Рита Браун - Claws And Effect

"And have a whipper-in on your butt." Pewter laughed, mentioning the bold outriders responsible for seeing that hounds behaved.

"Wouldn't be on my butt. Would be on a hound's," Tucker smugly replied. "I think Mom should whip-in. She'd be good at it. She's got hound sense, you know, but only because I taught her everything she knows-about canines."

"Pin a rose on you," Pewter sarcastically replied.

Tucker swept her ears back for a second, then swept them forward. "You don't know a thing about hunting unless it's mice and you aren't doing so hot on that front. And then there's the bluejay who dive-bombs you, gets right in front of you, Pewter, and you can't grab him."

"Oh, I'd like to see you tangle with that bluejay. He'd peck your eyes out, mutt." Pewter's temper flared.

"Hey, they hit a line right at the creek bed." Mrs. Murphy, a keen hunter of all game, trotted out of the barn, past Poptart and Gin Fizz, angry at not hunting themselves. She leapt onto the fence, positioning herself on a corner post.

Tucker scrambled, slid around the corner of the paddock, then sat down. Pewter, with far less enthusiasm, climbed up on a fence post near Mrs. Murphy.

"Tally Ho!" Tucker bounded up and down on all fours.

"That's the Tutweiler fox. He'll lead them straight across the meadows and dump them about two miles away. He always runs through the culvert there at the entrance to the Tutweiler farm, then jumps on the zigzag fence. I don't know why they can't get his scent off the fence but they don't." Mrs. Murphy enjoyed watching the unfolding panorama.

"How do you know so much?" Tucker kept bouncing.

"Because he told me."

"When?"

"When you were asleep, you dumb dog. I hunt at night sometimes. By myself since both of you are the laziest slugs the Great Cat in the Sky ever put on earth."

"Hey, look at Harry. She took that coop in style." Pewter admired her mother's form over fences.

"She would have taken it better with me," a very sour Gin Fizz grumbled. "Why she bothers with Tomahawk, I'll never know. He's too rough at the trot and he gets too close to the fence."

As Gin was now quite elderly, in his middle twenties, but in great shape, the other animals knew not to disagree with him.

Poptart, the young horse Harry was bringing along, respectfully kept quiet. A big mare with an easy stride, she couldn't wait for the day when she'd be Harry's go-to hunter. She listened to Gin because he knew the game.

As the animals watched, Miranda drove up with church ladies in tow. She cooked a hunt breakfast for Harry once a year and Harry made a nice donation to her Church of the Holy Light. Each lady emerged from the church van carrying plates of food, bowls of soup, baskets of fresh-baked breads and rolls. Although called a breakfast, hunters usually don't get to eat until twelve or one in the afternoon, so the selection of food ranged from eggs to roasts to biscuits, breads, and all manner of casseroles.

The enticing aroma of honey-cured Virginia ham reached Tucker's delicate nostrils. She forgot to be upset about the hounds. Her determination to trail the hounds wavered. Her left shoulder began to lean toward the house.

"I bet Miranda needs help," Tucker said in her most solicitous tone.

"Sure." Murphy laughed at her while observing Sam Mahanes lurch over a coop. "That man rides like a sack of potatoes."

Sam was followed by Dr. Larry Johnson, who rode as his generation was taught to ride: forward and at pace. Larry soared over the coop, top hat not even wobbling, big grin on his clean, open face.

"Amazing." Pewter licked a paw, rubbing it behind her ears.

"Larry?" Murphy wondered.

"Yes. You know humans would be better off if they didn't know arithmetic. They count their birthdays and it weakens their mind. You are what you are. Like us, for instance." Pewter out of the corner of her eye saw Tucker paddle to the back door. "Do you believe her?"

"She can't help it. Dogs." Murphy shrugged. "You were saying?"

"Counting." Pewter's voice boomed a bit louder than she had anticipated, scaring Poptart for a minute. "Sorry, Pop. Okay, look at you and me, Mrs. Murphy. Do we worry about our birthdays?"

"No. Oh boy, there goes Little Mim. She just blew by Mother. That'll set them off. Ha." Murphy relished that discussion, since Harry hated to be passed in the hunt field.

"Tomahawk's too slow." Gin Fizz, disgruntled though he may have been, was telling the truth. "She needs a Thoroughbred. Of course, Little Mim can buy as many hunters as she wants and the price is irrelevant. Mom has to make her own horses. She does a good job, I think." Gin loved Harry.

"But I'm only half a Thoroughbred," Poptart wailed. "Does that mean we'll be stuck in the rear?"

Gin Fizz consoled the youngster. "No. You can jump the moon. As the others fall by the wayside, you'll be going strong as long as you take your conditioning seriously. But on the flat, well, yes, you might get passed. Don't worry. You'll be fine."

"I don't want to be passed," the young horse said fiercely.

"Nobody does." Gin Fizz laughed.

"Am I going to get to finish my thought or what?" Pewter snarled. She liked horses but herbivores bored her. Grass eaters. How could they eat grass? She only ate grass when she needed to throw up.

"Sorry." Gin smiled.

"As I was saying," Pewter declaimed. "Humans count. Numbers. They count money. They count their years. It's a bizarre obsession with them. So a human turns thirty and begins to fret. A little fret. Turns forty. Bigger. Is it not the dumbest thing? How you feel is what matters. If you feel bad, it doesn't matter if you're fifteen. If you feel fabulous like Larry, what's seventy-five? Stupid numbers. I really think they should dump the whole idea of birthdays. They wouldn't know any better then. They'd be happier."

"They'd find a way to screw it up." Murphy looked over at her gray friend. "They fear happiness like we fear lightning. I don't understand it. I accept it, though."

"They're so worried about something bad happening that they make it happen. I truly believe that." Pewter, for all her concentration on food and luxury, was an intelligent animal.

"Yeah, I think they do that all the time and don't know it. They've got to give up the idea that they can control life. They've got to be more catlike."

"Or horselike." Gin smiled wryly.

"They've got to eat some meat, Gin. I mean they're omnivores," Pewter replied.

"I'm not talking about food, I'm talking about attitude. Look at us. We have good food, a beautiful place to live, and someone to love and we love her. It's a perfect life. Even if we didn't have a barn to live in, it's a perfect life. I don't think horses were born with barns anyway. Harry needs to think more like a horse. Just go with the flow." Gin used an old term from his youth.

"Uh-yeah," Pewter agreed.

Harry may not have gone with the flow but she certainly followed her fox. Just as Mrs. Murphy predicted, the Tutweiler fox bolted straightaway. Two miles later he scurried under a culvert, hopped onto a zigzag fence to disappear, ready to run another day.