Authors: Rita Mae Brown
“Lived forever, too. No kids. Guess that’s why they let us run all over the place.” Susan felt old Elizabeth MacGregor’s presence in the room. An odd sensation and not rational but pleasant, since Elizabeth and Mackie, her husband, were the salt of the earth.
“I hope Blair Bainbridge has as much happiness at Foxden as the MacGregors did.”
“He ought to keep the name.”
“Well, that’s his business,” Harry replied.
“Bet Miranda gets him to do it.” Susan took a deep breath. “You’ve got yourself a new neighbor, Sistergirl. Aren’t you dying of curiosity?”
Harry shook her head. “No.”
“Liar.”
“I’m not.”
“Oh, Harry, get over the divorce.”
“I am over the divorce and I’m not majoring in longing and desire, despite all your hectoring for the last six months.”
“You can’t keep living like a nun.” Susan’s voice rose.
“I’ll live the way I want to live.”
“There they go again,”
Tucker observed.
Mrs. Murphy nodded.
“Tucker, want to go over to Foxden tonight if we can get out of the house? Let’s check out this Bainbridge guy. I mean, if everyone’s going to be pushing Mom at him we’d better get the facts.”
“Great idea.”
2
By eleven that night Harry was sound asleep. Mrs. Murphy, dexterity itself, pulled open the back door. Harry rarely locked it and tonight she hadn’t shut it tight. It required only patience for the cat, with her clever claws, to finally swing the door open. The screen door was a snap. Tucker pushed it open with her nose, popping the hook.
For October the night was unusually warm, the last flickering of Indian summer. Harry’s old Superman-blue Ford pickup rested by the barn. Ran like a top. The animals trotted by the truck.
“Wait a minute.”
Tucker sniffed.
Mrs. Murphy sat down and washed her face while Tucker, nose to the ground, headed for the barn.
“Simon again?”
Simon, the opossum, enjoyed rummaging around the grounds. Harry often tossed out marshmallows and table scraps for him. Simon made every effort to get these goodies before the racoons arrived. He didn’t like the raccoons and they didn’t like him.
Tucker didn’t reply to Mrs. Murphy’s question but ducked into the barn instead. The smell of timothy hay, sweet feed, and bran swirled around her delicate nostrils. The horses stayed out in the evenings and were brought inside during the heat of the day. That system would only continue for about another week because soon enough the deep frosts of fall would turn the meadows silver, and the horses would need to be in during the night, secure in their stalls and warmed by their Triple Crown blankets.
A sharp little nose stuck out from the feed room.
“Tucker.”
“Simon, you’re not supposed to be in the feed room.”
Tucker’s low growl was censorious.
“The raccoons came early, so I ran in here.”
The raccoons’ litter proved Simon’s truthfulness.
“Hello, Mrs. Murphy.”
Simon greeted the sleek feline as she entered the barn.
“Hello. Say, have you been over to Foxden?”
Mrs. Murphy swept her whiskers forward.
“Last night. No food over there yet.”
Simon focused on his main concern.
“We’re going over for a look.”
“Not much to see ’ceptin for the big truck that new fellow has. That and the gooseneck trailer. Looks like he means to buy some horses because there aren’t any over there now.”
Simon laughed because he knew that within a matter of weeks the horse dealers would be trying to stick a vacuum cleaner hose in Blair Bainbridge’s pockets.
“Know what I miss? Old Mrs. MacGregor used to pour hot maple syrup in the snow to make candy and she’d always leave some for me. Can’t you get Harry to do that when it snows?”
“Simon, you’re lucky to get table scraps. Harry’s not much of a cook. Well, we’re going over to Foxden to see what’s cooking.”
Tucker smiled at her little joke.
Mrs. Murphy stared at Tucker. She loved Tucker but sometimes she thought dogs were really dumb.
They left Simon munching away on a bread crust. As they crossed the twenty acres on the west side of Harry’s farm they called out to Harry’s horses, Tomahawk and Gin Fizz, who neighed in reply.
Harry had inherited her parents’ farm when her father died years ago. Like her parents, she kept everything tiptop. Most of the fence lines were in good repair, although come spring she would need to replace the fence along the creek between her property and Foxden. Her barn had received a fresh coat of red paint with white trim this year. The hay crop flourished. The bales, rolled up like giant shredded wheat, were lined up against the eastern fence line. All totaled, Harry kept 120 acres. She never tired of the farm chores and probably was at her happiest on the ancient Ford tractor, some thirty-five years old, pulling along a harrow or a plow.
