The Tell-tale Horse

CHAPTER 25

On Thursday, March 6, Sister and a large contingent who managed to get off work or had already retired drove up to Casanova territory, east of Warrenton. Ashland Bassets were meeting at Eastern View, owned by the Fendleys.

Hunting on foot separated those with wind and those without, which became apparent twenty minutes into the hunt.

Joyce and Bill Fendley ran along, as did Marion, who took off early from Horse Country because Ashland hounds cast at two in the afternoon.

Sister had to laugh because Cabel Harper showed up in brush pants, very intelligent decision, and a true tweed jacket to repel thorns, topped off with a hunter-green Robin Hood hat, a pheasant feather stuck in for allure. Ilona confined herself to a baseball hat, while Betty Franklin, remembering those nasty thorns, also wore brush pants but she tied a wool scarf around her neck, tucking it into her jacket. The last time she hunted with the bassets she had cut her throat, and blood had poured over her shirt and jacket.

Charlotte Norton allowed the Custis Hall girls to hunt so long as they wrote a paper about it for class. Val drove them in her lime-colored Jeep. By the time the kids reached Eastern View, all but Val agreed a Wrangler wasn’t meant for long trips. Their fillings rattled in their teeth.

Al Toews, Master of Bassets, held the horn this March 6 and his joint master, Mary Reed, whipped in to him. Al and Mary had been in the custom of taking turns hunting the hounds but Al declared he would give it up to Mary after season’s end because his wind was shot. No one believed him since he could outrun anyone, but this declaration was made with solemnness. Al’s wife, Kathleen King, also whipped in to him today. The two were psychic when they hunted together. Aggie de la Garza, Miriam Anver, Frank Edrington, Sherrod Johnson, Mary Dobrovir, and Nancy Palmer whipped in as well.

Camilla Moon and Diana Dutton acted as first flight field master and second accordingly, although they didn’t exactly specify it that way, but the field seemed naturally to break into two groups as time ran on and so did the bunnies.

At a check, Tootie whispered to Sister, “Why so many whippers-in?”

“Bassets are harder-headed than foxhounds. Need more control,” Sister whispered back.

Camilla, a true canine student, turned as the Jefferson Hunt people were behind her, the Ashland members gracefully allowing the guests pride of place. “Second-best noses in dogdom.”

Tootie already knew that bloodhounds possessed the best so she rightly figured that foxhounds must come in third.

Naturally, harrier people, coonhound folks, and beagle devotees could argue the point. Even Plott hound lovers who run bear would argue, but foxhunters, like all hound people, prove marvelously resistant to others’ opinions.

Al bounded into a hateful covert of brambles, a thin swift-running blade of water, deep-sided, cutting it in two, a perfect abode for the cottontail.

Before first cast, the tall lanky Vietnam veteran had asked Sister if she would care to hunt hounds with him. Flattered as she was by the prospect of being that close to these aggressive hunters, this would be her only time to be one of the field as opposed to leading. Joyce Fendley enjoyed being in the field for the same reasons. She had no decisions to make. Camilla and Diana had to make them.

Hounds began to feather, then tails whipped like propellers. One lone deep note from Tosca alerted the others, followed by a crescendo of sound, beautiful spine-tingling music for the only pack voices as beautiful as these belonged to Penn-Marydels.

The rabbit, still in the covert, headed along the stream, then shot out over the pasture and ran a tight circle, hounds in hot pursuit and humans pursuing as hotly as their legs would carry them.

This rabbit could run, and the chase lasted fifteen exhausting minutes up and down the pasture—which had a steep roll to it—and then the rabbit disappeared, just popped down a hole. No amount of furious digging could dislodge Peter Cottontail, who lived to run another day.

Rabbit scent is fragile, but the afternoon proved a good one and hounds worked another narrow covert. Mary Reed hollered, “Tally-ho!” Al quickly pushed the bassets up to the line, and off they ran again.

Sister noted at the next check that most of the Jefferson Hunt people hung in with first flight, but huffing and puffing were evident. She was breathing hard too, and all those broken bones of decades past began to speak to her.

