Harry walked with Mim into the lovely paneled tack room. The air was nippy even though the sun was high.
"Where's Chark?"
"Other end of the barn. He's finishing up the last set. Bang 'em out early, as he says."
Harry sat down as Mim pointed to a seat covered in a handsome dark plaid. Harry could have lived happily in Mim's tack room, which was prettier than her living room.
"Mim, I know that Mickey Townsend drove over to tell you about the unfounded charges leveled against Fair. Fair dropped by last night. This is outrageous"—her face reddened—"for somebody to smear one of the best vets in practice. Do you have any idea who would pull a stunt like this?"
"No." Mim sat down opposite Harry. "I called Colbert and Arthur first thing this morning and told them the inquiry had better be fast and be quiet or I am going to make life sheer hell for everyone." She held up her hand as if requesting silence from an audience. "I also told them it's a waste of time when they have far more important things to do."
"Well, that's why I'm here. You're one of the most powerful people in the association." Mim murmured denial even as she was pleased to hear it, and Harry continued. "I dropped by Ned Tucker's this morning. Susan filled him in. He said he would represent Fair, no charge. He drafted a letter, which I have right here."
As Mim read, her eyebrows knitted together and then she smiled. "Good show, Ned."
The letter said in exhaustive legalese that Fair had no intention of submitting to an inquiry without a formal accusation. If this was allowed to continue, then every veterinarian, trainer, and jockey could be paralyzed by poisonous gossip. He demanded his accuser come forward, that a formal complaint be filed. Once that was accomplished, he would defend himself.
"What do you think? Rather, what do you think the National Steeplechase Association will think?" Harry took the letter back from Mim's outstretched hand, sporting only her wedding band and engagement diamond today.
"I expect they'll nail the accuser straightaway. But can you get Fair to sign this? You know how he is about honor. Nineteenth century, but then that's what makes him such a splendid man."
"Of course I can't get him to sign it. He thinks people should resolve their differences any way they can before resorting to lawyers. He doesn't understand that America doesn't work that way anymore. The minute we're born we put some lawyer on retainer."
"So what's the solution here?"
"Uh—Mim, what I had hoped is that you would fax this to Colbert. Maybe write a note that Ned Tucker came to you with this because he doesn't want the association further embarrassed. You know, the murder, public relations problems, et cetera. You want to give Colbert and Arthur, too, plenty of warning so they can frame a response should the press jump on this." Harry breathed deeply. She hadn't realized how nervous she was.
Mim sank back in the chair, painted nails tapping the armrests. "Harry, you are far more subtle than I give you credit for— of course I'll do it."
"Oh, thank you. Fair will never know unless Colbert tells him."
"I'll hint in my cover letter that if this can be rapidly resolved, the signed letter will never arrive. Fair will drop legal proceedings."
Harry beamed. "You're so smart."
"No—you are. And you're still in love with him."
"That's what everyone says, but no, I'm not." Harry quickly replied. "I love him. It's different. He's a friend and a good man, and he doesn't deserve this smear job. He'd do the same for me."
"Yes, he would."
As Mim and Harry discussed Fair, love, Jim, Bazooka, Miranda's choir group's fund-raiser for the Church of the Holy Light, as well as the kitchen sink, Mrs. Murphy and Tucker chatted up the barn cat, a strong, large ginger named Rodger Dodger. His tortoiseshell girlfriend, Pusskin, slept in the hayloft, worn out from chasing a chipmunk that morning.
Bazooka, being wiped down in the wash stall, listened disappointedly because the other animals weren't talking about him.
"How's hunting?" Rodger Dodger asked Mrs. Murphy.
"Good."
"Oh, yeah, she kills her play mouse nightly." Tucker giggled.
"Shut up. I account for my share of mice and moles."
"Don't forget the blue jay. That put Mom right over the edge." Tucker gloated.
"I hated that blue jay."
"I hate them, too," Rodger solemnly agreed. "They zoom down from twelve o'clock directly above you and peck you. Then peel out and zoom away. I'd kill every one if I could."
"What's going on around here?" Tucker changed the subject from rodent and fowl kills. Now, if they wanted to discuss how to turn cattle or sheep, she could offer many stories.
Rodger swept his whiskers forward, stepping close to the tiger cat and corgi. "Last night someone took Orion out of his stall, put him in the cross ties, and dug around in the stall, but was interrupted. Whoever it was covered the hole back up and put Orion in the stall."
"Can you smell anything in the stall?"
"Earth." Rodger Dodger rested on his haunches.
"Let's take a look." Mrs. Murphy scampered down the aisle. Since Orion was a hunter, he was playing outside in a field. The animals could go into his stall.
Tucker put her nose to the ground. The cats pawed the wood shavings away. The ground had indeed been freshly turned over.
Mrs. Murphy cautiously investigated the other corners of the stall. Nothing.
"Doesn't make sense, does it?" Rodger observed Tucker.
"I don't know." She lifted her head, inhaled fresh air, then put her nose back to the smoothed-over spot. "If we could get someone to dig here I might find something. If anything was removed, I would smell that." She sniffed again. "Right now it's blank."
The three animals sat in the stall.
"Do you know who it was?" Tucker asked.
"No, I was out in the machine shed last night. Good pickings. When Orion made mention of it on his way out this morning, I was too groggy to grill him."
"Let's go ask Orion." Mrs. Murphy left the stall just as Bazooka was put into his stall by Chark Valiant.
"You don't have to ask Orion," the steel gray told them. "I saw who it was. Coty Lamont."
"Coty Lamont!" Mrs. Murphy exclaimed. Rodger jumped on the tack trunk in front of Bazooka's stall and got on his hind legs to chat with the horse. "Bazooka, why was he here?"
"He didn't say," Bazooka sarcastically replied. "But Mickey Towns-end tiptoed in and shut the stall door with Coty in there. Coty tried to get out but Mickey wouldn't let him. He told him to cover it back up, and to come with him."
"Old Kotex hates Mickey." Mrs. Murphy used Coty's nickname. "For that matter, so does Chark Valiant."
"Bet Coty didn't go," Tucker said.
"Oh, but he did." Bazooka relished the tale. "Mickey pulled a gun on him and told him he had to go with him."
"Did he go?" Tucker's lustrous eyes widened.
"Sure he did. See, I don't know how he got here. Mickey just tiptoed into the barn," Bazooka added. "Anyway, Mickey told him to put his hands behind his head. He unbolted the stall, and Coty walked in front of him."
"Boy, is that weird." Rodger Dodger scratched his side with his hind leg.
It was more than weird, because that night at dusk Coty Lamont, the best steeplechase jockey of his generation, was discovered on a dirt road in eastern Albemarle County right off Route 22. He was laid out in the bed of his Ford 350 dually pickup truck painted in his favorite metallic maroon. The Queen of Spades was over his heart, a stiletto driven through it.
Rick Shaw lost cigarette lighters the way small children lose gloves. He used disposable lighters because of this. Pulling a see-through lime-green lighter from his coat pocket, he studied the corpse in the truck.