Sniper Elite Read Free Page A

became louder, and suddenly through the thick green foliage we could see the two dogs had a nice looking Captain Cooker bailed up in the creek line. It was a sow, 40 odd kilos. ‘Good eatin’ size,’ Jim said as he burst through undergrowth and crashed the 2 metres into the trickling creek.
    He rapidly closed onto the rear of the black feral animal; with the dogs at the front, he grabbed its back legs with huge hands that looked like a bunch of bananas and twisted the sow so she fell on her back; knife in hand and with a swift movement Jim had severed the carotid artery and cut into the trachea. Brightly coloured blood pumped by a rapidly beating heart gushed and bubbled from the throat. We watched on as her movements became gradually less aggressive until she lay still.
    It took Jim only seconds to show us how to dress the animal and prepare it for carriage out of the bush. He tied the trotters of each side together with baling twine and turned it into a very heavy and uncomfortable pack. Craig was first up to start the extraction of our Sunday roast and it wasn’t long before Craig’s back, bum and the tops of his legs were covered in blood from the carcass. He did extremely well to carry it as far as he did, then with great relief Craig handed over the ‘backpack’ to me. ‘Fuckin’ hell, this is heavy!’ I muttered under my breath. It wasn’t long before I was in the hurt locker but I wasn’t going to show the other two that I was struggling. It was about 3.5 kilometres to Jim’s home-made VW ute but the terrain for the first 2.5 kilometres was through pristine native rainforest as thick as jungle. There were times when I would walk 3 metres uphill, but then slip back five; I’d pick myself up and give it another crack.
    Downhill presented different challenges as it was quite treacherous under foot and I took a few bruises to the back of my head where the pig’s jaw cracked me every time I fell backwards. All the time both front trotters were putting direct pressure on each clavicle, and my legs started to tire by the minute. ‘Surely we aren’t far from the car by now!’
    When we broke out of the bush and onto the rolling cleared pastures I could see how far away Jim’s ute was. 1 kilometre to be exact, but it seemed bloody miles away! Jim let me struggle for about another 500 metres before he took the pig off me. I did say, ‘Nah, it’s okay mate, I’ll take it.’ But Jim insisted; he was probably concerned about the painful look on my face. But I reckon it was a personal test of his to see if I was tough enough to be invited back.
    Jim threw the pig onto the wooden tray at the back of the ute and strapped it down with more bailing twine. Even though it had gone four in the afternoon, we sat on the grass next to the VW and ate our cut lunches. Jim asked me where should we hunt next weekend. I had passed the test!
    I continued to hunt with Craig and Jim as often as I could until I travelled to England. Jim was an absolutely magic bloke and very down-to-earth; he called a spade a spade and if he said he was going to do something he would. One time he got sold a dud from a dodgy car yard; they told him that if he wasn’t satisfied with it over the weekend to return it and they’d give him his money back.
    When he did they welshed on the deal. Jim said, ‘If you don’t give me my money back I’m going to drive the car through your showroom window.’ The salesman didn’t take him seriously. He should have. Jim drove the ute through the huge glass window, hitting a couple of cars before he stopped. The mechanics from out the back heard the crash and came out to investigate then started to fight with Jim. Bad idea. He knocked most of them out.
    The court found Jim guilty and ordered him to pay $10,000 in damages, but he was an absolute champion. He died while he was out hunting. He was in his late 70s. He