Let Sleeping Dogs Lie (6 page)

Walking back, the group came up to the old, now unused Saddlebred barn. The Johnsons had their hunting barn up by the house. The five-stall Saddlebred barn, built decades ago by an owner of these lovely horses, rested farther away and had been let go by an interim owner. The abandonment gave it a sorrowful air.

As she rode by, Sister noticed glowing skulls with red eyes pushing up from the ground, red paint on the sides of the barn reading, Murder, Help, I’m Being Held a Prisoner, plus a mannequin hanging from the rafters.

Maria and Sonia, with Nate’s help, had created a haunted barn as a fund-raiser for the pony club last year. A haunted barn it remained.

“Those darn skulls get me. It’s the damned red eyes,” Sister remarked to Maria.

“Scared the devil out of the kids.” Maria laughed.

Walking behind Sister, Phil Chetwynd teased Maria, “If you ever have a big fight with Nate, we’ll know where to look.”

Mercer, next to Phil, chirped, “I don’t know, Phil, I’d worry
more
about you. Taking all those road trips.”

Phil grinned. “Truthfully, I think sometimes my wife is glad to get rid of me.”

“Hear! Hear!” Sister called out and people laughed, most especially Phil.

Once back at Roughneck Farm, a forty-five-minute drive from Oakside, hounds were carefully checked for barbed-wire cuts, sore pads, anything unusual.

Betty and Tootie untacked horses to clean them as Sister and Shaker checked, then fed hounds.

The Master and huntsman watched the boys eat. The boys ate first, then the girls. Shaker figured if any of the girls were going into heat early the scent would linger and might cause a ruckus among the boys. And the boys always knew before humans had a sign. Of course, given that all had just hunted together without a hint of someone coming into season early, hounds were safe but Shaker stuck to his program. Sister rarely interfered. Her philosophy was if you have a good huntsman who doesn’t drink, run women, or is cruel to horses, leave him or her alone.

Shaker hadn’t gone to Kentucky. Sometimes he’d go along to away meets but mostly he didn’t want to be far from his hounds. He did enjoy riding with other huntsmen and had struck up a friendship with Glen Westmoreland at Woodford as well as Danny Kerr, huntsman at Camargo Hunt, another rousing Kentucky hunt. Shaker enjoyed talking shop. Most huntsmen did, especially as they were few in number, 162 in North America, give or take one or two depending on circumstances.

“Dreamboat, this was your day. It was the best day you ever had,” Sister called to the racy-looking hound as he enjoyed his food, drizzled with corn oil for the taste and also the shine it put on the coats.

“Funny, isn’t it?” Shaker smiled, for he liked the hound so much. “He really did me proud.”

“I love this pack. It’s taken a lifetime of breeding and work and I’ve always loved my hounds, but Shaker, I think this is the steadiest, hardest-working pack I’ve ever had and of course, much of the credit belongs to you and our whippers-in.”

“No shortcuts.” Shaker appreciated the compliment and she knew it.

The two of them had spent many an hour poring over bloodlines and performance. They also attended other hunts, singling
out the special hounds there. The research never ended, the study, the planning, and they never wanted it to.

Sister’s cell phone beeped. She fished it out of her barn jacket, as she’d already taken off her good hunt coat. Peering down, she read a text:

“Call me. O.J.”

“Excuse me a minute.” She walked back into the tidy office and called Kentucky.

“Hey.”

“Sister, Alan and Meg notified the authorities as you would think they would. So Benny Glitters’s tomb has been opened with, oh, I don’t know what you call them, forensic people, I guess were there. Anyway, they found an entire human skeleton. Found the watch chain, no other jewelry. Bones and a watch.”

“What about the dog?”

“Buried with the human skeleton. No one can say for sure but it looks like the skeleton of a little terrier, you know, like a Norwich. The snout wasn’t long enough to be a Jack Russell. Oh, the human skeleton is male.”

“I’ll be damned. Did they find anything else?”

“Well, Benny Glitters.”

“Yes. Remind me again about Benny Glitters.”

“The owner, Captain Brown, of Walnut Hall before L.V.” Like most people, O.J. called Mr. Harkness by his first initials, as though he were still alive. “Brown was a very successful Thoroughbred horseman.”

“Right.”

