Chapter 8

The business of supplying game meat to the tavern and to various businesses around John's Crossroads was doing quite well. They were bringing in four to six deer a day, and could have sold more if they could get them. The trouble was that Turtle and Joe were still hunting the Indian way by sneaking up on an animal to get close enough to attack it with a knife or by taking it from ambush. This was damned time consuming so they rarely could take more than one or two deer in a day.

On the other hand, Ed was managing a regular two deer a day, plus he had time for rabbits and squirrels. Joe finally caught on and asked Ed how he had managed to be so successful with his hunting. In complete innocence, he said, "I thought you knew. I've been using my atlatl to kill deer. Was I doing something wrong? I'll stop right away if you want me to."

"No, no, that's not it. I just wanted to know how you could be so successful and still have time for rabbits."

"Well, to tell the truth, I could get more than two deer in a day if I really wanted to, but I thought that I was supposed to stay with just the two a day, since you and Turtle never brought in more than that."

Joe slapped his head and mentally kicked himself in the ass! How could he have been so stupid? Joe told Ed that he was free to bring in as many deer as he could kill, and Joe apologized for misleading him on how many he was supposed to get in a day. Ed looked a little surprised when Joe walked away muttering to myself.

Joe went to find Turtle. When Joe told him the result of his conversation with Ed, Turtle burst into laughter. He agreed that both of them had been pretty blind not to see what Ed was doing that had made him so successful. Turtle also agreed with Joe that they should switch to hunting with the atlatl as soon as they could make the changeover.

Joe went to the resident blacksmith and ordered 20 more steel tips for the darts. He gave Joe a hard time about wasting that much perfectly good steel on a toy, but Joe stuck to his guns, and he agreed to make what Joe wanted. It took him six days to make that many points, what with the other work that he had to do. Joe paid him with the meat at the same rate as on the first order, and he was happy, so Joe didn't press him on a couple of other ideas he had at the moment.

Meanwhile, Turtle fletched the shafts for the darts, so they were ready as soon as the points were available. Mary made quivers for the darts, so they had a convenient way to carry the ammunition. Turtle and Joe practiced daily with a couple of darts borrowed from Ed, and they were both adequately accurate with the weapon by the time the additional darts were ready.

The first day they were out hunting with the atlatl and darts, Joe realized that he was carrying two sticks of nearly identical dimensions. The atlatl and his fighting stick were so nearly the same that he was inclined to forget which one he was holding and had to look to see which it was. Hell, he don't need two sticks! Joe made a couple of minor changes to his atlatl and stopped carrying the separate fighting stick. Ed and Turtle were enthusiastic adopters of the idea, so they had a little bit less to carry hunting with them.

Once they all switched to the atlatl and dart hunting method, they were taking four or five deer a day, each. This was all the market could stand, but they were now able to hunt and still have a little extra time on their hands for other activities. Joe still had not fulfilled his promise to teach empty-handed combat to Turtle, so now was the time.

They skipped a lot of the niceties of the sport of martial arts and zeroed in on what Turtle was really interested in—the killing blows, etc. Turtle was an accomplished rough-and-tumble wrestler, so Joe mostly just needed to show him how to hold his hands or use his feet and to provide a practice dummy for him. They managed to go through the exercises without seriously injuring each other, but they both had some spectacular bruises to show for their efforts. By the time the weather got too cold to practice outside, Turtle was an accomplished killer with his bare hands and feet!

Along about this time, wonder of wonders, Joe found out that he was doing something right. Mary announced that she was pregnant! This was mid October, so she figured that she caught back in August. That meant that she should deliver in late April or early May. Well, it was too early for Joe to start worrying about her health, but he couldn't help being concerned. Winter months were lean months, so he wondered how well she would manage her pregnancy during that time. Mary and Martha insisted that Joe was worrying about nothing. They had it all worked out, and Mary would get along fine with her growing baby. There was nothing that Joe could do about it, but he did wish for multivitamin tablets, just on principle.

Joe was talking to John about it when he heard the real corker: Martha was pregnant, too! John was a little embarrassed to talk about it, but finally admitted that the noises that Mary and Joe made had inspired him and Martha to an increased activity of their own. Joe congratulated him and then teased him about soon Joe would have a brother or sister-in-law young enough to be his child. Joe had sense enough to shut up before he made John mad with the teasing. Joe did say that he hoped that the baby was a boy so that John would have a son to leave the tavern to. John brightened up at that, and they talked about that possibility for a while.

The demand for meat increased as people wanted to smoke or salt enough meat to carry them through the winter. They now had to get as many kills as they could to satisfy the demand. It was a good thing that Ed had clued them in on using the atlatl and darts for hunting, though Joe hoped that he would have tumbled to the idea himself eventually. Several people had asked for rabbits for variety, so Ed switched to hunting rabbits exclusively because he was so skilled with his sling while Turtle and Joe stuck to the deer hunting.

They generally asked for cash for the meat: a copper half-penny and the skin for each rabbit, and 7 copper pennies and the skin for each adult deer. A few people did not have access to cash money, so they traded in kind for the meat, and Mary took care of marketing the odd things they came up with. They were moving such a volume of meat that Joe worried about killing off all of the game, but Turtle said that he did not need to worry about that. The Nipmucks were killing at a much faster rate than them, and they had not seemed to make a dent in the supply of animals. OK, that was logic that Joe could live with, at least for now.

Turtle wanted to return to his village before the weather got too bad for traveling. Now that he had so much money, he could well be the richest Nipmuck in this part of the colony, and he knew where he wanted to spend some of his wealth. Specifically, he wanted a wife or two. He'd had his eye on two sisters for some time, but he never could get enough wealth together to pay for them, but now he had the money. He wanted to return to the village in hope that the two women were still available. If they were, he would work out an agreement and return with them to John's Crossroads. All of them thought that was a great idea, and encouraged him to follow through. Ed and Joe also volunteered to join him for the trip, if he would like for them to.

Turtle was very appreciative of their concern and interest in his welfare. It certainly would be safer to travel in a group, so he welcomed their company. He was ready to leave tomorrow, so Joe told the rest of the family what they were planning to do. Mary and Martha arranged with Cookie to supply them with enough food to get them to the village, a three-day's supply should be enough. They took along some extra cheese as a gift for Walking Bear.

Oops, the next morning, the weather definitely looked like snow was on the way. The first snowfall of the season was never more that two or three inches, so they were in no danger from it, but it would be uncomfortable if they had to camp in fresh snow. They bundled up and left early at a fast jog. They could make it to the village by dark if they could maintain this pace. Turtle knew of several shortcuts that would save several hours of travel time if they could follow them in daylight. After dark, the shortcuts would be too dangerous because of gullies and such.