Jim Kjelgaard

“ In the center of the beech brush was a well-marked trail used by deer that knew perfectly well the advantages of staying in a thicket. Tammie was looking down at a splash of drying blood, obviously a deer had been badly wounded here and had fallen. Ted heaped lavish praise on his dog.
"Good boy! Good boy, Tammie!"
He set his jaw and his eyes glinted. Unless a hunter were within twenty feet of the trail, in which case it was highly improbable that any deer would have come down it, nobody within the beech brush could have wounded the deer. But how about the opposite slope? ”

“ Behind the house was another, larger shed which sheltered a gasoline engine and buzz saw and provided a place for Al to take care of the furs, wild honey, herbs and other treasures that he brought in from the Mahela. In front stood the game rack, a cross pole mounted on two heavy timbers imbedded in the ground. Here hung the deer and occasional black bear that Al, Ted and their guests brought down.
To one side lay the garden, big enough to provide all the vegetables the Harknesses needed but not big enough to make a glaring scar in the beech woods. ”

“ The car in which the campers had come was backed off the road. It was a good camp and as they passed Ted was aware that John Wilson knew it was good. But he said nothing, and Ted had the impression that he did not talk unless he had something worthwhile to say.
A quarter mile beyond the camp, the truck's probing lights reflected from the startlingly bright eyes of a deer. Ted slowed. Deer were always running back and forth across the road and, since bright lights dazzled them, they would not always get out of the way. They came closer and the lights revealed very clearly a magnificent buck. ”

“ When Ted Harkness reached the summit of Hawkbill, he hurried. He grinned a little smugly as he did so, for his had been a non-stop climb and most people who wanted to reach Hawkbill, the highest point in the Mahela and the only one that wasn't forested, had to rest at least twice. Some, starting out with firm determination to climb to the top, wavered en route and never did get there.
The gorgeous, tricolored collie that had been pacing beside Ted ran a short ways, snuffled into some brush and disappeared. ”

“ Tammie was sitting near, watching Al work. For a moment, Ted watched, too.
Perfectly-shaped, with exactly the right taper, the board upon which Al worked did not vary a hundredth of an inch from one side to the other. Al, who got more money for his furs than other trappers did because he took better care of them, sliced off another shaving and squinted down the board. A big man, he seemed as rugged as one of the giant beech trees. ”

“ Considering the mass of laws we have, few people can live a single day without, intentionally or otherwise, running afoul of them. Have you ever looked up some of the crackpot laws, such as the one which states that, on Sunday, in this state, no horse shall wear other than a plain black harness?"
"It's not that."
"Ted, do you know anyone at all in the Mahela who lives up to the full letter of the game laws? Do you know anyone who doesn't take what he wants when he wants it, in season or out?" ”

“ Therefore, the coyote could not be tolerated. Ted's eyes roved up Hawkbill, and the cool wind felt good on his face. When they mounted a hill, he strove for and caught a glimpse of the burned mountain behind Hawkbill. Al saw and interpreted his look.
"They're there all right, and it's my bet they'll be there after deer season ends."
"Not both of 'em," Ted asserted. "I'm going to nail one or the other."
"Which one you aim to get? Damon? Or Pythias?"
"Either will satisfy. How do you tell 'em apart?"
"I imagine there'd be some small differences if a man was close. ”

“ Carl Thornton had spoken the truth. Those who lived in the Mahela thought that just living there gave them a proprietary interest in the game and fish that shared the wilderness with them. But, except for Smoky Delbert, a notorious poacher who hunted and fished for the market, most dwellers in the Mahela confined their poaching to killing a deer when they felt like having venison or catching a mess of trout when they thought they needed some fish for dinner. They broke the law, but as far as Ted knew, their chances of going to Heaven when they died were fully as good as his. ”

“ But nobody, regardless of whether he was running Crestwood or renting camps, could hope to make a living just from the three-week deer season alone. He would also have to lure all the small game hunters and all the fishermen he could, and if he didn't lure them honestly, they'd never come back. It stood to reason that nobody who lived a couple of hundred miles from the Mahela could know what was taking place there. They must be kept informed, and Ted wished to walk now because he wanted to judge for himself whether or not there would be a worthwhile flight of woodcock. ”