“Before he died, he’d bred Benny Glitters. Everyone thought this would be the next great one. It surely looked like it. Well, Captain Brown died in 1894. The year Benny was eligible to race, he was sold along with the farm to L.V. L.V. was a harness-racing man but he wouldn’t have minded winning the Derby. Anyway, Benny started out brilliantly, winning everything and then just fizzled. No
one knows why. He was sound. L.V. retired him, hoping he might prove useful as a stud. But then Lela, L.V.’s one daughter, he had two, fell in love with Benny, who was sweet. He became her favorite horse. She foxhunted him and when he died in 1921, she created a memorial. Benny is the only Thoroughbred buried in that graveyard, placed a little off to the side, under the trees.”

“She must have loved him very much.”

“It’s a wonderful story. The Chetwynds, your Chetwynds, did a lot of business in Kentucky, as you said. Old Thomas Chetwynd and L.V. were pals, according to Meg. Kindred spirits perhaps. Thomas had the big slate covering the tomb made, cut, engraved, and brought it out from Virginia to here. I guess there are a lot of slate quarries in central Virginia.”

“Yes. We hunt a fixture with an abandoned quarry on it. A seam of land running under a few counties, kind of like your limestone, I guess.”

“Anyway, that’s how Benny came to rest. The first Standardbred buried in what we all now know as the cemetery was Notelet, who died in 1917, and of course by then L.V. was gone. He died in 1915.”

“I don’t suppose anyone has an idea who it was down there with Benny,” said Sister, her interest piqued, inflamed really.

“No. It surely seems to be murder. You don’t just reopen a grave and stick someone and their dog in it.”

“True enough and it couldn’t have been a robbery. No one would leave a gold watch.”

“Meg said police took the watch with them after looking it over carefully at the site. No initials on it but a horsehead is engraved on the back. So I suspect whoever was down there was in the business.”

“Or an inveterate gambler,” speculated Sister.

“Didn’t think of that.”

“No good will come of this. I don’t care how long someone has
been entombed, when you disturb them, troubles follow.” Sister shivered for a second as she felt the old evil of the deed.

“I wonder if troubles will follow finding and moving Richard the Third.” O.J., an avid reader and history buff, had followed that recent news story with great interest. The bones of the former English king—killed in 1485 in the Battle of Bosworth Field—were found under a parking lot.

“In one way or another it will, but I’m sure the British are equal to it. My worry is this is our problem. Well, I certainly hope it doesn’t bring trouble to Meg and Alan, or others that we know.”

“Sister, isn’t it creepy to think someone has been down there for one hundred and thirteen years and no one knew?”

“That’s just it. Someone did know.”

Clutching a bottle of hyaluronic acid, Crawford Howard leaned over the counter of the Westlake Equine Clinic. Barbara Engles, the receptionist, printed out the receipt just as one of the partners in the clinic emerged from the rear of the facility.

“Crawford, how are you and how is Czpaka?” asked the veterinarian, Penny Hinson.

“Good. This stuff works. I take it myself. Physicians warn us not to use vet products but hyaluronic acid is hyaluronic acid and it’s a lot cheaper here.”

Wise in the ways of bumping up any human pharmaceutical cost, Penny nonetheless didn’t want to counter a human doctor’s caution. She smiled. “So both you and your horse have good working joints.”

“Marty’s horse, too,” he said, mentioning his wife and her horse.

Kasmir Barbhaiya came through the door. “A convocation!” he exclaimed.

Crawford Howard, a self-made man originating along with his fortune from Indiana, respected Kasmir. Crawford felt that anyone who made wagonfuls of money was smarter than someone who didn’t. “How’s Nighthawk?”

A large smile wreathed the kind fellow’s face, for Kasmir, like most foxhunters, dearly loved his equine partner. “A bad boy. Oh my, yes, a very bad boy.”

Penny unzipped her coveralls, smears of mud and some blood on them. “What did he do now?”

“Stole my Borsalino. Oh, a lovely navy hat it was, and he snatched it right off my head.”

“Did he put it on his?” Penny smiled at Kasmir.

“No, he ran all the way to the end of his paddock, all the way back, then dropped it in his water trough.”

Crawford chuckled. “Give him credit for good taste. You never wear anything shabby.”

“You are too kind,” Kasmir demurred. “I wish you would rejoin the hunt club, Crawford. Yes, I do.” Kasmir held up both hands palm outward as this was a vexing subject. “You must hear what happened in Lexington, Kentucky. A most remarkable thing.”

He told the three about the sudden pogonip, the sleet, the long ride back to the barns and then the discovery at the Walnut Hall dinner.

