The Great October Possum Massacre

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This story is based loosely on a possum hunt Dad organized shortly after we moved to the farm down on James River. I was thirteen, and it was my first (and only) possum hunt. So far one has been enough.

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One chilly autumn evening when I was ten and Teddy was eight, Dad announced at dinner that we were going hunting.

"Oh, boy!" said Teddy.

"Great!" said I.

"Henry, are you sure?" Mother said.

"Of course I'm sure," Dad said defensively. He always bristled when Mother questioned one of his Great Ideas. "Hunting is important for boys. It teaches them to read and understand nature's subtle signs, to recognize trees and animals and rocks and...and...rocks."

"Oh, boy!" said Teddy.

"Gee," said I.

Mother sighed.

"Hunting is a basic human instinct," Dad continued, trying hard to sell the Great Idea. "Our earliest ancestors were hunters..."

"But Dear," Mother interrupted, "our ancestors had to hunt. They didn't have supermarkets."

Dad grimaced and shook his head. "Women just don't understand," he muttered to Teddy and me.

"And besides," Mother said, "what do you know about hunting?"

"Aha! You forget that I grew up in the country. I spent many pleasant hours as a lad, tramping the woods and meadows."

"That was a long time ago."

"Nonsense. Hunting comes natural. Its in every man's blood."

"But Dear..."

"Now, Margaret, my mind is made up. It's time these boys learned something about life outside the suburbs. It'll do them good to get out in the open, breathe fresh air, test their wits..."

"What are we going to hunt?" I asked. I imagined myself stealing silently through the forest, stalking a bear, or a mountain lion, or, at the very least, a deer.

"Possum," Dad said.

Mother left the table holding a napkin to her mouth and making sputtering sounds.

"Possum?" Teddy said. "What's possum?"

"They're like big rats," I said.

"They are not!" Dad said. "Possums are wild beasts. They live in the woods and they're very...stealthy. They only come out at night."

I knew about possums. A classmate of mine brought one to school in a box once. She had caught it with her bare hands in her back yard. The idea of purposely stalking one of these lethargic beasts sounded about as thrilling to me as searching under the sofa for a pet hamster. But Dad was adamant. He launched into another enthusiastic sales pitch.

"What you do," he said, "is get a lantern, a dog or two, and a gun. Then you go out at night in the fall of the year when persimmons get ripe, and..."

"What's persimmons?" Teddy asked.

"They're like plums," Dad said. "Possums love persimmons more than almost anything. Why, I've seen times when every persimmon tree in the country had a possum in it. Some had two."

"Gosh," Teddy said.

"Anyhow, you go out at night, and when you find a persimmon tree with a possum in it, the dogs bark, somebody holds the lantern to make the possum's eyes shine, and you shoot the possum out of the tree." He paused and looked expectantly at Teddy and me.

"Why?" I asked.

"What do you mean, 'why'?"

"Why do you shoot the possum?"

"Because, that's what you're hunting."

"But...what good is a dead possum?"

Dad narrowed one eye and looked dangerously at me. "Hunting is a sport," he said. "You shoot the possum for the by-god sport, that's why."

"Oh," I said.

Dad's plan called for us to leave Saturday and drive to Aunt Lena's farm down in the southern part of the state. "That's good possum country," he said. "We can be there in time to hunt most of Saturday night. Your mother can visit with Aunt Lena while we hunt. Then, we'll drive back home Sunday."
So, for the rest of the week, Dad, Teddy, and I met in the garage each evening after dinner to lay plans and collect provisions for our adventure. Dad believed in thorough preparation. He made a comprehensive list of everything that we might need under any imaginable circumstance. He spread a tarpaulin on the garage floor and checked each item off a list as we placed it on the tarp. We had, among other things, jack knives, hunting knives, ropes, a kerosene lantern, a compass, a snake-bite kit, canteens, a hatchet, matches dipped in wax for water proofing, back packs, the old single-shot .22 rifle that Dad kept locked in the closet, flashlights, raincoats, a change of socks, long underwear, a first aid kit, and chocolate bars for quick energy. By Saturday, with a few Sherpas, we could have launched a respectable assault on Everest. We left most of the stuff behind because there wouldn't have been room in the car for us if we had packed it all, but it was fun making plans and collecting it.

Saturday dawned cold and frosty, and by mid-morning we were loaded and ready to go--except for the dogs. We brought them out last. I suspected they were the weak link in the whole plan. Button, the family dog, was a middle-aged dachshund fond of long dreamful naps in the sun by the patio door, while Teddy's dog, King, was a nasty-tempered miniature poodle. King's favorite activity was running away from home. If he got out of the house or yard, he ran, barking and yapping joyously, in whichever direction he happened to be pointed at the time, and he continued until caught. Twice that summer the whole neighborhood had turned out to corner and catch him. Dad said King was insane, but I suspected he got that way from watching Teddy play football. In our neighborhood games of touch, we had learned never to give the ball to Teddy, because once in possession of it, he, too, took off in any convenient direction, giggling and shouting, ignoring sidelines, goal lines, and the rules of the game. Teddy was the only thing, animate or inanimate, that King didn't growl at and try to bite.

