Days Off Part 3

"Look at them," she said, "how happy they are, and how safe! No fly-fishermen to stick a hook in their mouths and make them suffer. How can you bear to do it?"

"Well," said Chichester, "if it comes to suffering, I doubt whether the fish are conscious of any such thing, as we understand it. But even if they are, they suffer twice as much, and a thousand times as long, shut up in this hot, nasty pool, as they would in being caught in proper style."

"But think of the hook!"

"Hurts about as much as a pin-p.r.i.c.k."

"But think of the fearful struggle, and the long, gasping agony on the sh.o.r.e."

"There's no fear in the struggle; it's just a trial of strength and skill, like a game of football. A fish doesn't know anything about death; so he has no fear of it. And there is no gasping on the sh.o.r.e; nothing but a quick rap on the head with a stick, and it's all over."

"But why should he be killed at all?"

"Well," said he, smiling, "there are reasons of taste. You eat salmon, don't you?"

"Ye-e-es," she answered a little doubtfully--then with more a.s.surance, "but remember what Wilbur Short says in that lovely chapter on 'Communion with the Catfish': I want them brought to the table in the simplest and most painless way."

"And that is angling with the fly," said he, still more decidedly. "The fly is not swallowed like a bait. It sticks in the skin of the lip where there is least feeling. There is no torture in the play of a salmon. It's just a fair fight with an unknown opponent. Compare it with the other ways of bringing a fish to the table. If he's caught in a net he hangs there for hours, slowly strangled. If he's speared, half the time the spear slips and he struggles off badly wounded; and if the spear goes through him, he is flung out on the bank to bleed to death.

Even if he escapes, he is sure to come to a pitiful end some day--perish by starvation when he gets too old to catch his food--or be torn to pieces by a seal, an otter, or a fish-hawk. Fly-fishing really offers him----"

"Never mind that," said Ethel, "what does it offer you?"

"A gentleman's sport, I suppose," he answered rather slowly. "That is, a fair and exciting effort to get something that is made for human use, in a way that involves some hardship, a little risk, a good deal of skill and patience and perseverance, and plenty of out-of-door life. I guess it must be an inheritance of the old days when people lived by the chase; but, whatever it is, almost every real man feels a certain kind of gratification in being able to get game or fish by the exertion of his own pluck or skill. Some day perhaps this will all be changed, and we shall be contented to take our exercise in the form of ma.s.sage or croquet, and our food in compressed tablets. But not yet!"

Ethel shook her head and smiled rather sadly. "Bolton," she said, "you discourage me. You argue in this way because you like fishing."

"I do," he answered, promptly. "And so far as I can see, that is the princ.i.p.al reason why your friends, Aurora W. Chime and the Reverend Wilbur Short, and the rest of them, condemn it. They object to the evident pleasure of the fisherman more than to the imaginary suffering of the fish."

"Bolton!" she exclaimed earnestly, "that is not a fair thing to say.

They are truly good and n.o.ble teachers. They live on a lofty plane and labour for the spreading of the Higher Light. You will know them when we are married. They will be far better company for you than the thoughtless fishermen in your clubs."

Bolton looked a little glum. But he behaved like a gentleman, and cheered up. "Well, well," he said, "of course--you know--your friends, my friends! I'll be glad to meet them, and hear what they have to say, and consider it all very, very seriously. I promised you that, dearest, you remember. But that reminds me--there are two of the men on the _Ste. Marjorie_ now, at the club-house--Colonel Lang and the Doctor--old Harvey, you know--fine old chap. It's only twenty miles away. Couldn't we send word to them and ask them to come down for to-morrow? I'm so proud and happy about it all; I'd like to have them here, if you don't mind."

"Why, certainly," she answered, smiling with manifest pleasure, "that will be delightful. We'll send a messenger at once with a note to them.

But stop a moment--I have a better plan than that! Why not drive over yourself, this afternoon, to invite them? You'll be glad to see them again; and if you stay here you'll only be in the way until to-morrow,"

laughed she. "Why not go over and spend the night at the club-house and come back early in the morning? That will be quite like the ancient days--the young adventurer hurrying out of the forest to meet his bride."

