Keith and the coyote.
Before moving to the valley ranch, a coyote
came by the house one morning and I
grabbed the .25-35 and followed it over to
where the Wesleyan University is now. In
three shots, I made it so hot that it turned
back into the gulch out of sight and headed
towards the State Capitol. I followed along
behind and I got to where the cordwood was
piled to heat the Capitol. The coyote appeared
on the mountain south of there a good
six hundred to seven hundred yards away and
about thirty people getting ready for their
day's work in the Capitol watched. I rested
my left shoulder against the cordwood, aimed
at the coyote, raised the rifle fairly high above
him, knowing that the little bullet would drop
a long way, and fired. I'd reloaded the rifle
and was aiming again when the first bullet
got there and hit the coyote and he rolled
down the hill for quite a distance. I emptied
the gun, but could never hit him again, so I
went home and got a belt of shells and told
Dad what had happened. He said he'd go
with me and help get him. We trailed the
coyote up over the hill, down into Dry Gulch
into deep snow, finally coming on him in the
snow. I started to shoot him but Dad says,
"Just get a club. That's all you need." So I
finished him with a club. That hard point
solid 117-grain .25-35 had broken the right
shoulder and went about an inch into the
right lung and lodged there. But the hemorrhage
from the broken shoulder had simply
bled the coyote out. Dad stepped the distance
from the cordwood rick in back of the Capitol
to where the coyote had rolled, and said it
was between six and seven hundred yards. It
shows the futility of trying to kill anything
with a little rifle at that distance when a
hard-point bullet merely got into the right
lung after breaking the shoulder
When I visited Helena in 2002, I went to Elmer's old house at 1012 Billings Avenue, and drove from there to the State Capitol. It's all grown up now of course, but I could still see where Elmer must have stood and where the coyote was up on the hill to the south. Always thought that was a neat story.
