“He wouldn’t be so tur’ble off his guess, neider,” replied the equally weary Ches.
After supper, however, the world seemed different. There was Jones’s Hill—(a man of large ideas, was Jones, to call that mass of rock a hill)—shining red-hot in the last light against a topaz or turquoise sky, and the gulch that ran up to it in a mystery of dark green gloom offering up an evening prayer of indescribable odors—those appeals to a life in former spheres which no other sense remembers; the ceaseless roar of the wind in the pines, so steady that it formed a background for other sounds almost as good as silence itself; the evening pipe, and the talk of what had been done and what was to be done—all these made amends.
And then the sleeping—such sleeping! And waking up in the morning in the exact attitude one went to sleep the night before! Sleep that washed out all the former day’s fatigue, and started them as eager as hounds for that of the new day. That is, within limits, for, when a man overworks as continually as Jim had done, no paradise sleep nor balsam air can turn him right perpetually.
And for that reason the claim declared a holiday, consisting of a hunting trip. It was a curious hunting trip. Not one “bang!” went the clean and polished rifle. They stalked four deer, crawling on their bellies, quivering with the chase, rounding behind rocks. Then when the game was within range, up went the rifle, Jim squinted along the sights—then dropped it.
“What’s der matter?” whispered Ches. He had been waiting for a long time to hear the gun go off.
“They seem to be having a pretty good time by themselves there, Ches.”
“Yes—dat’s so—but I’ve heard deer-meat was good.” Ches was disappointed at this manner of hunting.
“So it is,” replied Jim, “probably nobody has that notion stronger than the deer.” He followed the four pretty animals below them with tense eyes. He loved to hunt but he hated to kill.
“See here, boy,” he said, sitting down and pulling off his boots, “I think I can show you some fun—do you notice they’re feeding up to that nose of rock? Well I used to be rather quick on my feet once, and I think if I can slip down behind there without their winding me, if one gets close enough I can catch him with my hands—which is a trick I’d like muchly to accomplish. Now you sit here and watch, and for your life, don’t make a move or sound! By Jiminy! if I could do that!” He trotted light-footed down the slope out of sight.
The boy soon saw him reappear behind the sharp rock-wall that jutted out into the valley, rubbing crushed pine-needles upon himself with the idea of overpowering the human odor, although, whether effective in its purpose or not, it was not necessary—a strong up-wind from deer to man making it impossible that they could scent him.