Chapter Twenty Five - Louis Berry's Novel - Erstwhile

Chapter Twenty-Five

The sun had not yet appeared above the trees, but the glow from the dawn breaking brought the woods to life. Richard stared at the neatly aligned rows of trees through the passenger window of Gaylord’s truck as they slowly traversed a sandy logging road in the middle of a vast forest of pines. The emptiness be-tween each column disappeared into a seemingly end-less blackness. The sight drew Richard deeper into his depression.
The path was barely wide enough for a single vehicle to pass. Several trails were cut throughout the tract of land that formed one hundred acre parcels. Some blocks were freshly planted in young pines that appeared fuzzy and unable to withstand a stiff breeze. Bordering them were mature trees ready for harvest on one side, and an empty field that had recently been cut on the other. It was littered with branches that had been discarded and strewn among the turned up Earth, resembling the chaotic emptiness of a once proud forest.
Richard leaned against the door, looking through the open passenger window. The truck slowly passed a giant spider web, with what appeared to be a Brown Recluse clinging to its center. Dew had accumulated and glistened on it in the morning sun. Colorful prisms exploded from each droplet. Richard thought about how fragile the web looked, yet realized it must have been very strong to hold the weight of the water.
The truck hit a bump and the two rifles that rested with their muzzles into the floorboard and stocks along the edge of seat slid and hit the passenger on the thigh. He reached down and cautiously returned them to their original position. Since half-past four in the morning, the two men had been searching for fresh deer tracks. A two-hundred-twenty watt lamp was rigged to hang from each side-mirror bracket and shined onto the ground below. There were at least five other trucks traversing the roads within the woods, as far as Richard could tell from the activity on the C.B. radio. It appeared that the group found at least a dozen tracks that were worthy of pursuing.
The dogs in the cage mounted to the bed of the truck began to bay, as they had done several times throughout the morning when picking up a scent. Each time Gaylord reached through the open sliding rear window of the truck and slapped the top of the dog box. “Shuut..uup!” He drew out his words for effect. “This land has been harvested for decades to provide the raw materials the mill needed to operate. Our families have been hunting it for much longer than that,” Gaylord said.
“As your families have grown did you ever fear that you might over-hunt the land?”
Gaylord snickered. “There’s not a man or woman who has hunted here that doesn’t fear just that. Whenever we try to convince some in our party to limit the number of deer we harvest, they spout off about a study that was done by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission that concluded that the deer population has never been healthier.”
“You don’t agree?”
He shook his head. “No, I don’t. They send people out here and count the number of tracks on a road as many deer, when it was most likely one that crossed the road several times.”
“What will happen to this land now that the mill is closed?”
“I suppose it will eventually be developed.” He laughed. “I’m okay with it as long as they keep the names that we have given the roads.”
“What names?”
“Well, there’s Jacob’s Dog Road, or J.D.R. for short. It got its name because that was where Jacob’s father-in-law accidentally shot his dog. Then there’s the Iron Gate Road, or I.G.R. Finally, there’s Toot-Paula Road.”
“Why Toot-Paula?”
“That’s where Toot proposed to Paula while hunting one day.” With a serious tone Gaylord ex-claimed, “That’s so damned romantic!” Then he added, “Some of the guys like to piss Toot off by referring to his road as T.P. Road.” Gaylord reached atop his dash-board and retrieved a thermos that was wedged be-tween it and the windshield. “Do you want some cof-fee?”
“I don’t have a cup,” Richard said.
Gaylord pointed to the floor between Richard’s feet. “There’s one right there.”
Richard looked down. He saw a dirty Styrofoam cup that appeared to have been in the truck for as long as Gaylord had owned it. It lay amongst a couple of oily rags, a pipe wrench and a box of rifle cartridges.
“Thanks anyway. I had some before we left the house this morning.”
Without a word, Gaylord opened the container and poured hot coffee into the cup that he had removed from its top. He closed it and placed it back on the dashboard. Reaching over to the glove compartment, he opened the door and removed a flask. Richard looked through the passenger window, but watched from the corner of his eye as Gaylord poured a goodly amount of the liquid into his coffee. Mixing guns and alcohol made him very uncomfortable. Using one hand to steer he turned the truck down H.T.R. When he made the turn, Richard saw several trucks gathered together at the end of the road.
