Frank and Tub, possibly at the expense of Kenny'a life. This in itself is ironic, because Frank and Kenny deliberately used the cold snow to isolate and insult Tub; now, Kenny is ignored in the cold while Tub and Frank share their secrets.

All three characters share common motivations. All three are insecure: Tub is fat and self-conscious; Kenny relies on the validation of others; Frank knows that he is committing a sin and feels guilty. All three are liars: Tub lies about his overeating, claiming a glandular condition; Frank lies about his adultery; Kenny lies about his motivation for killing the dog. All three are abusive: Tub becomes abusive after he is insulted one time too many; Frank goes along with Kenny's abuse of Tub, not caring that it is genuinely hurtful.

"If you want to piss and moan all day you might as well go home and bitch at your kids. Take your pick." When Tub didn't say anything he turned to the driver. "Okay, Kenny, let's hit the road."
(Wolff, "Hunters in the Snow," classicshorts.com)

Obviously, all three want to bag a good deer; that is their larger motivation for hunting. They also all want the approval of others; Kenny and Frank want each other's approval, and Tub wants approval from both, but cannot get it. In the end, all their motivations are selfish and cruel, and they have few -- if any -- redeeming factors.

"Hunters in the Snow" is one of those stories in which the setting is crucial to the plot. First, the setting creates suspense. During the hunt, we almost wait for one of the men to get lost and freeze to death, like in Jack London's "To Build a Fire." Tub's inability to keep up with his friends--whose friendship we doubt, as the "teasing" is over-the-top, even for "tough" men--creates more tension and distance, both physical and emotional, between the characters. 

The blizzard conditions lead us to expect some accident due to the cold, so Tub's shooting Kenny takes us completely by surprise, lessened somewhat by the fact that Kenny has just shot the old dog on the land they have asked to hunt on (because we don't yet know that the owner asked Kenny to shoot it). Once Kenny shoots the dog, our world is thrown into chaos. 

The setting intensifies the tension after they load Kenny into the truck, where the men in front are freezing so much that they stop twice--longer the second time--to warm up and eat, seemingly unconcerned about Kenny slowly freezing and bleeding to death in the open bed of the old pickup. We're torn here. We want the friends to level with each other and patch up their friendship, but what about Kenny? 

Finally, the setting gives them an alibi for Kenny's eventual death. Of course, their behavior as they drove toward the hospital and apparent lack of concern for him suggests that they wanted him to die all along. The question is left unanswered. 

The setting of the winter storm is important to motivating the actions of the characters in "Hunters in the Snow" because the harsh conditions cause the hunters to take morality into their own hands. Additionally, the hunters naturally fall into sort of a pecking order, in which Kenny becomes the leader of the group and takes over. Because they are alone in the storm, there becomes a need to want to conform with the group. This is seen when Kenny begins bullying both Tub and Frank. We then see Kenny grow upset and shoot a signpost and a neighbor's dog, and he then turns the gun towards Tub, who shoots him first. It seems that both Tub and Frank are driven by this feeling of being alone and in the wilderness because they feel as though they need to be tough in order to survive the setting. Therefore, it seems as those the characters abandoned the moral compass because of the environment and atmosphere created by the setting.