Percy Paterson’s watermelons were ripe for the picking when the first dove season started that year. Five of us teenagers, shotguns a-shoulder, decked out in boots, bandoleers, and camouflage hats, were pillaging the countryside, ignoring bag limits, hunting posted ground and generally being cocky young bucks full of devilment. Stumbling upon the watermelon patch, we felt like lusty pirates of yore, about to reap the spoils of war.
