Scarlet Fever by Rita Mae Brown

Author:Rita Mae Brown
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2019-11-25T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 17

March 14, 2019 Thursday

While it was still cold, the footing had improved. Few felt the cold, as they’d been running for thirty minutes at Mousehold Heath, a farm fifteen minutes east of the kennels. The miles of pasture from Mousehold Heath through After All then Roughneck Farm sometimes produced a track-and-field fox. On the other side of the ridge rested Foxglove Farm and Cindy Chandler’s neighbors. In theory, a fox could surmount the ridge to run north. However, many opportunities to dump hounds and humans existed on this side, so thus far no fox had ever taken advantage of the hard climb.

Hounds, fit, pushed hard but the fox, a visiting one, proved fit, too. Mousehold Heath, first cornerstone laid in 1807, sported a few fences but mostly the land was open. Hounds blew through it ten minutes after the first cast. They were now circling the main house at After All, the Bancrofts’ large estate. Mousehold Heath began as a modest farm and remained one now, being brought back to pristine condition by Jim and Lisa Jardin, a young couple doing much of the work themselves.

After All, by contrast, had begun as a large estate, undergirded by first tobacco money then railroad money. It remained a sumptuous place, having never fallen into disrepair. Money couldn’t buy everything but it certainly could maintain grand old estates.

The main house, stone with white pillars, a bit unusual, allowed the fox to give Sister, Weevil, and the whippers-in fits. Of course they couldn’t gallop close to the house. Winter may be hanging on but impeccable lawns would soon revive.

Sister rode quickly to the western corner of the main lawn, standing where she could view the house and outbuildings but be close to the covered bridge in case the fox decided to use that. Not only did he decide to use it, he stopped to assess Sister and her field.

After inspection he sauntered across the bridge while the hounds could be heard circling the house.

“Devil,” Sister thought as she smiled.

Sister never tired of fox behavior, rooted, it seemed, in a sense of superiority. She thought that in some ways foxes and cats held similar opinions of themselves. Nothing she could do but sit as her quarry walked through the bridge, then walked along the creek bank. Walked. Not ran. Not even trotted.

The field, of course, bellowed, “Tally-ho,” hats off, pointing in the direction of Mr. Fox’s path.

She could have killed them. For whatever reason, humans can’t resist “tally-ho.” If they count to twenty, all’s fair. Flushed from their ride, curious as to hounds circling, then dazzled by the appearance of the star himself, half the field shouted, “Tally-ho.”

Weevil heard them, but wisely did not lift his hounds. They would hunt their fox sticking to scent and move off soon enough, for clearly the fox had tired of circling the house.

Giorgio, a hound of smashing beauty, not the best nose in the pack, but good, plus he had drive, stopped by a boxwood lining one of the walkways into the main house.

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