by Glenna Mason
Clancey paused for a breath and a sip of water. “Take your time, Mr. Clancey. You've had a slight concussion today,” Jane cautioned.
“Thanks, Ma'am. I will. I screamed – ah – well, an obscenity at the ba . . . —uh—two of 'em. They both glanced my way, but the shorter, slimmer one jest continued on with the horses.”
A scowl crossed Clancey's usually jovial face.
“Bloody bas—! Anyway I had no time to think. Well, Sir William, I might have had time, but I guess what I am sayin' is I didn't think. My horse was tethered yards away, and the barn was too far, so I jest automatic-like grabbed a creek stone, and screamin' bloody murder hightailed it up that hill.”
He smiled at Sir William. “There's precious few weapons that can be picked up in a Lucas field, I'm here to tell ya', so I counted myself lucky to be near the creek bed. Well, suh, thinkin' back, it might not've been so lucky, but I thought so at the time.
“The big dude, an ugly bruiser type, with a scruffy, unshaved chin and a head a hair that ain't seen a shampoo in ages—he waited for me, see, and he, well, he jest grabbed that there rock right out of my uplifted hand—I wuz a plannin' to bop him a good 'un—and conked my noggin a good 'un with it.”
He pointed to his bandaged skull. “Right 'ere,” he added.
“I went down and out,” Clancey said. “That's all I remember until the pretty miss here come ridin' up on her beautiful bay and rescued me like some knight in shining armor.” He nodded at Elizabeth. “Thank you very much, Dr. Elizabeth,” he said, sighing.
“And then I do not remember nothin' much till the pretty nurse was a takin' my temperature and the even prettier Doc came and patched me up. Thank you too, Dr. Jane.” He cracked a crooked smile, but it was evident that Clancey had a nasty headache because his eyes squinted uncomfortably with the smile.
Clancey looked gratefully at both the Bennet sisters and commented, “You two saved my life.”
First Elizabeth and then Jane patted Clancey's arm and then each showered him with the radiant Bennet smile.
“Can you describe them, Mr. Clancey?' the chief inquired. “Could you pick them out of a lineup?”
“Not the smaller one, no, sir. He wore goggles and a hat pulled down. I never got near him either. The big one I'd say prob'ly I could.
“I hopes these bloody bas . . . —excuse me, Misses—bloody villains get thrown in jail good and proper for takin' my princess and her baby boy. They'd better not hurt 'em, or they will answer to me—directly.”
“Clancey,” Sir William said, speaking for the first time, “you are to be commended for your valor and your commitment. I’m rewarding you with a substantial raise. In addition, I’m assigning Mr. O'Shaunesey to escort you on your rounds until this crime is put behind us. He can assist you in your duties in any way that you request, but his primary function is your protection until we catch the thieves. You did see them; that could potentially be a threat.”
Patting Clancey on the arm, Sir William assured him, “Rest and get well, Clancey. You will never face danger on my property again, if I can help it.” Sir William then bent down and embraced his top lad with a big hug, a very un-Lucas-like gesture.
Jane now interceded. “Gentlemen, I hope that you have your information because now my patient needs to take his medicine and get to sleep.” With a final pat on Clancey's arm, everyone except the nurse exited the room.
Jane peeked back through the door and said, “Rest now, Mr. Clancey. You’ve done a yeoman's job today.”
*****
Elizabeth, relieved to know that Clancey was going to be all right, could turn her full attention to the matter at hand. To say she felt conflicted would be an understatement. She was appalled that Stantonfield had just been robbed of its top property, but she couldn’t help but be elated. Here it was—the mystery she had secretly yearned for since she was a little girl.
“Well, at least it isn't a murder mystery,” Elizabeth confessed, as she drove her convertible home, the wind whipping her blond curls across her face. “Well, at least not yet,” she said aloud, as she held her hair back with her left hand. “If I ever get my hands on whoever stole Alexis and her three-month-old foal, well, there may be murder and mayhem both.” That decided she felt a whole lot better.
She had no idea how true her words would turn out to be.