After another short burst, light fading and temperature falling, the group walked back to the old silo to enjoy a tailgate.

Betty asked Cabel if she’d heard anything from Clayton.

Gratefully drinking mulled wine, the warmth most welcome, Cabel airily replied, “He can’t call out. It’s lockup.”

“All for the best, I’m sure.”

“I’m lost,” Cabel suddenly blurted out. “He plucked my last nerve. Let’s call a spade a spade; my husband is a philandering drunk but we’ve lived together for twenty-two years and I miss him. If nothing else, he did take out the garbage, drunk or sober. I can’t believe how much I miss him….

“How do those Custis Hall girls get out of school? When I went there you were only let out of class if your mother died.” Cabel nodded toward Val, Tootie, and Pamela, abruptly changing the subject.

“Where’s Felicity?” Ilona asked. “Val, Tootie, and Felicity are the Three Musketeers.”

“Aluminum Manufacturing,” Betty answered. “She’s working three afternoons a week.”

“I thought the Porters had money,” Ilona said.

“They do.” Betty wasn’t about to tell them Felicity was pregnant, as well as the rest of it. “But she wants real-life experience, as she puts it.”

“Good for her.” Cabel nodded. “What else do they have to do at that age except drink, drug, and have sex?”

“Cabel, we didn’t.” Ilona recalled her own Custis Hall days.

“Speak for yourself,” Cabel wryly responded.

Betty held up her hands, palms outward. “I was a bleeding saint.”

“Spare me.” Cabel rolled her eyes, then stared at the girls again. “They are beautiful girls. Well, Pamela’s a pudge, though she’s losing some of it. But Val and Tootie are two of the prettiest girls I’ve ever seen.”

“The men notice, and they notice which other men are looking. Bobby tells me everything,” Betty noted. “He said if anyone lays a hand on one of those kids—did I get it right, lay? Well, if anyone does, he and Walter will dismember them. But I don’t think the men in our club are like that.”

“They all are,” Cabel stated flatly. “I’m amazed that Clayton didn’t make a pass at one of them. Too loaded.”

“Never stopped him before,” Ilona said uncharitably.

“Ramsey’s better?” Cabel fired back.

“Ladies, good to talk to you.” Betty backed away.

“Oh, Betty, don’t be so goddamned proper. You’ve seen us fight before. We’re joined at the hip. We’re bound to fuss sometimes. If you want to know who I think has really been dipping his stick throughout the county, let’s discuss High Vajay. I’ll bet you dollars to doughnuts he was sleeping with Faye Spencer. All he had to do was fall out of his own bed to fall into hers.” Cabel warmed to her subject.

“Wouldn’t want to be in his boots right now.” Betty avoided the sex suspicions. “He’s the main suspect for the Lady Godiva murders.”

“Boots? How about pants? I’m surprised he isn’t singing soprano. Mandy must have an iron will and a forgiving patience,” Ilona marveled.

“There are worse things than a husband who cheats.” Betty opened her mouth before thinking.

“Such as?” Cabel and Ilona said in unison, both incredulous. “Wanton cruelty. Loss of honor.”

“You don’t think sex outside of marriage isn’t cruel?” The pheasant feather bobbed on Cabel’s hat.

“I think it hurts, but I don’t think the intent is cruel.” Betty held up her hand to stay the protests. “Would I be devastated if Bobby ran off the reservation?” She used the old phrase. “I would, but I would be far more upset if he was cold, critical, and cruel to animals and people. Or if he proves a coward when Gabriel blows his trumpet. A man with no honor isn’t worth having and neither is a woman. As to sleeping around—well, sex is irrational and in a different category from other human endeavors.”

“You have a point.” Ilona was thoughtful. “But consider the intimate betrayal. I don’t know if I will ever completely trust Ramsey. I love him but I don’t trust him. That’s not good. And have you ever considered that your straying husband might bring home a gift that keeps giving, like AIDS?”

