CHAPTER 4
As the drizzle turned into a steady rain Sister had ample time to repent her enthusiasm. The hack to the other side of Whiskey Ridge, twenty minutes, soaked her back because she hadn't fastened tight the collar of her raincoat.
Carefully, Sister, Shaker, and Doug crossed Soldier Road, picking up the gravel road leading to the abandoned tobacco barn where they would first cast hounds.
The hounds, anchored by Cora, a mature female, behaved beautifully. Sister worried that the cooler temperature might encourage the young hounds to consider unplanned excursions but they didn't. Even Dragon, by nature wild and flashy, kept to the middle of the pack.
The few trailers parked by the side of the road testified to the fact that only the diehards would cub on this early morning.
Betty Franklin huddled in her trailer with Outlaw, her dependable, handsome quarter horse.
Jennifer, in the trailer tack room, called out, “Mom, I can't find my heavy socks.”
“They're hanging on the end of my nose,” Betty replied.
“Oh, Mom,” Jennifer grumbled.
Betty heard her rummaging around. So did Jennifer's horse, Magellan.
“That kid can't get organized. We go through this every time.”
Magellan sighed.
“It's because they wear clothes. They can never find them. Really, they should go naked,”
Outlaw said.
“They'd get pretty cold.”
Magellan laughed.
“And it's bad enough to see some of them fully clothed. I'm not sure I could stand seeing all that hairless flesh.”
“Found them!” A note of triumph blared from Jennifer.
“Where were they?” Betty asked.
“In the bottom of the feed bucket.”
“That's an excellent place for them, my dear.”
Jennifer chose not to reply.
The staff and hounds gathered at the tobacco barn, black in the rain, as Betty and Jennifer emerged.
The only other people there were Marty Howard and Cody Jean Franklin.
Cody, on her own now, had bought an ancient two-horse trailer, paint peeling, and an equally ancient truck but both were serviceable. She made it to the meets on time. And she was glad to see her mother and sister.
Marty, borrowing Fontaine's aluminum rig, not only wore a dark brown oilskin raincoat, she wore brown Gore-Tex pants as well, neatly tucked into her high rubber boots.
“Sister, I know this isn't proper but . . .”
Sister waved her off. “It's cubbing and it's raining and let me know if the pants work.” To herself she thought that Marty would be like an olive in a Greek salad; the material was too slick. “Since there are so few of us and aren't we surprised,” Sister laughed, “if Cody or Jennifer would like to whip, you are certainly invited to do so.”
“Yay.” Jennifer trotted over to Shaker for her orders.
“I'll stay with you,” Cody said, for she often whipped-in and thought she'd enjoy riding with the master.
Douglas tipped his hat to the ladies, paused a second longer in Cody's direction, and then moved a hundred yards to the north, as Shaker directed him to do. Shaker placed Jennifer behind him and Betty to his right.
“Ma'am.” Shaker, proper even in the rain, cradled his hat in his lap. A huntsman shouldn't put his cap on his head until the master gives the signal to cast hounds.
“Oh, Shaker. I'm sorry. Of course we can move off.”
He nodded at the master, clapped his hat on his wet auburn curls, and said to his hounds, “Hounds ready?”
“Yes!”
came the tumultuous reply.
“All right then, let's be off.” Shaker didn't blow his horn. As long as the hounds could hear his voice he kept his horn in his coat front between the second and third buttons. Besides, Sister loathed a noisy huntsman and whips. The quickest way to draw a reprimand from her was to blather.
The hounds moved ahead of Shaker. They lingered at the tobacco barn for an instant, a rich source of fox scent but it was fading fast.
“Come along now.”
Obediently they trotted across the meadow, slick to the edge of the woods. He urged them into the covert as he waited outside.
“He's been here!”
Dragon triumphantly barked.
Archie, older and pessimistic by nature, therefore the perfect anchor hound, sharply said,
“Of course he's been here, you twit. But he was here at three this morning. Before you run a cold scent look for a fresh one.”
