“It's fascinating.”
“And highly addictive.” She reached for a sugar cookie. “The more you breed, the more you want to breed, and you drive yourself onward with the dream of perfection.” She sighed. “Well, humility goes a long way. And even in the great crosses, the golden nicks, you still must cull.”
“The hard part.”
“God, yes. I think a youngster won't work for us, I draft him to a good pack, he's terrific. Now some of that can be because he's in, say, a newer pack. He's not overshadowed by Diana or an upcoming Trident. He becomes a star. But you never truly know until they hunt for you or for someone else.”
“This is going to make me think.” Walter laughed.
“You think plenty. Now you'll be hunting, watching in a new way. You'll be singling out hounds, observing young entry, seeing who contributes. The slow days are the best days to learn about the hounds. You see who really works. Might be dull for the run-and-jump crowd, but those slow days offer the best lessons a foxhunter can get.”
“I've never had a bad day hunting.”
“A bad day's hunting is a good day's work.” They laughed again and she changed the subject. “I've learned to trust my instincts hunting on and off a horse as well. I'm unsettled about Donnie's death. And the deaths of Mitch and Tony.”
“Do you think Donnie wanted to burn out Clay?”
“Sure looks like he did.” Sister glanced out the window. “It's like drawing through a heavy covert: you know the fox is in there, but you can't get him up and running. I've seen days when hounds, my hounds and other packs, too, have drawn right over a fox. I feel that's what's going on.”
“What do you do on a day like that?”
“Keep moving, but,” she paused dramatically, “later you can come back and draw in the opposite direction. Sometimes you can get him up that way because he didn't expect it.”
Walter tapped his spoon on the side of the mug, then stopped. “Sorry.”
“Is that how you think?”
“I have to do something rhythmic,” he replied.
“I do my best thinking working outside or sometimes in bed just before I fall asleep. But do you see what I mean about drawing over the fox? We're drawing over those deaths, over information.”
“I'd put it another way. You're on the right track, but the train's not in the station.”
“Not yet.”
CHAPTER 30
The burnt orange of Betadine stained Dragon's white fur. Aggressive and domineering as he could be with other hounds, he was an uncommonly sweet hound to people.
He stood on the stainless steel examining table as Sister and Gray sponged his wounds with antiseptic.
Lifting sixty- to eighty-pound hounds tested Sister after the sixth hound. Shaker had wanted to help, but his ribs needed to heal, so Sister threw him out of the med room. She had realized that her planned date with Gray at the club would either have to be canceled or pushed back too late, so she had called him to cancel. Since tomorrow was Saturday, the biggest hunting day of the week, she didn't want to stay out late, plus she was nervous about hunting the hounds. To Sister's surprise, Gray volunteered to help with her chores.
Riding, resplendent in perfectly fitting attire, pleases any foxhunter. Hearing “Gone Away” on the horn, hounds in full cry, is a thrill beyond compare. Few foxhunters, however, evidence any desire to be in the kennels picking up poop, feeding and watering, washing down the feed room and the runs, birthing puppies, or tending to sick or injured hounds in the med room.
The blood still seeped from Dragon's wounds. Sister's old lab coat bore testimony to that. Gray, too, wore a lab coat smeared with mud and bloodstains.
Dragon was the third hound they worked on. Two hounds had run under barbed wire Thursday, slicing their backs, although they had bled very little.
The fact that Gray was willing to forgo a fancy dinner and, on top of that, to lift hounds, get dirty, and dab wounds gave him an added luster in Sister's eyes.
Gray was the same height as Sister. He was fit and uncommonly strong, as was his wiry, much shorter brother.
Carrying a beloved red ball, Raleigh padded in to watch, as did Rooster. Golly heard there were mice in the office, so she, too, accompanied the humans and dogs. “Death to mice” was Golly's motto.
“Bon sang ne sait mentir”
was Sister's motto, archaic French, which meant, “Good blood doesn't lie.” This was fitting for a foxhound breeder, but equally fitting for the human animal. Blood tells.
“There you go, big fella. Guess you won't cross Cora again.” Sister gave Dragon a cookie for his good behavior before Gray lifted him down.
“Handsome.”
“That he is. Diana and Dasher turned out quite good-looking, too, but with a better temperament in the field. Dragon is hardheaded when hunting, and yet such a love the rest of the time.”
“My nose is the best. I get sick of Cora double-checking
everything. I don't care if she is the strike hound and the
head bitch,”
Dragon explained himself.
“Kennel up.” Sister pointed to the sick bay kennel, a series of separate pens with cozy boxes off the med room. Each of these rooms had a small outside run that could be shut off. Each room contained its own wall heater, high on the wall so the hound couldn't get on its hind legs to chew it. Since hounds curl up together in cold weather, they are able to keep warm; but a hound alone could use a little help in winter, especially if he or she has been injured or isn't feeling well.
