Рита Браун - Crazy Like A Fox

Betty covered her ears. The sound of gunfire never proved reassuring. Sweat trickled between her breasts. Outlaw, ears forward, stood like a rock.

One by one, Shaker counted hounds. No Tatoo. No Tootie. He blew again.

Tootie, moving at the edge of the heavy crop, called out, “We’re okay.”

Nearing the open pasture, the man stopped, lifted Tatoo over her saddle. “I think he’ll stay. You’ll need to pick out the rat shot and wash him, but nothing’s broken.” He paused, smiled at her. “You’re a good whipper-in.”

Tootie, overwhelmed, simply nodded her thanks.

“Are you all right? That was a nasty shock.”

“I’m okay. I’m just worried about the hound.”

He lifted off his cap, faded, hard used, and kissed her on the cheek. “The hound always comes first. Go on now.”

Jujube, tractable now, slowly walked toward the pasture.

When she turned to look back, the man was gone.

Seeing her reach the corner, Sister began to dismount.

Gray rode up. “A master’s feet should never touch the ground. With your permission.”

She smiled. He rode off and she thought, Now there’s a foxhunter. She also thought to herself what a divine man Gray was: calm, collected, in control, and hers, all hers.

“Hold hard, Tootie.” Gray rode up, swung his leg over, and lifted Tatoo, who whined, off the saddle.

Tootie, ashen, breathed deeply. “There’s a crazy man in there. He shot at the pack. I’m lucky he didn’t shoot me.”

Gray put his arm around her shoulder. “All’s well. Let’s get Tatoo back.”

Shaker, on sight of Tootie, rode up, dismounting. The pack followed. Gray put down Tatoo, Shaker knelt, examining the rat shot.

Tootie filled them in. She said she had help but she didn’t know who it was. Someone well turned out.

Neither man paid too much attention to this. “Ronnie!” Shaker bellowed.

Ronnie Haslip left the field, hurrying up to Shaker, Tootie, and Gray.

“Ride back to the trailers, will you? The key to the party wagon is in the truck. We’ll get out to the road. Bring it up, will you?”

“Of course.” The trusted fellow nodded and turned, riding off.

“Let’s not broadcast too much. Sister will know how to handle this. If it were up to me, I’d find the bastard and throttle him,” Shaker said as Gray lifted Tatoo in his arms again.

“The fellow who helped me choked him, threw him on the ground, then hit him in the head with the butt of his rifle. He took his pulse—he’s not dead.”

“If I find him, he will be.” Shaker on foot, leading Kilowatt, walked, the pack with him, while Gray continued to carry Tatoo. Tootie led his horse and her own.

Gray, to the other two, quietly said, “We can tell Sister what occurred once hounds are on the trailer. Or Tootie, you can tell her, and Betty and Shaker can get hounds back. The less people know of details, the better. God only knows what will be on Facebook.”

“Jesus Christ.” Shaker spat. “People have no sense.”

“You just figured that out, did you?” Gray lightly said.

Reaching the road, Gray gratefully put down Tatoo, who stood up, wobbly. Blood trickled out of a few rat shot holes.

“Digging out the rat shot will sting. Some of this will have to fester out.” Shaker again examined the sweet hound. “Goddammit. Goddammit it to hell!”

They waited as Sister took the field back in. Betty joined the pack just in case someone took a notion, plus there was no reason to stand at the far end of the marijuana patch now.

Tootie filled her in.

“Think we should call 911?” Betty asked.

“Hell no. Let him suffer.” Shaker smiled, then added, “And I bet you fifty smackers that marijuana crop will be burning soon. Someone will call Ben Sidell from back at the trailers.”

“Ah.” Betty blinked.

“That’s where Sister is different. She’d find the fellow, speak to him about foxhunting, and pay him off. Woman would have made a great old-time politician,” Gray commented.

“What’s the phrase, ‘Better to have them inside the tent pissing out than outside the tent pissing in’?” Betty remembered it correctly.

“Now everyone is morally pure.” Shaker laughed.

“Right.” Gray laughed also.

They chatted, petting hounds, loving on Tatoo. Famous Amos, Ronnie’s horse, regaled Outlaw and Wolsey with tales of Ronnie trying to tie his stock tie in the trailer.

Kilowatt listened. “Why doesn’t he do it at home? Shaker does. Mirror’s better.”

“Because my human is always late. He needs a wife.”

“Famous, Ronnie’s gay.” Outlaw giggled.

“You think I don’t know that? I said he needed a wife; I didn’t say that poor soul had to be a woman. She should hear Xavier” —he mentioned a childhood friend who had been out of town for two weeks on business— “who says to him to go online and look for a date. It gets worse.”

“Can you imagine if we could go online?” Kilowatt wondered.

“You’re cracked.” Jujube finally said something.

“That Lucille Ball is a babe. What a beautiful mare.” Outlaw half closed his eyes

“Redhead. She’ll run you crazy. Push you away from your feed bucket on the fence line. Squeal if you even brush by her. Too much work,” Kilowatt sensibly spoke.

The conversation didn’t finish because Ronnie drove right up.

“Quick work.” Shaker, leading Kilowatt, loaded hounds.

Betty and Tootie, on foot, also helped.

Gray laid Tatoo on the passenger seat in the truck.

“I can sit with him on my lap,” Tootie offered.

“He’ll be fine. They’ll be glad to get to the kennels. You all go in to the breakfast.” He slid into the driver’s seat, drove off.

Tootie, Betty, Gray, and Ronnie, on the ground, reins in hand, looked toward the mill, which seemed so far away.

“Anyone need a leg up?” Gray offered.

“Not yet,” Ronnie replied.

Once in the saddle, they walked back, talked about Audrey hitting the line, older hounds honoring, what a good day it had been until hitting the weed.

“How much marijuana do you think is out there?” Gray asked.

“Government flies over in helicopters,” Betty replied. “Infrared photography, right?”

“Waste of time and money.” Gray’s legs lightly hung on Wolsey, a fine horse, very kind. “They get a photo, cops are on the ground. They rush over to destroy the crop. Someone else goes to who owns the land, and half the time the owner is absentee. Big deal. Here’s the way it works. Why is one form of relaxation—or self-destruction, if you feel that way—legal and another is not?”

“Got me there.” Ronnie nodded.

“Because some people think smoking a joint is a gateway drug. Next come heroin and cocaine.” Betty provided the usual argument.

Tootie, patting Jujube’s glossy neck, said, “No, what comes next is an opioid crisis. It’s got nothing to do with marijuana.”

“A fine mess, isn’t it?” Ronnie felt tired, although they hadn’t hunted more than an hour and a half. The half was standing in the pasture.

“Sometimes I think our entire country is just one big contradiction.” Gray liked things to make sense.

“You know, it probably always was. Now we have news, non-news, and fake news twenty-four hours a day. The contradictions jump right out at you.” Ronnie half laughed.

“The trailers.” Gray, jubilant, headed for Sister’s rig, as did Tootie and Betty.

Ronnie and Famous Amos walked onto Ronnie’s trailer, not far from Sister’s.

Horses tended to, the four finally made it to the breakfast. Walter pressed a drink in Sister’s and Betty’s hands. Ronnie grabbed an ice cold beer, one of the craft brews from Route 151, remembered his manners, and brought Tootie, in the middle of a group questioning her, an iced tea.