The short story below is one of my early attempts at writing. I recently edited it, but the essence of the story remains.
If you get a chance to read it, please let me know your thoughts and BE HONEST!! I promise not jump off any cliffs if your review is bad. I have a sufficiently inflated ego to withstand criticism. :)
THE BEST HUNT EVER
The two-way radio base unit in the cabin crackled and a voice asked if the occupants were up and ready for the hunt. “Hey Dale, did you and Gramps finish your coffee yet?” Dale jumped up from the cabin’s all-purpose table to the corner of the room, grabbed the mic and replied. “Yeaahup, we’re on our second cup and the boy is finishing his Cheerios as we speak. He was speaking about Aaron, Gramps’ daughter’s ten-year-old son. Where you at Roofer?” No one knew how he got that nickname because he was not in the roofing business, his last name was Gorski and was not inclined to ever spend any time on a roof. He wasn’t any taller than men his age, so it didn’t have anything to do with his height. The radio made another crackling sound then a reply. “I just turned on to Silver Lake Road, so will be there in two minutes.”
The cabin was the property of the “Bag A Buck Hunting Club” and owned by Gramps, and five other hunting buddies. It was built as a deer hunting camp, but it also was used for bear hunting, snowmobiling, bird hunting, berry picking, maple syruping and card playing. The cabin itself was very comfortable with a well-equipped kitchen, running water, a full-size bath and shower, two sleeper sofas, three recliners, and a large TV. The two large bedrooms held two sets of bunkbeds and the two small bedrooms were each furnished with a couple of single beds. There was enough room to comfortably sleep six adults and just as many youngsters during the deer hunting season opening weekend. There was a screen porch that ran the full length of the front of the cabin where all the hunting clothing and gear was stored.
Dale then clicked the talk pad on the mic again, “Hey Stumpy! Where are you?” Stumpy got the moniker because his last name was Stump and had nothing to do with any physical attributes. He replied after several attempts to reach him. “I was asleep on the sofa. I just got home from the bars a couple of hours ago and the old lady locked me out of the bedroom.” After a long pause, he asked, “Why are you up at this ungodly hour?” Dale let him know that a bear hunter with an open tag was looking for a group of hound hunters to help him fill his tag. The hunter had been hunting from a tree stand over bait but didn’t see a bear all season. “Richie and Toke freshened all the baits last night and are out checking them right now.”
About then Richie came on the radio, “Tell Stumpy to get his ass off the couch and bring his two starter dogs over to the Cedar Bark bait. That was hit late last night. Not a big track but it could be a shooter.” Stumpy was too far away from Richie to pick up his signal, so Dale repeated the message for him to get to the bait site.
By the time Roofer drove into the driveway Aaron was already loading one of Dales hounds into the dog box on the back of Dale’s truck. This was not the boy’s first bear hunt. In fact, he had been with Gramps on two other previous outings and had witnessed treed bears both trips. His exuberance was overflowing in anticipation of the impending chase. Gramps loaded the other two hounds. All three were bred for this moment and were barking wildly, knowing somehow that they were about to be on fresh tracks of a bear.
Roofer asked if there was any coffee left. Gramps told him “There’s about a half a pot and it should still be hot, because I just unplugged it.” And motioned to Roofer to help himself. Moments later Gramps jumped into Roofers truck and the boy rode with Dale. They were about a mile north of the cabin when the radio on the truck fired up. It was Richie. “Where the hell is Stumpy with those dogs?” It was taking longer than it should have because Stumpy’s feet were having problems finding the opening of his boots.
Seconds later Pete came on the radio, “I’ll be there with Leopard in about three minutes.” Dale then clicked on his mike, “Poppa Smurf! I thought you had to work today.” Poppa Smurf was Pete’s radio handle and got that name because of his white beard and round belly. Pete came back with, “Nope someone told me that we had a tag available, so I called in sick. I just got to the bait site and will be releasing Leopard and Swinger to start cold tracking. You can let your dogs loose when you get here.” Leopard and Swinger were two Plott hounds and were the best cold trackers in the hunting group. Richie also let his Red Tick hound go with the two Plotts. By the length of time between each bark the hunters could tell that the starter dogs were still cold tracking when Dale stopped near the trail to the bait. The boy jumped out of the cab and onto the back of the pickup to release Dales two Walkers, Rowdy and Sarah. At the same time Roofer let his best Blue Tick join the chase.