*****
As Elizabeth sped toward her home, she finally remembered where her cell phone was—tucked safely in the glove box of her car. It rang as a reminder. Releasing the blowing locks, Elizabeth struggled to answer it quickly before the caller gave up. It was the Lucas secretary asking if she could come to an impromptu supper and meeting at Lucas’s house.
“That was quick. I just left Sir William fifteen minutes ago,” Elizabeth declared. “Seeing Clancey in a hospital bed must have spurred Sir William to action.”
*****
When Sir William's butler Cameron answered the door at Elizabeth's ring, she heard excited voices from the den down the hall. Elizabeth knew that Sir William had wanted all of his Pope Road neighbors here tonight, but as fate would have it only the Berea Road half were able to attend. The Lancaster Road half were unavailable at such short notice. How did Elizabeth know that? Elizabeth asked Cameron, as he escorted her down the entry hall; he answered her in his best butler fashion, succinctly and solemnly.
Pope Road was a country lane near Richmond, Kentucky, which curved around for four miles, dissecting horse farms of varying sizes. It stretched from Berea Road on one end to Lancaster Road at the other. It was unusual in that it was the one-and-only-street of tiny Claysmount, Kentucky, a village which was really just a post office and farms and congenial, committed neighbors.
Whatever happened to one resident of Pope Road was relevant and significant to all the others. Claysmount might be only a post office address, albeit an affluent one, but it was, nevertheless, a close-knit community.
Since it was the Berea Road contingent that had shown up, Elizabeth expected to see her sister Kitty, who, though she lived in Richmond and not on the lane, was the Stantonfield and Longbourn accountant and needed tonight for consultation, Jane and Charles, Maria Lucas and her husband, Gage Webb, plus Carol Lacy—oops—now Mrs. Carroll Carel, granddaughter and recent heir of Prescott Smith, whose family had received one of the county's original land grants some two-hundred years prior and still owned nine-hundred acres of prime bluegrass on Pope Road. She and her new husband of six months lived across the road from Sir William.
Also in attendance were Tommy and Jewell Dodd, whose lovely property abutted the Smith land, and was originally part of it. Tommy Dodd bought half the remaining portion of the land grant from Prescott Smith just five years ago, the Smith and Dodd families being lifelong associates. So Tommy and Jewell now had their own nine-hundred acres. They were a lively young couple, he from a well-respected Nicholasville family and she a New York City debutante, whom Tommy met while attending Columbia University. She, according to Tommy, was the jewel in her daddy's crown, until he heisted it.
And finally Elizabeth was looking forward to seeing her dear friend and fellow professor, Dr. James Joyce Carstairs, and his poet wife, Claire Evans. Their three-hundred acre farm, carved several years ago out of the Smith land grant, sat immediately across the road from the gate to the Bennet’s farm Longbourn, and next door to the Carel residence.
Elizabeth’s mother and father, Drs. Thomas and Francine Bennet, would not be in attendance as he, now retired from his medical profession, joined his wife in her life’s work, traveling the world to save animals from destruction and extinction . . . if he saved a few people along the way that was well and good. Elizabeth’s sister Mary, an accomplished photographer, accompanied them and displayed their work in such venues as The National Geographic. Lydia, the youngest of the five, was married to the reprobate George Wickham and resided at Ft Knox, where George was stationed as a lieutenant in the Army. Their son, Thomas George Wickham, was now four years old and much loved.
One might wonder how Dr. Francine Gardiner Bennet PhD., originally from the small town of Meryton in Hertfordshire, England, found the equally small Richmond Kentucky in the first place. Was it fate? No. Actually Francine, a brilliant and dedicated student of the first order, received a place at Princeton University as an undergraduate in Biology. When she graduated, she decided to get a Masters of Science degree in the center of horse country, so she could follow her dream of saving animals from the ravages of man—the horse being the number one recipient of concern on her list. She enrolled at EKU. As good luck would have it, mid-term, she got a painful wart on the bottom of her foot. One of her classmates mentioned that a handsome young doctor had just set up a practice in downtown Richmond. The doctor of course was Dr. Thomas Bennet. The rest was history. After the last of her five daughters entered grade school, Francine completed a doctorate degree at the University of Kentucky, twenty miles away.
