No country for old men - By Cormac McCarthy Page 0,25

the sporting goods store again he asked the same clerk if he had any aluminum tentpoles. He tried to explain that he didnt care what kind of tent it was, he just needed the poles.

The clerk studied him. Whatever kind of tent it is, he said, we’d still have to special order poles for it. You need to get the manufacturer and the model number.

You sell tents, right?

We got three different models.

Which one has got the most poles in it?

Well, I guess that would be our ten foot walltent. You can stand up in it. Well, some people could stand up in it. It’s got a six foot clearance at the ridge.

Let me have one.

Yessir.

He brought the tent from the stockroom and laid it on the counter. It came in an orange nylon bag. Moss laid the shotgun and the bag of hardware on the counter and untied the strings and pulled the tent from the bag together with the poles and cords.

It’s all there, the clerk said.

What do I owe you.

It’s one seventy-nine plus tax.

He laid two of the hundred dollar bills on the counter. The tentpoles were in a separate bag and he pulled this out and put it with his other things. The clerk gave him his change and the receipt and Moss gathered up the shotgun and his hardware purchases together with the tentpoles and thanked him and turned and left. What about the tent? the clerk called.

In the room he unwrapped the shotgun and wedged it in an open drawer and held it and sawed the barrel off just in front of the magazine. He squared up the cut with the file and smoothed it and wiped out the muzzle of the barrel with a damp facecloth and set it aside. Then he sawed off the stock in a line that left it with a pistol grip and sat on the bed and dressed the grip smooth with the file. When he had it the way he wanted it he slid the forearm back and slid it forward again and let the hammer down with his thumb and turned it sideways and looked at it. It looked pretty good. He turned it over and opened the box of shells and fed the heavy waxed loads into the magazine one by one. He jacked the slide back and chambered a shell and lowered the hammer and then put one more round in the magazine and laid the gun across his lap. It was less than two feet long.

He called the Trail Motel and told the woman to hold his room for him. Then he shoved the gun and the shells and the tools under the mattress and went out again.

He went to Wal-Mart and bought some clothes and a small nylon zipper bag to put them in. A pair of jeans and a couple of shirts and some socks. In the afternoon he went for a long walk out along the lake, taking the cut-off gunbarrel and the stock with him in the bag. He slung the barrel out into the water as far as he could throw it and he buried the stock under a ledge of shale. There were deer moving away through the desert scrub. He heard them snort and he could see them where they came out on a ridge a hundred yards away to stand looking back at him. He sat on a gravel beach with the empty bag folded in his lap and watched the sun set. Watched the land turn blue and cold. An osprey went down the lake. Then there was just the darkness.

IV

I was sheriff of this county when I was twenty-five. Hard to believe. My father was not a lawman. Jack was my grandfather. Me and him was sheriff at the same time, him in Plano and me here. I think he was pretty proud of that. I know I was. I was just back from the war. I had some medals and stuff and of course people had got wind of that. I campaigned pretty hard. You had to. I tried to be fair. Jack used to say that any time you’re throwin dirt you’re losin ground but I think mostly it just wasnt in him. To speak ill of anybody. And I never did mind bein like him. Me and my wife has been married thirty-one years. No children. We lost a girl but I wont talk about that. I served two terms and