Getting up at five-thirty in the morning appealed to her except in darkest winter, when she did it anyway. The outdoor chores took so much of Harry’s free time that she wasn’t always able to keep up with the house. The outside needed some fresh paint. She and Susan had painted the inside last winter. Mrs. Hogendobber even came out to help for a day. Harry’s sofa and chairs, oversized, needed to be reupholstered. They were pieces her mother and father had bought at an auction in 1949 shortly after they were married. They figured the furniture had been built in the 1930’s. Harry didn’t much care how old the furniture was but it was the most comfortable stuff she’d ever sat in. Mrs. Murphy and Tucker could lounge unrestricted on the sofa, so it had their approval.
A small, strong creek divided Harry’s land from Foxden. Tucker scrambled down the bank and plunged in. The water was low. Mrs. Murphy, not overfond of water, circled around, revved her motors, and took a running leap, clearing the creek and Tucker as well.
From there they raced to the house, passing the small cemetery on its knoll. A light shone out from a second-story window into the darkness. Huge sweet gum trees, walnuts, and oaks sheltered the frame dwelling, built in 1837 with a 1904 addition. Mrs. Murphy climbed up the big walnut tree and casually walked out onto a branch to peer into the lighted room. Tucker bitched and moaned at the base of the tree.
“Shut up, Tucker. You’ll get us both chased out of here.”
“Tell me what you see.”
“Once I crawl back down, I will. How do we know this human doesn’t have good ears? Some do, you know.”
Inside the lighted room Blair Bainbridge was engaged in the dirty job of steaming off wallpaper. Nasty strips of peony paper, the blossoms a startling pink, hung down. Every now and then Blair would put down the steamer and pull on the paper. He wore a T-shirt, and little bits of wallpaper stuck to his arms. A portable CD player, on the other side of the room, provided some solace with Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto Number One. No furniture or boxes cluttered the room.
Mrs. Murphy backed down the tree and told Tucker that there wasn’t much going on. They circled the house. The bushes had been trimmed back, the gardens mulched, the dead limbs pruned off trees. Mrs. Murphy opened the back screen door. The back porch had two director’s chairs and an orange crate for a coffee table. The old cast-iron boot scraper shaped like a dachshund still stood just to the left of the door. Neither cat nor dog could get up to see in the back door window.
“Let’s go to the barn,”
Tucker suggested.
The barn, a six-stall shed row with a little office in the middle, presented nothing unusual. The stall floors, looking like moon craters, needed to be filled in and evened out. Blair Bainbridge would sweat bullets with that task. Tamping down the stalls was worse than hauling wheelbarrows loaded with clay and rock dust. Cobwebs hung everywhere and a few spiders were finishing up their winter preparations. Mice cleaned out what grain remained in the feed room. Mrs. Murphy regretted that she didn’t have more time to play catch.
They left the barn and inspected the dually truck and the gooseneck, both brand-new. Who could afford a new truck and trailer at the same time? Mr. Bainbridge wasn’t living on food stamps.
“We didn’t find out very much,”
Tucker sighed.
“Other than the fact that he has some money.”
“We know more than that.”
Mrs. Murphy felt a bite on her shoulder. She dug ferociously.
“He’s independent and he’s hard-working. He wants the place to look good and he wants horses. And there’s no woman around, nor does there seem to be one in the picture.”
“You don’t know that.”
Tucker shook her head.
“There’s no woman. We’d smell her.”
“Yeah, but you don’t know that one might not visit. Maybe he’s fixing up the place to impress her.”
“No. I can’t prove it but I feel it. He wants to be alone. He listens to thoughtful music. I think he’s getting away from somebody or something.”
Tucker thought Mrs. Murphy was jumping to conclusions, but she kept her mouth shut or she’d have to endure a lecture about how cats are mysterious and how cats know things that dogs don’t,
ad nauseam
.
As the two walked home they passed the cemetery, the wrought-iron fence topped with spearheads marking off the area. One side had fallen down.
“Let’s go in.”
Tucker ran over.
The graveyard had been in use by Joneses and MacGregors for nearly two hundred years. The oldest tombstone read:
CAPTAIN FRANCIS EGBERT JONES
,
BORN
1730,
DIED
1802. A small log cabin once stood near the creek, but as the Jones family’s fortunes increased they built the frame house. The foundation of the log cabin still stood by the creek. The various headstones, small ones for children, two of whom were carried off by scarlet fever right after the War Between the States, sported carvings and sayings. After that terrible war a Jones daughter, Estella Lynch Jones, married a MacGregor, which was how MacGregors came to be buried here, including the last occupants of Foxden.