Dragon obediently walked into his place. Sister closed the door behind him, dropping the latch. The other two hounds were already asleep in their pens.
Fortunately, none of these hounds had suffered severe wounds. They'd most likely be back hunting within a week. If the wounds didn't close up to Sister's satisfaction, she'd keep the hound out of hunting, although not out of hound walk. No point in reopening wounds and delaying healing, but if a hound can be exercised, that's good for him mentally. If the animal wasn't ready to rejoin the pack, Sister would hand walk him. Each of these hounds pulled his weight in the pack, so she wanted them up and running.
Gray washed his hands in the big stainless steel sink. “I never realized how much work there is.”
“All day, every day.” She hung up her lab coat, inspected it, then took it off the hook. “Laundry time.”
“Ever get tired of this? It's a lot of physical labor, plus the actual hunting.”
“I love it.” Her face shone. “I couldn't live without it. Everyone needs a paradigm for life, and hunting is mine. Hunting
is
life. The way a person foxhunts is the way he or she lives.”
“True.” He wiped his hands on a thick terry cloth towel. “I think that's true about any sport, the way someone plays tennis or golf.” He thought for a second. “Maybe a little less true of the team sports because you have help, but still: character will out.”
“Hand me your lab coat.” She took the coat and draped it over her arm. “It is funny, isn't it, how we spend our childhood and adolescence constructing our social masks with the help of our parents, family, friends, and school, and then something unmasks us? Usually sports, love. People are always unwittingly revealing themselves. Me, too.” She opened the door to the laundry room, tossing the coats, plus other odds and ends, into the industrial-size washer. “This thing's about to go. Can't complain. It's been chugging along eight years. You wouldn't believe the dog hair we pull out of here. Same with the horse blankets. Sometimes I envy those critters their fur. No clothing bills.”
“Oh, but you look so good in warm colorsâpeach, pink, red. Now if you had the same old fur coat, that wouldn't be the case.” He handed her the detergent.
“You look good in every color of the rainbow,” she countered.
“Uh-uh,” he disagreed. “Not gray or beige.”
“Didn't think about that. Blond colors. Walter colors.”
“Kill!”
Golly screamed from the office.
Sister and Gray looked at each other as the house dogs ran to the closed office door. “I'm afraid to look,” she said.
“I'll go first,” Gray said in a mock-manly tone. He walked out, peeped in the inside office door, which had a window in it, then came back. “Biggest mouse in the county, maybe in all of America.”
“Good cat.” Sister turned on the washer as Raleigh hurried back into the med room to retrieve his ball before Rooster snatched it.
The five friends walked back up to the house, darkness deep on this cloud-covered early evening. Golly, mouse firmly in jaws, tail hoisted as high as possible, pupils huge, ran ahead of everyone.
“She's the only cat in the world who has killed a mouse.”
Rooster watched the fluffy tail swaying in triumph.
“The trick will be getting her to deposit it outside. She's
going to want to bring it in the mudroom and then into the
house. She'll be parading that damned mouse for days.”
“Why doesn't she just eat it?”
Rooster asked.
“Look at her.”
Raleigh laughed out loud, which sounded like a healthy snort.
Although Golly usually acquired a bit of a potbelly in winter, this winter she had acquired enough for two. As the dogs giggled, Golly laid her ears flat back, then swept them forward.
She couldn't open her mouth. The mouse would drop out, and one of the dogs, those lowlifes, would steal it. Something as valuable as a freshly killed mouse, neck neatly snapped, would bring out the worst, especially in the harrier; she knew it. But she thought to herself,
Go
ahead, laugh. I don't see either of you worthless canines
ridding this farm of vermin. At least the hounds hunt. You
two do nothing, nothing.
Once inside the mudroom, a tussle broke out between Golly and Rooster.
“All right, Rooster, leave her,” Sister ordered the dog, who obeyed but not without a telling glare at the cat. “Golly, what a big mouse. What a great hunter you are. Give me your mouse.”
Puffed with pride, Golly opened her jaws, the limp, gray-brown body thumping to the slate floor.
“Protein,” Gray said.
Sister picked up the mouse, stroked Golly's head. “Right. Mouse pie as opposed to shepherd's pie. Hope you like shepherd's pie because that's what we're having for dinner.”
“Is there time to dice the mouse?” He hung up his full-length Australian raincoat.
“No.” She patted Golly again and wondered just what to do with this prize. “Gray, I'm going to put this out by my gardening shed in case Inky comes in tonight. Why don't you go inside and fix yourself a drink if you're in the mood?”
