Рита Браун - Out Of Hounds

Sister believed trotting or walking up hills muscled up hindquarters, aided balance. Most any horse can negotiate a flat arena or show ring. Jumping over uneven territory, jumps set where they could be set, called for a bold animal, steady nerves. Those drop jumps could get you.

The four wore turtlenecks, old short jackets over that. Spring nudged forward but the swollen red buds on deciduous trees had yet to open. Daffodils popped up and in some places the forsythia burst open. The temperature rested in the high forties, pleasant, but one needed a jacket and gloves, warm long socks under boots helped.

“Have you been watching the news?” Betty asked Weevil, to her left.

“Not much. What’s the latest?”

“Some public officials are predicting we will be hard hit by the coronavirus. Others are saying it’ll be like a bad cold, don’t worry. But since this subject comes up for every news report, I’d bet things are not good,” Betty answered him.

Tootie piped up. “Mom says once the doctors get on the air, especially those who are government appointees, people will take this seriously.”

“The only thing I can gather is that the virus transmits easily.” Sister looked up at a startling blue sky. “On a day like today it seems that nothing could go wrong.”

She had told them about Jordon Standish’s visit. They all gave him credit for coming to her face-to-face even if it was to try to avoid charges. His programs seemed far-fetched but possibly not to a suburban person or someone in a city. They exhausted that topic on the way from the stable. The return called for other topics.

“Is your mother going to hunt closing hunt?” Weevil asked Tootie.

“She swears she is. Sam said he will take her to Horse Country Wednesday. She’s determined to look perfect.”

“That won’t be hard.” Betty smiled. “Say, Sister, have you heard anything from Crawford?”

“No. Sam mentioned that he is obsessed with finding the painting. Good luck to him.” The older woman now rode Matador on the buckle.

“So the high-priced detective hasn’t turned up anything?” Weevil wondered.

“Actually he did. They finally identified the driver found in Kentucky. The men killed had all worked in Atlantic City in the casinos. Still don’t know about the driver at the Gulf Station.”

“Cardsharks,” Betty said with satisfaction.

“Yes, but each had been arrested in Virginia for petty theft, stealing from convenience stores, holding them up. Over time, as they served their time, they were sent to Goochland to learn to work with horses. Not all were incarcerated at the same time, but it’s possible they knew one another.”

“Sister, that’s something.” Betty dismounted as they’d reached the stables. Once inside each of them untacked their horse, wiped down the animal, no one was really sweaty, threw on a blanket, then repaired to the tack room to clean the tack. The working tack was cleaned as thoroughly as the tack reserved for hunting.

As they worked away Sister told them her conclusions, the thoughts she’d written down yesterday.

“Maybe the mastermind was at the prison facility, too. Maybe that’s how he gathered his team,” Betty thought.

“Could be.” Weevil cleaned the simple D-ring bit with fresh water, then wiped it with a clean rag, paying attention to every detail. “It’s fate how people meet both good and bad.”

“I believe that,” Betty chimed in. “I often think everyone you meet has a message for you.”

“My message for you is hand me that girth.” Sister poked fun at her.

“Hey, you’re lucky I didn’t hand you a Fennell’s lead shank.”

They heard a car engine then it cut off. A knock on the door revealed Carter.

“Come in.” Sister motioned for him.

“Well, this is a busy crew.” He smiled. “Our hunting season may be over. There’s talk of shutting things down.”

“So far no one has said or done anything,” Sister replied. “We’ll hunt from Foxden tomorrow. I don’t want to fuel panic and you know how people can get. I’ll wait and see.”

“I’m driving down to my boat tomorrow,” Carter informed them. “If this does fire up, I want to make sure everything is shipshape.”

“How often do you go?” Tootie was curious.

“I check once a month in the winter but when the weather warms up I sometimes stay down there for weeks. Anyway, thought I would check in.” He looked at Weevil, winked, then left.

“Weevil, why don’t we all walk up to the schoolhouse tomorrow and cast there? Sort of a reverse cast.”

“Yes, Madam.” He smiled.

“You are so polite.” She smiled back.

As they left the barn to go home, Weevil opened his car door, found the small package, nicely wrapped, on the driver’s seat, put it in his pocket. Carter had left it for him. Weevil would decide when to give it to Tootie.

They worked well together, liked each other. He knew better than to court her in the conventional sense, but this was a present he had to give her. Maybe after the last hunt of the season.

Sister walked up to the house. Gray’s Land Cruiser sat outside. She was glad he was back from yet another short business trip.

She opened the door, heard the dogs barking as she hung up her coat.

“Hey, honey, I’m home,” she called out.

He called back, “I’m in the library, watching all hell break loose.”

She hurried in, dropped down next to him. “It’s kind of like watching the pot call the kettle dirty, isn’t it?”

“Well, honey, just in case, we’d better make some preparations.”

“Hunt tomorrow.”

“I know, but afterward I’ll make a run to Harris Teeter. If people get scared they will buy everything.”

“We have enough.”

“For how long? I mean it. I think people will go crazy.”

“Scare tactics?”

He flipped to CNN then to Fox then to CBS. “Thought I’d check the different flavors. One thing no one can refute is that China has been overwhelmed, Italy’s starting to slide, and Angela Merkel is taking no prisoners. It’s here that it’s murky.”

She silently watched. “What do you think?”

“I think after hunting tomorrow we should talk to Walter. Rich people will be buying freezers and buying all the meat in the stores. I mean, if some agreement doesn’t soon emerge between our federal government and the medical professionals. In a case like this, best to trust your governor.”

“Fortunately, our governor is a physician.”

“Yes, he is.” Gray put his arm around her. “At this point I’m more wary of other people than the virus.”

“Well, let’s take it a day at a time.”

CHAPTER 30

March 10, 2020 Tuesday

Fog as thin as a veil shrouded the old schoolhouse at Foxglove Farm.

A light mist swirled, barely visible. Hounds waited for Weevil’s instructions and the field waited by the clapboard schoolhouse, still inviting and still sturdy although abandoned in the 1960s when bussing became the method, children hauled to large schools, consolidated districts that created rectangular, big, mostly ugly new schoolhouses.

In the distance below, Sister beheld the huge cow and her son, Clytemnestra and Orestes, in a paddock. The Jefferson Hunt always parked by the stables and the cow barn, to Clytemnestra’s irritation. Best to be distant from the enormous crab.

This Tuesday the field swelled to thirty-some people. Given the continuing bad news about the coronavirus, many members felt this would be the last hunt despite the season’s normal end in mid-March.

Rickyroo, Sister’s bay Thoroughbred, waited as patiently as the hounds. He did wonder why every nose had to be accounted for before they took off.

“All right, then, lieu in.” Weevil cast downhill from the schoolhouse.