One Hoof In The Grave [Carriage Driving 02] (41 page)

“I never dreamed she’d fire across the arena that way.” I sniffled. “She might have shot Ned.”

I could feel his chest shake.

“What?” I pulled away from him. “You’re
laughing
?”

“I ought to know by now—horses first, people second.”

“God, the horses!” I pulled away from him and ran to the judge’s tent. Drivers, grooms and spectators were hanging around gossiping and grousing, not having a clue what had happened. I wasn’t about to enlighten them. Not about Catherine, at any rate.

First I apologized for the uproar and offered to refund their money for their cancelled classes this afternoon and the clinic scheduled for Sunday.

“Why can’t
you
teach the clinic?” Harry Tolliver asked from the crowd. “You have the skill and the credentials. I’d value a lesson with you.” He looked around. Several heads nodded. “How about it, people? Same schedule, different clinician?”

Amazingly, everyone agreed, even Marvin Cudlow.

That left the remains of Saturday afternoon’s show. We had no dressage judge, until Peggy stepped up and whispered, “Casey still wants to drive her dressage test. If you’ll drive with her, Dick can judge her
hors de concours
. He can judge the rest of the afternoon.”

“She wants to drive?” I looked over Peggy’s shoulder at Hank heading Ned. Casey’s carriage only had a couple of scratches in the paint. Carriages have to be tough. All we had to do was to put back the PVC rails Ned had knocked down. I nodded. “We don’t have an EMT.”

“Sandi’s had some training. She can help out in a pinch. Please God we won’t have any other accidents,” Peggy said.

“Then if Dick’s agreeable, have at it.”

I made the announcement, and again everyone agreed.

Geoff walked across the arena with me. “I can see killing Raleigh,” I said. “Heck I could have killed him myself half a dozen times. But trying to run us off the road with Golden and Ned in the trailer?” I shook my head. “There must have been a better way to handle the situation with Troy.”

“Killers can’t see any other way out.“

“In the end, she only made things worse for everybody.”

“Murder frequently does.”

The rest of the show went well. Casey drove Ned brilliantly, and all the clients and spectators seemed happy. I am a good teacher. A number of people asked me to have another fun show and clinic in another couple of months.

We’d see.

Peggy finished feeding the horses in pasture, while I settled the boarding horses down. Geoff leaned against the wall opposite and watched me. We’d agreed to pick up burgers and eat at my little apartment. What would happen during the meal and afterwards—mostly afterwards—I couldn’t guess, but I had hopes.

I was coiling the water hose when I heard his cell phone behind me. He answered, listened, and let forth with a string of cusswords. The ones in English I knew. The Spanish ones, not so much.

“All right, dammit,” he said, flipped his phone off and came to me.

“Problem?” I asked. Stupid question. His face told me he was furious.

He took my arm, guided me into the feed room and shut the door.

My heart sank. “What’s happened?”

“Some boaters just found a cigarette boat beached on Jekyll Island, full of holes and covered in blood.” He looked grim. “I’m headed down there.” He shook his head. “What is it with us?”

“Bad Karma?”

“Nuts.” He kissed me, and this time there was no tenderness. It was more like a ten round title bout. When we finally separated, he said, “Stay out of trouble until I get back.”

What trouble could I possibly get into?

(Continue reading for an excerpt of
The Cart before the Corpse
)

The Cart Before The Corpse

Book One

The Merry Abbot Carriage-Driving Mysteries

Excerpt

Sunday Afternoon, Chattanooga, Tennessee

Merry

I should learn to count chickens instead of eggs.

I’d already packed my computer and printer in my truck and checked out of my motel. The scores were posted on all the driving classes except the cross-country marathon. As show manager, I’d passed out ribbons and trophies. Once the marathon ended and the scores were tallied, I could drive away from the horseshow grounds with a happy grin and a fat check.

That’s when I heard the screams. “Runaway!” I turned and raced across the field toward the start of the marathon course. When the screams continued, I knew this was more than a loose trace.

Please God some nervous horse had yanked his lead line from his groom and wandered off to graze, or decided he didn’t feel like being harnessed to his carriage today and trotted away dragging his reins and harness behind him.

Just so long as he wasn’t also dragging a carriage.

A runaway horse harnessed to a driverless carriage is a four-legged missile with no guidance system.

I was still fifty yards from the start of the marathon course when I saw Jethro, Pete and Tully Hull’s Morgan stallion, kick out with both hind feet and connect with the steel dashboard of their heavy marathon cart with a God-awful clang. Terrified, Jethro reared straight up in his traces and tossed both Pete and Tully off the carriage and into the dirt.

“He’s going over backwards!” somebody screamed.

Amy Hull, Pete and Tully’s thirteen-year-old daughter, clung to the back of the carriage. Her normal job was as counterbalance around fast turns. Now, she was trying to keep both Jethro and the carriage from landing on top of her.

“Jump and roll, Amy!” I shouted. “Get out of the way!”

She jumped, landed on her feet and rolled away from the carriage. With less weight to overbalance him, Jethro came down solidly on all fours, Thank God.

But then he took off at a dead run across the field, with the carriage careening wildly after him.

Still screaming warnings, some people ran to help the Hulls. Competitors stamped on their carriage brakes and reined their own horses in hard to keep the course from erupting into a re-run of the chariot race in
Ben Hur
. Poor Jethro was terrified. With the eighteen-foot reins flying behind him, the carriage had become his personal banshee. He had to escape it if it killed him.

