Outfoxed Page 27

  “Maybe I should move there.”

  “No.” Martha quickly added, “I mean, it’s beautiful. I can’t make a decision like that for you but I think there are so many lost people there.” She measured her words. “What did Fontaine mean to you?”

  “Me?” A look of pure surprise crossed her beautiful features.

  “You.”

  “Fun. Never knew what he’d do next. And he was generous.”

  “To pretty girls.” She stopped, thought, then added, “Actually, he was generous to most people. He had a way about him. He lived for the moment. He never thought about the consequences of his actions. I wish I could be more, uh—present—without getting into the trouble he did. “ She exhaled. “I never leave the house without an umbrella, Handi-Wipes, and a box of Band-Aids.”

  “That’s probably why Fontaine liked you so much. Opposites attract.”

  “I don’t know. I always thought he hired me to get back at Crawford, discovered I was good at managing the office, the clients, reading blueprints, scheduling jobs and workers, and counted himself lucky.”

  “He was lucky. Until the end. Say, Martha, I meant it. Don’t you think Crawford would buy this business for you?”

  “I don’t know. I’d hate to be beholden to him.”

  “What if you worked out some kind of buyout over time? I mean if you two don’t get back together.”

  Martha appraised Cody. “It’s a possibility.”

  “Because if you don’t go out and bid new landscaping jobs, you’ll fall behind. You can’t wait until the company is legally yours.”

  “Isn’t it amazing how your mind works when you stop drinking?”

  “I’ve wasted a lot of time.”

  “Think how you’d feel if you dried out at sixty-two. You haven’t wasted all that much. Besides this will give you a checkered past, which will make you more fascinating to the stick-in-the-muds. Plenty of those around here.” Martha picked up a napkin, placing it under her coffee mug. “Do you want to work here?”

  “Yes.”

  Martha squared her shoulders; her voice was warm but authoritative. “You know, I believe we could work together but I have to know something. Tell me straight. Did you sleep with Fontaine?”

  “Yes, but didn’t everyone?”

  “I didn’t.”

  “My mother didn’t.” Cody laughed.

  “What was the attraction? I’d think to someone your age he’d look, well, old.”

  “Yeah, a little. He taught me stuff. How to dress and what to drink. Not that I’ll need that anymore. He paid attention to me and he’d give me money sometimes. If I’d fall behind on the rent or get messed up . . . he took care of things.”

  “You didn’t feel that you betrayed Sorrel?”

  “No. He betrayed Sorrel. I was along for the ride.” A trace of bitterness, a whiff, lingered in the air.

  “Did you sleep with him while you were with Doug?”

  “Doug harped on me. Nagged. Once he smashed my bottle of tequila, you know, the kind with the worm in it.” She drew in a deep breath. “I cheated on him. Hell, I cheated on everyone.”

  “There’s enough money in the till for me to hire you for four months. Not a lot but better than the last job you had. Maybe we can keep this company going. Start Monday?”

  “Deal.” Cody held out her hand.

  Martha shook it. “Deal.” She smiled. “Think Sister will cancel tomorrow?”

  “No. Takes a hurricane or blizzard to stop her. She’ll call this snow a ‘dusting.’ ”

  They both laughed.

  CHAPTER 55

  Deep in the wood a crisscrossing of mountain lion and coyote tracks attracted Inky’s attention. She’d left her own delicate prints in the snow, a tighter track than the red fox’s. As this was her first snow she hadn’t realized how tired she would get. She abandoned the idea of dropping down into the cornfields. She circled behind a cairn. A mouse had to be in there somewhere. She was right.

  Nibbling on her breakfast, she heard the horn far away. Hounds could move better in the snow than she could, so she started for home, a short quarter mile away.

  A soft hoot stopped her. “Inky. Coyote coming this way and the hounds are on him.”

  “I’ll hurry.” She talked as she ran, Athena flying slowly overhead. “Did you have a good night?”

  “When the weather’s bad I hunt the barns. Eight mice.”

  Impressed, Inky said, “I’m satisfied with one.” She reached her den, sitting down outside it. “This stuff makes me tired.”