“What does H.T.R. stand for?” Richard asked.
“Hangin’ Tree Road,” Gaylord replied flatly, without emotion.
Richard calmly nodded his head, recognizing the gravity of its name. Inside, however, he felt tense and uneasy. Nothing else was said between the two as Gaylord drove the truck to the end of the road to meet the other members of the hunting party. There was plenty of room on both shoulders for all of the trucks. After Gaylord parked his truck, Richard emerged from the passenger’s door and noticed a lone tree. It was not a pine and appeared out of place. There was a single branch, sturdy in appearance, cantilevered away from its trunk near the top. His heart raced at the thought of what might have transpired on that spot in the past.
Of the group, the two eldest men remained seat-ed in their trucks, which were parked across from one another. Each leaned out of their open window. All of the others had gathered in the space between them. Richard and Gaylord were the last to arrive. “This is Richard, everyone,” he said.
Richard could only distinguish grunts and groans from the men, except one, who responded, “Howdy.” He nodded toward everyone and smiled.
“Which track are we gonna put-out on first?” Gaylord asked the group.
“The best track to put the dogs on is one I found over on the T.S.R.,” replied Tommy Owens in his deep southern drawl as he pointed in the direction of his track.
“Tommy, how come it’s always your track that’s the best one?” asked Phil Butler.
Visibly upset, Tommy’s lip quivered as he responded. “Because I’m the one who gets here at one o’clock in the morning, tracking these woods. I’m the one who quits my job every year to make sure we’ve got deer meat on all of our tables. You people might as well stay in bed ‘til daylight, because by the time you all get here, I’ve already tracked every inch of these loggin’ roads.”
“Calm down Tommy,” Billy Owens said. “We’ll put-out on your track.”
Richard did not pay attention to the banter back-and-forth between the Owens brothers. He found himself transfixed by a man who stood back, away from the crowd, keeping to himself. The only thing that was unusual about him was that he wore a gun belt with two holsters, one on each hip. There was a nickel plated, pearl handled revolver in each.
One of the elder gentlemen started his truck and yelled to the rest, “You boys can stand around here playin’ grab-ass with each other, but we’re burnin’ day-light and the track’s growin’ cold.” He sped away in his truck in the direction that Tommy had pointed earlier, kicking up dust. The others raced through the cloud to their respective trucks out of fear of disappointing the old man. Seven trucks sped down the dirt road. The only one with a clear view was the leader. Every nerve ending in Richard’s body tingled as he feared seeing the tailgate of the truck in front of them appear from the dense dust-cloud that engulfed them all. He braced himself by placing his hands firmly against the dash-board, and laughed nervously. The road was bumpy and the high rate of speed caused the truck to bounce across its ungraded surface. He felt the truck become airborne several times. Richard could hear the dogs in the back bouncing off the top of the cage and scraping their toe-nails on the bed as they tried to steady themselves. When the trucks reached the intersection of H.T.R. and I.G.R. three trucks turned to the right, and the others went left, almost as if their routes had been choreographed. This kind of unspoken simpatico had been developed over many years together. Each continued on a pre-determined path until all seven had the block entire-ly surrounded.
Gaylord stopped the truck at the corner of I.G.R. and B.D.R. He reached over and grabbed the butt of his gun and got out of the truck. Richard did the same, not really sure why. “I’ll stay here and watch both ways,” he said as he pointed down both roads. “You go stand in the middle of the block,” pointing to a spot be-tween his truck and the one at the other corner, “and look for any deer running toward you. A lot of times you’ll see its white tail bouncing. If you see one, shoot it.” Without a word, Richard began jogging to where he had been commanded to go, holding the gun across his chest like a soldier. “If you see anything, use hand signals. Don’t yell!” Gaylord shouted a whisper to his protégé hoping not to startle the deer everyone hoped was deep in the block. Richard raised his hand into the air and waved acknowledgment as he ran away from the truck.
