked, after putting up Outlaw and Bombardier, her horse and Sybil’s.

“We can do it after breakfast. Don’t want to show up too late. I’ll put up the coffeepot. Might as well get warmed from the inside out.” Sister walked into the small but pretty office to make coffee. A hot plate and a small under-counter refrigerator were in the room. Sister thought someday, if she ever got ahead with money, she’d extend the office outward so she could build a proper kitchen and make a nice sitting room, since she spent more time in the barn than in the house.

She stopped. “Betty, Betty, come here!”

Betty opened the door, then stopped cold. “What in the hell?”

“That’s what I say.”

Before them on the desk gleamed the great silver John Barton Payne punch bowl from Marion Maggiolo’s store.

Sister called Ben Sidell on his cell but it was turned off. He hadn’t reached his trailer yet most likely.

She called Marion at Horse Country.

“Marion, your punch bowl is here.”

“What?”

“On my office desk in the stable. Looks fine. I’ll notify the sheriff here; you notify yours.”

Marion paused, trying to eradicate the worry from her voice. “Why you?”

“I don’t know, but I don’t like it.”

“It’s possible whoever stole the punch bowl didn’t kill that girl.”

“I don’t think so.”

“I’m glad you have it, but”—Marion switched her thoughts—“where are your dogs?”

“In the house. I suspect whoever put this here knew not to put it in the house. Raleigh and Rooster would have taken down anyone they didn’t know well.” Anger infiltrated her voice. “I don’t like being played with.”

“Play may not be the right word. I wouldn’t go out without those dogs or a thirty-eight. This is too weird.”

After hanging up the phone, Sister turned to Betty, who was admiring the magnificent silver bowl.

Betty looked up. “Not good. Not good at all.”

“Well, I hardly think I’m going to be the next Lady Godiva.”

Betty tilted her head upward to the taller woman. “Jane, none of us has any idea what’s going on, and that includes the authorities. Assume nothing. I don’t think you should be in the house alone at night. One of us should be with you. We can take turns.”

“Now, Betty, that’s a little extreme.” Sister felt a little shaky and tried to make light of it by changing the subject. “Funny, today is the Roman festival of Terminalia, celebrates the god Terminus.”

“The things that pop into your mind.” Betty put her hand on Sister’s shoulder.

“He’s the god of boundaries.” She looked into Betty’s quiet brown eyes. “Someone is crossing our boundaries, even those of life and death.”