Cabeza Prieta: a hunt for desert sheep turns into a life lesson.

So often it happens that one's preconceived ideas simply don't fit the script provided by reality. It forces me to recall a western New Mexico elk hunt when despite seeing elk--heck, big bulls--racing across a major highway in the truck headlights three mornings straight, I refused to bowhunt there for several more days because I had big ideas as to where I should be seeing elk and where I wanted to pursue them. It wasn't a place where elk were supposed to live, and especially not a place where big bulls should have been found. But then I did hunt there, reluctantly, after becoming frustrated with the places I wanted badly to find elk in. I killed the biggest bull of my life, a true Booner. Still, the hiss of vehicles across nearby pavement left me dissatisfied. Any worthy bull should've been pushed well away, deep into nearby wilderness--or at least somewhere requiring some amount of shank's mare.

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That was years ago. This week I've driven over sheep tracks crossing sandy desert; two-tracks three times without taking heed. I get out and look at these tracks--ram tracks--but do nothing further in regards to them. I want my sheep to be up in the picturesque rock and cliff, up in the rough and tumble mountains where self-respecting desert bighorns are supposed to live. I don't want to hunt sheep in sand and cactus flats. So it is that I've bowhunted Arizona's Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge tight along the Mexican border eight days without yet spying so much as a single ram. I find sign in seemingly every chute of the rough piece of ground where I discovered them while scouting months earlier, but I see no rams. I see scattered ewes and lambs--very few--but not the ram I've been seeing in my dreams for several months.

I see man tracks as well--the tell-tale tire prints of handmade huaraches, smooth-worn sneakers, striding steadily north toward Tucson and Phoenix, or northwest toward the brighter horizons of Greater Los Angeles--nearly always in pairs and threesomes. I've been warned to secure camp well before departing for each day's hunt, lock truck doors against desperate illegal aliens seeking food or quick transportation.

It has become a hot-button political topic in the Southwest, one bureaucrats in Washington little understand, don't have to live with directly--nor liberals who so vehemently defend the rights of people so brazenly breaking the laws of the United States. The public unanimously objects to these illegal immigrants, yet congressman and senators lack the intestinal fortitude to anger a single potential voter. And liberals, well, what can I say? They seem to live in a different reality than I can even begin to fathom; like the one that says that if we take guns away from law-abiding citizens all crime will vanish forever. The "Minutemen" have made their appearance, liberals wringing their hands all the while, but have mostly made their point and began to disband. The Border Patrol goes through the motions of monitoring a peaceful invasion. The northward migration of Mexicans continues undeterred.

We all sit idly and ponder how long we have until the first Al Qaeda suitcase nuclear device arrives in a major American city via our porous borders.

I start out in the black dark of the ninth morning, anticipating an hour of grinding over rutted roads to reach the far northern extremities of the range I've been poring over daily. I've made half the drive when I see sharp tracks in the sand of the road. I hop out with a flashlight to find the spoor of three rams. Worn tracks. Old rams. I start to get back into my truck, to continue with my plan. I stop and think it through, temporarily unwilling to abandon a solid scheme. I start again, travel 10 yards, and stomp the brake again. I sit staring at the dash lights for something that's not there for several minutes before shutting the engine off. I listen to the engine ticking in the December cold, reach for the ignition again, and stop myself. Then I do start up, but pull off the road to allow passage, shut her off and run back to brush out the tracks in the track. I've adopted a new plan. If this doesn't work out I've wasted only one morning. I can't help but remember I have only four days more at my disposal.

I begin tracking at dawn, following spoor as easily as if they've crossed snow. The tracks are razor-sharp and smoking hot, but by noon, as the day grows truly hot and I sweat beneath my camos, I still haven't caught them. I could track them at a trot for much of the morning, but this is out of the question. They've entered areas of thick palo verde and mesquite and cactus, and when this occurs I must slow to a crawl, probing ahead with binoculars, hoping to discover them bedded tight, working a cud. It doesn't happen that way.

I continue tracking through the afternoon, now at least 10 miles from my truck, not actually lost, but unaware of any roads in the area, the only way back that I know for certain is the path I've traveled to arrive here. I'm running low on water. The tracks are entering rockier ground, the going tediously slow. I must range ahead, to patches of softer soil, circling to discover the next traces of the rams' passage. I mount rises and glass ahead often, but fail to see a thing.

The sun is setting when I near a large outcrop and decide to pull off the tracks and glass carefully with the last of my light. I'm scrambling up the spine of the rocky outcrop, hurrying to reach the top, to make the best of what remains of daylight. Just as I reach the top I hear rattling rock and scramble to the ledge just in time to see three sheep rumps rounding a drop. I cuss and turn to run off the backside of the outcrop recklessly. I'm taking stupid chances, but I must cut them off. I reach the bottom, moving quickly, trying to move quietly.

I see the rams coming. They pause to look back at the outcrop where I'd spooked them, continuing, picking their ways over loose rock and through stabbing cactus. I'm pinned down, temporarily paralyzed, afraid to move a muscle in fear of sending them away again. Three of them, all behemoths, but the leader is decidedly the largest. I've never heard of a ram so big being killed with bow. And still they come. They are only 150 yards away.

They momentarily drop into a wash and I steal ahead carefully, nocking an arrow on the fly. I only make 30 yards before they emerge again, the largest ram still leading. I can't breathe. My hands are shaking. I'm pinned in the open, unable to move. The rams pass behind a palo verde and I jerk my rangefinder out of my hip pouch. The reading I receive is a disappointment. They have seemed so close, but they're still out there. It's a range I've practiced often; flatfooted in my relaxed backyard. They'll pass at 63 yards. I look beyond them and there is cover, broken ground that might allow me to back off and come at them again--if there was time. My legal light is going fast. I must get it together. I'm going to shoot.

