A black three-board fence marked off the meadow, a coop squatted in the best place to jump. Shaker on Gunpowder, a rangy gray formerly off the racetrack, effortlessly sailed over. His whippers-in had preceded him into the field. Sister could always push up a straggling hound.
“Noses down, young ones!”Cora commanded.
“I got something. I got something!”Trident, a firstyear entry, squealed.
Asa ambled over, sniffled,“Yes, you do, son. That’s agroundhog.”
The other hounds laughed as Trident, ears dropping for a moment, accepted his chastisement, then decided he’d follow Asa. He couldn’t go wrong then.
A sweetish, heavy, lingering line greeted Diana’s sensitive nose as she probed a mossy patch amidst the timothy swaying in the east wind.“Pay dirt.”
Although only in her second year, Diana, tremendously gifted, had earned the respect of the older hounds.
Just to be certain, Asa touched his nose to the spot.“We’re off.”
Both Diana and Asa pushed forward, Cora already ahead of them. Her nose, while not as extraordinary as Diana’s, was plenty good enough. Yes, this line was perhaps fifteen minutes old and, on the dew, the temperature in the low sixties, it would hold for perhaps another five or ten minutes in the hay. Then the rising sun plus the wind would scatter it forever.
Trident inhaled the light fragrance.“This is it! Thisis it! I’m really hunting. It’s not foxpen. This is the realdeal.”He was so overcome, he tripped and rolled over.
Trudy, his littermate, laughed as she moved past him, her nose on the ground.“Showtime!”
Archie used to say“Showtime!”when hounds would find. It made everyone laugh, relaxing yet energizing them.
Hearing their former anchor hound’s phrase from this new kid made the others really laugh.
The scent grew stronger, snaking toward the woods. Whoever left it was in no hurry.
Whoever left it happened to be dozing on a rock outcropping about a quarter of a mile into the woods. Uncle Yancy, a red fox and the husband of Aunt Netty, filled with blackberries, peaches, and grain from Sister’s stable, needed a nap to aid his digestion. Uncle Yancy would frequently sit on the window ledge and watch TV at either Shaker’s or Doug’s cottage. Now that Doug had taken the horn at Shenandoah Valley Hunt, he wondered if anyone would be in there. He could see the picture better from Doug’s window than from Shaker’s. He liked to keep up with the world. Raleigh and Rooster never minded his curiosity, but that damned cat would torment him sometimes. She’d call out to the hounds,“Lookwho’s here, you lazy sots.”Then some offended creature would open his big mouth and Yancy’d push off.
He lifted his head from his delicate paws.“Oh, bother.”
Bitsy, on her way home from a very successful night, screeched,“They’ll be fast, Uncle Yancy.”
“Ha! The foxhound isn’t born that can keep up with me.”
Bitsy landed on a low maple limb.“Pride goeth beforea fall.”
He stretched as the sound grew closer.“Not pride.Simple fact. If you want a good time, fly with me as Isend these young ones in the wrong direction. Mighteven unseat a few humans, too. Why any creature wouldwant to totter around on two legs is beyond me.”
“That’s why they ride horses. Then they have four,” Bitsy sensibly concluded.
“I hadn’t thought of that. Of course, some of themcan’t stay on those horses, now can they? A weak andvain species, the human, but a few are quite lovely. Ohwell”—he shook himself—“let’s cause as much mayhemas possible.”
He left the rocks, walked down to Broad Creek, crossed it, then climbed out on the other side. He shook off the water.
“I’m telling you, Uncle Yancy, these young ones are fast.”
“Bitsy, they aren’t supposed to run in front of thepack. They’re supposed to run as a pack.”
“That’s what cubbing is for, to teach them. And I wouldn’t be so cocky if I were you. If St. Just is about,he’ll make trouble.”
St. Just, king of the crows, hated foxes, especially red foxes, because Target, Uncle Yancy’s brother, had killed his mate. St. Just swore revenge on the whole fox nation and he had led one young red to his death last year.
Finally heeding the little owl, Uncle Yancy started trotting east.
“It’s getting stronger!”Trudy yelped as she approached the rocks.
Sybil, up ahead, spied Uncle Yancy slipping through a thick stand of holly.“Tallyho!”
Yancy decided to run after that. He broke out of the holly, crossed an old rutted path, dove into a thick thorny underbrush, then slithered out of that and headed for the edge of the woods.
“Over here.”Dasher, a second-year dog hound, littermate to Diana, reached the edge of the creek the same time as Cora. He splashed across the creek, then began whining because he couldn’t pick up the scent.
“Don’t be a nincompoop!”Cora chided him.“Do youreally think a fox is going to walk straight across a creek?You go left, I’ll go right. And who’s to say he didn’t double back? Trudy,”she called to the youngster,“you andyour idiot brother work that side of the creek.”
While hounds searched for the scent, Sister and the field quietly waited on the rutted wagon road.
Crawford had just unscrewed the top of his silver flask when Dasher hollered,“Here.”
“Drat.” Crawford knocked back a hasty gulp, motioned for Marty to have a sip, which she declined. As they trotted off he screwed on the cap, its little silver hinge ensuring it wouldn’t fall off. Not a drop sloshed on him even though he’d filled it to the brim. He was quite proud of himself.
“Stronger!”Cora, again ahead, spoke in her light, pretty voice.
Bitsy flew back to watch the hounds, then took off again to give Yancy a progress report.“They just raninto the thorns.”
“Damn,”Yancy cursed. These hounds were faster than he thought.
He broke out of the woods and into the easternmost meadow of Roughneck Farm, which was filled with black-eyed Susans, Queen Anne’s lace, and cornflowers; it hadn’t been weeded or overseeded in years. Sister thought of it as her wildflower experiment and was loath to return it to timothy, alfalfa, or orchard grass.
A hog’s-back jump loomed in the fence line. Sister and Lafayette sailed over it as the pace was picking up. She saw Betty, up ahead, already flying over the spanking-new coop that marked the westernmost border of After All Farm.
“This fox is a devil,” she thought to herself.
The hounds, in full cry now, roared across the wildflower meadow. Even Trident was on, his concentration improving.
Walter Lungrun, riding Clemson, an older and wiser horse, steered clear of Crawford, whose horse, Czapaka, a big warmblood, occasionally refused a jump when he’d had enough of Crawford sawing at the reins.
New coops, not having yet settled into the earth, looked bigger than normal. Fortunately, Tedi and Edward painted theirs black. Unpainted coops seemed to cause more trouble than painted ones. Sister never knew if the trouble was with the horses or with the people.
As she trusted Lafayette with her heart and soul, she didn’t give this jump a second thought, landing just as she heard Shaker double the notes on the horn.
They were close, close to their fox, who must have tarried along the way.
Uncle Yancy, putting on the afterburners now, was shadowed by Bitsy, who was quite worried about him. She wished she hadn’t said“Pride goeth before a fall,”as she had no desire to see Uncle Yancy, everybody’s uncle, perish. Rarely did Sister’s hounds kill, but if a fox was ancient or sick, the hounds might dispatch it swiftly. In three seconds the quarry was dead, its neck snapped by the lead hound.