“I know it’s terrible. It must eat you from the inside out.” Betty was compassionate. “But look at Sister. Neither she nor Ray was monogamous, and they had a good strong marriage. Gay men are like that too, or so it seems to me, and their relationships last longer than most heterosexual ones, a fact the sex Nazis can’t concede. I don’t want Bobby fooling around, don’t misunderstand me, but I truly believe there are worse sins. We make a small god of monogamy.”

“I hope you never find out.” Cabel headed back to the food.

“I’m sorry. I’ve upset her,” Betty said to Ilona.

“She’s having a hard time. She’ll get over it.” Ilona smiled. “We all do and if we don’t, we’re pretty stupid, aren’t we? You can’t spend your life massaging old wounds.”

“Plenty do,” Betty said. “Virginians mistake personal injustice for history.”

“Isn’t that the truth! There are a lot of embittered injustice collectors out there.” Ilona started for the food, then turned back to Betty. “I was on my way to becoming one of those people. Finally couldn’t stand myself, and I said, ‘Ilona, you’ve got to do something or you’ll turn into a snitz.’”

Snitz is a dried apple.

“Glad you got hold of yourself,” Betty complimented her.

“Me too.”

Betty then joined Al and Mary, the whippers-in, the Custis Hall girls, and Sister. She slipped her arm around Sister’s waist.

Neither woman thought a thing about that. They loved each other deeply and were not afraid of touching. Touch is healing. Men are denied this except with their wives and their children; they don’t get the same loving reinforcement from their own gender.

“Master.” Tootie addressed Al, who was a natural teacher. “Why did you draw the first covert up one side and then down the other? Shaker doesn’t do that.”

“Because Shaker is hunting a predator. I’m hunting prey. A rabbit will survive more often than not if it is still, if it sticks in its warren. The bassets have to bolt them. When you hunt foxes, you usually pick up their line when they themselves are hunting or returning to their den from a night’s hunt. So I have to make good the ground in a very different way.”

Mary chimed in. “And fox scent is heavier than rabbit scent.”

Sister and Betty were as enthralled with this information as were the young folks. True hunters find no bottom to their enthusiasm, much to the despair of those around them.

Al thought things through in systems, in checklists. He broke down complicated problems into discrete parts, which is natural for a combat pilot. A man has a much better chance of living through a war if he does this, and the equipment Al flew was the most sophisticated for its time. You’d better have a checklist or else. He applied this relentless logic to hunting the bassets, but like all good huntsmen he could be flexible.

Tired but full from all the food, the Jefferson Hunt gang bid their Ashland friends good-bye as they piled into trucks, SUVs, old station wagons still providing service, and Val’s Jeep.

Tootie hesitated for a moment before stepping over the lip into the sturdy vehicle that really could go anywhere.

“Will you stop being a prima donna!”

“Val, you’re not sitting in the back,” Tootie said.

Pamela replied, “Neither am I. Come on, Tootie, I rode back there on the way up.”

“All right, all right.”

Sister walked by. “Be grateful you don’t have old bones.”

“They’ll be old by the time I get to school.” Tootie laughed and climbed in, the door swinging shut behind her.

Sister and Betty drove past Marion, who was starting her car.

Stopping, Betty lowered her window. “Come on down. We’re hunting Mill Ruins Saturday. You’ve never seen Peter Wheeler’s old place. The mill still works.”

“I don’t know if I can take off work, but it’s a wonderful invitation.”

As Sister and Betty rolled down Route 29 they reviewed the hunt, the tailgate, their lengthy discussion with Marion as to the status of the Warrenton murder, and the murder at Foxglove. Then they replayed Al’s wonderful talk on hunting with bassets.

“It’s funny, all the years I’ve whipped in and I never thought about hunting a hunter. All I know is fox. Well, deer occasionally, but hunting with hounds, all I know is fox,” Betty said.

“Since a prey animal is in some respects weaker than a predator, camouflage and stillness are essential.” Sister loved talking about these subjects. “But you know, a cow is prey and a horse is prey, but of course they’re large. They don’t have to remain still and they have hooves to kick the daylights out of a predator.”

