Just a Bit Longer

Mulak Reader - Just a Bit Longer

Here’s a little piece that, as best I can remember, was written in a single sitting and is the accurate recounting of an event that took place at Forge Pond in Granby. Ducks Unlimited liked the story, and used it in the fall 1979 issue of their magazine.

JUST A BIT LONGER

An almost undetectable current has kept open a stretch of black water in the center of the narrow pond. In the water, between shelves of ice where the pond narrows and doglegs to the right, sit seven black duck decoys with a pair of drake mallards thrown in for color. Opposite the decoys, among the dry weeds and brush, rests a canoe. The broken ice around it is already refrozen. Rain is falling and has been since before dawn, sometimes slowing to a drizzle but never completely stopping.
Surveying the scene, I realize that my wife is probably right: I am crazy. I'll catch pneumonia and freeze off various unmentionable parts of my anatomy. She told me all that this morning. I'd heard it all before. But she's right: My rear end may well be frozen to the bottom of the canoe right now for all I can feel back there. Yes, and I suppose that I'd be the first to laugh at someone else for doing something half as silly as what I'm engaged in this morning. The cold rain has soaked through my wool hat and is working on my neck. There are three empty shells in the bottom of the canoe to remind me of my failings.

Before dawn, with the level of the pond unexpectedly up by a foot or so, I discovered that the natural blind where I had sat earlier in the season was now under water and frozen over. Rather than cast about in the darkness in search of a new place to hide, I had put out the decoys as usual and elected to break some ice and pull the canoe into the bushes. At dawn, with my attention focused on a high circling black, three others slipped in low and unnoticed until the very last. I had missed all three easy shots and would have missed three more if I had had them—I've never yet been able to hit much of anything with my cheek off the stock.

Now, way down the pond I see a single black working the open water: Back and forth, ever cautious, looking for who knows what. I talk to him a little, but in the rain my Lohman duck call freezes-up and I switch to Ken Martin. The black is wary, even for a black. I talk some more. He turns and flies off, then comes back a moment later. Now Ken has frozen-up, so I dig out the Lohman once again from inside my shirt and it plays true. The black comes within gun range for a moment as he circles, but I want him in front of me, over the rig. No wonder he's so cautious: One of his primaries is askew, evidence of flack damage over someone else's decoys. He does not come back into my field of vision. I turn, slowly, in time to see him clearing the treetops, going away.
          A minute later I spot the black once again at the far end of the pond where I first saw him. Am I teasing him, or is it the other way around? I continue to talk to the black. One moment I am sure I've fooled the bird as he turns toward the rig, then the next I'm equally sure I've been found out as he swerves away.
          In close now. Ever cautious, he circles widely... Twice... A third time. I talk softly. At the right moment, the current gives a realistic wiggle to the decoys. The black sets his wings, but not for my spread. He comes into a little inlet behind my left shoulder where a spring has kept the water open. I cannot turn in that direction, sitting in the bottom of the canoe as I am. The duck hovers in the air, back-peddling. I can see the black nail on his khaki bill, his nostrils, the pupil of his eye. He is no more than 15 feet from me but I am helpless to shoot. Without putting down he climbs away.
          He circles widely. I talk. He leaves. I call him back, and he circles some more, still undecided. He still likes the little cove. I shift my position slightly so that I can swing in that direction, but that small motion is my undoing—He sees me, and suddenly flares off. This time he leaves for good.
          I curse.

          Ten o'clock. Somewhere I read that if you keep wiggling your toes, they'll get warm. I've been wiggling all morning and all I've got is tired, cold toes. There is no action, but I know for sure that as soon as I start to pick-up it'll rain ducks. I get as comfortable as I can, determined to wait just a bit longer.
          Ten fifteen. Maybe just a little longer.
          Ten thirty. Who's kidding who? I'm freezing. I'd be a fool to wait any more. If anything was going to fly, it would have flown by now. I begin to gather in the rig, and have the heavy rubber gloves on when they show up: Two blacks and a drake mallard, gliding down the pond, necks stretched out, just looking for company. I grab for the gun and they flare off, climbing. I look up after them and the water from my hat brim runs into my collar.
          My wife was right. Sometimes, having this much fun is more trouble than it's worth. Sometimes.

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This site was last updated 09/21/06