  “Don’t venture far from your den in deep snow, Inky. It can be fatal. Sometimes the snow will get an icy crust on top. That’s not so bad but you can slip and slide halfway to China.” She chortled. “Wings are a big advantage.”

  “I’ll let you know when I sprout some.”

  The horn sounded a bit closer, maybe two miles away.

  “They cast behind Foxglove Farm.” Athena perched on a low limb, her head turned nearly upside down. “Didn’t take long to pick up the coyote. They run straight as a die. You’d best be careful of them. They’ll eat your game and run you out, too. Right now there’s enough for everybody but during a famine the coyote will be your enemy. Never forget that. Not so good for the hounds either.”

  “I’d think it would be so easy. They stay on the scent and just run along.” Inky blinked as Athena shook some snow off the branch and the snow fell in her eyes.

  “A good hound figures things out. If you zig and zag and circle back, a good hound thinks about it, casts himself or herself until picking up your scent again. If all hounds do is run coyote, then all they need to be is fast. They don’t have to solve problems. Sister fears the coyote. If he runs you foxes out, then generations of breeding for special characteristics in hounds will go down the drain. People will breed for nose, drive, and speed. They won’t need brainy hounds.” Athena noted Inky’s crestfallen face. “Don’t fret. There aren’t that many coyotes here yet and as I said, it won’t be a problem until there’s a shortage of food. Besides, when Mr. Coyote starts snatching the house pets from suburban manicured yards, you’ll hear a fuss. Next thing you know the laws will change and folks will be out there hunting coyote with guns. That, too, presents problems. I tell you, Inky, the first weekend of deer season there are more guns out here than there were at Gettysburg.”

  “What’s Gettysburg?”

  “Human foolishness. I’ll tell you about that some other time. When the snow melts why don’t you store up corn, oats, whatever, just in case we get a big storm. Squirrels have a point, you know.”

  “Thank you. I will.”

  The horn was within a mile of them now. They looked over at a rocky foothill to the Blue Ridge Mountains shining in the distance, the very edge of the Foxglove Farm territory. The coyote was trotting along the top of the boulders of the foothill.

  “Is he in danger?” Inky asked.

  “No. A coyote runs only as fast as he needs to run. When he’s ready he’ll vanish. Although he’d better not let Cora or Dragon get too close. They are very fast hounds. They’re way back, though. Hear them now?”

  And the faint music of the hounds drifted toward them.

  Inky listened intently. “Will the coyote kill me?”

  Athena swiveled her head back to focus on Inky. “Don’t give him a reason. Don’t challenge him. You’ll be all right. You have more to fear from St. Just now than from coyotes.”

  “Exactly how did Target kill his mate?”

  “Hubris. Conceit. Two summers ago, the summer of the grasshoppers, Target was sunbathing on Whiskey Ridge and she dive-bombed him. He leapt up and caught her. Wasn’t asleep, you see. She brought it on herself.”

  Inky’s beautiful eyes seemed even more lustrous as she sat in the snow. “Athena, do you know everything?”

  She laughed. “No, my, my, no, but I watch, I listen, and I learn. If you listen to older animals and watch everyone around you, you learn from their experiences, too
. You can even learn from humans.”

  “Really?”

  “They’re a case study. You see they’ve removed themselves from the rest of us and they’re suffering. They’re losing practical intelligence. Just one example: Humans are fouling their own nest. Every bird, every den dweller knows you can’t do that. But they are. I don’t mind that they’ll pay for it. I mind that we’ll pay for it with them.”

  “All of them?”

  “Not all of them. Some are still close to us. But I fear their knowledge will be discounted by the city dwellers. I fear in another generation or two it will be lost and then the earth will shudder.”

  “I hope not.” Inky felt frightened, for she respected the power of the earth.

  “I hope not, too, little one, but they grow more and more arrogant. I tell you a common house cat—and I do not esteem cats, most especially that smart-ass, Golly—but even Golly has more wisdom than humans.”

  “Even Sister?”