“ Some men who'd spent their lives in black bear country had yet to see their first one. It took hunters of the highest caliber to get them, and thus Ted looked forward to those who would occupy his camp. But while he waited there was little else to do and he spent some of his time in Lorton.
Just another sleepy little town for forty-nine weeks of the year, Lorton was almost feverishly preparing for its moment of glory. If it was not exactly the center of all eyes, due to its geographical position as the town nearest the Mahela, it was the center of deer hunting. ”

“ Ted and Tammie got into the pickup and Al drove. He did not speak because he was thinking too busily to talk. A father, if he was worthy of being a father, showed his children the right path. But it was always better if he could guide them into doing their own thinking, instead of leading them along the path—and sometimes that called for subtle measures. ”

“ The big buck would wait until he was sure someone was again on his trail, then he'd get up and sneak away. There would be nothing except tracks in the snow to mark his going. A man could not travel silently through the thickets, but a deer could.
Deep within the thicket, Ted found the bed, a depression melted in the snow, to which Pythias had retired when his wandering was done. The tracks leading away were fresh and sharp, no more than a couple of minutes old, but they were not the widely spaced ones of a running buck. ”

“ Ted chose to walk, for he had been doing a great deal of serious thinking and had changed many of his ideas. Running a successful resort, or even a successful camp, involved a great deal more than just being a gracious host. In any city, or even any town, such a camp probably wouldn't rent at all because it was so radically different from what urban residents had come to expect in their dwellings. But it fitted the Mahela, and for a short time each year, it would be appreciated because it offered a refreshing change from conventional living. ”

“ These were the bucks that were known throughout the Mahela, and far beyond it, as Damon and Pythias. All who'd seen them thought that either one, if bagged, would set a new record. But so far, both had carried their antlers safely through several hunting seasons and from the lazy way they posed on the mountainside, they might have been two gray steers in any farmer's pasture. The appearance was deceptive, though, and Ted knew it. Let anything at all excite either buck's suspicion and they'd prove their mettle. Ted rubbed Tammie's head reflectively. ”

“ Al and Smoky Delbert, as far as anyone knew, had been the only two people in Coon Valley that day. Al wouldn't shoot an illegal deer and Ted had Loring Blade's word for it that Smoky's rifle had never been fired. There had been a third party, and after Ted chased him out of the thickets on Burned Mountain, Pythias had cut through the beech scrub. Obviously, he knew the route and he wouldn't have remembered that, a couple of months ago, he had almost come to disaster on it. A deer's memory isn't that long. ”

“ Ted exchanged greetings and looked out of the window. Renting hunting camps might be a nice way to earn a living, but there must be easier ones! The very fact that he'd rented his camp to them implied an obligation. Six hunters who knew exactly what to do had little enough chance of getting a bear. These youngsters had one in a thousand. But if there was any way to do it, Ted still had to offer them their money's worth and he considered himself responsible for them. Sending them into the Mahela alone probably, and at the least, meant that they would get lost. ”

“ Pythias, who had sucked in his woodcraft with his mother's milk, had only contempt for any mere human who coveted his royal rack of antlers.
The second day of the season, giving John Wilson ample time to post himself in the white birches, Ted had gone to the bed in which they'd seen Pythias on the first day. A small buck and two does had gone through, but Pythias had not. Most deer have favorite runways, or paths, that are as familiar to them as sidewalks are to humans. Pythias seldom used one, and he never took the same route twice in succession. ”

“ Ted wished he could sink through the floor. Expecting hunters, he had his hands full of what, very literally, were babes in the woods. But they had a great dream and a great hope, and regardless of who told them that not once in 1000 times will even a wounded black bear charge a hunter, they wouldn't believe it because they did not care to believe it. They had come bear hunting to live dangerously! ”

“ As Ted continued to watch the big buck, John Wilson became restless.
"Let's go after him."
"Wait a bit," Ted advised. "It isn't going to be that easy."
The climbing hunters, about a hundred and fifty yards apart, broke out of the forest and into the briers. Two of them were so placed that, unless he moved, they would pass the big buck at almost equal distances. But the buck let them pass without so much as flicking an ear. He knew very well exactly where both hunters were, but he was no fawn to panic because men were in the woods. ”

“ Twice, just after the grouse hunters left and again four days later, Ted sent Tammie to Al. He would send him again just before deer season opened, for that was an uncertain time. There would be hunters everywhere and no assurance as to what they would do. Horses, cattle, sheep, leaves fluttering in the wind and men had all been mistaken for bucks with nice racks of antlers and punctured accordingly with high-powered ammunition. ”

