The Last Conqueror

"Maybe we were selfish not having children."
Cecil said, "I think we were smart."
She chewed and was quiet again for a moment. Then she said they used to go country-western dancing together. She wasn't sure why they stopped. It was true she was "kind of put out" the year Cecil was gone four months. But she wasn't lonesome, at least not too much.

"I think we have a good relationship," said Mary Lee.
"Hell, I guess so," said Cecil. "We been married 49 years."
The forks clinked against the plates, the ice against the glasses.

In the spare bedroom, Cecil had already laid out the equipment for his next trip. The hunting in Africa is not what it used to be -- too much land-clearing, he said -- but he was going back to Cameroon to collect the Lord Derby eland. Mary Lee, he knew, would miss him; she had already cried "one or two little-old-bitty tears, but not enough to worry about."

Cecil figured he would die hunting. He hoped it would be by a lion or elephant. But if old age caught up to him first, he would have his wheelchair tied into the back of a pickup and hunt from there.

It's been a great life, he said. He had the trophies to prove it. He could have done as other men have done and drunk or gambled away his time, but that would have been a waste.

"Them people ain't got no memories," he said, "and I got memories all around me.