Bolton insisted that he couldn't think of it--didn't want to go--would much rather stay where he was. But Ethel was captivated with the novelty of the idea. She always liked her own plans. Besides, she really wished to have him out of the way for the rest of the day and the evening. There was a good deal to be done--letters to be written--a long, personal, uplifting talk with Nancy Bangs, and with Gladys, and with Victoria, and with each of her brothers separately--just half-an-hour of soul-counsel for each one: three hours altogether. She would see them in regular succession, beginning with the youngest brother, and winding up with Nancy. Then she was charmed with the picture of Bolton coming in, post haste, in the morning, as if he had just arrived from a journey across the great northern wilderness. So she carried her point, and when he had agreed to it, he found that he rather liked the plan too. It gave him something to do, a chance to practise his habit of putting things through with determination.

He sent a messenger over to _Sacre Coeur_ at once, to say that he was coming and that a canoe should meet him at the landing-place on the North-East Branch. He finished up all the arrangements that remained to be made at Tadousac for the smooth running of to-morrow's affair. He ordered a good horse and a "_quatre roue_" to be ready for him at five o'clock; and having parted with Ethel in the manner appropriate even for so brief a separation, he was away for the river in due season.

The long road with its heavy stretches of sand, its incredibly steep clay hills, its ruts and b.u.mpers over which the buckboard rocked like a boat in a choppy sea, and its succession of shadeless _habitant_ houses and discouraged farms, had never seemed to him so monotonous. At eight o'clock, when it was growing dusk, and the moon rising, he reached the landing-place on the Branch, and found his canoe, with his two old canoe-men, P't.i.t Louis, and Vieux Louis, waiting for him. With their warm, homely greeting his spirits began to revive; and the swift run through foaming rapids and eddying pools, along the four miles of the Branch, brought him into a state of mind that was thoroughly cheerful, not to say exhilarated. There was Brackett's Camp on the point above the Forks; and there was the veteran painter-angler himself, with his white beard and his knickerbockers, standing on the sh.o.r.e to wave a salutation as the canoe shot by the point. There was the main river, rushing down with full waters from the northwest, and roaring past the island. There was the club-house among the white birches and the balsams on the opposite bank, with the two flags fluttering in the moonlight, and the lights twinkling from the long, low veranda. And there were half a dozen canoe-men with a lantern at the landing-steps, and old John the steward in his white ap.r.o.n rubbing his hands, and the Colonel and the Doctor blowing the conch and the fish-horn in merry welcome. It was all very jolly, and Chichester knew at once that he was at home.

Dinner at nine o'clock, before the big open hearth, with a friendly fire. Much chaffing and pleasant talk about the arrangements for to-morrow. A man to be sent off at daybreak to have two buckboards ready at the landing at seven for the drive to Tadousac. Then a reprehensible quant.i.ty of tobacco smoked in the book-room, and the tale of the season's angling told from the beginning with many embellishments and divagations. There were stories of good luck and bad; vituperations of the lumbermen for leaving tree-tops and broken branches in the stream to get caught among the rocks and ruin the fishing; accounts of the immense number of salmon that had been seen leaping in the estuary, waiting to come up the river. The interest centred in the story of a huge fish that had taken up his transient abode in the pool called _La Fourche_. The Colonel had p.r.i.c.ked and lost the monster two days ago, and had seen him jump twice yesterday. The Colonel was greatly excited about it, and vowed it was the largest salmon seen in the river for ten years--"a whale, I tell you, a regular _marsouin_!" he cried, waving his hands in the air. The Doctor was provokingly sceptical about the size of the fish. But both agreed that there was one thing that must be done.

Chichester must try a few casts in _La Fourche_ early in the morning.

"Yes," said the Doctor, puffing slowly at his pipe, "plenty of time between daylight and breakfast--good hour for a shy, old fish--we give up our rights to you--the pool is yours--see what you can do with it--may be your last chance to try your luck--" for somehow a rumour in regard to Miss Asham's views on angling had leaked out, and Chichester's friends were inclined to make merry about it.