The dogs seemed to be running parallel to the road so Dale, Pete and Roofer moved their trucks closer to where they could hear the dogs a little better. Within minutes of stopping a sow bear with two cubs started to cross the road in front of the vehicles. The sow crossed into the brush, but the cubs turned and went back. The group could hear the sow barking and cuffing, calling to the cubs to follow her. Gramps yelled at the boy to get up on top of the dog box in case she came back onto the road. With some hesitation the cubs joined their mother, and they were gone within seconds. Luckily the sow was not the bear the dogs were tracking. It was just a coincidence that she and her cubs crossed the road when they did.
Soon the dogs seemed to be getting farther away from the hunters so they moved to another road that ran perpendicular to the road they were on. As they moved in the direction of the barking dogs, they could tell that the trail had gotten much warmer as the dogs were barking hard and fast. Ten minutes later the barking changed from a trailing bark to a treeing bark. The dog’s voices were high pitched because their heads were raised looking up at the bear in the tree stretching their vocal cords. The boy led the way down an old logging trail that was headed in the direction of the barking dogs. Each of the dogs have a distinctive voice and Pete was concerned that he could not hear Swinger barking. The boy stopped suddenly about fifty yards ahead of the party and was looking to the side of the trail. When the rest of the party caught up to the boy, they found Swinger laying just off the trail. The bear had bitten his shoulder nearly off with another bite midway down his back. He was still alive but had to be put down to relieve his suffering. Pete was visibly shaken and asked Dale to take care of the job that no one wanted. Dales 357 ended it for Swinger and the pursuit was back on. Pete returned to his truck with his dog who would be buried in a patch of woods in back of Pete’s house where some of the past family pets were buried.
Further down the trail the boy turned and disappeared into the brush. The others could see the bear in a spruce tree about fifteen feet off the ground just above the tops of the brush. When the rest of the group got to the tree, they saw the boy with a large stick. He was beating it against the trunk and yelling at the bear to try to keep it from coming down. The bear had different ideas and looked like it was preparing to jump from the tree. Gramps grabbed the boy by the collar and dragged him away from the tree just as the bear jumped. Stumpy had arrived with the hunter with the tag only seconds later.
With the dogs in hot pursuit, the bear ran toward a shallow river not far from the logging road. Stumpy followed and found the bear in the middle of the river surrounded by barking dogs. He could be heard shouting for the shooter to get to the river when suddenly the bear bolted in Stumpy’s direction knocking him over into the river. The dogs followed suite making sure that Stumpy was completely soaked with river water. The entire hunting party could hear Stumpy’s expletives as he climbed the bank out of the river.
The tag was eventually filled, the 140-pound bear was registered, and the hunt was over by early afternoon.
Later that day, Dale and Gramps took the boy squirrel hunting in the woods next to an abandoned farm about a mile from Dale’s house. It was a good time for the men to teach the boy some hunting skills and gun safety. They even let him take shot at one of the squirrels. He missed and the squirrel disappeared into a hole in the tree. After supper at the cabin, Dale got a call from Richie saying that another hunter with a kill tag wanted to join the group for the final day of the bear hunting season. All the bait sites had to be freshened, but the work was split between all the hunters, so they were able to retire early in anticipation of one more hunt the following day.
Gramps was the first to check in with a bait that had been recently hit. It looked to be a large bear by the size of the track. Gramps returned to cabin to get the boy and Dale who already had the dogs loaded. Stumpy was at the bait with his starter dogs, but they had to wait another ten minutes before any of the dogs could be released per the bear hunting regulations. The fresh scent of the bear had the dogs baying even before being let go. The boy, Dale and Stumpy followed the dogs and the rest of the hunters drove into the woods about a half mile from the bait site. It only took the dogs about fifteen minutes to tree the 300 pounder. The boy was the first person to reach the tree with Dale and Stumpy close behind. The bear was not making any moves to jump and run as long as the dogs continued to bark at the base of the tree. The hunter with the permit arrived and took his prize with one shot.
The hunt was over before 8:00 AM. Gramps made breakfast for the entire hunting group back at the cabin. After cleaning up, making the beds and vacuuming the carpet it was time to pack up and head for home.
The boy was unusually quiet for the first fifteen minutes of the ride. Then he turned to Gramps and said, “I had the best time of my life, Gramps.” Turning his head away from the Aaron so that tears swelling up in his eyes could not be seen, Gramps replied, “So did I my boy, so did I.”
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