An Epic Ruse
You know, some men might fancy sitting in a chair in their underwear with three young ladies gathered round the room, but I gotta say it’s not my cup of tea. But that’s exactly the situation I found myself in a couple of weeks ago.
Mind you, the ladies were fully clothed and saying things like, “Boy – this weather we’re having sure is something,” and, “so how many years were you a game warden?” and, “what SPF sunscreen do you use?” while they burned and biopsied blemishes off my body with a mini-acetylene torch-looking thing-ama- jig. Yep, boys and girls; wear your sunscreen!
But my trip to the dermatologist wasn’t all bad. I ran into a friend and former boss, David Westphal, in the lobby, and it was great to catch up with him. David ran the USDA office in Atascosa County for many years. I worked for him one summer in high school, and he hired me again when I got out of college.
I was a field technician for the USDA for a year until I got into the game warden academy.
Back then, I lived with my grandparents on the same ranch I live on today, and I loved to deer hunt. David was a hunter, too, and he didn’t mind if I spent time in a blind before work in the morning.
I would get up, get dressed and be in a tree at least an hour before sunrise. If I hadn’t shot anything by about 7:45 a.m., I’d high-tail it out of there and be at the office by 8:00. I was 23 years old then, and the best buck I had ever taken at that point in my life was a scrawny little eight-pointer that wouldn’t even be legal in Atascosa County today. But one cold, crisp morning that year, a right-nice 9-point buck hopped the fence and proceeded to walk right underneath me.
BLAM!!! He was down. I hopped out, took a moment to admire him and then hoofed it back to the house to use the phone to call the office to tell them I’d be in late. One of the office ladies answered and said she’d pass along the message.
After I tagged and field dressed the buck, I drove to the barn and hung it up. Then, I got cleaned up and went to work.
When I got to the office, David wasn’t there. Someone said he’d been hunting that morning, too. Good for him.
I saw David’s truck pull into the parking lot a while later. He parked, got out and walked with purpose toward the office door. Something was up.
When he came in, the four office ladies all stopped what they were doing. David started laying it on thick. “Y’all got to come out here and look at this deer I got this morning!” he said. “Whoo-wee it’s a big ‘un!”
We all dutifully followed David out the door and gathered around his truck. There in the back, was a right-nice, 9-point buck.
I was a little suspicious until I saw that the tag on the antler was secured with bailing wire. Who does that? Not me — I duct tape those suckers so they don’t come off.
Everyone congratulated David, and somebody said, “Jon, here, killed a buck, too.”
“Oh yeah?” said David, “How big was he?”
“Well, he’s a 9-point, like yours,” I said.
David said, “Oh, he ain’t bigger than this one, is he? I don’t think he could be — this is the best one I ever shot.”
Scratching my head, I said, “I don’t know. He’s close.”
David kept on, and — as most of you reading this probably aren’t nearly as naïve as me at 23 — you’ve probably already figured out, David had MY deer with HIS tag on it in the back of his truck.
After failing to get me to step out and proclaim I had, most assuredly, shot the bigger deer, David said, “Let’s go take your deer back.”