“ He met Tammie within yards of the house and took his pack off. Loring, if this is to be done, it's to be done my way."
"What's your way?"
"You do exactly as I say."
"I'm listening."
"Meet me at my house two hours after midnight. We'll cross the hills to Glory Rock; we won't be able to walk up Coon Valley. Then you're to hide behind or beside the rock, any place you can listen without being seen, until I say you can come out."
"Now look here, Ted, I like you and I like your dad, but I'm not sticking my neck out for anybody." ”

“ As long as you were taking him in, you should have had him fined a hundred and seventy-five dollars."
"Not him," Loring Blade declared. "You can't hurt him too much by hitting him in the pocketbook. His hunting privileges are what he holds dear."
It was, Ted decided after the warden had left, a smart way to do things. The penalty for breaking game laws should be harsh, but fining Arthur Beamish a hundred and seventy-five dollars would bother him less than a ten-dollar fine might inconvenience a Stacey or a Crawford. However, Beamish's hunting privileges really meant something to him. ”

“ Crestwood cost Carl Thornton more money than I've earned in my whole life."
"I don't want to leave the Mahela."
"Too much of your pappy in you," Al growled, "and not enough of your mother. I want you to be somethin' besides a woods runner."
"It isn't that, Dad. I've tried to explain to you. It's the people—seeing them come in here all tired out, and seeing them go away rested and refreshed after we've shown them everything we have in the Mahela. I know college is valuable and I don't look down my nose at education. But this is my job." ”

“ Ted scarcely heard. He was here, beside Glory Rock, the day after Smoky Delbert was shot. Damon and Pythias, always together, and a deer so badly wounded that it couldn't possibly go on. Damon hadn't gone on. Only Pythias had. Hurt but not mortally, he had left enough blood on the leaves to convince Ted that there'd been only one deer.
"When do you suppose he picked that one up?" John Wilson asked.
"I don't know."
Carl Thornton, who got what he wanted, had decided to get Damon and Pythias himself.
"He's darn' near as big as a horse," Wilson said. ”

“ Ted drove on to Lorton, where, even though most of the town's residents were his friends, he could not help feeling self-conscious. Smoky Delbert's shooting had brought Lorton more fame, or notoriety, than it had known since its founding. The story had been in most of the State's papers and gained wide distribution through a couple of news services. Parking in front of the First National Bank, Ted left Tammie in the truck, dropped his stamped letters in a mailbox and walked up the dimly lighted stairs that led to the law offices of John McLean. ”

“ Just below, almost at Ted's feet, was the snug log house in which he and his father lived, surrounded by two hundred acres of forest, except for small and scattered patches here and there. The Harknesses owned the last remaining private land in the Mahela. Its only clearings were those in which the cabin was built and one for a garden patch. Al Harkness didn't want or need much clearing. He preferred the beech woods to the cultivated fields, the trap line or woodsman's ax to the plow. ”

“ Spurting ahead, the old truck still missed by a wide margin a lean coyote that was running a scant twenty feet behind the buck. Tammie rose and bristled. Ted held him down. The collie was fast, but nothing except a greyhound was fast enough to catch a coyote. Visible for only fleeting seconds, this one disappeared in the forest. Failing to run the coyote down, Al stopped his truck.
"Doggone! Of all times to be without a rifle!"
"It looked to me as though he was chasing that buck," Ted observed.
Al shook his head. "Just followin' it; one coyote couldn't kill a grown buck. ”

“ Ted told the grouse hunters who'd sent a ten-dollar deposit that the camp was theirs for the first two weeks of the season and he pondered over the other grouse hunter's letter.
Nobody at all had applied for woodcock season because, Ted decided, woodcock are so uncertain. One of the finest of game birds, they are also migratory. A few nested in the Mahela, but they were too few to attract sportsmen. Depending on conditions, flight birds might and might not be in the Mahela during the season and some years they by-passed it completely. But when they came, they offered marvelous shooting. ”

“ The bear came on for another sixty yards, lay down beside a huge boulder and prepared itself for a nap.
Ted crawled away. Bears have a remarkable sense of scent and good hearing, but very weak eyes. This one couldn't see him. If it smelled him, it certainly would not be where it was. If he was very careful, it might not hear him. As soon as Ted thought he was far enough from the valley's rim, he rose and ran back to where he'd left Paul Jackson.
That alert youngster heard him coming and had his rifle ready, but its muzzle was pointed at the ground. ”