Рита Браун - A Hiss Before Dying

DoRe climbed up, took the reins from the driver, then pointed down the street. “Mr. Holloway!”

Jeffrey, outside now, beheld John and Charles, Piglet leading the way, walking toward them.

“What are you doing here?” Jeffrey handed his wife up into the coach, then moved a bit away as she leaned out the window.

“We came to keep you out of trouble,” John replied.

“Uh, climb up into the coach. I am partially out of trouble and please let’s not discuss this in front of my wife. I will pay all your expenses. Thank you for trying to save me.”

Charles lifted up his hands. “Someone had to.”

Jeffrey walked back to the coach. “My dear, our neighbors will be riding with us.”

“Of course.” Maureen felt happier than she had in years.

She didn’t know the duel was set but she’d seen her husband declare his love in his own way. She believed he did want to make her happy.

Sheba, by the coach, pouted. “We will be squeezed in.”

“No, we won’t. You sit up with DoRe,” Maureen commanded.

Sheba’s face fell as Charles helped her up. She sat next to DoRe, who refused to look at her.

The men climbed in, then Piglet was lifted up, and he jumped into Charles’s lap.

The two-and-a-half-day trip allowed them to watch spring unfold from the falls of Richmond into the Piedmont. Spring, about ten days behind in the Piedmont, filled the air with fragrance. John and Charles kept offering to pay for lodging when they would stop for food, or to hire another coach that they might be less crowded.

Both Jeffrey and Maureen refused. And everyone had to admit it was a beautiful ride home, filled with talk of politics, of planting hay, corn, flax, even a bit of wheat.

The happiest creature was Piglet. He’d ridden in carts but never a coach-in-four. Surely there was no dog as stylish in Virginia.

November 22, 2016 Tuesday

O ak leaves shivered on trees. They turned gold or sometimes orange then brown. Many did not fall off the tree. Instead, they shook a little. If a breeze intensified, what seemed to be self-inflicted shaking grew more pronounced. The dried leaves would then loudly rustle. Harry often thought no other fall leaves sounded like oak. Virginia abounded in many types of oak. She couldn’t remember if it was forty or fifty or what.

“Susan, how many kinds of oak are in Virginia?”

Next to her friend in the Volvo, Susan shrugged. “I don’t know. Why do you think of these things?”

“I don’t know.” Harry smiled.

“No cat would waste time on that.” Pewter tossed off this criticism.

“No human would waste time on catnip.” Tucker, next to Pewter in the backseat, stared out the window.

“Oh, yes they do,” the gray cat fired back. “They make catnip tea. Why you would want to waste a heavenly herb on tea, who knows?”

“All that catnip she harvested mid-September, hanging upside down in the high rafters of the tractor shed. How I wish we could get at it,” Mrs. Murphy dreamed.

“She’ll bring it down for Thanksgiving and she’ll also make you catnip socks for Christmas,” Tucker predicted.

“She is good about that,” Mrs. Murphy affirmed.

Back in the front seat, Harry asked, “Did you like target practice with the flintlock?”

“I did, actually,” Susan replied. “I’m glad you took me to the shooting range because I would have had a hard time without an instructor. What I found interesting was how good the pistol feels in your hand. Thanks for letting me use it.”

“Does, doesn’t it?” Harry nodded. “So many modern pistols are heavy. ’Course, most law enforcement people like Glocks. Coop uses a Glock. Actually, for a modern gun I still prefer a revolver.” She took a curve on Garth Road. “So many people are dead set against firearms, but I find shooting targets at home or going to the range relaxing. Also, when you consider the history of guns and rifles, that’s fascinating.”

“Today is the day Kennedy was shot in 1963, speaking of firearms.”

Harry thought a moment. “Right. Ever notice if you haven’t lived through an event yourself, you might pay attention but it doesn’t emotionally affect you too much? The people who remember it will be remembering where they were at the time. I’m glad we were born later.”

“Richard Neville was born today in 1428.” Susan held the hand rest as Harry turned right. “Speaking of dates, I’ve always been fascinated by the War of the Roses, and Neville was a brilliant man. I love Philippa Gregory’s books.”

“I think the world does.” Harry slowed on the country road although it was paved. “Some people have the knack of making history come to life. Academics are snotty about historical fiction. I think it’s a great way to learn.”

“You went to Smith. You aren’t an academic but you certainly received the best education.” Susan said this admiringly.

“Did. I’m hoping over time I will get to know Marvella Larson better. She knows more than any of us and I really love the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts.” She pointed to her right. “Don’t you wish Cloverfields still stood? That was the site of the main house.”

“I do. We’re luckier than many other states. Virginia has preserved so much of her heritage,” Susan agreed.

“Because we were too poor to tear buildings down at the end of the nineteenth century and for most of the twentieth when everyone put up big glass blocks. Most of that stuff is ugly as a mud fence.”

They both laughed.

“Speaking of Cloverfields, do you have your chit underneath your sweater?”

“Do.” Harry pulled up the brass piece on the box chain. “I wonder who wore this. I wonder about their life and who wore Number Five and Liz’s Number Seven? It makes it real. I like to touch things from the past.”

“That’s what got MaryJo and Panto into all that tribal stuff. How long have people been wearing those skins, dancing, singing? Plus MaryJo sent away for the DNA testing, which she declares proves she has twenty-seven percent tribal blood. At least she’s shut up about it finally. Remember when she’d constantly bring it up?”

“Yeah.” Harry stopped at the crest of the hill at the back of Cloverfields. They looked toward the ravines where the bridges had been built, although you couldn’t see down into the ravines. They were too far away.

“Sometimes, late afternoon, I like to sit with Grandmother and Mother at Big Rawly, look over the fields. Think of footsteps down the hall over the centuries.”

“That place is so beautiful and isn’t it odd that Big Rawly survived but Cloverfields didn’t? The Garths were supposed to be so highly intelligent but Fate doesn’t always play favorites.”

“Apparently not.” Susan stared at the sky, long afternoon rays softening everything as Harry turned, drove over a cut hayfield stopping near the site of the old main house.

As they sat there, a brand-new truck barreled up from the slope to the ravine. Both women watched this $60,000 Ford F-250 diesel rumble by, hesitate as the driver beheld the Volvo near the house site, then move faster, speeding away.

“Isn’t that Panto?” Susan inquired.

“Sure is. He must be making the bucks to buy that new big-ass truck.”

They sat silently for a time.

“I’m going to follow him.” Harry put down her window. “Hear that?”