ANOTHER HUNT FOR STELLA

Doggone John’s bones ached as he laid there, half asleep, ruminating over the death of his bird dog, Stella. Living on the farm his whole life, he’d breed and put down over a dozen dogs in his long lifetime. But Stella, his only true friend and confidant since his beloved wife Bess had died, was special. Bess had given him the pup for his birthday the year before the Lord took her from him. And since Bess’s death, it’d been Stella and him, living alone in the old farmhouse, doing their best to get by.

After carefully wrapping Stella’s body in her favorite blanket, John laid her to rest out back two weeks ago. Since then, he’d spent his days weeping and drinking. Now totally alone, lost, and teetering on the edge of a hole he knew if he fell into he’d never climb back out of, Doggone John was cried out, and his hooch was almost gone. He had a decision to make. He could either drive the old farm truck into Jackson to get more booze so he could drown himself for good, or he could pull his head out of his ass and start living again. He’d walked this precipice before when Bess passed and chose life. When asked how he got through it, he’d say it was the plain old mule stubbornness of an Ohio farmer who’d lived through the Great Depression that’d saved him but, if he was being honest, he’d admit it was the pup that got him through.

“Hell with it. I ain’t no quitter. I owe it to old Stella and to my dear Bess to soldier on,” he said aloud, his breath turning to little clouds in his frigid bedroom.

John sat up in bed and looked out the frost-rimmed window onto his fields. In the middle field, he could see a half dozen pheasants and a couple whitetail does picking over the last of the fall cow corn husks that his neighbor Earl had sloppily left behind after the harvest. He shook his head. “That damn fool, Earl,” he mumbled, irked he’d had to lease his fields to Earl, only ten years his junior and himself an old coot, these past couple years. John did, however, appreciate that Earl’s piss-poor farming skills left the fields with ample corn to draw pheasants and deer. I might not be able to farm no more, but by God, I can still pull a trigger!

Doggone sat up and clasped his hands. He took another look out the window, an idea forming, then closed his eyes. He said a little prayer aloud: “Lord almighty, please keep me from falling into this bottle and give me the fortitude to go on. I ask you to keep old Stella happy in wherever it is that bird dogs go in your grand design. And Lord, if ain’t too much to ask, I’d like old Stella sittin’ at my feet when I reunite with my beloved Bess in your eternal kingdom. Amen.”

He felt better. A decision had been made; the time for self-pity and grieving was over. Still, he knew he’d be lonesome and it’d be a hard winter if he didn’t find some company. But that was a problem he knew he’d have to mull over, and he had faith the Lord would give him an answer. Worst case, there was Earl and his sassy wife, Elinor, next door to keep him company. They annoyed him, although they were good people. Besides, he knew his options were as skinny as a buck after the rut.

#

Doggone John pushed the quilts off and swung his spindly legs off the saggy mattress. The cold floor on his bare feet was enough motivation to get him up and moving. He tottered to the closet and pulled on a pair of wool socks, his heavy long johns, his oiled tin-cloth field pants, and his favorite heavy flannel shirt. As he fumbled to lace up his hunting boots with stiff arthritic fingers, he muttered, “Son of a bitch…why’s it gotta be so damned hard to do anything these days?” As soon as he muttered it, he felt a pang of shame and pushed the negative thought away.

Dressed, he felt a shiver leave his body. John grabbed his wire-rimmed spectacles from the nightstand and put them on. He grabbed his pipe and tobacco pouch along with his Case jackknife and slipped them into his pockets. He caught his reflection in the mirror over the dresser. He had a two-week gray beard going, his hair needed a cut and wash, and he looked paler than Bess’s ghost. Goddamn, I look like an old pile of skin and bones. Better get me some grub before heading out. Doggone pulled on his red woolen hunting cap, flipped up the earflaps and adjusted the brim. He looked back into the mirror and thought, that’ll do.

#

In the kitchen, Doggone John grabbed some kindling and wood chunks from the oak-wood coffer his granddaddy had built, opened the iron grate on the old woodstove and shoved them in. He took a long match from the match safe, struck it on the stove and set the kindling ablaze. He filled the enamel pot with well water from the earthen jug, then scooped out a handful of grounds from the tin coffee can and put them into the kettle. He set it on the stove and stomped his feet on the creaky wooden floor to get his blood flowing. While waiting for his morning brew, as was his ritual, he took his pipe from his pocket and grabbed the can of Prince Albert from the shelf next to the sink. He filled the pipe then his pocket-worn tobacco pouch. He fished his jackknife from his pocket and used the end bolster to tamp down the loose-cut tobacco. He lit his pipe and took in a mouthful smoke then puffed it out, filling the air with the rich aroma of cherries, leather, and spice. He slipped some matches and his Case knife back into his pocket and looked through the kitchen window at the thermometer.

“Twenty-nine degrees…by God girl, my bones is tellin’ me it’s gonna snow today,” he said aloud before realizing Stella was no longer there to hear his daily weather forecast.

He shook his head, feeling silly about talking to his dead dog. But as he sat at the kitchen table and smoked and sipped his coffee, it hit him. Hell, why not talk to the old girl? She’s only gone in the flesh after all.

He smiled.

“Girl, you want to hunt one up this morning?” he asked.

