“Or they both could have been deliberately infected and, somehow in the time it takes to die from rabies—one to three months, that’s what the humans have been saying—” Pewter was getting excited now, “Barry became more of a nuisance or got closer. I think that’s what happened, and I think that whatever this is about has to do with St. James.”
“Oh, no,” the swallows said in chorus.
Madison said quite firmly, “There’s nothing here. Nothing out of the way; I mean, Barry and Sugar bred broodmares, trained horses, took in lay-ups. People came through—customers, vets, friends—but it was all business. I never even heard an argument, except with Carmen.” He asked his friends, “Did any of you?”
“No,” they answered in unison.
Madison hopped one step closer. “I can appreciate that you’re curious. Cats are notoriously curious. I’m sure you’d like to figure this out, but all your thoughts, if you’ll pardon me, seem convoluted.”
“They are,” Mrs. Murphy warmly agreed with him. “Because we don’t know what this is about. Once we understand the motive, this will be crystal clear and simple.”
Thelma flew down next to Madison.
“Mama!” Their children really squealed now.
“Hush,” Thelma commanded. She looked the three groundlings in the eye. “There is one other thing. The girlfriend, Carmen. She was sleeping with both of them.”
“Aha!” Pewter smiled.
“Barry and Carmen had broken up,” Tucker said.
“Oh, they’d break up and get back together, and even when they’d break up, she’d sleep with him.” Thelma shrugged.
“Did each man know about the other?” Tucker thought Carmen’s schedule demanding.
“Sugar knew about Barry, of course, but Barry didn’t know about Sugar,” Thelma, her eyes bright and black, responded. “Didn’t last long with Sugar, though. That Carmen is a no-good tart, if you ask me.”
Up at the racetrack, Alicia pointed out to Aunt Tally and Harry where Ziggy Flame’s paddock used to be. After Ziggy disappeared and Mary Pat never came home, over the years the five-board paddock fell apart. As no other stallions came to St. James, there was no reason to build a stallion paddock.
“You have a good memory,” Aunt Tally said.
“It seems like yesterday. It’s odd. Time plays tricks on you.” Alicia folded her arms across her chest. “Harry, you’re too young to understand.”
“I know it’s flying by.” Harry smiled.
“I walked out the other morning in the heavy fog. At first I couldn’t breathe for the emotions, but now,” Alicia looked around at the estate, each building laid out with care, everything aesthetically pleasing, “I love it all over again.”
“You were hurt.” Aunt Tally, as always, cut straight to the bone. “No wonder your inspection visits were short.”
“Bad enough we didn’t know where Mary Pat and Ziggy were. Worse to be the prime suspect. The whispers, the cold shoulders.” She stared out across the infield. “All those people silently disapproving of our relationship could use this as an excuse to be ugly. While Mary Pat was alive I was protected by her aura, her wealth. When she disappeared, the ugliness was unveiled. The people who were good to me were Harry’s mother and father, Miranda and George, Tally, Mim, and Jim. And that was it.”
“They certainly ate crow when they found out you’d inherited the kit and kaboodle. Course, that took a year. Mary Pat had to be declared legally dead. It was complicated, but you emerged the winner.” Aunt Tally relished the tale. “What really shocked them was when they found out she’d adopted you. Smart, that Mary Pat. Very smart. It was the only way she could legally protect you. Did you know you’d been adopted?”
“Yes.” Alicia closed her eyes for a moment. “Since gay people couldn’t get married, they had to find ways to protect one another. By adopting me, Mary Pat made it very difficult for someone to contest the will. Also, if she’d been critically ill, I would have been able to visit her in the hospital as next of kin. Heterosexuals don’t realize how many barriers there are for gay people in situations like hospitalization. It’s better now in some places where domestic partnership is recognized by the state, but when we were together it was still the Dark Ages. I live a marvelous life because of Mary Pat, but I’d give back every penny to see her walk out from those racing barns. You can’t compare money with life, you just can’t. And I know you know that, Aunt Tally.”
“Speaking of eating crow.” Harry’s eyes narrowed, for bounding toward them were the three animals, with Pewter carrying feathers in her mouth.
Before leaving the barn, Pewter asked the swallows if they’d houseclean. She wanted some nice long tail feathers or wing feathers.
They complied, and she picked them up only to race out of the barn, followed by Mrs. Murphy and Tucker.
“She is the biggest fake in the world,” Mrs. Murphy spat.
Tucker, running alongside the tiger cat, said, “They’ll never believe her.”
“She’s killed a bird.” Aunt Tally rapped her cane on the ground.
“Pewter, how could you?” Harry disapproved.
Pewter, upon reaching Harry, dropped the feathers and rubbed against Harry’s leg. “I am a mighty hunter.”
“Gag me.” Mrs. Murphy sat on the feathers for spite.
37
What do you make of it?” Cooper leaned toward Fair’s computer screen.
Fair examined the latest data on reported rabies cases, nonhuman, in Virginia. “That we are, fortunately, in a valley of the rabies cycle.”
Cynthia Cooper had brought over Jerome’s computer discs, his handwritten notes, plus a detailed U.S. Geographical Survey topographical map he’d had for the St. James area, since that’s where the rabies seemed to have broken out.
It was seven-thirty in the evening, and long, late rays of sun were slanting over meadows outside.
“Being at the bottom of the trough makes it unlikely for humans to be exposed?” Cooper asked.
“In theory, yes, but we know there’s always a pool of the rabies virus in existence. It never goes away. It flares up, then subsides.”
“Hmm, nothing new here. Go to his suspect file.”
Fair clicked, bringing up Jerome’s icons, while at the bottom of the screen a bikini-clad woman walked across with a sign over her head reading “Suspects.”
Laughing, Fair said, “Jerome was more of a computer nerd than I would have thought.”
“I just saw the nerd.” Cooper felt guilty.
“Here we are.” Fair opened the file and beheld photos of a raccoon, a skunk, a possum, a bat, a cow, and a horse. “And he had a sense of humor.”
“I never was witness to it. When’s the last time you treated a horse for rabies?”
“Never. I’ve given the shots. But there was a case years ago in Greene County.”
She waved her hand. “I know. I was hoping we’d find something new.”
“But your people have been over this.”
“They aren’t veterinarians.”
“What else is on here that you want me to examine?”
“Jerome never used your services, did he?”
“Cooper, Jerome didn’t know one end of a horse from the other.”
“Well, look at this.” She reached across Fair’s broad chest, took the mouse, moved it, clicked, and brought up another file.