When he made it to the spot where he was directed to stand, he stopped and looked into the block. Then he peered to the left, and then to the right, gauging whether he was equidistant from each corner. Once he settled into his spot he realized that if a deer ran into the road he was in the line-of-fire of both Gaylord and the hunter at the other corner. He walked off the road and to the edge of the woods where he could duck for cover, if necessary.
The trees were mature and had been planted in perfectly straight rows. There were no limbs on the low-er parts of the trees to obstruct the view of the woods. The trunks made it difficult to see to his right or left. However, when he looked straight down the row where he stood, he could see for a few hundred yards. A thick blanket of pine straw covered the ground. He stepped into the woods past the first couple of trees. The straw, dead and dry, crunched beneath his feet. With every step he took away from the road, he felt a bit safer.
After a few minutes, Richard realized that he had to pee. He looked around and thought, why not? He leaned his rifle against a tree, unzipped his pants and began to urinate. His body tingled. When he finished there was a large patch of straw that was wet and shiny.
Before he could zip and button his pants, Richard heard the sound of dogs baying in the distance. Quickly, he closed his pants and reached for his rifle. He could see nothing in the woods around him, but the barking grew louder.
After another minute, Richard began to question his position. He walked back out of the woods and onto the road. Gaylord’s truck was still at the corner, and he was standing on top of the dog-box. He waved Richard back off the road and into the woods. Richard obliged.
Suddenly, Richard heard a twig snap. He looked down the center of the row where he stood, but saw nothing. He looked closely at the brown blanket of dead straw on the ground. There it was! A deer was running directly toward him. It was camouflaged by the surroundings. Apparently, it did not see Richard. He slowly raised the butt of his gun against his shoulder and held it tightly there. When the bead at the end of the barrel lined up with the sight at the rear, and the two together found a spot on the chest of the deer, he gently squeezed the trigger. The thunder of the gun hurt his ears and echoed throughout the trees, and the recoil caused him to become disoriented, momentarily. He re-gained his composure in time to see the deer move sharply to his left, toward Gaylord.
Richard ran as quickly as he could onto the road. He waved his arm vigorously toward Gaylord, hoping that he understood the deer was heading his way. Apparently, he did. Gaylord readied his rifle against his shoulder and swept the barrel from side-to-side practicing the timing he would need when the deer crossed the road at full speed. Richard watched as his friend became very still. He saw a burst of smoke come from the end of the gun and then heard the shot. Gay-lord jumped down off the dog-box, got in the truck and sped down the road, out of Richard’s sight. He was unsure whether he should abandon his position. The truck that was at the opposite corner approached him from behind at a high rate of speed.
“Hop on!” the driver yelled. Richard saw the man’s daughter in the passenger seat, so he knew the man meant to get on top of the dog’s cage, which he did.
Richard held on as the man accelerated. The metal diamond pattern on the box scraped his knees as they all bounced along the road. The truck came to a hard stop at the intersection Gaylord had vacated moments earlier. A cloud of dust overtook the truck just before the driver made a right turn. Once the truck was back up to speed and out of the dust, Richard saw Gay-lord’s truck stopped about a hundred yards away. There was no sign of him.
When the truck Richard was riding on came to a stop, the dogs that had been chasing the deer emerged from the woods, crossed the road and continued into the next block. Richard jumped off the truck. The driver and his daughter got out. All three followed the dogs into the woods. They quickly lost sight of them.
“Over here!” a voice called out from a few rows over. It was Gaylord.
Without answering the three ran toward him, high-stepping in the straw. When they got to the spot where he was they saw the dogs. They were sniffing and occasionally barking at the carcass of the deer that lay motionless.
Gaylord looked at Richard. “I don’t know if it was your shot or mine that got him.”
Richard felt pride. Maybe he had slain the beast. The thought gave him a primal pleasure that he had never felt before.
“If you killed it, you have to clean it,” the driver of the second truck said. He and Gaylord laughed as they saw a look of fear on Richard’s face.
