<TITLE>17. Par 57-59</TITLE>L-57 I told the wife I was going to bear hunt, and I said, "I'm going down here to hunt deer, and I'll pick up a deer, come back; I'll be back by noon."
She said, "I'll be waiting for you." Cold that night; we had to take little Billy and put him between us, keep him from freezing to death: cold November and the limbs were freezing, dropping off the trees. Had a little shelter rest, and the cabin was locked. The Hurricane Mountain, the tower set up there, and we was going to go way back over in the other part of the country to hunt.
So he was going to unlock the cabin, and she could go in there, and her and Billy stay while we taken the trip and went away. So, her just a kid nearly herself, about twenty-one, twenty-two years old. And so, that night--that night we liked to froze. So building a little fire and making a little lean-to, and so then the next morning I started out to get a deer, 'cause he was supposed to come that day.
And so, I told her I'd be back at noon. And I went down across the hill to do some tracking. Come back up along the ridge, and I--I seen a bobcat crossing, and I couldn't get close enough to it to shoot it so I went on up over a hill. And I trailed up along-side and went into a great big bear den. And there wasn't nothing in there; I come back, went down towards the giants, what they call the giants. It's a great massive forest in there for miles after miles, all flat woods like in there and tarred.

L-58 So I got way down on the side, and I seen a deer over, a great big fellow, and I shot the deer. When I got through over there, I said, "Well now, looky here, it's after twelve o'clock, so I got to hurry." And I went back, started back up this way. I--it come a--the storm was coming down, fog. When it gets foggy in the woods, any hunter knows that's a dangerous time. You can't hardly see your hands before you.
Well, I started walking. I said, "I've got to hurry." And I went around; I kept walking, walking, walking, walking. I thought, "Well my, where'd I turn off at?" And the first thing you know, I happen to stop, look, I thought, "Well I've seen this place somewhere." Looked up, and there hung my deer. I knowed what I'd walked around somewhere. So I said, "Now, I've got to go one certain way." And I walked again, come back to the place three times, right straight.
Now, the Indian calls that the death walk, you know. So that's what you are; you're walking in circles. And I knew that, but how was I going to get out.
And now, the storm was right down, blowing in the top of the trees, fog just a turning. And I thought, "Now, the sensible thing to do..." I'd have went into somewhere, and--and a came somewhere and hibernated up till the storm was over, and then climbed up to a high place, and see where I was, and go on. But I got a wife and baby up there, would freeze to death and die that night. They never in the woods in their life. They didn't know how to take care of themselves, and scare them to death anyhow. For I knowed they'd both die that night; I had to find them. And what a feeling. Oh, my. Baby and wife to die in the woods that night.

L-59 And--but I thought I was too good to ever be lost in the woods. So then I went around; I thought--I thought, "Well now, here I've got to go one way." I thought, "As I come up the mountain, the wind was facing me in the face. I come down this way, so that would throw it this way." I thought, "Now, the storm coming, which way did it come?"
And the winds had changed, and them pockets and circuits will blow any way, blow this way awhile and then this way awhile. And oh, it was cloudy, and squalling, moss on both sides of the tree down in that low place, till wasn't nothing in the world I could find for a landmark. But down in there, 'course the wind don't get down in there like it does in a blizzard and then both sides was thick. There was nothing in the world I could find to get myself out of the woods.


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