The graveyard had been untended since Mrs. MacGregor’s death. Ned Tucker, Susan’s husband and the executor of the estate, rented out the acres to Mr. Stuart Tapscott for his own use. He had to maintain what he used, which he did. The cemetery, however, contained the remains of the Jones family and the MacGregor family, and the survivors, not Mr. Tapscott, were to care for the grounds. The lone descendant, the Reverend Herbert Jones, besieged by ecclesiastical duties and a bad back, was unable to keep up the plot.
It appeared things were going to change with Blair Bainbridge’s arrival. The tombstones that had been overturned were righted, the grass was clipped, and a small camellia bush was planted next to Elizabeth MacGregor’s headstone. The iron fence would take more than one person to right and repair.
“Guess Mr. Bainbridge went to work in here too,”
Mrs. Murphy remarked.
“Here’s my favorite.”
Tucker stood by the marker of Colonel Ezekiel Abram Jones, born in 1812 and died in 1861, killed at First Manassas. The inscription read:
BETTER TO DIE ON YOUR FEET THAN LIVE ON YOUR KNEES
. A fitting sentiment for a fallen Confederate who paid for his conviction, yet ironic in its unintentional parallel to the injustice of slavery.
“I like this one.”
Mrs. Murphy leapt on top of a square tombstone with an angel playing a harp carved on it. This belonged to Ezekiel’s wife, Martha Selena, who lived thirty years beyond her husband’s demise. The inscription read:
SHE PLAYS WITH ANGELS
.
The animals headed back home, neither one discussing the small graveyard at Harry’s farm. Not that it wasn’t lovely and well kept, containing her ancestors, but it also contained little tombstones for the beloved family pets. Mrs. Murphy and Tucker found that a sobering possibility on which they refused to dwell.
They slipped into the house as quietly as they had left it, with both animals doing their best to push shut the door. They were only partially successful, the result being that the kitchen was cold when Harry arose at five-thirty, and the cat and dog listened to a patch of blue language, which made them giggle. Discovering that the hook had been bent on the screen door called forth a new torrent of verbal abuse. Harry forgot all about it as the sun rose and the eastern sky glowed peach, gold, and pink.
Those extraordinarily beautiful October days and nights would come back to haunt Harry and her animal friends. Everything seemed so perfect. No one is ever prepared for evil in the face of beauty.
3
“He has not only the absence of fear but of all scruple.” Mrs. Hogendobber’s alto voice vibrated with the importance of her story. “Well, I was shocked completely when I discovered that Ben Seifert, branch manager of our local bank, indulges in sharp business practices. He tried to get me to take out a loan on my house, which is paid for, Mr. Bainbridge. He said he was sure I needed renovations. ‘Renovate what?’ I said, and he said wouldn’t I be thrilled with a modern kitchen and a microwave? I don’t want a microwave. They give people cancer. Then Cabby Hall, the president, walked into the bank and I made a beeline for him. Told him everything and he took Ben to task. I only tell you this so you’ll be on your guard. This may be a small town but our bankers try to sell money just like those big city boys do, Mr. Bainbridge. Be on your toes!” Miranda had to stop and catch her breath.
“Please do call me Blair.”
“Then to top it off, the choir director of my church walked into the bank to inform me that he thought BoomBoom Craycroft had asked Fair Haristeen to marry her, or perhaps it was vice versa.”
“His vice was her versa.” Blair smiled, his bright white teeth making him even more attractive.
“Yes, quite. As it turned out, no proposal had taken place.” Mrs. Hogendobber folded her hands. She didn’t cotton to having her stories interrupted but she was blossoming under the attention of Blair Bainbridge—doubly sweet, since Susan Tucker and Harry could see his black truck parked alongside Mrs. Hogendobber’s house. Of course she was going to walk him through her garden, shower him with hints on how to achieve gargantuan pumpkins, and then bestow upon him the gifts of her green thumb. She might even find out something about him in the process. Some time ago Mrs. Hogendobber had borrowed some copies of
New York
magazine from Ned Tucker, for the crossword puzzles. After meeting Blair the other day, she had realized why his name was familiar: She had read about him in one of those magazines. There was an article about high-fashion romance. When he introduced himself, the name had seemed vaguely familiar. She was hoping to find out more today about his link to the article, his ill-fated relationship with a beautiful model named Robin Mangione.