That night Lane dreamed again about his hunt. Actually, he was seeing himself field-dressing the elk and paying attention to nothing else, which he had been warned not to do, and really had known better anyway, but sometimes a person does stupid things.
He had had the hide laid out and the elk quartered. The meat was laying on the clean side of the hide, the hair down so as to be on the outside when pulled up and tied around the meat.
He had just finished up and put his knife, and tools away when he heard the whistle of a bullet go past him. Actually, he had heard the bullet hit first and the whistle of it as a bullet hit the dirt made him realize what it was. A split second later he heard the report of the rifle from the far end of the clearing.
Looking up he could see a man waving