We had to keep the dogs separate in the car because they hated each other. At home, they maintained a fragile truce based upon territorial imperatives. Each dog claimed exclusive rights to certain areas of the house, and as long as boundaries were mutually recognized and respected, and as long as they stayed at least six feet apart, they ignored each other and coexisted in relative peace. Any breach of these rules, however, resulted in a snarling, barking, biting, melee that could be stopped only by a few swats with the broom that Mother kept behind the kitchen door.

"Don't worry," Dad said. "Hunting instincts will take over once they get out in the woods; they'll forget their feud."

We arrived at Aunt Lena's farm in the late afternoon in time to unpack, visit a while, and have a delicious supper composed of foods from Aunt Lena's harvest. Aunt Lena was Dad's older sister, and our favorite aunt. After her husband died in the war, she stayed on the farm, tending a herd of cattle, a flock of chickens, assorted dogs and cats, and a large garden. She was a big, happy, loud-talking woman who prided herself on her ability to outwork, outthink, outfarm, and outcuss any man in the country, while still keeping a clean house. She also made the best sugar cookies imaginable.

After supper, Dad, Teddy, and I stepped out on the back porch to check the weather. Stars were snapping on one by one in the incredibly clear night sky. With the sun gone and no wind or clouds to moderate the cooling, the temperature was already in the upper twenties, heading for a hard freeze by morning. "Ideal possum hunting weather," Dad said.

"Ideal pneumonia-catching weather," said Mother. She insisted that we all don multiple layers of everything, especially Teddy, who was prone to catch colds. He stood and watched while Dad and I selected the gear we were going to take, because he couldn't bend over in all the clothes. Mother had wrapped a thick wool scarf around his head so that only his eyes showed, and everything he said sounded muffled, as if it came through a wall from the next room.

When we were almost ready, Mother brought each of us another sweater. "Just to be on the safe side," she said. Teddy mumbled something through his scarf and I could see sweat beads standing between his eyes.

"Now, Henry, you be careful," Aunt Lena said as we prepared to begin our adventure. "Don't start acting afool and get these boys hurt. I remember how you fell out of a tree when you were a boy and broke your leg on one of these silly skunk hunts of yours."

"Possum," Dad said. "We're hunting possum.

"Whatever. It's all foolishness, if you ask me. And stay out of that pasture across the creek," Aunt Lena added. "My cows are in there for the night, and there's a young bull with them that might fight."

"Come on, men," Dad growled.

Outside, a full moon peered over the eastern horizon, bathing the landscape in crisp silver light that left inky black holes for shadows. The dry frozen grass crunched underfoot as we crossed the yard.

We turned the dogs loose when we got out behind the barn, and they ignored each other, just as Dad had said they would. King trotted out in front like a true hunting dog, while poor short-legged Button waddled along behind and did his best to keep up.

We hadn't gone far before Teddy stepped in a cow pie. He stood on one foot saying, "Ugh," and "Yuck," while Dad took the shoe off and wiped it on the grass, but it was still a mess when he put it back on. Teddy insisted that we light the lantern after that. He said he didn't want to step in any more cow pies and he especially didn't want to step on any snakes.

"It's too cold for snakes," Dad said.

"I realize that," said Teddy. "But I'd feel much better with the lantern on."

So Dad lit the lantern and let Teddy carry it. For the next three or four hours, we hiked through the fields and woods; we must have looked at a hundred persimmon trees, and it was fun being out in the clean night air even though we didn't find any possums.

We did see one skunk.

Actually, the dogs saw it first and thereafter we had to throw rocks at them occasionally so they wouldn't come too close. Their enthusiasm for the hunting business seemed to cool noticeably as a result of all this.

It was around midnight when Teddy finally said, "I'm tired."

I was delighted that he brought it up because I had lost interest in the whole thing by then, too.
Dad, however, was not easily discouraged. "I know where there is one more giant persimmon tree," he said, in his best sales-pitch voice. "I'll guarantee that if there is only one possum left in the world, he is in that tree right now."

I sighed and Teddy groaned, but Dad didn't take the hint. We straggled along behind, and he led us through a field down to the creek, which we crossed on a big tree trunk that had fallen across like a bridge.

"Dad," I said, when we reached the other side, "Isn't this where Aunt Lena said the bull was?"

"Your Aunt Lena tends to exaggerate things. Those cows are all the way down at the other end of the pasture." I could hear the cowbell off where he pointed, and it was true that it sounded a long way off. There was a hill between us and the cows, too, so they couldn't see us.

"Besides," Dad said, holding up a wetted finger, "we're down wind from them." I started to point out that there was no wind, but I knew it wouldn't make any difference to Dad. "They'll never know we're here," he said. "Even if they do discover us, we have the dogs and they can handle any old baby bull."

The tree we were headed for stood by itself in the middle of the field. When we had covered about three-quarters of the distance between the creek and the tree, Teddy suddenly stopped and said, "What's that?"