“Besides, you've picked this up under a rotted log, Dragon. It will be washed away within two paces,”
Cora, ever steady, gently said.
“Cora, can we really do anything today?”
Diana, a gorgeous female, first-year entry, inquired of the leader.
Cora lifted her nose a moment.
“Chances are we won't get much. Pick up and put down kind of day. Scent for twenty yards and then nothing, but we must try. A good hound always tries.”
Diana put her sensitive nose down, moving away from the rotted log.
As they moved slowly, their tails, called sterns, were held upright.
Douglas, a bit ahead, peered down over the western side of Whiskey Ridge to the creek below, swollen with rain, high and swiftly rolling. Crossing it would be difficult.
Jennifer, inexperienced, impatient, pushed the hounds up too much from the rear.
Sister and Cody rode up to her. Cody was on Motorboat, happy to be out.
“Jennifer, let them work. They aren't strung out.” Sister pointed to the pack carefully making good the ground, working well together.
“I'm sorry.”
“Honey, that's how we learn.” Sister stopped and waited as Jennifer moved on at a walk. She listened intently, hearing only the patter of raindrops on leaves beginning to turn colors. She heard Lafayette's and Motorboat's breathing.
Cody, a fine rider, sat the thoroughbredâquarter horse cross with that grace so peculiar to her. She knew better than to talk when hounds were cast.
Sister turned to her and smiled as if to say, “That kind of day and I'm glad you're here.”
Sister especially enjoyed the people who turned out regardless of conditions. Over the years they'd become her family, since her blood relations and her two Raymonds had died.
Archie, deeper in the woods, conferred with Cora:
“Distinguishable but . . . ?”
“It's all we've got and most likely all we're going to get. You do the honors.”
Cora confirmed his thoughts.
Archie lifted his head, wiggled his tail a bit.
“Come along.”
“Old line,”
Cora added in her distinctive contralto.
The other hounds called out in turn and then together, loping along behind Cora and Archie, who moved forward. If scent had been hot, Archie would have taken his usual position a bit like a safety in football, a defensive position. A hot scent even a puppy can find and make good but a scent such as this, fading fast yet distinguishable on the moss and underbrush, demanded a professional.
Archie and Cora worked side by side, running a few steps, then slowing to check and double-check. It would never do to overrun such a pathetic little trail.
Dragon, bored with the pace, decided he could do better off on the right. Besides, maybe he'd pick up something more potent. He had no sooner shot off about two hundred yards than a loud crack pierced the beating rain.
“Leave it!” Betty commanded, flicking her whip out one more time for effect. The crack worked like magic. It usually wasn't necessary to touch the hound.
He scooted back to the pack.
“Settle, boy, because if you don't, you're going to get yourself in trouble and some of us, too,”
Cora growled at him.
Dragon said nothing but ran alongside Dasher, his litter mate, who showed promise but could be easily influenced by his brother.
“Dragon, come up with me.”
Archie curled his lip slightly.
A cowed Dragon did as he was told. The work was difficult and patience wasn't one of his virtues, but Archie had grabbed him by the neck, throwing him down hard in the kennels after Tuesday's hunt. He feared Archie, as would any hound with a grain of sense.
Sister and Cody trotted through the woods, the hounds in sight but well in front of them. Sister picked up the pace and soon was right behind Jennifer, who was right behind the hounds.
The hounds swung out in a big circle. Moving back to the tobacco barn and then picking up speed, they shot across Soldier Road and onto the low, broad, and long meadow between the two ridges. The great tree, enshrouded as though in a silver winding sheet, commanded Hangman's Ridge.
They popped over a coop in the fence line and then headed toward the coop that Sister and Shaker had repairedâFontaine's coop, as they now thought of it. Once over that obstacle they continued at a trot through the thick woods.
The hounds moved faster.
“Fools.”
Butch heard the hounds in the distance from the safety of his den.
“Should I give them a run?”
“Just because they're dumb enough to get soaked doesn't mean you should.”
Butch scowled at his son, Comet.