The biggest ram appears ahead of the others and I draw my bow. He continues walking. I can't believe he's not spotted me. I produce a soft bleat and he continues walking. Three more steps and he'll enter more brush and get past me. I produce a louder bleat. He doesn't stop. I'm panicking. I whistle loudly. This stops him but he also looks right at me. I aim longer than is necessary, a little voice in my head screaming to release. The ram turns his head forward to walk again and I dump the string. It all happens instantly. The arrow disappearing into the background clutter, the ram seeming to slip into another gear, dipping his head to bolt, the arrow flashing in his general vicinity, the hollow thump, and mass pandemonium and settling dust. I wait only minutes and it's abruptly dark. Too dark to find my arrow without using a flashlight; to see blood; to track prudently, I back off.

I use my GPS to mark the exact spot I've shot from. I retreat to the rock outcrop and GPS that as well. I think about roughing it out in the outcrops, cussing myself for not GPS-marking my truck before rashly setting out this morning. I think better of it, the December desert assuming an instant chill with the vanished sun. Even with fire it would prove a miserable night. There is also the fact that I need water badly. I start marching.

I push my truck within five miles of the GPS coordinate after an uncomfortable night in the cab, having been too tired to travel back to camp last night. I start out when I can just see to walk, shaking off the drowsiness of a cold night without sleep. Soon I can easily make out the distinctive outcrop where all the action started and it comforts me and I pick up the pace, eager to solve the mystery that has gnawed at me throughout the night. I reach the outcrop by 9 a.m. and climb to gain the vantage; to see if I might be lucky enough to find a sheep laying dead in an opening; or three healthy sheep nearby inviting a stalk. Instead I find fire smoke. There's thick smoke coming out of a sudden wash a half mile from where I sit. Somehow I understand what this means.

I go to the place where I've shot my sheep, finding the deep scars where he has dug in to run after my shot. After 20 yards there's blood. In another 80 yards a coagulated pool, human tracks and heavy drag marks. I follow the skid several hundred yards, knowing where it's going, slipping along carefully. I began to hear sticks being broken, a branch ripped from a shrub.

I stalk in as carefully as I would slipping up on a bedded buck, peering ahead with binoculars, assuring myself I've seen everything before moving closer. I come to the lip of a deep wash to find three Mexicans gathered around a fire, setting meat on sticks around a fire; whittling additional roasting sticks with pocket knives, carving fist-sized pieces of sheep meat, bright antifreeze jugs at their sides. They are cooking more than they could possibly eat. Apparently they intend to smoke the entire sheep.

I glass carefully and find my ram's head off to one side, the cape in ribbons. Something inside of me snaps. I rise to my feet and walk toward the group intent on blood; my bow swinging freely in one hand, an arrow in the other. The stocky one senses me and whirls suddenly, wielding the knife, terror in his eyes. The others spin, cowering, scared senseless, small-boned men that won't make 300 pounds as a pair. The man with the knife looks at it as if he doesn't quite know where it's come from, tossing it away from himself as if in quick apology.

I begin cussing them in English, gesturing to my sheep, expressing my anger and frustration of a ruined trophy in terms there's no way for them to understand. They back away, bunching like spooked animals, none of them offering a word. They've backed away, left their knives behind. I continue cussing them, walking over to my sheep to inspect the damage, anger growing inside of me again. Suddenly I began to comprehend how frightened these men are, these fellow human beings, these desperate souls. As quickly as my temper has flared I abruptly feel sorry for them. I suddenly feel like a world-class jackass. I've used these helpless men to vent a long night of worry. I stop talking and look them over and can't help but smile. I throw my hands into the air and take a deep breath. I shrug out of my backpack and lay my bow atop it, walking to the fire to select a piece of meat. I begin chewing, waving them over, laughing at the ridiculousness of it all. They crack smiles and I wave them over again.

We eat in silence for several minutes before one of the small ones begins in broken English, asking how far until civilization. They're going to Los Angeles. The talker has a relative there; a "rich" uncle who keeps the yards of the muy, muy rich. They have all been promised work. He wants to be an American. He translates in Spanish that I barely follow occasionally, for the others, and they nod in agreement, stars in their eyes. They've no idea where Los Angeles is, not even its general direction. He's very sorry to have ruined my sheep, he says. They have had no food in three days and were very hungry. They saw the sheep as an answer to their prayers to God. I laugh and wave it off. What's done is done.

They help me carry what's left of the meat, and the marvelous head, to my truck. The smallest one still does all the talking, the others shy, but nodding in agreement with all that is said, smiling sheepishly. We ride to my camp and they fill their water jugs, take the food I offer and a jute sack to carry it all. They help me pack and don't request a ride, a situation that could've turned awkward. I wouldn't have been able to oblige. There are fines involved today for helping a fellow human being crossing the desert by wits alone. A hefty fine.

We shake hands and the others speak for the first time, thanking me in embarrassing thoroughness, looking me hard in the eyes with their fierce, black Indian eyes so there's no question of sincerity. I swing into my truck and wave as they turn to walk northward. I watch them walking steadily and unwaveringly. Tough bastards. I wish them all the most luck possible. They're going to need all they can get. They'll be lucky if they see Los Angeles at all. If they do, they just might find that preconceived ideas seldom fit the scrip provided. Life's simply like that.

I start my truck and head for home.

BASED ON A TRUE STORY BY AARON MIVERS