Рита Браун - Hounded To Death

“Ben will work him over.” Betty, like Sister, felt something was missing.

“No, he won’t. Because of Margaret,” Bobby stated simply.

“Well, there is that.” Sister nodded. “But Margaret will find out from her uncle herself. I’d bet my bottom dollar on that.”

The three close friends sat there looking at the papers, the ink, and one another for a time.

Bobby finally said, “Blackmail.”

“What?” Betty’s voice rose.

“That’s why she killed herself. Someone found out. She couldn’t take the shame.”

“Wouldn’t she just pay him off ?” Sister thought paying was the reasonable course until one could figure out how to get rid of the blackmailer.

“How much for how long?” Bobby shrugged.

“Bobby, Hope Rogers wouldn’t kill herself over blackmail. She’d kill the blackmailer first.” Betty’s voice had the ring of a wife speaking to a dense husband.

“Mo Schneider?” Sister wondered, then checked herself. “But she was already on her way home.”

“You don’t know that,” Betty said.

“Hell of a way to kill the jerk. Be a lot easier to pull the trigger,” Bobby said.

“Yeah, it would.” Sister reached over and touched Betty’s hand. “I truly believe Hope was murdered. Whether it was because of this illegal operation, I don’t know, but I do know who-ever killed her is walking around free, probably right in this community. Think about it.”

“Doesn’t add up. The whistle was going to be blown and she panicked.” Bobby’s voice sounded authoritative.

“Honey, I disagree but I don’t want to be disagreeable.” Betty smiled sweetly, already feeling a trifle guilty for her manner toward him a few moments ago. “Like Sister, I believe she was murdered. And I agree with you: Things don’t add up. We’re still only seeing part of the picture.”

“Right.” Sister backed up Betty. “But the more I think about all this, the worse I feel.”

CHAPTER 19

“That heat beats down like a hammer.” Mitchell Fisher rested his pole saw against the big poplar tree and wiped his brow.

“The anvil outlasts the hammer.” Sister, one handkerchief tied around her forehead and another around her neck, each filled with ice cubes, was managing the heat better than Mitch. She withheld her advice about ice in a neckerchief, however, because Mitch, like many doctors, betrayed an arrogance that left him unable to learn from others.

He was smart but not that smart. Then, too, physicians and academicians confuse intellect with wisdom. The two are poles apart, something Sister learned from her days teaching at Mary Baldwin. Some of the biggest idiots she knew paraded their expertise about one thing. Oddly, many people were awed by someone’s knowing more and more about less and less.

This Saturday, August 16, thirty members of Jefferson Hunt had come, armed with chain saws, axes, hammers, nails, ATVs, and Gators, to clear trails and build jumps at Skidby. Their first work party at the end of June had accomplished a lot. This second work party would open the large estate for its first year of hunting.

Many a master is tempted to throw up jumps everywhere and cut many trails: impressive but unwise. Best to open new territory like a wheel. Get round the perimeter and make spokes into the center. Not that these trails would be straight lines, given the topography, but the wheel pattern made for best access. However, one doesn’t know how the foxes will run. So save money and energy at first by only putting up jumps where absolutely needed. The second year, jumps can be added by taking into account the foxes’ running routes.

Mitch rode first flight when he could. Like too many fox-hunters he cared little for the hound work, but other than that Sister liked him well enough. His enthusiasm in opening Skidby rubbed off on everyone despite the heat.

Sister, Mitch, Barry Baker, and Gray Lorillard made up one work party, their job being to clear the trails. Bobby Franklin headed a group coming behind them, to build any jumps that might be necessary and double-check the trails. Work parties of four, each headed by an experienced foxhunter, fanned out in all four directions. They’d meet back at the barns at two for a late lunch. Given the hot weather, they’d started at seven-thirty.

Betty and Tedi drove a Gator filled with ice chests. People carried their own water but, knowing the heat, Betty arranged to visit each party with sodas, water, tonic water, Gatorade, and sandwiches. That way she could also assess how each party was progressing and see if they needed special help.

Barry, seventy-four, Sister, seventy-three, and Gray, sixty-nine, all outworked Mitch, who was only forty-five. Although relatively fit, Mitch wasn’t really an outdoor guy. He usually paid others to do what he found himself doing today.

“How far are we from Dinwiddie Creek?” Barry asked, his red T-shirt soaked through as well as his neckerchief.

“Half a mile,” Mitch answered.

“We’ve made good progress.” Sister smiled. “Well, let’s press on. Ought to be cooler at the creek.”

As they worked, Mitch pointed out old meadows that the forest had reclaimed. “Second growth. I’ll turn it back into pasture eventually.”

“Hard work, that,” Gray said laconically, as he cut a low-hanging branch from a fiddle oak.

“I’ll let the loggers do it. Make a bit of money, too.”

“Still have to get the stumps up, Mitch—burn ’em or bury ’em—and then you’ve got to smooth out the land and scratch it up real good, so when you put that first dressing of fertilizer on, it can work way down into the soil.” Gray was simply transmitting what he’d observed.

Mitch took it that Gray thought he was stupid. “I know all that.”

Sister prudently said, “Then you know what’s ahead of you.”

Barry stepped in. “Ever go into the caves where the officers hid after April 9, 1865? The date of our surrender at Appomattox Courthouse?”

Mitch brightened. “I did. Found a broken pipe, a piece of spur. Didn’t go deep, but one day I’ll really explore those caves. Who knows what else I’ll find?”

“Perhaps you’ll show me sometime.” Barry whacked at dead vines.

“Be glad to,” Mitch replied.

The whine of the green Gator’s little engine announced Betty and Tedi. A minute later they appeared.

“Ice-cold drinks, food; get your ice-cold drinks!” Betty called.

“Looks like you-all could use them.” Tedi hopped out to stretch her legs.

“How’s it going with the other teams?” Sister asked.

“Good. Xavier’s made the most progress. I never realized how organized he is.” Betty had known Xavier, also called X, since he was a boyhood friend of RayRay’s. “He lashes them on.”

“Walter’s struggling with the pond and the swamp, which he’s now calling the Little Dismal.” Tedi laughed. “I never heard our joint master cuss before, but today the air is blue.”

“Beavers.” Mitch smiled. “That pond will be twice as big next year, after they dam up the water.”

“Amazing creatures. People used to shoot them.” Barry grabbed a Gatorade. “That’s frowned upon these days so they trap them and remove them, but soon enough another crew comes to wherever the first one lived. A good site is a good site, and beavers know what they want.”

“I’ll bet anyone here fifty dollars that whatever fox lives in that area will head straight for the swamps when we pick up scent.” Sister turned to Barry. “Remember the time we were all out with Deep Run? Must have been ’seventy-two. The fox headed into a swampy area, swam out, and sat on top of the beaver lodge.”

Barry smiled. “Never forget it.”