He rose to the fly decidedly. "I don't know about this being my last chance," said he, "but I'll take it, any way. John, give me a call at half-past three sharp, and tell the two Louis to be ready with the canoe and the rod and the big landing-net."

The little wreaths of grey mist were curling up from the river, and the fleecy western clouds were tinged with wild rose behind the wooded hills, as Chichester stepped out on the slippery rocks at the head of the pool, loosened his line, gave a couple of pulls to his reel to see that the click was all right, waved his slender rod in the air, and sent his fly out across the swift current. Once it swung around, dancing over the water, without result. The second cast carried it out a few feet further, and it curved through a wider arc, but still without result. The third cast sent it a little further still, past the edge of a big sunken rock in the current. There was a flash of silver in the amber water, a great splash on the surface, a broad tail waved in the air and vanished--an immense salmon had risen and missed the fly.

Chichester reeled in his line and sat down. His pulses were hammering, and his chin was set at the angle of solid determination. "The Colonel was right," he said, "that's an enormous fish, _and he's mine!_"

He waited the full five minutes, according to ancient rule, before making the next cast. There was a tiny wren singing among the Balm-o'-Gilead trees on the opposite sh.o.r.e, with a voice that rose silverly above the noise of the rapids. "Cheer up, cheer up," it seemed to say, "what's the matter with you? Don't hurry, don't worry, try it again--again--again!"

But the next cast was made in vain. There was no response. Chichester changed his fly. The result was the same. He tried three different flies in succession without effect. Then he gave the top of the pool a rest, and fished down through the smooth water at the lower end, hooking and losing a small fish. Then he came back to the big salmon again, and fished a small Durham Ranger over him without success. A number four Critchley's Fancy produced no better result. A tiny double Silver Grey brought no response. Then he looked through his fly-box in despair, and picked out an old three-nought Prince of Orange--a huge, gaudy affair with battered feathers, which he had used two years before in flood-water on the Restigouche. At least it would astonish the salmon, for it looked like a last season's picture-hat, very much the worse for wear. It lit on the ripples with a splash, and floated down stream in a dishevelled state till it reached the edge of the sunken rock. Bang! The salmon rose to that incredible fly with a rush, and went tearing across the pool.

The reel shrieked wildly as the line ran out. The rod quivered and bent almost double. Chichester had the b.u.t.t pressed against his belt, the tip well up in the air, the reel-handle free from any possible touch of coat-flap or sleeve. To check that fierce rush by a hundredth part of a second meant the snapping of the delicate casting-line, or the smashing of the pliant rod-tip. He knew, as the salmon leaped clear of the water, once, twice, three times, that he was in for the fight of his life; and he dropped the point of the rod quickly at each leap to yield to the sudden strain.

The play, at first, was fast and furious. The salmon started up the stream, breasting the rapids at a lively rate, and taking out line as rapidly as the reel could run. Chichester followed along the open sh.o.r.e, holding his rod high with both hands, stumbling over the big rocks, wading knee-deep across a side-channel of the river, but keeping his feet somehow, until the fish paused in the lower part of the pool called _La Batture_. Here there was a chance to reel in line, and the men poled the canoe up from below, to be ready for the next turn in the contest.

The salmon was now sulking at the bottom, with his head down, balanced against the current, and boring steadily. He kept this up for a quarter of an hour, then made a rush up the pool, and a sidelong skittering leap on the surface. Coming back with a sudden turn, he threw a somersault in the air, close to the opposite sh.o.r.e, sank to the bottom and began jigging. Jig, jig, jig, from side to side, with short, heavy jerks, he worked his way back and forth twice the length of the pool.

Chichester knew it was dangerous. Any one of these sharp blows might snap the leader or the hook. But he couldn't stop it. There was nothing to do but wait, with tense nerves, until the salmon got through jigging.