The grandfather clock in the hallway struck the quarter hour, just as Elizabeth entered the family room. Sir William's den, usually so sedate and formal, was the most electric that she had ever seen it. Voices were at high pitch and overlapping
Jimmy Joyce arrested Elizabeth's attention first with “The callers are often wackos, but that does not stop them from wasting the time of the police.”
Carroll Carel added, “And naturally all those leads must be followed up, good, bad or indifferent.”
“Yes,” Jimmy Joyce concurred, “because this is the biggest case in Kentucky history probably. Seventeen racehorses stolen in two hours! The ramifications of failure by the police are huge.” Seventeen! Elizabeth was startled; she had not heard.
Elizabeth prepared to enter the fray, just as Sir William briefly restored a minimum of order. His rich tenor voice loudly invited, “Please replenish your drink, at your leisure.” It was apparently a welcome offer, for the guests gathered around the bar area.
For many years Sir William and his wife Lady Lucas, of Meryton, Hertfordshire, visited the Bennets in Kentucky, because Francine Bennet was not only a Gardiner from their hometown of Meryton, but also Lady Lucas’ best friend. As the years went by, the Lucas family came to love Kentucky almost as much as England, the two being so similar and so equally beautiful. When the premier horse farm Stantonfield became available, the Bennets contacted Sir William and he bought the property, which lay adjacent to their best friends’ estate, Longbourn. Lady Lucas died fifteen years ago, five years after the purchase of Stantonfield. Then five years later, when Sir William’s son John was old enough at twenty-two to run Lucas Lodge and the estate in Hertfordshire, Sir William and his youngest daughter Maria moved to Stantonfield to supervise one of the finest breeding enterprises in Kentucky, and thus the world. His older daughter Charlotte was of course married to clergyman William Collins and living in Kent near the de Bourgh estate, Rosings Park. Since Maria was Sir William’s only child in Kentucky, after graduation from Eastern Kentucky University, she became his hostess. Maria, now twenty-eight, married Gage Webb, Stantonfield’s farm manager, three years after her graduation. They soon had a son, Gage Webb III, better known as Trey, now two years old and the light of his grandfather’s life.
As the guests gathered around the bar, Maria rang the bell pull. When Juliet immediately arrived, Maria, requested, “Juliet, we need more wine poured and a refresher on the hors d'oeuvres.”
“Pull up a chair from any place,” Sir William invited, with a sweeping motion, when everyone had his or her favorite cocktail.
The room was a study in Southern elegance. Orange and violet from the setting sun shone directly on the massive gilt-framed prints of horses and riders, in rose-red jackets, that adorned the walls. The scene seemed to say, “A world of such beauty and grace should not be subjected to the cruel destiny of the present crisis.”
“First,” started Sir William, “let me thank you for coming tonight at such short notice. I invited the whole street, of course, but some were unable to join us. But I am glad and honored you are all here. We'll hope to include the rest of Pope Road next time. We’ll talk and discuss and drink. Then at nine, we’ll scrap the agenda of intrigue and relax over what I hope will prove to be a most elegant dinner.”
Everyone smiled at such a plan.
“As all of you who are here know already, we here at Stantonfield have had two of our most valuable and beloved horses stolen. It is a travesty, but it is not a tragedy. I feel quite confident that I will get them back.”
Murmurs resounded all around. Sir William raised his hand. Quiet returned immediately.
“Now don't get anticipatory. I haven't heard a word from the kidnappers or the police.” Sighs expressed their disappointment.
“This is a situation of constant flux and inevitable malleability. However, this is not the kidnapping of a child, which could have frightening, even perverse undertones. This kidnapping, my dear friends, is a business operation, pure and simple. I'd almost bet the farm on it.” He paused and smiled disarmingly. Some of the guests nodded in understanding.
“So far no call has come in requesting a ransom. But the call will come. It will cost me big time, but I will get Alexis and Junie back.”
No one wished to interrupt Sir William's narrative with a verbal reply. A few nods were again the only perceptible response.
