The Hunt Ball Page 3

  “She’s referring to you.” Rooster’s pink tongue stuck out between his teeth.

  “I’m not paying any attention to her.” Raleigh lifted his noble head higher.

  “How much is that doggy in the window?” Golly moved forward in time to Patti Page’s 1953 hit song.

  “Golly, what’s the matter with you, going mental on us again?” Rooster loved to torment the cat. It was mutual.

  “Death to all dogs!” she screamed, shot forward, jumped off the ground, and hit Rooster on the side with all four paws. She bounded off like a swimmer making a turn in a pool, then she scorched ahead of the dogs, blasted past the humans, and climbed up the old pawpaw tree, where she immediately struck a pose on a large branch.

  “You’re very impressive,” Sister drily commented as she and Marty passed under the pawpaw tree.

  “I am who I am! I am the mightiest cat in all Christendom. Dogs shudder at the mention of my name, Killer Kitty!”

  “I’m going to throw up,” Rooster coughed.

  “Roundworms,” Golly taunted.

  Raleigh, on his hind legs, tried to reach the branch.

  Betty, hurrying to catch up, called out to the sleek animal. “Your mother will give you such a smack.”

  Sister turned and beheld Raleigh, Rooster waiting at the bottom of the tree. “Boys, leave her alone.”

  “You’re lucky she protects you or I’d be throwing up a big hairball: you,” Rooster barked with mock menace.

  Sister called over her shoulder, “Boys, she’s not worth it.”

  “Ha!” Raleigh dropped to all fours and pranced toward the three women as Betty caught up.

  Rooster followed.

  “She doesn’t protect me. I can blind you with a single blow. I can tear out your whiskers one by one. I can bite your tail in two.”

  “Ignore her,” Sister said in a singsong voice.

  “You’re afraid of me. Admit it!” Golly ratcheted up the volume. She huffed, she thrashed her tail. No response. The two dogs didn’t even turn to watch her. Disgruntled, she backed down the tree, grumbling loudly, so loudly that Cora, the head bitch, could hear it in the big girls’ run.

  “Golly, pipe down, I need my beauty rest,” Cora said as she stretched out.

  “Face it, girl, you need plastic surgery,” Golly fired back again at high volume. She then dug her claws in the grass, wiggled her behind, and tore off, flying past the dogs and humans. She soared over the chrysanthemums filling richly glazed pots by the mudroom door. She then sat down to lick her front paws as the people approached.

  “Golly certainly has a high opinion of herself,” Betty laughed.

  “Don’t they all?” Sister laughed in turn.

  C H A P T E R 3

  As Sister, Betty, and Marty walked toward the house, Comet was enlarging the den in the stone ruins. His den across Soldier Road on Cindy Chandler’s farm appeared shabby to him compared to this. The other motivation for switching dens involved his housekeeping skills. He had none. His old den was filling up with bones, feathers, and fur. Some foxes are good organizers, others aren’t.

  He cheerfully lined the main section with grass, made note of good places for extra entrances and exits, and was particularly pleased that the creek gurgled one hundred yards below him. He was close to water but in no danger of flooding. To make the site even better, the pricker bushes and rambling old tea roses would keep out the nosy.

  The hands that cut and placed the stone vanished from the earth in 1787. The small house was eventually abandoned as the next generation prospered to build the first section of Roughneck Farm, the simple but large, graceful house that Sister and her husband, Raymond, bought when young marrieds. It had a roof and walls but the staircases had collapsed. It was a ruin. Together they restored the place, doing much of the work themselves. In good time, Raymond began to make a lot of money. By the time they reached their mid-thirties they could pay for any repairs or improvements.

  While Sister knew of this old, well-built foundation, she never cleared it. She recognized a splendid site for a den as well as Comet. She wanted Roughneck Farm to appeal to foxes the way Murray Hill appeals to a certain kind of Manhattan resident.

  Comet carried in more sweetgrass and suddenly dropped to his belly, hearing a light flutter of mighty wings. These wings were silent until it was too late.

  A pair of huge balled-up talons raked his back.

