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The bird’s ability to fly is a traditional symbol for spiritual ascension and the ability to transgress beyond worldly cares, and the bird’s ability to go underneath the surface and pluck things out of the river and digest them is a metaphor for what Nick needs to do to transmutate his unpleasant memories. He follows the river from a distance, for some time, delaying gratification before deciding on a place for his camp. He wants to begin his healing in the woods deliberately and with discipline.

She now knows that he has found his sense of manhood and that his future does not include her because he can change, and perhaps she cannot. The short, happy life of Francis Macomber begins with his standing solid and shooting for the water buffalo’s nose and the heavy horns, “splintering and chipping them”—and then he himself is killed—killed by Margot. His short, happy life lasts for only a second or two, but he dies as master of his own life. Wilson believes that Margot intentionally shoots her husband, and he makes it quite clear that he knows, boasting that had he lived, Macomber would have left her.

As a small boy, Nick vowed never to be one of these men. Ironically, Hemingway’s story is not about “the killers,” nor is it about Ole Andreson, the prizefighter who it is assumed is killed. Rather, the story is about Nick Adams’ confrontation with unmitigated evil, represented by the two gangsters, Al and Max. Note that we don’t even know why the killers are murdering Andreson; George thinks that the prizefighter must have betrayed or double-crossed some gamblers. ” The main concern, however, has little to do with Andreson or the killers.