Рита Браун - Probable Claws

“Puppy, you’ve had a terrible shock.” Harry looked up at her husband. “Honey?”

Fair knelt down to pet the fellow. “I can’t really say no now, can I? But I think we’ll need a saddle for him someday.”

Tucker ran into the living room to tell the cats.

“We’ll manage.” Mrs. Murphy shrugged.

“Another dog. Living with you is bad enough!” Pewter wailed.

Harry led Pirate to Tucker’s bed, realized that wasn’t a good idea. She hurried into the bedroom, returned with an old blanket that she placed next to Tucker’s bed. She encouraged the puppy to investigate, put a little cracker on it.

Fair poured Cooper a drink. “Here. You’ve had a long day.”

“Thanks.” Cooper watched the puppy curl up.

Mrs. Murphy, Pewter, and Tucker came into the kitchen. Worn out, the little big dog had already fallen asleep.

“Gross. I don’t want to live with another dog.”

“Oh, Pewts, it won’t be so bad.” Mrs. Murphy sniffed Pirate’s head.

“Bad. It’s the worst. Why does everything happen to me?”

“If I were you, I’d be good to this puppy,” Tucker advised. “He’s going to be huge.”

“If I’m not afraid of the world’s largest spider, I’m not afraid of a disgusting dog,” the gray cat spat.

“She’s got the bottle brush tail.” Cooper observed Pewter.

“She’ll settle down.” Harry sat at the kitchen table. “Lisa was only in her early thirties. Too young to die.”

Fair agreed. “Mother used to say ‘When the good Lord jerks your chain, you’re going.’ ”

Harry looked at Cooper. “You don’t think anyone helped jerk her chain, do you? I mean, you and Gary, the day he died, talked about Lisa getting an Irish wolfhound. You said Nature First disturbs vested interests.”

“Did. Anything is possible, but no one walked into the office after you dropped off Lisa’s book. I doubt she was killed, but for the sake of argument, if she was, it was incredibly clever.”

Indeed.

29

April 4, 1787

Wednesday

“Think the worst is over?” A light wind out of the west blew Rachel’s hair.

“You never know,” Catherine answered as they both walked through their mother’s garden.

Isabelle had lavished her attention on the large formal garden to the rear of the house. On each side of the house, a narrow band of English boxwoods hugged the outside walls. In front of those she had planted annuals that would peep out of the ground for each season but winter.

The two sisters strolled through the formal gardens that were impeccably kept by Rachel with help from the slaves, those with a green thumb. Percy, Bumbee’s husband, cussed daily by his wife if she saw him, evidenced just as much creativity with color, plant height, even statuary for gardens as Bumbee displayed in her weaving room. They were two artistic souls who couldn’t agree on anything. If Percy said “apples,” Bumbee answered “oranges.” Better for both that she now lived in the weaving room.

“Did Percy come up with that low serpentine wall?” Catherine asked.

“He said too many straight lines create fatigue.” Rachel laughed. “I never know what that man is going to say or do. He talked me into camellias and I don’t like camellias, but when they first bloomed, the white against the dark waxy green leaves, he was right. Just set off the front gardens.”

“Hmm. Well, the daffodils have broken through the ground. Mother always said, daffodils first, then tulips will follow. Once the tulips have bloomed, spring is truly here. She had such a gift.” Catherine sighed. “You’ve inherited it.”

“I don’t know,” Rachel murmured. “When I asked do you think the worst is over, yes, I did mean winter, but allow me to ask it again. Do you think you are all right?”

“My body has recovered. John holds me at night but we don’t yet mingle. He’s fearful. He’s more fearful than I am. Still, I should perhaps wait a bit.”

“Yes,” Rachel simply replied, then stopped to admire a forsythia, buds swelling, ready to open in a riot of yellow. “You’ve heard about Maureen? You and I haven’t had a minute to catch up.”

“You’ve been at St. Luke’s every day.” Catherine smiled.

“What a beautiful job Charles has done. I can’t wait for you to see it. We’re almost there. The men can begin painting as soon as the temperature stays fifty degrees or above and we’re almost there. But I digress.” She smiled sweetly because Rachel, like her mother, could wander off on tangents. “Maureen is allowing Jeffrey to begin a carriage business. He will build everything. The tools alone will cost plenty. She will build him a shop impervious to all weathers.”

“Where did you hear that?” Catherine’s eyebrows lifted up.

“DoRe.”

“Bettina?”

“Well, yes, but DoRe told her the shop alone will be huge. He swears it will be fifty by fifty yards. There will be room for ironwork, copperwork, even gilding. Gilding!”

Catherine put her hand on her hip. “Help us dear Lord. She will build herself a carriage of gold.”

“I believe you’re right.” Rachel burst out laughing.

“He is good. Once people see how well crafted his work is—look at the carriage he imitated from ours—I think people will come to him. Especially people from Philadelphia and Charleston. God forbid they don’t own the latest or the best.” She paused, grinned widely. “Including matched pairs as well as four-in-hand horses. Hard to find. Hard to train, and we’ve got Barker O. No one can make a carriage horse like that man.”

“DoRe?”

Catherine considered this. “Close. A terrific whip.” She used the correct term for a coachman who drives. “Uncanny. I wish I had both men. What we are losing to France we would recoup here. Nothing we can do about DoRe until he asks Bettina to marry him.”

“He will, won’t he?” Rachel frowned for a moment.

“He will, but he’s a cautious man who works for a difficult but clever woman.” Catherine stopped to examine a green daffodil shoot. “Isn’t it a miracle how plants know when to grow, when to open their blooms? It really is a cycle of life and then death.”

“Yes.” Rachel changed the subject. “What have you heard from Yancy? Of course, he will want the last race to be Black Knight against Reynaldo. I certainly wouldn’t leave Reynaldo alone in any stall down by The Levels. Nor would I allow anyone else to touch him.”

Catherine smiled. “Jeddie and I have thought of that. No one will get near my boy. But Yancy did put in writing—the letter came yesterday—that whoever wins their race takes the entire purse. He also said the entry fee will be one hundred dollars.”

“What! That’s an enormous sum.”

“It is. I expect he thinks this will weed out the bit players and really pump up the purses. John, Jeddie, and I will travel down to The Levels next week. I’m not agreeing to anything until I see the place.”

“You don’t trust him, do you?”

“Not one hundred percent,” she confessed. “But I do know he has more to lose than I do if I don’t race or if my horse is mysteriously injured. He needs Reynaldo.”

“I suppose…” Rachel’s voice trailed off.

“Aren’t the mountains ravishing.” Catherine shielded her eyes, for the sun had just touched the rim of the Blue Ridge.