The Hunting Story, Part Three

 

“I’ll have a Bloody Mary, please.”  The flight attendant didn’t bat an eye that morning. Apparently lots of people use flying as an excuse to have an early nip.  I had decided that I would drink my way from Georgia to Montana and that it would be my last day of drinking.  And so I did.  I drank my way through three airports and 12 hours of take-offs, landings, friendly seat-mates and stale peanuts.  I had a  good time.  The next morning I told Brent of my decision to stop drinking, trying desperately to feel committed to it, but with many such self-promises behind me, it seemed unlikely this one would stick any better than the others.  It was about that time when Brent yelled, “There he is, baby!  There goes that big ‘ole buck!  Get your gun!”  The 6-millimeter Remington seemed custom-made for me and when I practiced with it on the trip, my aim was dead-on.  My dad bought the Remington on the off-chance that one of his three daughters might want to hunt with it.  I don’t think it got much use after my grandmother shot her deer with it - over thirty years ago.  He’d let me bring it from Georgia and was flying out the following week to go hunting with me and Brent. I grabbed the gun and we went back out.  Brent set me up in the second-story window of the other house he’s building, the one nestled right up against the armpit of the mountain and I waited for 45 minutes or so, growing cold and stiff in the morning air.  I had not seen the deer, but Brent was convinced he was still up there, still sniffing the does in the front yard of the smaller house, resting from a  night of chasing them through woods damp with rain that should already be snow but wasn’t.  I grew weary and hungry and walked the short distance back to the smaller house and the warmth of the fire and more watery coffee, Brent fussing at me the whole time.

 

Brent was back only a few minutes and I had just barely gotten warm when he saw him again out the back window.  Brent’s house sits right up against the mountain - “out the back window” is wilderness.  I wanted to wait, to come back that weekend with steadier hands and nerves, more prepared in body and spirit to even attempt such a thing.  My reluctance was growing by the minute and I heard it:  my voice began to take on that whining tone.  “I just really don’t want to do this, Brent.  Can’t I wait?” 

 

 “Angela, he said, that’s not how it’s done.  It just don’t work like that  He won’t be here Sunday.”  So out we went, this time picking a spot on the patio.  I made a makeshift prop of out of a picnic bench to rest the gun barrel on.  It was still cold so Brent pulled an electric heater outside and put it at my back.  I was better dressed than earlier, but it was rainy and cold and pretty soon I was shivering.  I have to admit, though, that hunting couldn’t get much more comfortable than this! After a few minutes, we spotted him, bedded down on the side of the mountain, little more than a hundred yards from where I sat.  I sighted him, but his position would make this shot have to be perfect.  Because he was lying down, the large area of heart and lungs were unavailable, a neck shot was the only one and the distance was long.  For an hour, I sighted him, got the crosshairs on that tiny point below his chin, but never gained the confidence to take the shot.  I did not want to injure this animal and have him running further up the mountain to die a slow and painful death before I could get to him, or worse, never finding him.  Man!  Was I ever feeling tired!  My hair was wet and my teeth were chattering and Brent reluctantly let me go back to the smaller house to warm up – again.