Outfoxed (7 page)

CHAPTER 12

A stiff tiger trap, cut logs shining in the morning mist, like giant's teeth, slowed Dragon for a moment as he scrambled over, the pack ahead of him. The tiger trap jump, like a coop but with vertical logs, often backed off riders. Sidetracked by an unfamiliar smell, Dragon snapped to when he heard Cora's authoritative call.

Twenty couple hounds, forty individuals, had been carried in their special trailer to Beveridge Hundred, an old plantation five miles west of Sister's house as the crow flies.

But today it wasn't the crow flying, it was the hounds. Shaker cast them in the classic triangle cast. Sending hounds on their mission was truly like a fisherman casting his net. Hence, the term “cast.” Most huntsmen threw their hounds straight into the wind, figuring the scent would carry and they'd be off in a hurry. That was a better idea for flat country than for the hills, ravines, pastures, and deep creeks of Jefferson Hunt territory. Shaker liked to give his hounds about fifteen minutes to settle; then he'd cut the corner and move up the side of the triangle into the wind. He planned his hunt and hunted his plan, always dividing the territory to be hunted into a series of triangles.

The pack struck quickly, running straight. Their quarry ran perhaps seven to ten minutes ahead. The scent held on the still-wet earth. The light shone scarlet as the sun's rim loomed over the horizon.

Shaker doubled his blasts as he plunged into a stand of black birches, shot out into the thirty-acre hay field just as hounds crossed over the middle of the cut field.

Sister galloped about fifty yards behind Shaker. He soared over the tiger trap; Sister and Lafayette easily cleared the big jump. Cody made it, as did Fontaine, who kept his eyes glued to Cody's perfect butt in the saddle.

Gunsmoke, Fontaine's half-bred, thought the horse Cody was trying for Fontaine, Keepsake, a rangy thoroughbred, was doing great so far. But then thoroughbreds always did better when the field was moving fast.

Marty, Crawford, and finally Bobby safely landed in the hay field.

Three visitors from Bull Run Hunt kept up with the small Tuesday group.

At the edge of the hay field the hounds split. Cora headed left toward The Rocks, an outcropping of boulders, while Archie headed right through double-lined rows of cedars into another hay field.

“Archie, two foxes. Stick with me,”
Cora called, her bel canto lilt floating over the mists still not rising.

This brought Archie's head up.

Dragon shot his mouth off.
“This scent is hot.”

“Yes it is, son, but if the fox can split us, we'll wind up in East Jesus, the whips will be going in two directions, and each fox can further mislead us. We're on Target. They're on Aunt Netty.”
Archie knew his foxes by the patterns they ran.
“Reds.”

“I'm not leaving this scent,”
Dragon howled, nose to the ground.
“Cora's an old bitch, anyway.”

“Good way to get drafted out, you fool.”
Archie turned, flat out now, belly low to the ground, tail stretched out behind him as he streaked for Cora.

Without hesitation the other hounds, including Diana on her first flaming run, followed Archie. He cut across the hay field, crawled under the old wire cow fence, catapulting over the sunken farm road worn down by three hundred years of use. With one bound he was over the loose stone wall, heading, flying, flashing down to The Rocks.

Moving in the opposite direction, Dragon touched the earth with his nose, bawled for all he was worth, and charged into a smaller pasture. Hay rolled in large round bales dotted the verdant expanse.

“Moron!”
a taunting voice called.

Dragon jerked his head up. Sitting on top of the hay round were Target and Reynard, magnificent, shining, as red as the scarlet sunrise.

“I'll tear you to shreds!”
Dragon bared his fangs, bouncing toward father and son.

“You fierce beast.”
Target, falsetto-voiced, mocked him, while Reynard watched the older, wiser fox sucker in the hound.

When Dragon was two strides from the hay round, Target casually jumped down, darting into a burrow in the bale. Reynard followed. His tail flicked into this makeshift den just as Target skidded around the bale.

