I admired Takahashi's cooking, I admired the enormous pile of firewood he always had chopped, I admired his generosity; but most of all I liked his cheerfulness and good humor. He grew to be a joy to me. We had some pop corn which we sometimes popped over the camp-fire. He was fond of it and he said: "You eat all time—much pop corn—just so long you keep mouth going all same like horse—you happy." We were troubled a good deal by skunks. Now some skunks were not bad neighbors, but others were disgusting and dangerous. The hog-nosed skunk, according to westerners, very often had hydrophobia and would bite a sleeper. I knew of several men dying of rabies from this bite. Copple said he had been awakened twice at night by skunks biting the noses of his companions in camp. Copple had to choke the skunks off. One of these men died. We were really afraid of them. Doyle said one had visited him in his tent and he had been forced to cover his head until he nearly smothered. Now Takahashi slept in the tent with the store of supplies. One night a skunk awakened him. In reporting this to me the Jap said: "See skunk all black and white at tent door. I flash light. Skunk no 'fraid. He no run. He act funny—then just walk off."
After that experience Takahashi set a box-trap for skunks. One morning he said with a huge grin: "I catch skunk. Want you take picture for me send my wife Sadayo."
So I got my camera, and being careful to take a safe position, as did all the boys, I told Takahashi I was ready to photograph him and his skunk. He got a pole that was too short to suit me, and he lifted up the box-trap. A furry white and black cat appeared, with remarkably bushy tail. What a beautiful little animal to bear such opprobrium! "All same like cat," said Takahashi. "Kittee—kittee." It appeared that kitty was not in the least afraid. On the contrary she surveyed the formidable Jap with his pole, and her other enemies in a calm, dignified manner. Then she turned away. Here I tried to photograph her and Takahashi together. When she started off the Jap followed and poked her with the pole. "Take 'nother picture." But kitty suddenly whirled, with fur and tail erect, a most surprising and brave and assured front, then ran at Takahashi. I yelled: "Run George!" Pell-mell everybody fled from that beautiful little beast. We were arrant cowards. But Takahashi grasped up another and longer pole, and charged back at kitty. This time he chased her out of camp. When he returned his face was a study: "Nashty thing! She make awful stink! She no 'fraid a tall. Next time I kill her sure!"
The head of Gentry Canyon was about five miles from camp, and we reached it the following morning while the frost was still white and sparkling. We tied our horses. Copple said: "This is a deer day. I'll show you a buck sure. Let's stick together an' walk easy."
So we made sure to work against the wind, which, however, was so light as almost to be imperceptible, and stole along the dark ravine, taking half a dozen steps or so at a time. How still the forest! When it was like this I always felt as if I had discovered something new. The big trees loomed stately and calm, stretching a rugged network of branches over us. Fortunately no saucy squirrels or squalling jays appeared to be abroad to warn game of our approach. Not only a tang, but a thrill, seemed to come pervasively on the cool air. All the colors of autumn were at their height, and gorgeous plots of maple thicket and sumac burned against the brown and green. We slipped along, each of us strung to be the first to hear or see some living creature of the wild. R.C., as might have been expected, halted us with a softly whispered: "Listen." But neither Copple nor I heard what R.C. heard, and presently we moved on as before. Presently again R.C. made us pause, with a like result. Somehow the forest seemed unusually wild. It provoked a tingling expectation. The pine-covered slope ahead of us, the thicketed ridge to our left, the dark, widening ravine to our right, all seemed to harbor listening, watching, soft-footed denizens of the wild. At length we reached a level bench, beautifully forested, where the ridge ran down in points to where the junction of several ravines formed the head of Gentry Canyon.
How stealthily we stole on! Here Copple said was a place for deer to graze. But the grass plots, golden with sunlight and white with frost and black-barred by shadows of pines, showed no game.
Copple sat down on a log, and I took a seat beside him to the left. R.C. stood just to my left. As I laid my rifle over my knees and opened my lips to whisper I was suddenly struck mute. I saw R.C. stiffen, then crouch a little. He leaned forward—his eyes had the look of a falcon. Then I distinctly heard the soft crack of hoofs on stone and breaking of tiny twigs. Quick as I whirled my head I still caught out of the tail of my eye the jerk of R.C. as he threw up his rifle. I looked—I strained my eyes—I flashed them along the rim of the ravine where R.C. had been gazing. A gray form seemed to move into the field of my vision. That instant it leaped, and R.C.'s rifle shocked me with its bursting crack. I seemed stunned, so near was the report. But I saw the gray form pitch headlong and I heard a solid thump.
"Buck, an' he's your meat!" called Copple, low and sharp. "Look for another one."
No other deer appeared. R.C. ran toward the spot where the gray form had plunged in a heap, and Copple and I followed. It was far enough to make me pant for breath. We found R.C. beside a fine three-point buck that had been shot square in the back of the head between and below the roots of its antlers.
"Never knew what struck him!" exclaimed Copple, and he laid hold of the deer and hauled it out of the edge of the thicket. "Fine an' fat. Venison for camp, boys. One of you go after the horses an' the other help me hang him up."