It might. As well some of the rest of us, horses, competitors, trainers and spectators alike, if we didn’t stop him. And nobody else was trying. Everybody not rushing to help the Hulls dove out of the way, cowered behind trucks and horse vans, huddled in the tents with the food and the vendors and prayed that Jethro wouldn’t decide to charge them.

Jethro weighed three quarters of a ton. The steel marathon carriage weighed only slightly less. The horse had become a runaway eighteen-wheeler with four legs and a terrified brain.

He craved sanctuary. He was desperate to find his people so they could get the monster off his tail. He didn’t know he’d left them behind in the dirt. Somehow I had to focus his attention on
me
, let him know that one human being wanted to save him from the monster that chased him.

He swerved past a four-wheeled spider phaeton pulled by a huge black Friesian gelding. Friesians were originally bred to carry Lancelot in full knightly armor, so they’re graceful but massive. The axles passed one another with barely room for a single piece of blotting paper between them. Anne Crawford, on the Friesian’s reins, stood up and screamed. Her Queen Mary hat with its pheasant tail and orange tulle flew off her head and landed on the Friesian’s broad rump. The Friesian kicked at it.

The hat fell in the dirt and the Friesian relaxed, thank the Lord.

Jethro spun through a ninety-degree corner around the stables. The carriage rocked dangerously but righted itself. Then he headed straight for the parking area where over forty trailers and trucks were closely aligned in rows.

I ran to cut Jethro off, waved my arms and yelled to get his attention in hopes he’d be so startled he’d pull up or swerve away before he reached the narrow lanes between the vehicles.

He knew how wide
his
body was, and that he could fit between the trailers and trucks. He didn’t have a clue how wide the carriage behind him was. If it stuck hard, he’d be yanked up on a dime. The steel carriage might disintegrate.

Jethro could break his neck. Carriages are replaceable. Jethro was not.

Jethro galloped straight at me. Behind him the carriage caromed from side to side and clanged as it side-swiped trailers and trucks like the steel ball in a pinball machine.

At the last minute, I dove between a silver
dually
and a bright red Ford Two-Fifty truck as Jethro thundered by, still pursued by his invisible banshee. If he even noticed me, he darned well didn’t care. I wasn’t one of
his
people. He headed for the access road, the only paved road on the farm the road that cars and trucks drove on—cars and trucks that might collide head-on with Jethro.

I sprinted across the field in front of the stable. If I could get ahead of him . . . He came out from between the final pair of horse trailers and swerved onto the road as I reached it.

Without warning, his aluminum shoes slipped on the paving, and all four feet flew out from under him. He crashed onto his side and tipped the carriage. His sharp hooves flailed the air.

I knew he’d start struggling to his feet in about ten seconds. I did the only thing I could do. I yanked off my jacket, tossed it over his head, sat on his neck and leaned both hands on his shoulder.

The minute I covered his eyes and he felt my weight, Jethro relaxed. He was drenched with sweat, his sides heaved, and every muscle trembled, but in his mind the banshee wasn’t after him any longer, although I could still hear the wheels spinning behind him. I didn’t dare turn to look.

“Somebody undo the girth! Unhook the tugs and the traces!” I shouted over my shoulder. “Get this carriage off him!” He shivered and struggled, but quieted when I spoke to him gently and caressed his sweaty neck.

“You’re okay, sweetie,” I whispered. I could recite nursery rhymes so long as my voice stayed calm and my hands caressed his neck. He trusted that I could free him of the banshee. Behind me, I heard people shouting, calling for knives to cut the harness free. Careful to keep his eyes covered, I rocked Jethro up on his shoulder just far enough to allow the steel shaft under him to be pulled free, then pressed his head down once more onto the pavement. A minute later, both shafts slid backward away from the horse. I couldn’t take my eyes off him, but I could hear people grunting as they shifted the weight of the carriage. I kept stroking and talking.

After what seemed like an eternity I felt a hand on my shoulder. “Merry, we’ve got the carriage up and the harness free. Time to get him up.” My heart lurched. So long as Jethro stayed quiet under me, so long as he didn’t scramble to his feet and try to walk, we didn’t have to assess his injuries.

I didn’t want to know. If he’d broken a leg . . .

The first thing you learn around horses is how fragile they are in mind and body. You protect them and care for them as well as you can. Sometimes that’s not enough, but it’s the job we sign on for. They can’t take care of themselves. I’d tried to help Jethro, but I had no idea whether I’d been successful.

“Merry, I’m going to haul you back away from him on your butt. Don’t want you catching a hoof in the head when he tries to stand.” I felt strong hands under my armpits. I knew the voice. Jack, the Johnsons’ groom. Probably strong enough to lift
Jethro
if he had to. He swung me away and to my feet as though I weighed about as much as a little Jack Russell Terrier, then dropped a heavy brown arm across my shoulders and turned me against his chest. Behind me I heard Jethro’s hooves scrabbling. “He’s up, Merry. You can look.”

I felt Jethro’s warm breath against my neck as I faced him and leaned my shoulder against his. “Please be okay,” I whispered. Jack hooked a hand on his bridle, but Jethro was too worn out to go anywhere. The stallion took a tentative step, snorted once to frighten any residue of banshee away, then took two more steps. He walked ‘dead sound,’ meaning without injury, in civilian terms. He was bleeding from a couple of shallow cuts on his shoulder, probably from collisions with the fenders of trailers. He’d scraped himself a bit from the asphalt on the road, but the damage was minor. A few stitches, a little Betadine antiseptic, and he’d be fine. Amazing that he hadn’t ripped a leg tendon on the fender of a truck or gashed himself to the bone on a trailer door.

“Merry, honey,” Jack said, “Idn’t that your good leather jacket?”