 In the case of a fox running along train tracks as a train is approaching, Mannix drew on a story told to him by a master of hunting in the area of Whitford Sales—near Thorndale, Pennsylvania—who had to stop hunting in the area because of a fox who consistently killed pursuing hounds on the Trenton Cutoff using this method.Mannix felt it was nearly impossible for any writer to escape imparting some anthropomorphism in such a novel, as a human must guess at the way an animal's mind may work and what motivations it may have.He felt animals think differently from humans, though are capable of reason on a "rudimentary level compared to a human."