“Sure you can tote that heavy mouse by yourself?”
“With effort.” She grinned.
“Can I fix you a drink?”
“Hot tea. I need a pick-me-up.”
When she returned, steam curled out of the Brown Betty teapot. Before she reached the oven to check on the shepherd's pie, Gray poured her a bracing mug of orange pekoe and Ceylon mix.
“You know how to make real tea.” She lifted the lid, the mesh tea ball floating inside the pot, emitting even more of the delightful fragrance.
“The English taught me.”
“Really?”
“I lived there for five years when I worked for Barclays Bank.”
“I didn't know you did that.”
“Well, I got my law degree then my accounting. I did it backwards, I suppose. I thought if I had a strong background in banking before finding the right firm, I'd be a triple threat. And when I graduated, I had a choice between Atlantaâwhere my color would actually help me at that time, remember those were the days of Andrew Young and Maynard Jackson; they put Atlanta on the map in terms of banking and investingâor London. Well, I wanted to experience other cultures, and I thought England would be easier than if I tried to crash Germany.”
“Aren't you the smart one?” Another ten minutes and the pie would be ready. The crust was browning up.
He smiled. “In some ways. People think tax law is boring. Not me. The power to tax is the power to destroy. I learned a lot about taxation in England. Here I was, a kid really, negotiating a culture mentioned by Roman writers, finally subdued by Agricola in A.D. 84, wasn't it? I soaked it all up. Haunted Hatcher's.” He mentioned the venerable bookstore. “Didn't have enough money to shop at Harrod's but I liked to stroll through. And on weekends for pennies I could go to France, Germany, Spain. Loved Spain and the Spanish. Couldn't get into what were then Soviet satellite countries, but I met people, high-level types, visiting Barclays. You know, it was just the right time, the right place.”
“Sounds fabulous. What are you drinking?”
“A perfect Manhattan. I make a mean Manhattanâa good dry Manhattan or Manhattan South. Name your poison.”
A sudden memory of the drunks guzzling hemlock shot through her. “Tea. I'm not much of a drinker, although my flask has port in it.”
“I drank a lot. Not as much as Sam, but a lot. Especially when my marriage tanked.” He helped her set the table. “One day I realized I needed to slow down. I didn't want to wind up like Sam. Alcoholism floods both sides of the family.” He folded a white linen napkin in thirds. “One drink in the evening, even if it's a party. One.”
“Good rule.”
“You never drink?”
“Champagne to celebrate, but I don't have a thirst for it. It's a true physical drive, and I don't have it.”
“Sam said even when he was in high school, he'd be plotting how to get liquor, where to hide it. When he rode competitively, he would secrete a bottle in the trailer. He stashed booze in the tack trunks. Carried a thin flask in his barn jacket. Controlled his entire life. Still does. He has to fight it every day.”
“Insidious.”
Golly sauntered through, warbling,
“A Mighty Fortress
Is Our Puss.”
The cat had no sense of religious decorum.
“Still crowing.” Sister laughed at her friend.
The dogs, chewing greenies, ignored her. The problem was that Golly wouldn't ignore them. Their scratched noses bore testimony to her relentless need for attention.
“When did you have time to make shepherd's pie?”
“I just slaved over this stove.” She giggled. “Lorraine brought it by. She'd made them for Shaker and me. Those two are getting along, but he's close-mouthed. They're inching toward each other, and, truth is, he's scared to death. The divorce took a big chunk out of him.”
“Always does.”
As they enjoyed their meal, Sister asked, “You don't speak of your first wife, your only wife, I assume.” When he nodded in affirmation, she continued. “That bad?”
“No. Few romantic relationships can last a lifetime. We'd probably be better off with different people at different times in our lives. The person you marry changes. That can be good, but for me those changes were filled with resentment, anger, feelings of abandonment. Nothing too original.”
“Who changed?”
“We both did. The focus of our relationship was our children and my career. We lost sight of each other. Theresa and I get along better today than when we were married. We see each other once or twice a year, usually something involving our kids. I expect in the next few years, we'll be dealing with grandchildren.” He stopped for a moment. “I talk to her once a week. After the first year of the divorce was over, we both calmed down. I kept telling myself, even in the worst of it, âWhatever you saw in her in the beginning is still there.' And I went into therapy. That helped.”
“You did?”
“You didn't?”
“I foxhunt three times a week, and attend other hunts if I can. Does it for me. I figure things out. I may not use the same language a therapist does, but I really do figure things out.”
“You're smarter than I am.”
“Not at all. It takes a lot of courage, especially for a man, to ask for emotional help. Actually, I don't know if I could do it. Too big an ego.”