The valley teemed with life, breeding, killing, and eating undisturbed by man. He passed sow bears standing erect and protective of their cubs, woodpeckers and flickers knocking, bull moose rearing their ponderous lips and rack of bone from which water roots dangled slovenly. Geese, too, passed high overhead, northbound and honking. The man began to assume again life’s benevolence, of which he had recently entertained some doubts.
