“I’d be happy to take everyone back.” Edward touched the brim of his cap with his crop.
“Shaker, ready?”
“You read my mind.”
“Sybil,” Sister addressed a bedraggled Sybil, who had just joined them, “Shaker, Betty, and I will put hounds up. You ride back with the others.”
“Thank you.”
After each field member said, “Good night, Master,” and rode off, Sister turned to her hounds.
Edward took the riders back over the zigzag fences and followed the edge of the corn row. Tedi rode up front with him. Folks tried to stay within sight of one another.
The fog, pewter gray now, swirled droplets of moisture. People waited to jump the last coop into After All Farm, although you could barely see it until one stride in front of it.
Ralph Assumptio, boot to boot with Xavier, passed his old friend his flask.
“You know what? Let’s walk the fence line and find the gate. This is stupid. We have the whole rest of the hunt season in front of us, and I, for one, don’t want to buy real estate during cubbing.”
Xavier savored the marvelous port in Ralph’s flask. “You got that right, buddy.”
“I agree,” Ken called from in front of them, although they couldn’t see him.
“Me too,” Sybil chimed in.
The sound played tricks on them in the fog.
“Ron, you still with us?” Xavier asked.
“To your right.” Ron gently squeezed his horse, who walked forward, the two of them appearing spectral in the swirling mists.
Xavier handed Ron his flask.
“What do you have in yours?” Ralph asked Xavier.
“Schnapps.”
Ralph wrinkled his nose. “You carry that stuff so the rest of us won’t drink it.”
“I like it.”
Ken’s voice floated toward them. “Xavier, admit it.”
“Admit what? I like schnapps. I like sweet stuff. My waistline ought to prove that. Sybil, where the hell are you? Not with your husband, I hope. The entire point of foxhunting is to depart from one’s spouse.” He knocked back some of his schnapps. “Within limits, of course.”
“I’m on your left,” she called out.
Ken laughed. “Xavier, don’t give my wife ideas.”
They heard a rub up ahead at the jump. Someone’s horse’s hind hooves literally rubbed on the jump.
“If I recall, the hand gate is maybe two hundred yards down the line, wrong direction from the house, but we can follow the fence line back once we’re through the gate.”
Rolling his shoulders, Ralph replied, “Well, let’s do it. It’s too damned raw out here.”
Ken’s voice again reached them. “I’ll go first. Why don’t we fall in line and try to keep the horse in front of you in view.”
Ron moved toward the fence, or what he thought was the fence. “I don’t hear anyone up ahead.”
“Must all be over.” Xavier picked up his reins.
“Or unconscious from missing that jump.” Ron laughed.
“We’d have heard the screams,” Ken called out, his voice moving farther and farther away.
“Sybil, where are you?” Ron asked.
“I’m the rear guard.”
“I’ll take your word for it.” Ralph raised his voice so she could hear, but the fog carried sounds strangely; little sounds were magnified.
“I’m here,” she called back reassuringly.
They walked along, silent for a few moments. The squish, squish of their horses’ hooves accentuated the increasingly dismal day.
A soft whisper in his ear made Ralph sit up straight in his saddle. It sounded like “I’m going to kill you.”
“What’d you say?” Xavier, too, heard the whisper.
“Nothing,” Sybil replied, soaked and cold.
Ralph, the fence line to his right, now heard, “I know it was you.” He couldn’t quite recognize the voice. A knife edge of fear ripped at his stomach.
Ron turned in his saddle. “Where the hell is the gate?”
Xavier grumbled, “I don’t know.”
Ken called, “Keep up.”
“We’re behind you,” Ron called back. “Just moving slower.”
“Gate, please.” Ken uttered the traditional foxhunting command that directed the last person to close the gate.
Ralph thought he was between Ron and Xavier, but he could no longer see them.
Ron reached the opened gate, passing through. “Sybil, gate please,” he bellowed.
“Okay,” she responded, her voice fading away.
The voice whispered in Ralph’s ear again. “Time to join Hotspur.”
Ralph pressed with his right leg, and his horse swerved left. He didn’t pass through the gate, but instead he tore off through the cornfield.
Ron heard him take off. “What the shit is going on?”
Xavier clucked to his horse and caught up to Ron. “What’s going on?”
“That’s just what I said.” Ron frowned. “Ralph!” No response. “Sybil.”
“Here I am.” She appeared out of the silver.
“What’s going on?” Ron again asked.
“I don’t know.” Sybil shrugged.
“Well, Ralph’s not here.” Ron yelled, “Ken!”
“Yo,” Ken called back, from an indeterminate distance.
Xavier leaned forward. “Look, we’re going to get lost out here. Let’s trot. The sooner we get back the better.”
“Yeah, but where’s Ralph?” Ron, truly worried now, pointed his crop at Xavier.
“I don’t know.” Xavier knocked his crop away with his own crop. “What are you so worried about? For all we know, he’s ahead of us. Maybe he’s ahead of Ken.”
“We can’t leave him.”
“You two go back. I know this country. I’ll look for him,” Sybil calmly replied.
“Sybil, we can’t leave a lady out here. I’m telling you, there’s a storm coming up,” Ron said sternly.
“Don’t think of me as a lady. Think of me as a whipper-in and there’s a lost hound. I’d be out then. Just tell Ken when you see him that I’ll be late getting in and not to worry. If the weather turns nasty I’ll put my horse up at Sister’s.” She disappeared into the fog.
“Sybil! Sybil!” Ron shouted.
Then they both heard a light rap on the coop.
“She’s going the wrong way,” Xavier exhaled, thoroughly tired of the whole thing. “Come on, Ron.”
“Something is really wrong. I don’t think we should leave them.”
“Leave Ralph? We don’t know where he is, and Sybil’s right, she does know the territory even if she is heading in the wrong direction,” Xavier said.
Ron’s eyes narrowed. “How do you know it was Sybil who just took that jump?”
“Look, old buddy, I’ll grant you that things have been really crazy. But maybe Ralph got sick of crawling through the mist. Maybe he spurred on and he’s halfway back to the trailers by now.”
“He turned in the opposite direction. I heard him hit the corn.”
“What do you mean?”
Ron shook his helmet as a raindrop hit the velvet top. “I heard the stalks, the leaves, you know, the long leaves. I heard them hitting him.”
Xavier sat silent, then spoke. “Hear anything else?”
“Just that rub on the fence when Sybil jumped in. She should have headed back toward Sister’s.”
“We have to go in. We do. We can’t do anything to help. It’s going to rain. It’s already raining.” Xavier peered up into the deepening gray as the drizzle slicked his face. “If they aren’t there, then we can worry. Come on.”
With reluctance, Ron passed through the gate, waited for Xavier to walk through, then he leaned over from atop his kind, patient horse and closed the gate, dropping the metal kiwi latch, shaped like a comma, through the steel circle.
Ralph galloped through the corn. His face wet, broad flat corn leaves were hitting him. He thought he heard hoofbeats behind him. He reached the farm road as the first raindrop splattered. If he had been in better command of himself he would have prudently turned left, jumped into the orchard, and ridden to Sister’s barn, perhaps a fifteen-minute trot. But panic had overtaken him, and he turned his horse right, pushing toward Hangman’s Ridge.