He looked down and imagined her staring back at him with her brown eyes.

“I know you do! Well, alright. Let’s go get ‘em right after we get some grub,” he said.

After a bowl of steamed oats, some salt pork, and a hunk of stale bread, more than he’d consumed in a single meal in a fortnight, John pulled on his field coat, grabbed his game belt from the hook by the door and strapped it on. He dumped a half box of number six-shot shells into his coat pocket, then grabbed his daddy’s Ithaca 20-gauge break barrel shotgun from its resting place next to the door. “Here we go, girl,” he said and headed out the backdoor.

The cold air was like a slap on his face. He clapped his hands together and stomped his feet again. The ground was near frozen, coated in a heavy layer of frost.

“By God, she’s a cold one today, girl! Best get movin’ before I freeze off my old stones and pecker!”

He chuckled at his own crudeness.

He looked out into his fields, trying to decide where to start. The two does he’d seen when he woke were still feeding a couple hundred yards off, but the game birds had moved to warmer cover. The deer looked up at him, unconcerned, then returned to grazing.

“You two sassy bitches is lucky it’s too damned much trouble for me to be butcherin’ a deer these days,” he said.

Figuring the pheasants had moved westward to keep the breeze in their faces, Doggone John headed to the fence row running along the front field toward Earl Mason’s place. As he walked, he imagined Stella working out in front of him.

“Hunt ‘em up, Girl!” he yelled.

As he neared the edge of his property, Earl stepped out of his barn and waved.

“Mornin’ Doggone John. You huntin’? Who you hollerin’ at?” he asked.

John frowned. Damn fool. What does it look like I’m doin’?

“Yup, sure am, Earl,” he said, drawing out the “l” on Earl to punctuate his annoyance.

“Doggone, you need you a new dog. Kickin’ up birds is a child’s game, John. You want to borrow Scout?” Earl asked.

John paused before answering.

“I’m too damn old to get a new dog and train it. But I ain’t so old that I can’t kick up birds, Earl. Besides, Scout’s the dumbest son of a bitch bird dog I ever seen. I’ll be just fine, thank you very much,” John said.

Earl spit a brown stream of Mail Pouch tobacco juice onto the ground and shook his head.

“Suit yourself, you old cuss.”

John turned without saying anything, held his hand up and waved, then cut across the field toward the back fence. Earl watched him go, shaking his head. Poor old bastard is losing it.

Once John had made his way into the field, out of Earl’s earshot, he stopped and closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Lord, please don’t let Earl ruin our hunt. We need this.

When he opened his eyes, Stella stood looking back at him, her tail wagging. “Ask and you shall receive,” he said aloud. “Ask and you will bask in his good grace!”

Doggone smiled and then walked to his dog’s side.

“Girl, that fool Earl don’t understand. When the autumn leaves are down and the days are so short they blend into the night on both ends, you and me hunt. Always been that way. Always will be. Ain’t no changin’ that now!”

John felt the tension of the past few weeks melt away. He quickened his step and grinned.

As he walked, Stella worked ten yards in front of him, her nose down, her brown and white coat shimmering in the cloud-muted sunlight, her tail wagging.

“There you go, girl. Hunt ‘em up!” he called out.

#

Doggone John and Stella made it to the fence row in good time. He felt a pep in his step that’d been gone for years. He watched Stella working in and out of the brush, stopping occasionally to sniff the ground, then the air.

“She’s getting birdy, by God… Hunt ‘em up, girl!”

As they progressed, John noticed Stella was back to her prime, her limp gone, her movements once again graceful and effortless. It’s a Goddern miracle!

After walking a few more minutes, Stella froze and pointed. John snapped the breach closed.

“We got ‘em now, girl. We got ‘em now!!!”

He inched forward to Stella’s side, then stepped just in front of her. John took another step, and two big rooster birds broke from of the brush along fence in a loud thrash of flapping wings. Doggone swung the old scattergun to his shoulder, put the bead at the end of the barrels on the back bird and squeezed off a shot. The rooster dropped in a lazy cartwheel and landed in front of him. As he’d done for fifty years, he instinctively swung the barrels past the beak of the second fleeing rooster, now twenty-five yards out and twenty feet off the ground and pulled the second trigger. Through the cordite smoke, he watched the lead rooster tumble from the sky and land with a thud.

He hooted, “Doubles! By God we got doubles, Stella!”

John walked to the first bird and scooped it up. He held it in both hands and showed it to his dog, her tail wagging, her eyes gleaming with pride.

“Good girl! Good girl!”

He stuffed the bird into the game pouch on his belt and patted Stella’s head. Grinning like a schoolboy, John walked and retrieved the second bird and stuffed it into his satchel with the other.

“We’re gonna eat like kings tonight, girl. Bess is going to be so happy…been too damned long since we had two pheasants for the stew pot!”

Doggone John walked back toward the farmhouse, humming to himself. He felt alive and young and happy.

As he neared the farmhouse, Earl stepped out of the barn again and waved.

Earl hollered, “I heard two shots. You kick something up?”

John waved back and smiled.

“We got doubles, Earl! We got doubles!”

Earl looked puzzled, started to say something, but stopped. Then he smiled, slightly shaking his head, and said quietly, “Good for you, John. Good for you.”