“But they have to go out,”
Inky half said, half questioned.
“It's their job.”
“Which is exactly why we aren't domesticated. Domestication is for weak hearts. You can't do what you want when you want; you have to do what the human tells you. I hear, though, that the food is quite good.”
“And good medical benefits, too,”
his wife, Mary Vey, added. She paused a moment.
“They're getting closer.”
“Following my old trail. Well, let's give them something to talk about back in the kennel. Damned if I want them digging out our main entrance.”
He grabbed a fresh chicken wing, feathers still on.
“Comet, get the rest.”
The two males, mouths full of pieces of chicken, walked out the oval entrance to their den.
“Want me to drop them?”
“Throw them all around.”
Butch dropped bones, feathers, a cock's comb, and a neck in a wide semicircle around the den entrance.
They casually sauntered back into their snug quarters with four escape routes, one of which hung over Broad Creek, as hounds drew closer.
The pack in full cry charged upon Butch's den within seven minutes.
“Chicken!”
Dragon squealed as he grabbed the feathered wing.
“My favorite,”
yelped another hound.
Archie, with difficulty, resisted the temptation to grab a piece of chicken. He headed instead to the den opening, cocked his head to listen.
Cora joined him.
“I know they're in there and they'll burst out laughing the minute we leave.”
“You're right,”
Butch sang out to taunt her.
Archie turned to exhort the rest of the pack to start digging even though he knew he was sitting over tunnels and other escape routes. But it was too late. Shaker Crown was upon them.
“Leave it!” he bellowed. He then blew three successive short and sharp toots on his horn, which was his signal that he wanted his whips in immediately. Jennifer came up from behind, Douglas galloped up, and Betty rode in from her position.
Without a word, the mother and younger daughter dismounted, rushing toward the hounds as Sister and Cody trotted up. They, too, dismounted, each human grabbing a hound and pulling the chicken out of its mouth or even reaching into the mouth to pry out the bones.
They knew that chicken bones could splinter in a hound's intestine.
Fifteen minutes of frantic work removed the danger.
Humans and hounds, muddy, stared at one another.
Shaker, voice low and stern, chastised them: “How could you? Archie and Cora were the only two hounds doing their job.” He turned on his heel and mounted up. The hounds, heads hanging, were both mortified and enraged, since they could hear the tittering in the den.
Sister walked over to the den. “Gray. This den has been occupied by grays since I first hunted this territory as a child. Maybe I ought to come back out here and drop them a fixture card.”
“They know the schedule.” Betty laughed.
Douglas swung onto the saddle. “They do know.”
“I expect they do.” Sister turned to Lafayette, leading him to a log. She stepped on the log, then lifted up lightly as everyone mounted up. “Well, let's call it a day.”
Shaker quietly said, “Come along, hounds.”
As the small band rode away, Diana, drawn by an overpowering curiosity, snuck back to the den.
“I'll get her,” Doug volunteered.
“Don't rate her, Doug. She's going for the fox and she's young,” Shaker ordered.
“I won't.” Doug knew better than to crank on a young hound, but he cheerfully took the advice. Some people couldn't stand to be told what they already knew but Douglas was an easygoing fellow.
Diana scurried to the den opening, spread her front paws far apart, and stuck her head down the entrance as far as it would go. To her surprise, Inky was coming out to see the pack leave. They touched noses.
This surprised Diana. She jumped back and sat down blinking. Inky did the same thing. Then the smallish black fox crept up closer to the entrance to get a better look at the hound.
The two looked at each other. Then Inky, hearing Douglas, ducked back in.
“Diana. Come along,” he sang out to her.
She hurried to him but thought to herself,
“They're like us. They're dogs.”
She'd only smelled fox. She'd never seen one before.
Douglas soon joined the others, the rain beating down on them in sheets.
“Thought you said this would clear up,” Betty, riding next to Sister, complained.
“I thought it would.”
“You say that every time the weather gets filthy. âOh, it will pass.' ” Betty mimicked Sister's voice, an amber alto.