IT WAS LIKE the buck fell from the sky. I’d glassed the wooded creekbottom to my left only minutes before. Then I scanned the opposite timber, stared at my boots for a few seconds, and heard the slightest scuff in the leaves. Or I thought I did. This was my third straight morning in the stand, the point at which I can begin to hear phantom, wishful-thinking noises. But when I turned to look in the direction of the sound, there stood the buck, just 25 yards off, his hooves planted in a scrape.
I wasn’t nervous at first. In profile, his tines looked OK but not towering, and his ears were hiding whatever mass was there. But then he arched