  He snarled, then bolted for the main entrance. He heard a large bird walking around the opening to his den and cursed that he hadn’t time to dig out more exits.

  “Oh, come on out, you big chicken,” a deep voice chortled.

  “Athena.” He popped his head out as the two-foot great horned owl turned her head nearly upside down to stare at him.

  “Scared you,” she laughed again.

  “Nah, I wanted to make you feel good,” he lied.

  She blinked, her large golden eyes both beautiful and hypnotizing. “You are too clever by half. Take care, Comet, that you don’t come to a bad end. You put me in mind of Dragon, that arrogant hound. He’s another one who pays no heed to good sense.”

  Comet emerged from his den. Arguing with Athena could bring reprisals. She wasn’t just the queen of the night, she was the queen, period, but her authority irritated him. On the other hand, foxes and owls were allies and it was best not to disturb the equilibrium.

  “Isn’t death always a bad end?”

  “No.” She unruffled her feathers, the sunlight warming her.

  “H-m-m. I don’t want to go anytime soon.”

  “Who does unless they’re suffering?” She paused, turned her head around almost backward to behold Bitsy, the screech owl, flying toward them. “God, I hope she isn’t going to sing to us.”

  Bitsy lived in Sister’s barn. A little thing, but her voice could wake the dead. She so wanted to be like the great horned owl whose voice, sonorous and low, filled the forests and meadows with melancholy beauty.

  As hunting had been good for all the prey animals, they lingered in the soft early-morning light before retiring to their nests and dens. The foxes, on such a warming autumn day, would find flat rocks on which to sunbathe.

  “Guess what?” Bitsy also lived for gossip.

  “What?” Comet humored her.

  “You scared the bejabbers out of those Custis Hall girls. I heard them talking at the tailgate.”

  “This pipsqueak scared them?” Athena asked, which thrilled the screech owl, who felt she had important information.

  “They were separated from the others, wandering about in the mist. Comet popped out right in front of them, uttered a few unkind words, and took off. It’s a pity humans have such poor senses. Those girls, when they first took the wrong turn, couldn’t have been more than a hundred yards from the other humans, yet they couldn’t smell horse or human. They rode left, everyone else rode right. It’s a wonder humans have survived.”

  “Herd animals. They can’t survive without one another,” Comet astutely noted.

  “That doesn’t explain their inability to smell. What’s the difference if there’s one human or one thousand? They still don’t know what’s under their nose, literally.” Bitsy puffed out her plump breast.

  “Now, Bitsy, every creature on earth has figured out what it must do to live. Humans are day hunters, we’re night hunters. Their eyes aren’t too bad in the light. Nothing like ours, naturally, but they’re perfectly serviceable. They can climb trees, build things. They are so successful now that most of them don’t realize how weak they are. Ah, well, it will all come to a bad end,” Athena said and sighed.

  “That’s what you said about me and that snot, Dragon.”

  “Really!” Bitsy’s huge eyes grew even larger as she listened to Comet. She then turned to her heroine. “Did you say that?”

  “I did. And now, of course, you want to know why.” Athena raised her right eyebrow. “Because both of them are too clever by half. Sooner or later, they’ll reach too far.”r />
  Comet smiled. “Is that an observation or a prophecy?”

  “Both,” Athena succinctly replied.

  “Any other prophecies?” He unfurled his long pink tongue.

  “Here’s an observation before a prophecy. You’re in Inky’s territory. You’d better reach an accord.”

  Inky, a gray fox whose coat was so dark she shone glistening black, was a beloved friend of most of the other animals as well as Sister and the hounds. Everyone knew Inky. She visited the kennels nightly as she made her rounds. The only animal who didn’t like Inky was Golly.

  “There’s so much game this season. I don’t think Inky will mind.” He considered Athena’s advice, though. “But you’re right. No point getting on her bad side. And I can’t take her for granted even though we are littermates.”

  “Her cubs are leaving the den. They’re making their way in the world. What if one of them wanted this den?” Bitsy kept tabs on the neighborhoods.

  “I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it.” Comet had no intention of surrendering his new apartment. “Athena, your prophecy?”

  “We’re a week from All Hallow’s Eve. Propitiate the dead.”

