Publisher's Synopsis
The next instant he laid down the shell, slipped to his door and caught up the gun that lay inside, on a shelf of the rude scantling. A wood duck had appeared over the lower tree tops, flying languidly to its nest, somewhere in the foothills. Long before it reached the wood's edge, the Inger was in his doorway. The bird's heavy flight led straight across the clearing. One moment the big body came sailing above the hut, then it seemed to go out in a dozen ugly angles and dropped like a stone to the edge of the garden. It lay fluttering strongly when the Inger reached it. He lifted and examined it approvingly. One wing was shot almost clear of the body. That was the mark he liked to make. He swung the bird under his arm, took out his jack-knife, pried open the mouth, slit the long tongue, tied the feet together and hung it outside his door to bleed to death. This death, he had heard, improved the flavor.
