Pursuit Remembered

He left the tent before dawn. The wind was colder than it should be. February cold. Not the kind that cuts, but the kind that stays with you. The nylon flap clicked behind him. She was still sleeping. He didn’t wake her.

He walked with the red light on. The beam was tight and low. The track was narrow. When his eyes adjusted, he killed the light and let the dark take him.

The rifle rode strapped to the side of his carbon fiber pack. He liked it that way. Light. Balanced. It was a 6.5-284 Norma. He liked the lighter calibers. They kicked less and they shot flatter, and he could shoot them well when it mattered. He’d had a magnum once. It was too much rifle for him. It hit hard and bucked harder. He never shot it well under pressure. So he gave it to a friend. The friend liked it more than he ever did.

A pair of Leica binoculars hung on his chest. Big glass. Heavy. He liked them. They showed everything, even the things you’d rather miss.

He climbed the ridge above camp. Passed two tents in the saddle. He saw them before they saw him. They would sleep longer. That was fine. He wanted the ridge to himself.

The track gave way to steep rock and loose earth. The scrub was low and mean. It clawed at his pants. Small boulders rolled underfoot. He stepped carefully.

The valley opened in the dark below. He could feel it before he saw it—wide and still. A good place. The kind of place stags liked.

He stopped after a while. Sat on a rock. The wind bit at him now. He pulled on his jacket. It was thin, synthetic, just enough to take the edge off.

He watched the faces. The light was coming but slow. Everything was grey-blue and quiet. He glassed the scrub and slips. Nothing moved.

He moved on.

Another few hundred metres and he found a rock the right shape. He slid his pack off and balanced it there. It wobbled, but it held.

The sky behind him turned pink.

He watched the eastern slope. It caught fire with the first light. Yellow-gold. Sharp. The kind of light that shows everything. No place to hide.

He waited.

The light came slow. Not sudden, but sure. The kind that doesn't need to hurry. He glassed the slopes. Tussock. Rock. Scrub. Nothing. He swept left to right, top to bottom. Again. Again.

A pair of hinds stepped into view. Eight hundred yards off on the far face. He watched them a while. Thin-bodied and careful. They fed, then stopped. Lifted their heads to the wind. Fed again. He turned the glass away.

The wind was steady. He felt it on his cheek. East to west. A good wind. The kind that stayed where it should.

The stream below moved through the rocks, slow and thin. He could just hear it when he stopped breathing.

He sat. Let the glass rest on his knees. The rock beneath him was colder now. He didn’t mind. The sun hadn’t reached him yet.

He thought of the morning. The kind of morning men used to write about. The kind where nothing happened and still everything felt right. The light. The wind. The space. That was enough, sometimes.

But he was here to hunt.

He stood. Quietly. Lifted the pack and set it beside him on the rocks. Took one more look.

To his right was a steep cut in the land. A re-entrant. He hadn’t checked it. He stepped forward, slow, bent slightly, brought the glass up.

There.

Dark against the yellow grass. Still.

Two hundred yards, maybe less. On a tongue of tussock just above the creek-bed. Solid body. Thick through the chest. The stag was uphill, head down, feeding. Above him, the beech trees waited. If he bolted, that’s where he’d go. Two bounds and he’d be gone.

He lifted the binoculars. Pressed the range button. The laser painted the slope. A number blinked: 181. He unstrapped the rifle from the pack. He dialed the scope turret to one and a quarter minutes. He didn’t check the data. He knew it.

Worked the bolt. A round chambered smooth. He took the soft plugs from around his neck and pushed them into his ears. The sound of the wind dropped away. He heard only himself now. His breath. His heartbeat. That heartbeat lived in the stag too. Carried across the space between them.

He moved higher. Laid on the rock. It was cold. Sharp. He pressed himself down, flattened against it. The rifle low. Solid. A rest he could shoot from.

A stone slipped. Rolled. Clattered once. Loud as thunder in the hush.

The stag looked up.

The scope was at eighteen power. The stag filled it. Its head was turned, ears forward. Looking for him. Eyes on the dark.

He held the crosshair. A 4W reticle. The shoulder.

He saw the antlers now. But he didn’t care about them. Not then. He was in the moment before.

His right thumb pushed the safety forward. His finger found the trigger. Two pounds. Crisp.

He exhaled. The air left slow. His finger moved.

The rifle cracked. Loud. The muzzle brake split the morning apart. Birds lifted. Silence shattered. The bullet covered the ground between them in less than a second.

The stag jumped. It ran uphill. Into the beeches. Just like it was meant to.

He stayed behind the scope. Watched. The light was stronger now, but not enough to tell. Not enough to see how the animal moved. Not clearly.

He didn’t know for sure. But he had shot well. He knew that.

And that was something.

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