Рита Браун - Out Of Hounds

He laughed. “Actually, I did, but it’s not the same at all.”

She unwrapped the box, lifted the lid. Two white pearl studs greeted her. “What?”

“Those are fake. You need them for hunting, as a lady wears pearl studs. But if you lift that little cardboard up, the real present is underneath.”

She flicked up the cardboard onto which the fake studs were affixed, placing it on the coffee table. “Oh. Oh, those are beautiful. Exquisite.” She beheld two pink pearl earrings, perfect pink pearls in size and luster, 8.5 millimeter. “Weevil, these are beautiful.”

“Hold them up to your skin.”

She did, couldn’t stand it, so walked to the mirror. “This is too much. Really.”

“You have helped me so much. It’s my first full year hunting the hounds. I couldn’t have done it without you and they will look beautiful on you.”

She put the pearls in her ears. Indeed, they did look beautiful on her, but then anything would. Tootie had all of her mother’s beauty with none of her mother’s vanity.

“Weevil, I like working with you. I like your gentleness and how you watch the hounds. You know what everyone needs and you’re kind to them, kind to people, and way too generous to me.”

The rain pounded on the standing seam roof. He pulled his chair closer to hers when she sat down because they had difficulty hearing.

“I ask you to give me a chance.” Weevil folded his hands together so he wouldn’t show how nervous he was. “You don’t date. You have your girlfriends from Custis Hall. I don’t know if you don’t like men or maybe you would rather spend time with a woman, but I ask you to spend time with me, and the pearls aren’t a bribe, that really is for whipping-in.”

An agonizing silence followed his declaration.

“My parents’ marriage was poisonous. And I saw the way men behaved around my mother. I…I don’t want that and I feel like I’d be a failure. The only good relationships I’ve seen are since I’ve been here, Sister and Gray and Betty and Bobby. It’s not that I don’t like men, but I have this fear, I guess fear and mistrust.”

He took a deep breath. “You’re honest. So I’ll be honest back. I know that. You hang back even in groups. That’s okay but not all men are pigs, and I take it your father was and is a real pig.” She nodded so he continued. “He cut you out of the will.”

“Mom will make up for it but he was awful, especially since she moved here.”

“I am not your father. Most men are pretty decent. Maybe sex-obsessed.” He laughed. “But decent. Do I want to go to bed with you? Of course I do. I’m not dead. What I really want is to hear you sing when you’re happy, to maybe breed and make horses down the road when you’re out of vet school. And I want to work with you with hounds. I know women say they can take care of themselves and I believe it, but I still want to take care of you. Don’t worry about sex. I can wait, but I hope you get around to it.”

She laughed. “I have no idea what to do.”

“Well, I can help you there.”

They both laughed.

She brightened. “What do you have for Betty?”

“Crystal fox-head earrings. I’ve been on an earring kick. Women like earrings. Marion found them for me. She’s been terrific, as has Betty.”

“The pearls are better.” She smiled, got up, and kissed him. Then she kissed him again.

He blurted out, trying to contain his body. “Tootie, I love you. You must know I love you.”

“I’m not worth it.”

“You are worth every breath I take. What is that line from the Bible, a virtuous woman is more precious than rubies? Change it to pearls.” Then he really kissed her.

That was all it took.

CHAPTER 37

March 15, 2020 Sunday

Gray, Sister, Betty, Tootie, Weevil, Walter, and Ben sat spread out in Sister’s living room. The rain continued to pour outside. A fire warmed the room. Even though it was two in the afternoon, it was dark, the clouds hung low outside.

Walter and Ben sat farthest away, praticing the social distancing. As both men had to see people they kept their distance. No reliable tests were available yet in the area. However, both felt fine.

Sister and Gray sat close, as did Tootie and Weevil. Betty sat on Sister’s other side on the sofa.

Aunt Daniella, given her advanced age, stayed home and Tootie told her mother to stay home. Gray told his brother he would call him, and Aunt Daniella wanted Gray to call her immediately then she would call Kathleen. Everyone, while irritated at not being allowed to be there, did understand.

“The Ides of March,” Sister simply said.

Walter replied, “This is only the beginning.”

“That, too,” she replied. “Ben, you’ve taken our statements, those of us in the middle of this. Did you get anything out of him?”

“His first concern was reducing his sentencing. He swears he didn’t kill anyone, which I believe, but I also believe he ordered the killings. He would have killed you two but he says he just wanted to scare you.”

“Including Delores Buckingham?” Sister asked. “Did he order her death?”

“Most especially Delores. She figured out, to a point, the scam, which involved drivers with prison records. Ex-cons have trouble finding work. Some can be lured back into crime, fortunately many can’t. The ones Carter recruited had all wracked up gambling debts. Cards, as you might suspect from the removed forefinger and middle finger on the right hand. Even with that advantage, they lost money. Drugs didn’t help.”

“So they were destitute and desperate?” Gray inquired.

“Add lax morals. Since the dead don’t talk, I can’t say whether they cared one way or another what they were doing. Carter refused to identify the driver found in the Gulf station. He’s vague about how he recruited these men, which means, to me, he knows a lot more about illegal gambling than he admits.”

“His problems are bigger than that. How did he get the idea to steal Munnings’s paintings?” Betty, having seen Carter at his worst, wanted to know particularly, since she’d thought she knew him.

“Carter visited many rich peoples’ homes, especially those who are older. He knew where good art hung. Over the years he might walk off, having someone else do the dirty work, with a small painting by a good artist. Not the biggest and not always highly expensive, but good. For a time he would lift street scenes from Paris by very good painters during the last half of the nineteenth century. The thefts were reported but he never got caught. Whatever happened to the men, and I’m not sure his minions were always men, he won’t say. I believe that he used women from time to time, those employed as housekeepers or even nannies.”

“He made money. Right?” Tootie asked.

“Enough to live well, buy a new car or truck every two years, and he blew a lot of money on his small yacht, which he calls a big boat. It’s a small yacht.” Ben leaned forward. “Foxhunting proved another entrée into an upper-class world.”

“Ben, most foxhunters are not all that rich,” Sister quickly said.

“No, but enough are to make learning to ride and ride well useful. Essex, Piedmont, Orange, Middleburg, Green Spring Valley, Radnor, to name a few, contain wealthy people. At one time or another he hunted at those hunts and made friends. He hunted at the hunt outside Franklin, Tennessee, hoping some country music money might be there. He was nothing if not thorough.”

“I guess. Did he hunt in Great Britain?” Weevil wondered.

“He did, but he would need a real network there among former or practicing criminals and there wasn’t time. Plus how to manage it? Also, his American accent wouldn’t help him.”