“I am willing to pay. My mares are only one rung below my family. They are an integral part of my life.” Sir William said the latter with emphasis. “Money is no object, when it comes to Alexis,” Sir William assured them. “And Junie—well I hardly know the young man—but isn't he a little like my grandson, Trey? He deserves a future. So I'll pay what it takes for him too,” Sir William said.
This time the nods were unanimous.
“And, friends, it is simple math anyway. This is a big enterprise in more ways than one. Farms throughout central Kentucky have been robbed. All seventeen of the stolen thoroughbreds are famous now. The publicity the foals will garner for their future owners is priceless. I may not break even, but Junie will bring a lot more now at the yearling sales. Bank on it!”
Elizabeth was astounded. Sir William was right, of course. It would be almost worth it for the owners to steal their own horses. What a coup that could be! Pay money to yourself, and assure fame for your foal. Then, astonished at such a stupid thought, she quickly reprimanded herself, “Elizabeth, what a terrible thing to think about the owners.”
Quickly she reminded to herself, “I didn't actually think they had done it, just that it would be brilliant and easy.”
Elizabeth, nonetheless, was ashamed of herself for even harboring the slightest suspicion of the owners. “After all,” she thought, “that's accusing Sir William.”
“What can we do to help?” Carol Carel asked.
“One thing I wanted to warn you about,” said Sir William in answer, “and one way you can all certainly assist me is with the reporters.”
“Reporters!” they all cried out.
“Well, yes. They will no doubt be around and soon and in big numbers. This is international news. There will be little actual news to report, so they will no doubt be after any tidbit they can find.”
“But, Sir William, how can we help out with the reporters? We do not know anything,” Jewell Dodd responded.
“Exactly, Jewell, but they will be looking for something to report, since there will be little news,” explained Sir William.
“Oh, bother,” declared her husband Tommy.
“As you all know, I am a very private person. I do not want my face on the front of some scandal sheet, or even a legitimate newspaper or news magazine for that matter, just because of some innocent remark by one of my neighbors.”
“Of course, Sir William, no interview equals no innocent remark blown out of proportion,” Tommy said.
“We do have the advantage of Pope Road, Sir William,” Jimmy Joyce said. “Our drives are long, which should cut down immeasurably on unwelcome intruders.”
“Yes, thank
goodness,” Sir William said.
All heads shook in the affirmative.
“Can't we all just agree tonight to no interviews period?” asked Jimmy Joyce's wife, Claire Evans. “I may be a poet trying to sell my slim volumes and all,” she added with a touch of mirth, “but I am certainly willing to find my publicity elsewhere, Sir William, and not at your expense.”
“Yes,” the guests chorused.
“Zero interviews,” Tommy concluded for them all.
“Thank you, my friends. I am so grateful. I cannot tell you how much that alone helps me and Maria and Trey. I am not surprised at your generous offer, but I have been rather worried about the invasion to my privacy, more so than the loss of money actually.”
After that statement, Sir William rose from his chair and shook each man’s hand. Next Sir William headed for the bar, where he retrieved the bottle of bourbon. He poured another round into all the available bourbon glasses.
Maria rose and went directly to the bar, where she picked up the white and the red wine decanters and returned to refill the waiting wine goblets.
Once again the two settling into their respective seats, the father and daughter simultaneously lifted their glasses to salute the friends gathered there. “To neighbors like you!” Sir William toasted with sincerity.
“To neighbors,” everyone rejoined, clicking glasses cheerfully.
Everyone sipped in quiet for a few minutes. Nevertheless a slight tension was on the edge of the quiet.
“Have you contacted the other owners?” asked Jimmy Joyce, breaking the silence. Perhaps only one the stature of Dr. Carstairs could initiate the next phase of the evening.
James Joyce Carstairs was certainly a loyal neighbor and friend to Pope Road residents, always ready to step up in a crisis and eager to lend a helping hand, but he was also Dr. J. J. Carstairs. Dr. James Joyce Carstairs just happened to be one of the world's leading authorities on James Joyce, the Irish novelist. He was also a well-respected member of the Eastern Kentucky University faculty, one who lured many English majors to the campus by virtue of his stature, and a good friend to Elizabeth, whose office was just across the hallway. How ironical that Jimmy Joyce had the great Irish author's name.
