“Yes. A little elevation will enable you to see over the entire marsh, and many a pond hole have I found in that way that is not known to most of the gunners, and not always to the natives.”
“Keep still,” I remarked at this point of our conversation, “there comes a magnificent flock of ducks, if they would only turn this way what a shot they would give us.”
We were silent except for whistling, which we did with the finest touches and the utmost skill. The flock, spread out against the distant sky in an angle-pointed line, was headed directly for our hiding place. We had crouched down on their first appearance, and grasping our guns and watched them, waiting with increasing impatience and anxiety. Nearer and nearer they came, over the distant marsh undisturbed by any other gunner, and unattracted by other decoys until they were directly in front of us and not more than three hundred yards distant. It was a moment of intense excitement, for if we could once get our four barrels into those serried ranks, there was no telling how many we might not kill.
On they came still nearer, we whistled more softly and they answered with undiminished confidence. Now they were over the meadow just beyond our stools, a few minutes more of the same course and they would be in our power. But alas, just as they struck the open water they deflected their course a little, not much, but enough to carry them beyond fair reach of our guns, so that when we fired we were only rewarded with three birds that plunged from the flock headlong into the water. As they were being retrieved by our four legged companion, William sagely remarked:
“I have observed that generally there is some misfortune connected with what would make the finest shots, and that at such times something is sure to go wrong; either the birds do not come in right, or a twig or reed gets in front of you, the gun misses fire, or something else happens, so that the best chances usually prove the worst.”
“There is an awful deal in luck,” I replied, “after all is said, Napoleon’s star was not an imaginary planet by any means. I never was a lucky sportsman, and have had to earn my game by the sweat of my brow.”
“Did you ever know a sportsman who would admit that he was lucky?” inquired William, calmly.
“I can’t say that I ever did; but if you will keep still and not fluster me with unnecessary generalizations, I will kill that pair of widgeons that are coming over the marsh, luck or no luck.”
After uttering that boast, I had to make my words good, and though I detected a twinkle in my companion’s eye, as if he would not mind should I happen to miss just that once, I took care to aim straight, not the sort of excessive care that invariably results in a miss, but the rapid and confident deliberation that first holds the gun right and then pulls it off when it is right, without waiting until it gets wrong.
“Good,” said William, sotto voce, in his quiet way, as the two ducks, doubled up by the full charge of shot came down splash into the mud, close to our stand, “I have seen a good many misses when a man was most sure of hitting; I hardly expected that you would kill them both so neatly.”