“Or me.” Betty laughed. “Remember the time that doe charged Archie?” She named a now-departed beloved hound. “When was that? I remember, 1997. Outlaw was green then, his first season, and after the doe charged Archie she charged us. Scared the hell out of both of us. Outlaw came up with all four feet off the ground.”

“Bet your heart flew up too.” Sister smiled. “Every now and then something happens out there and the rush is incredible. Sometimes it’s good and sometimes it’s bad, but at least you know you’re alive. Hard to believe the season’s almost over. Always gives me the blues. Then I snap out of it. When the puppies start coming and the garden blooms, I pick up again.”

“You’ve got a green thumb.”

“Thanks.” Sister sat upright, making Betty look ahead, wondering if something ran across the road. “Betty, what if our killer is a prey animal?”

“What?”

“What if our killer feels weak? Here we’ve been assuming this is some kind of sex thing, which it may be, or that it’s tied into wireless competition. But what Al said about a prey animal sitting tight, then having to be bolted? Maybe that’s our killer, sitting tight, only coming out to kill when the coast is clear. Aashi and Faye were seen as predators.”

Betty thought hard. “Weak things can kill, can fight back. After all, the doe did.”

“One has to provoke them, right? The first defense is to hide. I guess the second is to flee, but if we can bolt the killer, we’ll know him.”

“High Vajay doesn’t strike me as weak,” Betty said.

“Too smart.”

“You don’t think High’s the killer?”

“I don’t know, but I doubt it. He has too much to lose by committing that kind of felony.”

“Unless he had more to lose with the two women living.”

“True.” Sister noted a streak of turquoise over the crest of the Blue Ridge Mountains.

“I thought weak people poisoned their victims. Guess that’s one of those stereotypes. You know, kill by stealth.” Betty wondered how to flush out the murderer.

“Still a useful way to send someone off planet earth. All the labs in the world can’t point to who put the poison in the cup. They can only identify the poison. But, see, this is what bothers me. If someone used poison, wouldn’t you assume they don’t want to be caught?”

“Sure.” Betty reached up for the Jesus strap as they took a curve. Reaching for the strap was force of habit.

“Part of me thinks our killer, like most murderers, wants to get away with it, and part of me thinks not. The Godiva part is too public.”

“People do get away with public murders. What about all those political murders in places like Ireland, Serbia, Iran, and Iraq? I’m not even counting Africa. I guess it’s a matter of scale. The more people you kill the better your chances of escaping justice.”

“Pinochet proved that.” Sister pointed to the flaming sunset over the Blue Ridge Mountains. “But, on the other hand, we judge everything by the comfort of America. Look at Spain, a hideous civil war. Did that war lay the groundwork for Spain’s resurgence today? Same with Chile. Did all those murders of Allende’s people lay the groundwork for that country’s economic revival? We don’t like to think about things that way. I mean, we don’t like to think that sometimes forests have to be burned for fresh growth.”

“Yeah, it’s repulsive.”

“I guess it is. The Chileans slit the bellies of those they killed, then dropped them from airplanes into the ocean so they’d sink without a trace. I consider that gross.”

“Isn’t that always the problem with a human corpse? How do you destroy the evidence?”

“Right. But here we have a killer who wants everyone to admire the evidence. I just don’t get it. What I do get is, he’s here.”

“And was at the Casanova Hunt Ball.”

“Right. I’ve gone over the list. It’s half our club.”

“Ben Sidell has it?”

“Of course, he’s questioned everyone methodically as to when they left the ball and what they saw. As far as I can tell, everyone has been cooperative.”

“Too bad Crawford wasn’t there, we could pin it on him.” Betty laughed.

“He’s like a bad penny, he’ll show up when we least want to see him.” Sister sighed. “Maybe I’ll have a brainstorm.”

“I rather hope not,” Betty said firmly. “The last time you thought you could pin a murder on someone he nearly killed you. This person puts the silver bowl in your stable office, drops off a movie, parades a corpse at Cindy Chandler’s. You stay out of it.”

“How can I stay out of it? I’m in the middle and I don’t even know why.”

“Well, that makes two of us. Where you go, I go.” Betty smiled.