Рита Браун - Crazy Like A Fox

Sister laughed. “That stinker runs Crawford’s stables!”

Crawford peered into the stall and got a strong whiff of Earl. “You know, I’ve wondered if there was a fox in here.”

Weevil quickly patted down the extra earth dug up, and fished in his pocket for a treat. He had an old peppermint there and he unwrapped it, dropping it into the den.

“Candy. I love candy.” Earl grabbed the peppermint.

“Well, let’s mount up and get there.” Sister happily allowed Shaker to give her a leg up. “Weevil, catch a ride with Crawford. We’ll meet you at Tattenhall Station.”

“Yes, Master.” He smiled that dazzling smile.

Within fifteen minutes the riders reached the station. All dismounted, stripped off their tack, wiped down the horses. Weevil quite properly took care of the Master’s horse as Crawford did drive him to the Station. Sister was impressed. Then he helped Betty and Tootie.

When they finally walked into the packed breakfast, everyone looked up. Silence.

Kasmir, as the host, walked up to his beloved Master. “If you would like to make an announcement I will fetch you a drink.”

That fast, Gray handed her a restorative libation. He’d come back with Sam to help with the hounds, since they would arrive before the rest of the staff.

“Ladies and gentlemen. Your Master has a few words.” Kasmir turned to Sister.

“It’s wonderful to see you all. I will be mercifully brief. Allow me to introduce Wesley Blackford, Wesley Carruthers’s grandson.” A murmur went up, especially from those old enough to recall Weevil. “He has solved the mystery of his grandfather’s disappearance which I regret to say was because he was murdered, then buried in a stall at Old Paradise.” A rumble followed this. “The mournful cowhorn echo you heard was our new Weevil. Beautiful though it was, I think it unnerved our killers who I am dreadfully sorry to report are Alfred and Binky DuCharme.” This really set them off. She held up her hands. “Binky has confessed. Alfred, no. This will all come out in time, but I ask you to welcome a very alive Weevil, and I thank Crawford, first for allowing us to follow the fox onto his land and then for his calm under the current circumstances.” She turned to extend her hand to Crawford.

It wasn’t that he did but so much, but then again, masters are political creatures, wise, hopefully, and she had done the exact right thing because now Crawford could be praised, questioned, lend his voice to the situation.

Sister raised a glass. “To Wesley Carruthers, Huntsman of The Jefferson Hunt from 1947 to 1954 and member of the Huntsman Hall of Fame. Three cheers.”

A riot followed.

People rushed up to Sister, Crawford, Shaker, Weevil, Betty, and Tootie.

Weevil put his hand under Tootie’s elbow. “May I get you a drink?”

They were now surrounded.

Tootie laughed. “We’ll have to fight our way to the bar.”

Weevil declared, “I hope to meet each one of you, but this beautiful whipper-in needs a drink. Allow me to get her one.”

The crowd trailed the two to the bar.

“My God, he is a carbon copy!” Tedi exclaimed while those around them listened intently, as the Bancrofts were much older and had hunted behind Weevil.

Edward Bancroft, next to Tedi, with Ronnie Haslip on one side and Alida Dalzell on the other, said, “I know some of you know about my late sister and Weevil. That was a long time ago, and things were different then. Let’s give this young man a chance.”

Tedi looked at her husband. “Edward, you are the most open-minded man, the biggest heart. Yes, let’s give him a chance.” She kissed him with feeling.

Red-faced but quite pleased, he mumbled, “Now, now.”

The breakfast went on for four hours.

Yvonne, who had followed in the car, was there. She and Sam just raked over everything. People couldn’t stop talking, eating, drinking. Foxhunting is convivial as it is. This was over the top.

Sister finally made her way to Weevil, who wasn’t going to let Tootie slip away, a fact registered by many. “I need to ask you. How do you know our fixtures so well? And have you a place to stay?”

“I’m staying at the Days Inn in Waynesboro. As for the territory, Mother gave me my grandfather’s diaries when I graduated from college. I memorized everything.”

“Yes, you did.” She smiled. “Pack up. You can stay at Roughneck Farm. There’s lots of room, and Gray and I will help you sort things out if you need help. And please, your mother is welcome, too.”

“Thank you. I don’t want to put you out. I think Mother will come down once the body is released to me or her. I guess there are a lot of decisions to be made.”

“You won’t put me out. Gray’s there and the house is big. I’ll put you to work.”

He smiled. “All right.”

“You can walk hounds with us and work horses.”

“Oh, madam, that isn’t work. That’s paradise.”

CHAPTER 32

“In the midst of life we are in death. Of whom may we seek for succor, but of Thee, O Lord, who for our sins are justly displeased.

“Yet O Lord God most holy, O Lord most mighty, O holy and most merciful Savior: Suffer us not, at our last hour, for any pains of death, to fall from Thee.”

The Reverend Judy Parrish’s vestments swayed slightly in the November 12 breeze as she stood over Wesley Carruthers’s grave. A small, highly polished walnut casket rested on the side of the grave. When his body was found only bones remained. They were gathered up to be laid in this small casket.

Sister and Gray had helped Weevil with the paperwork and the legal hoops.

Beverly Blackford sat next to her son as the service unfolded. Reverend Parrish, a true shepherd to her flock even if someone wasn’t an Episcopalian, avoided bromides. She said she didn’t know what was on the other side, but she did trust God’s love and Wesley was infolded in that love.

Most of Jefferson Hunt crowded into the calm, lovely hound cemetery with its statue of the great hound Archie in the middle. Few there remembered Weevil, but all were there to honor a Jefferson member and huntsman.

Weevil was not alone, surrounded by hounds he had loved and that had loved him.

Standing behind Beverly and Weevil II, seated under a canopy, holding hands, Sister thought, hoped, the murdered man was now hunting his hounds with George Washington, Teddy Roosevelt, the young Winston Churchill, the Empress of Austria, and the Virginia Astor sisters behind him, thrilled with the chase, with viewing an eternal fox. A fancy perhaps, but since no one does know what comes next, or if there is a next, Sister’s dream of heaven was as good as someone else’s.

The service concluded, Weevil walked his mother to the house, where Kasmir had taken care of everything, given all Sister needed to do.

Sister walked with Marion Maggiolo and Monica Greenberg, who had driven down together for the service. Betty walked with Bobbie, and Tootie escorted her mother. Everyone had attended, except for Margaret DuCharme, M.D., and Arthur DuCharme. They felt it might be inappropriate, since their fathers were the killers, but they trusted that in time they could offer their condolences and respects to Weevil and his mother.

Kasmir had outdone himself. The table carried American, Indian, and English food considered necessary for after a funeral. His Oxford days served him well. The big bar was in the kitchen, a smaller one in the library where it truly resided, one in the mudroom, given all the kitchen traffic, and another in the hall by the front door.

The shockingly beautiful floral arrangements impressed as much as food and drink. Large calla lilies along with dwarf calla lilies, with a red rose in the middle of each arrangement, made those who loved flowers gasp. Kasmir, being Indian, possessed a sense of color not native to Americans and Europeans. He also understood the absence of color, and he paid for everything no matter how much Sister fought with him.