Shooting a Mammoth by Todd Tucker

Author:Todd Tucker
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2014-04-15T00:00:00+00:00

BOOK TWO: HUNTING

Eleven Years Earlier: Porter County Indiana

T hey got up early and were in the truck in minutes, having carefully staged all their gear the night before in the new Dodge Ram. Jay’s father had brewed coffee even before waking his son, and now he sipped from the tiny plastic thermos cup-lid as they drove east on Highway 2, toward the farm where they would hunt. Jay drank his coffee, heavily leavened with milk and sugar, from a mug. It smelled good in that truck cab, the combination of new car and strong coffee, and his father was calm, as he always was when they hunted, as if the combination of cool autumn air and the full gun rack had some kind of sedative effect on the man, bringing out the best in him. Hunting was the only true leisure activity that his father ever participated in, his only pursuit which didn’t result, at its completion, in the exchange of money. Herm Gurney, owner of Gurney’s Gun Superstore, was one of the few men in town who would actually identify himself as a friend of Jim Huck’s. A trip like this, where it seemed the hunting actually had some practical purpose—well, the man was absolutely delighted. Jay had just begun his senior year of high school, and although he didn’t know it, this would be the last time he ever hunted with his father.

The fields they passed were covered with a light dusting of powdery snow, even though it was early October. It was just starting to get cold then, the winters longer and more severe each year, right at the point where people were starting to notice. That January would be the first time they closed Lake Superior to all shipping and the Coast Guard began moving its icebreakers south.

The cold, combined with the worsening economy, had given rise to a new problem in the rural areas. Stray dogs, abandoned by their owners or the shelters the counties could no longer fund, had come together in packs, and were roaming the countryside according to their ancient instincts, safer together than alone, bringing down animals together and sharing the kill during the day, their body heat at night. These packs of dogs had interbred with the coyotes that had roamed around the countryside for years. Their offspring, called coydogs, were notoriously dangerous as they had the natural cunning of coyotes, but had no fear of humans, even though it had been generations since any of their ancestors had known the comfort of a bowl of Ol’ Roy or a nap on the couch.

An aged, distant relative had a farm in LaPorte County, one of the farmers who’d been lucky enough to get a contract from Perdue to raise chickens. Perdue supplied the chicks and the feed, and all his uncle had to do was keep them alive and get them fat, and get rid of the chicken shit, which he did by spreading it out on his soybean and corn fields as free fertilizer.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.