Growling, saliva dripping, Dragon bumped into the bale as his hind end gave out under him from the force of his sharp turn. His head nearly hit the ground, his two front legs splayed out. He was eyeball to eyeball with a mature copperhead still drowsy and not amused.

Like lightning the snake struck, sinking her fangs, almost as large as Dragon's, into his left cheek. He shook his head but she didn't let go until she'd released her venom to the last drop.

“Oh, God, it hurts,”
Dragon screamed as the snake finally let go.

“Moron.”
Target laughed as Dragon, weeping, tried to outrun the pain. At least he had sense enough to go for the sound of the hounds, maybe a mile off by now.

Hounds, horses, huntsman were stymied at The Rocks, water spilling down over the sides in a gentle waterfall.

Aunt Netty, on a ledge behind the waterfall, cleaned her claws embedded with mud. She'd run over the rocks leading up to the small waterfall. Her scent would last for only a few moments on the rock but the morning was damp, the mists were low, and the hounds were close. To be safe she ducked behind the water. She didn't mind getting a little wet. She knew her scent had been wiped out by the waterfall.

Cora, a trifle overweight, panted.
“Aunt Netty works her magic act.”

In the distance they could hear Bobby Franklin, who'd fallen far behind, talk to his horse, Oreo. “Not so fast. Not so fast. I hate running on rock!”

“Stop worrying, you fat pig,”
the horse replied.
“My sense of balance is better than yours.”

“Everyone in one piece?” Sister laughingly asked.

“Is it always like this?” one of the visitors asked.

“Sure,” Fontaine lied, winking.

A rustling noise coming through the woods captured their attention. Dragon joined them in a few moments. He shook his head, he cried, he rolled over.

Shaker dismounted as Sister held his reins. “Snakebite,” he tersely informed her.

“His head will blow up like a pumpkin,” Cody said.

“Killed my Jack Russell. Remember Darth Vader?” Fontaine said that, which, under the circumstances, was not a helpful recollection.

Crawford, hoping for brownie points, dismounted from Czapaka. He walked over to Shaker, who didn't look up but kept his gaze on Dragon.

“I can throw the hound over my saddle.”

“No need,” Shaker replied evenly.

“He's better off walking back.” Douglas Kinser had ridden in from his outpost.

“Sister, do you mind if I have Doug walk Dragon back?”

“No. Betty's out on your left. Can you get by with one whip?”

“Two's better.”

“I'll go.” Cody smiled.

“No, you won't. I haven't bought that horse yet, and who knows what you'll get into. It's already been a wild morning,” Fontaine commanded.

“I'll whip. I'm not the best rider in the world but I can do it. I know most of the hounds by sight,” Marty volunteered.

“Good.”

“Fine.” Shaker seconded Sister. “You take the right. Three blasts, short and high of equal duration, means come in to me. You know the other signals?”

“Well, Shaker, if I don't you all can come out and find me. Just don't leave me out until sundown.”

Crawford, jealous of Marty for the chance to whip, mounted up. He smiled at her but was secretly miserable that he wasn't a strong enough rider to whip. And he hadn't a clue as to how to rate hounds. He thought all a whip had to do was ride hard. In Crawford's case, ignorance was bliss. How he longed to say at some fancy Virginia party, “Oh, yes, I whip-in at Jefferson Hunt.” It would be even more delicious to drop the information into a cocktail party in Manhattan. They'd think it had something to do with sexual practices. He'd then get to fire off a double entendre or two, after which he could declaim about foxhunting.

As it was, Crawford could have used Velcro in his saddle.

“Sister?” Shaker worked closely with his master. She'd carried the horn in her youth when the then huntsman died unexpectedly and violently in a bar fight Saturday night. She had a great eye for terrain and a good sense of casting hounds. Not a professional huntsman by a long shot, but she was no slouch either.

She inhaled deeply, the heavy air filling her lungs. “Warming fast.”

“Northern edge of the woods?” He swung gracefully up in the saddle.