  “Some dead can’t be satisfied.” Bitsy believed in ghosts. She’d seen them.

  Comet, like most animals, was sensitive to what humans especially couldn’t explain. They often felt spirits around them, but the species was hag-ridden by logic. Few would admit to the experience. “Not a good time to go to Hangman’s Ridge.”

  Athena’s voice lowered. “And it will be black as pitch on All Hallow’s Eve, beware.”

  C H A P T E R 4

  The bricks of Custis Hall’s original four buildings around the quad had faded over the two centuries of their existence into a glowing paprika. Mt. Holyoke, founded on November 8, 1837, boasted being the first institution of higher learning for young ladies. But Custis Hall, a preparatory school, predated Mt. Holyoke by twenty-five years. It masqueraded as a finishing school. The girls learned management, mathematics, Latin, French, embroidery (a good hand was considered one of the gracious arts), a smattering of history, and a bit of literature, although the reading of modern novels was discouraged by the administration. Novels were considered racy. A copy of Moll Flanders or Les Liaisons Dangereuses could park a pretty bottom on a hard bench in front of the headmistress.

  Charlotte Norton smiled to herself thinking about the history of Custis Hall as she eased off the accelerator, turned right onto the campus, passing through the monstrously large wrought-iron gates, the morning sun hitting the buildings so they shimmered. She never tired of seeing the restrained architecture. She loved her work and felt not one pang of jealousy when her former graduate school classmates moved ever closer to becoming presidents of universities, a few already presidents of smaller colleges. Her passion was secondary school.

  She noticed, as she coasted into her parking space, a van with the local TV station’s call letters and number on it. It was parked illegally alongside the main campus road and she had no idea where the campus police might be.

  The only vehicles allowed beyond the parking lot were service vehicles. The door to her new Volvo AWD VC70 station wagon closed with a comforting heavy thud. She heard chanting.

  Her boot heels clicked as she hurried along the stone path, worn from use, toward the back of Old Main Hall. She’d intended to dash into her office, change clothes, and get on with her day. She’d left her cell phone to charge on her desk and now regretted that decision. Usually she called Teresa Bourbon, her assistant, at least once before reaching her office.

  The chanting grew louder. She pulled open the back door to Old Main, the long polished wooden corridor before her.

  “Plantation! Plantation! The Custis Hall Plantation.”

  “What the hell?” she muttered to herself, noticing, as she raced to her office, that no one was in theirs.

  She skidded to her open door, Teresa commanding the anteroom.

  “Mrs. Norton, we’ve got a situation.” Teresa met her boss’s gaze levelly as she used the old black expression.

  “Jesus, what is going on?”

  “There are fifty girls in the Main Hall, one TV reporter, and one print reporter. They have just discovered that Custis Hall was founded by a slave owner.” Teresa, African American, held up her hand, her silver rings shining. “And they are deeply upset by the artifacts displayed in Main Hall.”

  A long stream of air blew out of Charlotte’s delicately shaped nostrils, her nose slightly upturned. “I can’t go out there in riding habit.”

  “Oh, why not?” Teresa wickedly smiled. “You’ll confirm their idea that you’re the Miss’us.”

  Charlotte loved Teresa. They’d worked cheek by jowl for nine years. The thirty-six-year-old woman knew exactly how to handle her. Charlotte flew into her paneled office, ran to the bathroom, shed her jacket, vest, and shirt, grunting as she pulled off her boots with the stand-up boot pull. She yanked a deep carmine cashmere turtleneck sweater over her head. This was followed by a pleated black skirt. She used her coveted staghandle boot pulls to pull up a pair of soft Italian leather boots. She took a very deep breath, then calmly walked out of her office as Teresa winked.

  “Don’t you want to witness this?”

  “No. Gotta mind the store. If it gets really good, I’ll lock the door and come fetch you home.”

  “Oh, Teresa,” Charlotte smiled softly, “I think I’m about to be called a racist pig.”

  “Could be worse.”

  “I suppose it could.” With that, Charlotte squared her shoulders, lifted her head, and strode to the great entry hall at the front of Old Main.