“Help me drag it out of here,” Gaylord said as he grabbed a hind leg, leaving the other for Richard. He reached down and grabbed it and the two men pulled as they walked. Richard looked back and watched as the lifeless body bounced across the pine straw, its head bobbing from side-to-side and its tongue hanging from its mouth. The pride he felt moments earlier quickly left him. This was the first time he had taken a life. “I’ll clean and dress the deer tonight when I get home and bring your portion by the store for you,” Gaylord said in a matter-of-fact tone. “We usually split the kill amongst ourselves, if that’s alright?”
“Of course,” Richard said.
The two men continued until they reached the center of the road. The dogs had been following closely the entire time, sniffing, growling and biting at one an-other; laying claim to the prize that lie dead in front of them.
“Put the dogs up, boys. They’ve smelled enough of the kill,” commanded one of the elders who had ar-rived on scene and gotten out of his truck. Everyone dutifully followed his instructions and placed the dogs in the cages in which they belonged. Some dogs jumped onto the tailgate and ran into their cages willingly; oth-ers had to be dragged by the collar. Once Gaylord and Richard had put away their dogs, they walked back to where the deer lay on the ground. Pick-up trucks and men preening surrounded it. Each man grabbed a set of legs and carried it to the truck. Standing beside it, they rocked the deer back-and-forth until there was enough momentum to sling the dead animal on top of the dog-box. The others waited silently until Richard and Gay-lord came back to the inner-circle.
“Which track are we going to put-out on now?” one elder asked.
Without hesitation, Tommy spoke up. “I found one this morning … ” Laughter from all the other men drowned out Tommy’s sentence before he could complete it.
In a very calm and cool voice, the man who wore two guns asked Richard, “Was that your first kill?”
“I don’t think it was me who killed the deer. I believe it was Gaylord,” Richard said. “That deer was still running full-steam when he hit the road in front of Gaylord.”
Two Guns ignored his protest and said. “It’s your first kill. You have to wear the sign of the Erst-while Hunter.”
The others nodded in agreement. Richard be-came nervous, unsure of what was in store for him. The last time he had been hazed was his freshman year in high school as a member of the football team. It was not a pleasant experience.
Gaylord hopped up on his tailgate and began searching the bed of his truck. He picked up an empty can and moved toward the dead animal. Placing a knee on each side of the deer Gaylord pressed and pumped vigorously on the chest just above where the bullet had entered the body. He held the can beneath the puncture. Blood pulsed from the wound with each compression. The men waited silently until he was finished, then he jumped down from the tailgate and made his way to the group. Each man took a turn to dip his index finger into the can. One after the other walked up to Richard and ran their blood-soaked finger across his face. He could not tell if there was any rhyme or reason to this ceremony. Everyone was silent. Richard tried desperately to visualize how his face looked. He felt like there may be a ‘V’ on his forehead, but he wasn’t sure. The gaminess of the blood reeked and made his stomach uneasy. When everyone was finished painting his face, they all stood back and clapped. There was no laughter, only serious applause.
“I damn sure wish they’d still let us hunt those two-legged animals,” the elder man said.
“I guaran-damn-tee ya’ that if we were out here huntin’ them people, his bullet,” Two-Guns pointed at Richard and continued, “wouldn’t ‘a been the one that pierced the animal’s chest.” Nausea boiled within him as he endured what seemed to be an eternity filled with racial epithets and threats. Just as quickly as he had be-come a member of the group, he was once again alone in the crowd. Would the disgust he felt show on his face? He tried to stay calm while not allowing himself to fall in with the majority. His stomach churned and bubbled. The taste of copper oozed from his throat into the back of his mouth. The acidy liquid coated his teeth. Not wanting to spit out the regurgitated fluid, Richard swallowed and tried to remove the taste from his mouth by rubbing his tongue along his teeth. He had no desire to visit H.T.R. again, ever.
Finally, the decision was made to continue the hunt. Richard hurried to the passenger’s door of Gay-lord’s truck. When he opened the door, he caught a glimpse of his reflection in the large side-view mirror. He adjusted the door so that he could see more clearly what the men had painted on his face. It was a Confederate flag.