He Did Not Go Gentle

"I work with him every day," I said.

"I hope so. Come along with me if you want."

I did, and we walked on up the road, leaning forward to compensate for the steepness. I think he was showing off, but in any case he set an impressive pace. The road curved up the south side of a mile-long canyon. A small creek ran through the canyon, 50 yards or so below us, the steady trickle of water looking like tinfoil where the sunlight caught it in the open spaces between the clumps of deer brush and pine.

The old man swore at nearly everything. He swore skillfully, using his obscenities and profanities as verbs, adverbs, adjectives and nouns. Occasionally he even worked in a more original if misused part of speech. "I love to hunt," he said for no apparent reason and in a tone of voice that implied I had accused him of being unfaithful. "No matter what some idiots say, I love it. These anti-hunting people, these vegetarians in leather shoes and fur coats. Most hunters nowadays are fools. But they're no worse than those others."

"I like hunting, too," I said. "It's my second season, my first with a dog."

He swore again, violently. "Don't hunt without a dog."

Behind us now a Jeep was grinding along the logging road. The old man swore quietly. We stood off to the side in the warm shade of a Douglas fir and watched the Jeep pass, a new model carrying two young men who could easily have been the old man's grandsons. A case of beer was conspicuous between two pump-action shotguns leaning against the rear seat. They waved at us and smiled, that special supercilious smile young people reserve for the aged. The old man smiled and waved back.

The Jeep ground ahead and finally rounded a bend, leaving us its dust. This time he swore ferociously. "No dog," he said. "Potbellies. They won't get any birds. Drinking beer. A Jeep. I hate the sound of motors."

I hunted with him through that afternoon and I learned a lot. He showed me how to work the elderberry and huckleberry patches on the steep slopes, and the brushy draws near water, and the high fiats where the springs spread out into small marshes and the grass was heavy enough to provide cover for the birds. It was hot, hard work. I was sweat-soaked, my calves ached, and the muscles along the backs of my thighs quivered, yet the old man did not appear to be tired.

His technique was simple and sensible enough. We would get on the downhill side of wherever he knew there might be birds and send up the dogs to hunt the cover. Otto learned from the older dog as I learned from the older man. It was steep enough country so that the grouse always flushed downhill. We would hear the dogs quartering through the cover, and then the loud drumming of wings, and suddenly a bird would appear, or sometimes two or three, fast grayish blurs that burst out to sail by and curve away at difficult angles to disappear behind the nearest trees. You would hear them, suddenly see them, get the gun to your shoulder, swing and shoot, and the birds were either hit and down or out of sight.