“Good idea.”

As the hounds packed in and trotted to the next cast Diana whispered,
“Is Dragon in trouble?”

Dasher, her litter mate, as was Dragon, whispered back,
“If not with the people then with the snake. Boy, is he going to be sick.”

Jefferson Hunt named their hounds using the first letter of the bitch's name. Dasher, Dragon, and Diana had been born to Delia, an old lady now retired to laze in the sun.

“If that copperhead hadn't bit him, I would have!”
Archie exclaimed.

Shaker stared down at Arch. “What are you talking about?”

“Sorry,”
the steady fellow apologized. Wouldn't do for him to be accused of babbling.

“How do you know it was a copperhead?”
Dasher whispered.

“Head already getting fat. A nonpoisonous snake would have left two fang marks and that's about it.”

“Rattler,”
Cora quietly said.

“He'd be dead by now.”
Archie tried not to gloat.

At the northern edge Shaker pushed the hounds toward the hay field. They picked up a fading scent moving at a trot. The next hour the hounds worked diligently with a few small bursts as their reward.

Sister lifted hounds and they happily walked back to the trailers.

“Bobby, dear, we could hear you all the way down to The Rocks,” his wife chided him.

“Oh.” His face reddened.

Behind them Crawford rode in silence, Fontaine behind him. Fontaine was studying Czapaka intently, especially his hindquarters. Confirmation, the way a horse is put together, reveals a lot about the horse's potential use and longevity of service. Cody observed this.

“Nice horse.”

Fontaine turned his head back. Cody drew alongside him so they could speak without shouting. “Yes, he is a nice horse.”

“Quick with his hind feet?” Fontaine called up to Crawford, meaning “Does the horse kick?”

With disdain, Crawford, not even turning his head, called back. “No, but I am.”

“I'll remember that.” Fontaine smiled broadly and benevolently for all to see.

“What's Fontaine up to?” Cody thought to herself.

Walking back to the trailers, Target was a deadly foe.

CHAPTER 13

“Going to be a great year. One of the best. They go in cycles.”
Lafayette dropped some of his hay, reaching down to snatch it up.

Rickyroo, in the next stall, stuck his nose between the iron stall divider bars.
“We were right behind Aunt Netty.”

“Could you see her?”

“No. She vanished. The usual.”
Rickyroo picked up his red play ball with a handle. He threw it over his head.

Ricky, full of energy, found things to do, things that were upsetting to the humans. If a bridle hung on the stall door, he'd play with it until he had pulled the reins into his stall; then he'd chew them to pieces.

He tore off other horses' blankets when they were turned out in the field.

He also tore a flap off Cody Jean Franklin's frock coat last year because he felt like it.

The humans called him a handful. The horses thought of him as a joker.

Aztec, a graceful five-year-old light bay, a blaze down her face, said,
“It's not fair. You two go and I stay home.”

“You'll go out in the field, Az. Sister believes in bringing along horses slow,”
Lafayette counseled her.

“I'm as big as you are.”

“And so you are, but I've seen a lot more than you have. The last thing we need is you spooking all over the place with Sister on your back. She's a good rider but she's no spring chicken.”

“I'm not going to spook. I hilltopped last year.”
She referred to the practice of hunting but not taking the jumps.

“Be patient,”
Rickyroo advised.

“You're not,”
Aztec grumbled.

“I know what I'm doing.”
He threw the ball at the bars between them.

Golliwog strolled in during the conversation, Raleigh behind her.
“If you knew what you were doing, you wouldn't be playing with that stupid ball.”

“Raleigh plays with balls,”
came the retort from the dark bay.

“My point exactly.”
Golliwog sat down on a hay bale, picked the tip of her tail up with her paw, and began grooming.

Raleigh, an exceedingly good-natured dog, said,
“Golly, you're such a snot.”

“Cats,”
was all Lafayette said.

“You're jealous. You're all jealous. You have to work for a living whereas I simply exist to be beautiful and catch the occasional offensive mouse.”