“A gold watch?” Crawford stroked his chin.

“Oh, that poor little dog.” Barbara couldn’t care less about the watch.

“Did they find a body?” Penny got down to business.

“I read
The Lexington Herald
online,” Kasmir informed them. “They did, but whose body they don’t know. A stray skeleton, ah, too many deaths, I think.”

“How do they go about notifying the next of kin if they can’t identify the remains?” Crawford remarked.

“Who would know?” Kasmir replied.

“Exactly,” Penny sensibly said as Mercer Laprade came through the door.

“Ah, Mercer,” said Kasmir. “I was just telling the ladies and Crawford about the branch cracking the slate covering the horse’s tomb.”

Mercer was careful around Crawford, as he hoped one day the rich man would breed Thoroughbreds to Mercer’s profit. “It was a joint meet with one excitement after another.”

“You two should come hunt with me.” Crawford then added with vigor, “The hell with the MFHA and who would know? My Dumfriesshires are good hounds.”

He mentioned the Master of Foxhounds Association of America and a type of hound that originated in Scotland, hence the name. As Crawford ran or tried to run an outlaw pack, members of recognized hunts could not hunt with him without jeopardizing their status with other recognized hunts. The rub was how does one enforce this and Crawford well knew it. He had no intention of submitting to MFHA rules, hence the term outlaw pack.

Kasmir inclined his head in a small bow. “You are most hospitable.” Then he quickly changed the subject, turning to Mercer. “You would remember, what was the name of the horse whose memorial covering was smashed?”

“Benny Glitters,” Mercer quickly answered as he, too, wanted to slide away from the outlaw pack discussion.

“Yes, yes, that’s it.”

Mercer was eager to share his knowledge, hoping Crawford would be a bit impressed. “Benny Glitters was a son of the great Domino. Captain Brown, who owned him and the farm then called Senorita, thought he would equal his sire on the track. A beautiful fellow, Benny. Alas, he went up like a rocket and came down like a stick, which was unusual since Domino usually passed on talent. His son, Commando, for example, another great horse.”

Crawford placed the bottle back on the counter. “Benny washed out?”

“The farm was bought by L.V. Harkness, who changed the name to Walnut Hall,” said Mercer. “One of his daughters fell in love with Benny, who more or less went with the farm. He lived to a ripe old age, twenty-nine. He was so loved he was buried at the farm, the only Thoroughbred in the graveyard. So that’s how Benny wound up where he did. His father, by the way, is buried at Hira-Villa, Kentucky. Domino died in 1897. A great, great horse. You can never trace pedigree back far enough.”

“It’s worked for you.” Crawford nodded, acknowledging Mercer’s success. For Crawford, success meant money, which led to prestige.

“A bit of care and most people can see some profit in Thoroughbreds.” Mercer was shrewd and knew not to push it. He also did not expand on his views concerning the upsetting graveyard incident.

“Um.” Crawford picked up the bottle again. “Well, I’m on my way to Old Paradise.”

Both Kasmir and Mercer held their breath for an instant, and Penny’s eyebrows rose.

“A place steeped in history.” Kasmir always felt the romance of Old Paradise. His holding, Tattenhall Station, lay across the road from Old Paradise. Both places encompassed thousands of acres.

“Steeped in history and stupidity,” said Crawford. “The DuCharme brothers, thanks to their ridiculous feud, never realized the profits the place could bring. The last smart DuCharme was the one who created the place and that was after the War of 1812. The rest drifted along.” Obviously, he disdained the distinguished old family.

“Perhaps,” Kasmir said noncommittally. Although a recent resident of this beautiful area, he took pains to learn the history of the farms as well as the people.

“Perhaps? The brothers are idiots and all over a woman. This was back in the 1960s.” He laughed. “And it’s not like Binky’s wife is Helen of Troy.”

No one said a word.

Then Penny remarked diplomatically, “Your efforts are bringing the place back. The sad Corinthian columns, all that’s left from the great fire—the sight of them always gives me chills.”

“Marty says that, too.” Crawford had often heard this from his wife.

“Crawford, you like history.” Mercer fed him a compliment. “The boars on top of the pillars to your entrance were the symbol of Warwick the Kingmaker, the man who put Edward the Fourth on the throne.”

Crawford lapped it up. “A man who knew how the world truly works. I have always admired him and when I first went to England I visited where he is buried.”