  “Sister is one of us. Peter Wheeler was, too, and Shaker and Doug. They live within Nature’s rhythms and despite human frailty they are respectful. But Peter has gone back to earth. And what of the young ones? I just don’t know.” Athena glanced back at the boulders. The coyote had left and she saw the silhouette of the pack, in a line, crossing the rocks. “There’s good hound work for you.”

  “It’s pretty, isn’t it?” Inky smiled. “Athena, when the snows started I was at the hound graveyard. Sister and Raleigh were there and she was hurt. She was mourning Archie and the human dead, too. And she said she was going to lay a trap on Thanksgiving hunt. She didn’t say what but when the snow melts I’ll tell Aunt Netty and Mother and Father. I don’t know what we can do but we can be out and ready.”

  “I’ll stay up on Thanksgiving, then. I wonder what she’ll do?” Athena sighed, her plump chest pushing out, revealing the light-colored feathers under the long silky ones. “I’m going home to bed. I suppose Babs is there.” Babs was the screech owl in the next tree. “She’s a dear friend, you know, but that dreadful voice.” Athena shook her head then lifted off as Inky turned and scooted into her den.

  CHAPTER 56

  A sudden wind swirled snow in Lafayette’s eyes, up into Sister’s. Shaker, just ahead, struggled down a steep deer trail snaking to Edmond’s Creek. The coyote trotted along the rocks, then bounced down to the bottom of them and into the creek. He should have been easy to track but the hounds couldn’t find scent and Shaker couldn’t find tracks.

  By the time Lafayette reached the bottom of the incline, Shaker reached the other side of the creek.

  Lafayette called to Shaker’s horse. “A storm’s coming up fast.”

  “What’ll I do?” Keepsake, being tried out by Shaker and a bit green, worried.

  “There’s nothing you can do. They won’t smell it until it’s almost upon them or until they see the clouds piling up in the west. Shaker will get you home; don’t worry.”

  Sister patted Lafayette’s neck. The weather kept everyone away, including the Franklins, who couldn’t get the trailer down the driveway since Bobby didn’t have a snowplow. The wind piled up drifts, which though not large were large enough to risk getting stuck.

  She loved staff hunts. Not that she didn’t enjoy her field—she did. But those days when she didn’t have to shepherd people, when she could just fly or sit and listen to hounds turn back to her, those days made life worth living.

  Standing out like a resplendent cardinal in the snow, Doug waited upcreek for the hounds to find. He, too, checked for tracks. When Shaker looked his way Doug shook his head. The huntsman rode downcreek, Sister shadowing him on the opposite bank, portions of which were steep.

  “Nothing.” Shaker shook his head.

  “Me, too.”

  “Right under our noses.” Cora lifted her eyes back to the boulders. She felt he was hiding there but how he escaped detection she couldn’t say. “Let’s go back up.”

  “I don’t think he’ll allow it,” Dasher said. “And if they don’t smell the storm, we’ll have more to worry about than the coyote.”

  The barren trees began to bend and sway. Doug noticed the scudding clouds first. He pointed to the western sky. Both older people glanced up.

  “Damn, those clouds are rolling in fast,” Shaker exclaimed.

  They had hacked to Foxglove to cast hounds. From the kennels Foxglove was two miles on the trails. At the point where they now stood they were halfway between both farms.

  “Makes sense to head home.” She smiled at her hounds. “I’m proud of all of you.”

  “He’s in the rocks.” Cora wanted to circle back.

  “Good girl.” Sister praised her as she turned Lafayette on the narrow path, walking back to the creek crossing. Once on the other side the three humans walked through the forest, Shaker and Sister up front and Doug in the rear.

  They hadn’t ridden a half mile when the wind began to whistle. Heavy frock coats, a vest, shirt, and silk underwear kept their upper bodies warm, but their legs began to feel it. Each had learned the trick of slipping a flat heat pack in the toe of their boot, which helped keep their toes from freezing. There was no help for one’s hands, since a rider must feel the horse’s mouth.

  Sister wore silk liners under her string gloves but her hands ached in the cold. She didn’t complain about it, nor did Shaker and Doug. Came with the territory.

  Their ears began to sting. Snow blew off the conifers. As if the heavens unzipped, all at once the snow fell, fat flakes falling quickly. Within minutes their helmets, shoulders, and backs were covered in snow. The hounds’ backs began to turn white.

