Guapo

  We all tend to give human characteristics to animals at times. Whether the "characteristics" are the result of their thinking or of their reflexes, etc. is a great debate.
  This story might better be called "Brief Encounter" ," Fall Follies" , "Autumn Anxieties" , but "Guapo " keeps us from committing to a side.
  One of the ranches we hunted at regularly, belonged to Tomas V. ---He was related somehow to Bob's wife,--but that gave us the "open sesame".  The ranch house was a nice frame house with rather extensive lawn and driveways. It was about 2 mi. from Rte 281,with a caliche connecting road.  Tomas and his wife had raised their boys,there and were considering moving. These factors helped to "open the door".
  After arrival we would go to the home and offer some groceries---Mrs V especially liked bananas. After a brief chat we would start quail hunting. --walking the fence line in back of the house about a quarter of a mile, making a U turn and returning on the next fence line which ended up about 200 yds from the original path.
  In addition to the fields there was a small pond(tank). After the "quail walk", time had usually elapsed so it was late enough to start dove hunting.
  On the particular days involved in this story, a large retriever type of dog had appeared and greeted us effusively. --He was white with brown and black, so he appeared dirty , no matter what.  As a result he was called "Guapo" --which means "handsome"( -with an ironic twist).
   Bob, Nick and I established ourselves and started shooting.  -A peculiar thing happened.- Guapo brought all the downed birds to me no matter the source.  After a while" Dr.A"  appeared and the same phenomenon persisted.  Guapo became busier and busier with 4 shooters, and my "stack" became higher and higher. -I then became busier and busier returning birds.  Doing more returning than shooting.  In fact, the second time, John was with us and was kept busy with his "return mail".  Guapo persisted, despite my efforts to discourage him.
   The only potential other problem was that should the representative of the Fish and Wildlife Dept. there would be a long "discussion" with a lot of "Yeah,! Yeah!- I've heard that one before," type of things. But it didn't happen!
  This activity continued for about three sessions,  Tomas was becoming more and more obviously disturbed with each session.
   About two weeks after we decided to go to another site to avoid problems with Guapo(and Tomas)
Tomas pulled us over on the highway.  "Where's Guapo?"was his insistent cry. --We haven't seen him since 2 weeks ago Wednesday. "
  " Let me look at your pick up !"He did , found nothing and went away grumbling, "That's what you get when you let city guys hunt on your land!"
   The dog had disappeared the day after we had been there last and hadn't (hasn't) been seen since!
         "Ay, Que Guapo!!"