Fiction is Stranger than Truth

 

We were in a cabin on the First South Branch of the Oconto River. It was the last day of November. The deer hunting season had ended and it was legal for hunters to again carry a shotgun into the woods and look for Ruffed Grouse. I spent an uncomfortable night in that cabin, waiting for midnight when I could give Major Nathaniel Peabody his monthly Spendthrift Trust remittance.

It was cold. It was very cold. The bunk assigned to me was the furthest from a potbellied wood-burning stove and I knew it would somehow be completely out of the heating business when I experienced my regular early morning call of nature.

It has always been my desire and my plan to live in a nice condo in Philadelphia and, when Pennsylvania winters became unbearable, in a nice condo in Florida. Both places have central heating and air-conditioning. They are civilized. It has never been my desire or plan to be trapped into wearing heavy woolen clothing and, on the first day of each month, having to personally deliver Major Peabody’s checks, regardless of whatever part of the uncivilized world in which he might decide to station himself.

I’ll admit I was not a happy camper and I complained about the cold weather. I was immediately confronted by a chorus of “You don’t know what cold is” from the assembled bird hunters. There followed a series of comments all beginning with … “I can remember when it was so cold that…”  Some of those comments (like the one referring to a brass monkey) were so extreme I began to think they weren’t telling me the truth.

Major Peabody, of course, joined in with the rest of them. He told me duck hunters will get up at four in the morning during those almost sunless December days, get into leaky skiffs, paddle through two foot waves that turn to ice when they run over the boat’s deck and then, in sub-zero temperatures, sit for hours in a blind while gale force winds whistle around them, hoping a duck will fly past them.

 That was simply too much for me. I could conceive of no one being that stupid. I gave the Major a look of mammoth disbelief and gave voice to the thought that he was not only stretching the truth, but treating it in a most Cavalier fashion. Peabody called me aside and quietly chastised me for hinting he had told an untruth.

“In hunting camps,” he told me, “the truthfulness of a companion’s statements should always receive the full benefit of the doubt. Even a man’s lack of accurate memory or a possibly unintended misstatement,” Peabody explained, “should be gently corrected, not referred to as a lie or be subjected to flat challenge. Such an act,” he warned me, “would be considered as socially unacceptable within any closely knit fraternity of men who regularly hunt together.”

“For instance,” Peabody told me. “Steve - the fellow who owns the place – you’ve heard him say he makes the best Bloody Mary in the galaxy?”  I agreed. “Yes,” I said. “I’ve heard him say it more than once and I’ve heard the other men agree with him - many times.”

“Since I am addicted to aged single malt,” Peabody continued, “I don’t drink Bloody Mary and am not a good judge of them, but I can tell you this. If you speak privately with each of the other hunters, you’ll discover Steve is the only one who thinks he makes the best Bloody Mary in the galaxy. Nevertheless, no one will disagrees with him”

I saw the Major’s point and began to appreciate the grouse camp etiquette he was explaining to me. “I see,” I said. “I see. Steve’s friends don’t want to hurt his feelings, so they agree with him.”

“Ahhh …. Something like that,” was the Major’s response.

(In point of fact, the Major didn’t want to disabuse his attorney. He didn’t want to tell him his companions publicly agreed that Steve made the best Bloody Mary only because Steve, upon hearing the compliment, would immediately make a batch of them and hand them to the hunters who wouldn’t have to get up from their chairs and mix their own drinks.)

The conversations moved from the weather to other hunting experiences and Major Peabody rejoined his friends and reported an occurrence at a Maine grouse camp. He had been hunting near a stand of young spruce when a bird exploded from cover so close to him he almost dropped his 20 ga. The grouse was nearly out of range by the time he fired. It sailed on and disappeared into the trees.

“That certainly is a strange story,” one of the Major’s hunting friends observed “I suppose you’re going to admit it was the only shot you missed during the entire year?”

Peabody paid no attention to the comment and went on with his tale. “It is a strange story and it becomes even more strange. I walked into that stand of spruce, shaking my head and trying to understand how I could have missed. Then I heard a sound coming from above me. Gentlemen, the grouse fell out of the tree. I hadn’t missed. I hit it. The bird had enough strength to fly to the tree, but that was all. It died there and fell to my feet.”

The other hunters were silent. They exchanged sidelong glances and wouldn’t look into the Major’s eyes. Then one of them spoke. “I believe you, Major,” he said. “That very same thing happens to me three or four times every season.” He paused before adding: “Only I’m not lucky enough to be standing anywhere near the tree when the bird falls out of it.”

Then one of the old timers took his turn. “It’s nice to be with people who can recognize the truth when it is told,” he said. “It’s a terrible thing when people don’t believe you. Terrible. Yes, terrible.” He paused and took a sip of his Bloody Mary. “You may not believe this, but about fifteen years ago I was accused of telling a fib. I’ll never forget it. It is burned in my memory.

“The grouse cycle was on the down side and there weren’t many birds around, but it was a nice October day. The woods were beautiful and it was a good day for a walk. I was hunting on one of those long-ago abandoned logging roads north of the Pine River. I hadn’t seen a thing and then, at about ten in the morning, this bird jumped up in front of me. I busted it and it fell in the middle of the trail.

“I was going to retrieve it when I heard a wooshing sound right over my head. I looked up in time to see a red-tailed hawk heading straight toward my bird. He was gliding down with his talons stretched out in front of him. He meant to steal my grouse and I wasn’t going to let him do it. He grabbed it just as I fired at him. Well, I missed and he sailed away with my bird.

“You can imagine my surprise when I saw a four point buck lying alongside the trail. He must have stuck his head out of the brush just as I shot at the hawk.” He took another sip of his drink, and slowly moved his head from side to side. “I still can’t believe it.” he said. “The game warden didn’t believe me. Neither did the judge. I was convicted of killing a deer out of season.”

I could commiserate with the poor man as he sat there, slowly shaking his head in dismay. “It seems to me,” I said, “the judicial system has treated you quite badly. I suppose there might have been some technical violation, but the judge should have recognized the basic equities of your situation. You were victimized by conditions entirely beyond your control. Had I been the judge, I would have rapped the gavel and said: Case dismissed in the interests of justice.”

The old hunter nodded his head in agreement. “That’s what I had hoped would happen, but I suppose the judge assigned too much weight to the fact that the deer was killed with double ought buckshot and not by seven and a half chill bird load.”