"What's what?," Dad said.

I stopped and listened. Teddy was right. It wasn't a sound exactly. It was more as if the ground was shaking--like an earthquake.

"Dad," I said, "I think something is coming."

Dad listened for a second. He looked at us and he looked at the creek and he looked at the tree. We were closer to the tree.

"Uh...men, lets just sort of trot on over to that tree." His voice sounded calm, but he looked nervously over his shoulder while he spoke.

Just then the top of the hill, over toward the sound of the cowbell, heaved and bulged and changed into the silhouette of the biggest bull that I have ever seen. He carried his head high, like he was looking for something, and jets of white steam were shooting from his nostrils. Each time one of his hooves struck the earth, a small tremor rippled beneath our feet. When he spied us, he broke into a full gallop and bellowed, and, I swear, smoke and flames poured from his mouth. I have been in and out of my share of tight spots in the years since that night, but I can honestly say that I have never been more scared than I was at that moment.

"It's the b-b-bull," Teddy observed as he started to run.

Dad immediately sprang into action: he pointed at the charging bull and shouted, "Sic 'im, dogs!"

King snarled once, lunged at Button, and tried to tear Button's ear off. The two dogs got so occupied with trying to kill each other that they completely ignored the bull. Dad cursed and kicked at them, but he missed and nearly fell down. Then, remembering the gun, he quickly pulled the hammer back, and fired a warning shot above the bull`s head. The pitiful pop of the .22 did not impress the bull in any observable fashion; he continued to charge. With no time to reload, Dad dropped the useless rifle and said, "Run."

I still remember how effortless, how dream-like, that run was, almost as if my legs were working by themselves. It felt as if I were flying, as if I got about an inch off the ground and stayed there until I reached the tree. Teddy was already half way to the tree when I started, and I passed him. I could hear Dad behind us, shouting encouragement.

"Run, dammit, run," he said.

I was already in the tree when Teddy arrived. He jumped a couple of inches off the ground, wrapped his arms and legs around the trunk, and began to squall at the top of his voice. Dad grabbed him by the seat of his pants and collar, jerked him off the tree, and threw him up among the branches where I managed to grab him and pull him up on the limb with me. Dad shinnied up beside us just as the bull thundered to a stop beneath us. He began circling the tree, bellowing and rolling his eyes and pawing dirt up over his back.

Dad said bulls have very short attention spans, and that this one would eventually get tired and wander off to graze or to check on his heifers or something, and we would make a dash for the creek. While we waited for this prediction to come true, Teddy suddenly pointed above Dad's head and said, "What's that?"

In a tree fork just above us sat a rather mangy looking animal, staring calmly at us with what appeared to be weak eyes.

"Hey, that's a possum!" Dad said.

Teddy began to whimper, but Dad said he would show us how harmless possums were. He broke off a branch and poked the beast a couple of times. The possum curled up in the fork and stopped moving.

"He's sulled up," Dad said. He stood up and lifted the possum out of the fork. He handled the possum, turned it upside down and every which way, and still the possum didn't move. "He pretends he is dead to fool his enemies. He stays like this until they leave. Right now, he is perfectly harmless."

The possum bit down on Dad's thumb. Dad howled and shook his hand and the attached possum vigorously. The possum, quickly tiring of this phase of the demonstration, let go of the thumb and went crashing through branches, landing with a thump on the ground. He scurried off into the darkness while Dad cussed and examined his thumb by the flickering light.

That's how we noticed the fire.

Apparently, when Teddy started running for the tree, he had thrown the lantern, because it had broken and set the grass on fire.

A grove of cedar trees stood in one corner of the pasture, and when the fire got in under them, things began to happen. Cedar trees are difficult to ignite, but when one gets hot enough to start, it goes up with a whoosh like a can of gasoline.

The trees began to light up one at a time, and it was like a Fourth of July fireworks show. Teddy and I laughed and clapped our hands and said, "Wowee," each time a tree exploded. Dad sat on the limb with his head in his hands saying, "Oh me, oh my."

Aunt Lena and Mother finally saw the glow from the fire and came to rescue us. Aunt Lena threw rocks at the bull and called him some ugly names, and he walked away stiff-legged, with his head up high, as if he were offended.

Aunt Lena called Dad some ugly names, too, and said that she had been saving those cedar trees for fence posts, and what the hell was she supposed to do for pasture now that Dad had burned the best one she had, and she went on like that for a long time. Dad didn't even try to answer.

By that time, the countryside was awake; some neighboring farmers came in their pickup trucks to see what the commotion was about, and it was lucky they did, because we needed help putting out the fire.

The trip home next day was strangely quiet. Dad seemed absorbed in his driving. Mother hummed and chuckled under her breath some, but she stopped each time Dad glared at her. We were all covered with soot from the fire; Dad had a bandage around his sore thumb where the possum had bitten him; Teddy had dried cow flop all over his shoe and pants leg, and the dogs reeked of skunk.

We were tired but happy.