  “If we cut down into the ravine, we’ll be out of the wind,” Shaker suggested. “It might take a little longer, as it’s rough going, but this wind—” He raised his voice to be heard above the roar.

  “Worth a try. Damn, how did this thing come up so fast?”

  They picked their way down the folds of the ravine, holly bushes and mountain laurel sharing the banks with hardy firs. Once down in the bottom they followed the creek westward.

  “I can’t hear myself think.” Sister bent low to avoid a branch.

  Doug looked at the edge of the ravine. The snow spilled over the top like a white-powdered waterfall.

  The creek widened into a roundish shallow frozen pool where a small tributary fed into it, ice encrusting the creek bank edges. They halted to allow hounds and horses to drink, as the tributary was still running strong. The water emerged from the other side of the pond, but the ice was closing in fast.

  “Funny how you get thirsty when it’s cold. Wouldn’t think so.” Dragon gulped the icy water.

  “I’d like bacon-bit kibble right now.” Dasher sighed, taking a few steps into the deeper end of the pool. He’d pushed through the ice crust at the edge of the pond. He felt something odd among the pebbles, metal. He dug at it, moving it closer to the other hounds.

  “Whatcha got?” a large tricolor asked him.

  “I don’t know but I’m not giving it to you.” Dasher reached down in the water, picking up the object with his mouth.

  “I’d let you play with my toy.” Dragon came over.

  Dasher didn’t respond or he would have dropped his prize.

  Doug dismounted. “Dasher, that’s really special. Let me keep it for you.”

  The handsome young hound turned his head away from Doug. Dragon bumped him to see if he could get him to drop the toy.

  Sister said, “Dasher, what a good hound.”

  He turned around to face her, then slowly emerged from the pool, looking crossly at any hound that looked at him. He would surrender his find to Sister but they’d better leave him alone.

  She dismounted also, reaching for the gun that he gave her. “Good hound. Good hound.”

  The gun, cold and wet, soaked through her string gloves. “Thirty-eight.” She shook it, then slipped it inside the large game pocket inside her coat. “I’ve got a funny feeling about this.”

  “
Yeah, I do, too,” Shaker agreed.

  CHAPTER 57

  The storm raged for one full day. Power cut out. Those that had them switched over to generators, careful to turn off the main switch at their breaker boxes or the poor sod trying to restore power would have a most unpleasant sensation.

  The transportation department of the state, playing the averages, which it had to do, didn’t have enough snowplows to open the main arteries, much less the back roads. People dug out as best they could or sat home, eating canned soup off Sterno stoves. The lucky ones who had gas stoves could cook real meals.

  Then as quickly as the freak storm had hit, the temperatures rose into the sixties, the sky beamed heavenly blue, snow melting everywhere. The sound of water running into downspouts, across roads, under culverts, into creeks and rivers drowned out other sounds. It was as though the earth were melting. Creeks rose to the top of their banks, overflowing in low-lying areas.

  As the snows melted the grass, still green underneath, deepened to a brighter green; the leafless trees seemed to stand out against the color.

  Since Crawford Howard owned a Hummer, which suited him better than his Mercedes, he merrily drove everywhere. He surprised the Vanns by bringing them food, as they lived at the edge of the county down a twisting back road. He even delivered ten bags of kibble to the kennel in case chow was low. After a morning of good deeds he emerged from his mud-bespattered behemoth, which he parked in front of Mountain Landscapes. Since Martha had an apartment downtown she could walk to work. With masses of roses in his left arm, he rapped on the door with his right hand.

  “Come in.”

  He opened the door. “A rose by any other name is Martha.”

  “You must have bought out the store—or did you buy the store?” She laughed, rising from the drafting table. “I’d better get a tub.”

  “Brought that, too.” He hurried outside, returning with a large round black bowl.

  “Oh, they’ll be stunning in that.” Martha took the bowl, filled it with water in the small kitchen in the office, then placed the roses inside, careful to have a few falling over the side. She placed the arrangement in the middle of the coffee table. “There.”