  At the sight of her, students renewed their vigor and volume. Dwayne Rickman, fiftyish, a local celebrity as a TV reporter, moved toward her with the microphone.

  She saw the two overwhelmed security fellows, men way past their prime but still wearing a uniform, swing toward him.

  Knute Nilsson, treasurer, looked relieved as she took over, as did Alfonso Perez, the director of alumnae affairs. They’d been holding the girls at bay, assisted by Amy Childers, the head of the science department, and her brother, a board member, Christopher Stoltenfuss. Knute, a natural leader, quick-thinking, told the other teachers to stay with their routine, don’t leave the classroom. Amy happened to be coming in for an appointment with Charlotte and simply got caught in the middle. Her brother had come for a meeting with Knute so they felt like deer in headlights.

  Al Perez had walked out of his office the minute he heard the chanting. He and Knute worked well together. They had things, more or less, under control. Everyone adored Al, a sunny personality in his early thirties, a new baby at home, career on the upswing. To date, he was the only Hispanic faculty member, and he adamantly pushed for hiring more Hispanic faculty.

  “Mrs. Norton, what is Custis Hall doing to accommodate its African-American students?” Dwayne asked politely.

  “Custis Hall’s mission is to give each young women a superior education, a grounding for life. Her race, her religion, her class background are irrelevant to that task but relevant to our knowledge of her. We have the highest number of scholarship students of any preparatory school on the East Coast.” As she spoke her eyes swept over the fifty-odd girls. Perhaps one-third of them were students of color; the others, white, appeared even more impassioned than the African-American students. Her Hispanic and Asian students were conspicuous by their absence.

  “Custis Hall is the plantation,” Pamela Rene, the ringleader, began the chant.

  The others took it up but quieted as Dwayne asked more questions. He signaled his cameraman to cut the lights.

  “Mrs. Norton, thank you.” He nodded to her.

  Dwayne liked Charlotte Norton. She did a lot for the community. Her husband, Carter, head of neurosurgery at the local hospital, was another tremendous asset. Dwayne had been around long enough to know a setup when he saw one. He’d do his best with the footage he shot to make sure Custis Hall a
nd Charlotte came out ahead.

  The print reporter evidenced no loyalty to Custis Hall or Charlotte. He was new to the area and this story held about as much appeal to him as covering brush fires in the county.

  “Ladies,” Charlotte addressed the assembled, who did give her the courtesy of silence, “I’d be untruthful if I didn’t tell you I’m surprised. I had no idea you were uneasy about our founder, our beginnings, but as you can see, Mr. Nilsson, Mr. Perez, Mrs. Childers, and our board of directors member, Mr. Stoltenfuss, are in front of you. We’ll listen, but we can’t listen in this setting. A charged subject demands cool heads and a better place in which to discuss the issues.”

  Pamela spoke out, pointing to the locked glass cases that contained artifacts of Miss Custis’s life: George Washington’s epaulettes; a dress worn by his wife, Martha; pots, iron skillets, plowshares, old bits. A marvelous carriage, impeccably equipped, sat on a dais in the center of Main Hall. All objects represented the life of Martha Washington’s niece. “Slaves made these things but they get no credit! That’s wrong.”

  Charlotte had to bite her tongue because the dress had been fashioned in Paris. This was clearly spelled out in the hand-painted cards identifying each item. However, Pamela was correct about the other artifacts. She neglected to mention that there was a brief gloss on slave labor. Didn’t matter. It wasn’t enough and it wasn’t what Pamela wanted: attention.

  “Ladies, I’m willing to meet with you one by one or in groups. But this calls for quiet thinking and a great deal of research.”

  Knute stepped in and spoke, for which Charlotte was grateful. “So much was destroyed between 1861 and 1865. We’ve lost a lot, including information about the Custis family. No one paid much attention to slaves or women. Their lives weren’t well documented. Miss Custis merited attention because she was related to George and Martha Washington. We’ll address your concerns as Mrs. Norton said. But let’s take this one step at a time, calmly and deliberately.” Knute felt no need to apologize for Custis Hall’s founder. The past was the past. It certainly was open to reinterpretation, but he couldn’t change a damned thing about it.