“You're doing a piss-poor job of it.”
Aztec laughed.

“Oh, really?”
Golly dropped her tail.
“Do you have any idea how many places there are for mice to hide? Shall I list them, grass-eater, eyes-on-the-side-of-your-head, big fat flat teeth, no-good . . . !”

“We're scared.”
Lafayette reached for more hay in his hayrack.

“I could scratch your eyes out if I wanted to. You're lucky that I like you—basically.”

“Golly, cool it.”
The sleek Doberman nudged the cat.
“We all know that you are the most beautiful, the smartest cat that ever lived. Even smarter than Dick Whittington's cat.”

Having heard what she wanted to hear, Golly's mood instantly improved.
“Say, I heard Dragon got nailed.”

“Archie told me on the way home that the little shit had it coming,”
Lafayette said.
“When Archie realized they'd split and told his group to catch up with Cora, Dragon refused. He even called Cora an old bitch. Archie's furious.”

“She should have drafted him out when he was a puppy. He was beautiful but he was rotten even then. I told her but she missed it. The problem with Sister is it takes her too long to figure these things out. I knew that puppy's attitude was wrong. Outrageous.”
Raleigh stood on his hind legs to peer into Lafayette's stall.

“But you're a dog. Dogs know about one another. Same with us.”
Lafayette nodded to his stablemates.
“We know if a horse will work into the program long before Sister or Douglas knows. It's the nature of things.”

“I suppose, but I'd like to save her the trouble.”
Raleigh loved Sister with all his heart and soul.

“Humans need trouble. Makes them think they're living.”
Golliwog laughed.

“Cynic,”
Raleigh returned to the cat.

“Means ‘dog' in Greek, you know.”
Golly adored showing off.

“It does?”
Aztec was surprised.

“Yes. Diogenes lived like a dog. Really, he lived in a hovel and wore rags but he was brilliant. He questioned everything, especially authority. He upset the rich, obviously. They called him a dog. They called the people who followed him dogs. Stuck.”

“How do you know all this?”
Aztec asked, her deep-brown eyes filled with admiration.

“I read whatever Sister is reading. I sit on her shoulder or on the pillow behind her shoulders. She reads all the time.”

“I don't understand the appeal of books.”
Ricky tossed his ball again.

“Big surprise.”
Lafayette snorted in jest.

“I'll tell you about books.”
Golly stretched fore and aft, then sat down quite regally, prepared to declaim.
“It's the best way to enjoy an uninterrupted conversation with the best human minds from any century, from most any country. Superior as we are to humans, imagine if we wrote books. You might know what Man O' War learned and thought. I could learn from the cats of ancient Egypt. It truly is our one great failing. We don't record our experiences.”

“We're too busy living them.”
Raleigh laughed.

“There is that.”
Golly smiled and purred. She did love Raleigh quite a bit.

The slam of a truck door diverted their attention. The cat and dog walked to the open barn doors. The sun had just set and soon a light frost like thin icing would blanket the ground.

“Doug and Cody,”
Raleigh said.

“That started up again?”
Rickyroo paid little attention to human couplings and uncouplings.

“How could Doug pick such a loser, even if she is pretty?”
Golly returned to her hay bale by the side of the aisle, set up for the morning feeding.

“On again, off again.”
Lafayette's stall dutch door opened on the other side of the barn from Doug's cottage.

“I don't want her to hurt Doug again.”
Raleigh's ears swept back.

“Of course she will. She'll hurt everybody, including herself, but there's one thing I'll say for Cody . . . if she gets somebody in trouble, she gets right in there with him.”

“What's the worst that can happen? She gets pregnant,”
Ricky said.

“There's lots worse than that. People commit suicide over love and really dumb stuff,”
Raleigh replied.

“Well, it doesn't affect us.”
Ricky felt the whole thing was silly.

“The hell it doesn't.”
Golly spoke forcefully.
“Everything they do affects us.”