Рита Браун: Fox Tracks

Out into the fray they charged. If anything, the storm had worsened.

“I bet Galdos Senior nearly died when he suffered through his first New York blizzard,” Sister said, head down.

“I got spoiled at Custis Hall.” Tootie was born and raised in Chicago. “Princeton reminds me of why I love Virginia. Four seasons of equal length. No long winters. I have good professors but, Sister, I hate it. I want to be an equine vet. I don’t need to go to Princeton, but Dad swears he will cut off the money if I don’t finish.”

“Princeton is one of the best universities in this country, honey. You can go to vet school after your undergraduate work. That gives you three more years, well, three and a half, to work on the parental units. I’m assuming your mother is in league with your father.”

“I guess,” Tootie responded with no enthusiasm.

After another big blast smacked them, Sister ducked into a doorway. The two women huddled there for a moment as Sister opened her bag, fishing for her cell phone.

“Oh no, I left my phone on the counter.” She sighed. “You go on back to the hotel. No point in both of us being out in this.”

“How can I ever dream of whipping-in if I can’t take a little bad weather on foot? We can sprint.”

They did, despite the slippery pavement.

Pushing the door open, they laughed to be out of the storm but they did not see Adolfo behind the counter.

“Maybe he’s in the humidor room.” Tootie shook the snow off her head, then passed the counter as she walked toward the large climate-controlled room. She turned slightly as Sister triumphantly spotted and retrieved her cell phone: right on the counter where she left it.

“Sister!” Tootie called, before running for the back of the counter.

The older woman followed Tootie, now kneeling down.

“Dear God!” Sister exclaimed, for Adolfo Galdos lay on his back, beautiful green eyes staring straight up to Heaven. He’d been shot neatly between the eyes. On his chest lay a pack of American Smokes cigarettes.

CHAPTER 3

A glorious swirl of red, white, and black filled the ornate ballroom of The Pierre. Tradition dictates that all hunt balls should be white tie, but over the years they had devolved into black tie for those men not awarded their colors.

From her table, Sister watched the men entitled to wear evening scarlet: formal tails with the colors of their hunt on the lapel. Hard to fault even a hefty fellow in such splendor. The women in attendance wore white or black gowns. A few refined ladies even wore long evening gloves.

Concentrating on how much she wished the other less stylish gentlemen had worn black tails with white tie, Sister tried to keep her mind off Adolfo’s shocking murder. It wasn’t working.

Gray, usually on the dance floor, returned with a glass of alcohol for her. “Not bad.”

“You would know better than I.” She took the glass.

He slightly flipped up his scarlet tails to take the seat next to Sister. “Runs in the family,” he stated matter-of-factly.

Indeed it did. His brother, Sam, a Harvard graduate, once lived at the train depot in Charlottesville, being moved nightly along with the other alcoholics. They slept under whatever bridge, overpass, or deep doorway they could find, until again being chased off. Over the years, Gray and his sister, a total snob, would discuss Sam, but only Gray would actually drive down from Washington to talk to his brother. Three years ago, Sam agreed to dry out, which he did. This more or less had a happy ending except that Sam was now employed by Crawford Howard, Sister’s enemy. After just five years of habitation in Charlottesville, Crawford was the only person to give Sam a chance. People who had known him all his life worried that sooner or later Sam would backslide.

Sister found herself wishing she and Tootie had found Crawford Howard shot instead of Adolfo. However, furious as the pompous, rich, underhanded Crawford could make Sister, she had to admit he didn’t shy away from reformed alcoholics, and to help young people, he would do anything—even, like Sister, sitting on the board of Custis Hall.

“Well?” Gray said with eyebrows raised, waiting for her verdict on the sparkly drink.

“Oh.” Sister took a sip. “Bubbly. Tickles my tongue.”

“It’s odd that alcoholism shows up in every generation in the Lorillards, black or white, but my sister and I are unaffected. My Uncle George could empty a liquor store and still remain upright.”

“People say it’s in the blood or the genes or whatever but I also think it’s in the culture.” She took another sip. “No one has ever been a drunk in my family, both sides, but you know, there’s still time.”

At this, they both laughed, for Sister was a one-drink-a-night girl and that was that.

Hailing from Lexington, Kentucky, where she was Master of the Woodford Hunt, Jane Winegardner walked across the ballroom straight toward Sister, evening gown swishing as she did so. She leaned over Sister, kissing her on the cheek.

As Sister’s Christian name was Jane and she was the elder by quite a bit, Jane Winegardner was referred to within these circles, as “O.J.”—the other Jane.

“You doing okay?” asked O.J.

“I am, really.”

“What a shock.” O.J. sat next to Sister in one of the empty chairs at their table. Tootie, her date, and Val and her date, were off dancing.

“You know, it really was,” said Sister. “Adolfo was a delightful gentleman.” She thought for a moment. “Well, you and I have endured shocks before.”

“Life.” Jane looked up to wave at Lynn Lloyd, MFH, from Red Rock in Nevada. “But when we had our adventure, we found out why it all happened.”

Sister well remembered the dreadful mess they had stumbled upon when hunting together in Kentucky.

Gray joined the conversation. “He was from Cuba. He came here as a teenager in 1959. That’s what he told my beautiful date. I can’t help but wonder if some of his talk about the old Cuban fortunes before the Revolution has something to do with his murder.”

“Well, could be,” O.J. said, considering it. “You let me know if there’s anything I can do. And come hunt with me! It’s been a first-rate season.”

“For us, as well.” Sister smiled. “Good weather, an abundance of healthy foxes. The pack just thrills me as they’re so good and our hunt staff is working so smoothly together.”

“Working with hounds is easier than working with people.” O.J. laughed, a mellow rolling chuckle.

“Isn’t that the truth.” Sister leaned toward her friend. “But our field is in good shape, no dramas. Well, once we got rid of Crawford, the dramas did abate.”

“What’s he doing here tonight?” O.J. asked, wrinkling her nose.

Gray leaned toward Sister to speak to O.J. over the loud music. “New master up in eastern Maryland. Crawford’s been shining on Brian Bocock, taking hounds, giving him tidy sums of money for this and that, hunting up there with this kid about once a month. So, without knowing Crawford’s unsavory history—I mean the man runs an outlaw pack, for Christ’s sake—Brian invites him to his table at the ball.”

“What next?” Jane threw up her hands. “You’d think someone would have told him.”

“The folks from Green Springs did. I think Elkridge-Harford did, too,” Sister said, naming two solid hunts in Maryland.

Green Springs, established in 1892, occasionally hunted over the course for the Maryland Hunt Cup, and its masters over the years had ridden in that competition. You’d best be able to fly on a Thoroughbred at Green Spring Valley. And Elkridge-Harford did not countenance sloppy turnout, dirty tack, that sort of thing. Both hunts had the highest of standards and took excellent care of their hounds.