The Grasshopper Trap by Patrick F. McManus Page B

next morning. “We’ll arrive at your house at two sharp. Got that? Two sharp !”
    â€œRight,” he said.
    â€œDon’t bother about breakfast. We can grab a quick bite at Greasy Gert’s Gas ‘n’ Grub just before we turn off the highway and head up to our hunting area. Now remember, two sharp !”
    We picked Sidney up the next morning at exactly 5:35. He was furious. Naturally, Retch and I were puzzled. Then it occurred to me that since this was Sidney’s first hunt, he didn’t realize that when hunters say “two sharp,” they mean “sometime around five.”
    â€œStop whimpering and toss your gear in back,” Retch said. “You better not have forgot nothin’ either, because we’re not turnin’ around and comin’ back for it! Now put your rifle in the rack next to mine.”

    â€œWhat do you mean, next to yours?”
    â€œThat ol’ .30-06 right there … Say, I wonder if you fellas would mind swingin’ by my house again. Just take a few minutes.”
    After Retch had picked up his rifle and I had returned to my house for my sleeping bag and then we had gone back to Retch’s for his shells, it was almost six-thirty by the time we got out to the highway.
    â€œAren’t we going to be awfully late with all these delays?” Sidney asked. “What time will we start hunting?”
    Retch and I looked at each other and laughed. “Why, man, we’re already hunting!” Retch said. “This is it. This is what hunting’s all about.”
    We drove along for an hour, as Retch and I entertained Sidney with detailed accounts of other hunting trips. “It was a tough shot, looked impossible to me at first,” Retch was saying. “That six-point buck was going away from me at an angle and …”
    I held up my hand for silence. “Okay, now we got to get serious. We’re coming to the most dangerous part of the trip. We get through this ordeal and we should be okay. You guys watch yourselves. If you start to feel faint or queasy, Sid, let me know right away.”
    â€œCripes!” Sidney said nervously. “What do we have to do, drive up a sheer cliff or something?”
    â€œWorse,” I said. “We’re going to eat breakfast at Greasy Gert’s.”
    Dawn had long since cracked and spilled over the mountains by the time we arrived at our hunting spot. Retch looked out the window and groaned.
    â€œWhat are you groaning for?” I asked. “I’m the one that had Gerty’s chili-pepper omelette.”
    â€œIt’s not that,” Retch said. “I see fresh tracks in the snow
all over the place. If we’d been here an hour earlier, we’d have nailed us some deer.”
    â€œListen,” I said. “Did we come out to nail deer or to go hunting today? If we’re hunting, we have to get up two hours late, forget a bunch of stuff we have to go back for, and then stop for breakfast at Gerty’s. You know how it’s done.”
    â€œYeah, sorry, I forgot for a second when I saw the tracks,” Retch said. “I got carried away. Who cares about nailing deer right off!”
    â€œI do!” Sidney yelped. “I just bought twenty-five hundred dollars worth of hunting stuff, and I want to get my free deer!”
    It was clear that Sidney had a lot to learn about hunting, so I lost no time in starting on his first lesson. I put him on a stand and told him that Retch and I would sweep around the far side of the ridge and drive some deer past him. “We’ll be back in an hour,” I told him. “Don’t move!”
    Retch and I returned three hours later and found Sidney still on the stand. He was frosted over and stiff as an icicle. We leaned him against a tree until we got a fire going to thaw him out.
    â€œHow come you didn’t move around?” I asked him.
    â€œY-you t-told me to stay on the st-stand.