The change came suddenly. A notion to go down stream struck the salmon like a flash of lightning; without a moment's warning he took the line over his shoulder and darted into the rapids. "_Il va descendre! Vite, vite! Le canot! Au large!_" shouted the two Louis; but Chichester had already stepped into his place in the middle of the canoe, and there were still forty yards of white line left on the reel, when the narrow boat dashed away in pursuit of the fish, impelled by flashing paddles and flinging the spray to right and left. There were many large rocks half hidden in the wild white water through which they were plunging, and with a long line there was danger that the fish would take a turn around one of them and break away. It was necessary to go faster than he went, in order to retrieve as much line as possible. But paddle as fast as they could the fish kept ahead. He was not towing the boat, of course; for only an ignoramus imagines that a salmon can "tow" a boat, when the casting-line that holds him is a single strand of gut that will break under a strain of ten pounds. He was running away, and the canoe was chasing him through the roaring torrent. But he held his lead, and there were still eighty or ninety yards of line out when he rushed down the last plunge into _La Fourche_.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A notion to go down stream struck the salmon.]

The situation was this: The river here is shaped like a big Y. The salmon went down the inside edge of the left-hand fork. The canoe followed him down the outside edge of the same fork. When he came to the junction it was natural to suppose that he would follow the current down the main stem of the Y. But instead of that, when the canoe dropped into the comparative stillness of the pool, the line was stretched, taut and quivering, across the foot of the left-hand fork and straight up into the current of the right-hand fork. "He's gone up the other branch," shouted Chichester, above the roar of the stream, "we must follow him! Push across the rapids! Push lively!" So the men seized their setting-poles and shoved as fast as they could across the foot of the rapids, while the rushing torrent threatened at every moment to come in over the side and swamp the canoe. There was a tugging and a trembling on the line, and it led, apparently, up the North-East Branch, past Brackett's Camp. But when the canoe reached the middle of the rapids P't.i.t Louis uttered an exclamation, leaned over the bow, and pulled up the end of a tree-top, the b.u.t.t of which was firmly wedged among the rocks. Around the slender branches, waving and quivering in the current with life-like motion, the line was looped.

The lower part of it trailed away loosely down the stream into the pool.

Chichester took in the situation in a flash of grieved insight. "Well,"

he said, "that is positively the worst! Good-by, Mr. Salmon. Louis, pull out that-er, er--that branch!" and he began slowly to reel in the line. But old Louis, in the stern of the canoe, had taken hold of the slack and was pulling it in hand over hand. In a second he shouted "_Arretez! Arretez! M'sieu, il n'est pas parti, il est la!_"

It was a most extraordinary affair. The spring of the flexible branch had been enough to keep the line from breaking. The salmon, resting in the comparatively still water of the pool, had remained at the end of the slack, and the hook, by some fortunate chance, held firm. It took but a moment to get the line taut and the point of the rod up again.

And then the battle began anew. The salmon was refreshed by his fifteen minutes between the halves of the game. No centre in a rush-line ever played harder or faster.

He exhausted the possibilities of attack and defence in _La Fourche_, and then started down the rapids again. In the little pot-hole in mid-river, called _Pool a Michel_, he halted; but it was only for a minute. Soon he was flying down the swift water, the canoe after him, toward the fierce, foaming channel which runs between the island and the eastern bank opposite the club-house. Chichester could see the Colonel and the Doctor at the landing, waving and beckoning to him, as he darted along with the current. Intent upon carrying his fight through to a finish, he gave only a pa.s.sing glance to what he thought was their friendly gesture of encouragement, took his right hand from the reel for a second to wave a greeting, and pa.s.sed on, with determination written in every line of his chin, following the fish toward the sea.

Through the clear shallows of _La Pinette_, and the rapids below; through the curling depths of _Pool a Pierre_, and the rapids below; through the long, curving reach of _L'Hirondelle_, and the mad rapids below; so the battle went, and it was fight, fight, fight, and never the word "give up!" At last they came to the head of tide-water and the lake-like pool beside the old quay. Here the methods of the fish changed. There was no more leaping in the air; no more violent jigging; no more swift rushing up or down stream; but instead, there was just an obstinate adherence to the deepest water in the pool, a slow and steady circling round and round in some invisible eddy below the surface. From this he could only be moved by pressure. Now was the time to test the strength of the rod and line. The fish was lifted a few feet by main force, and the line reeled in while the rod was lowered again. Then there was another lift, and another reeling in; and so the process was repeated until he was brought close to the sh.o.r.e in comparatively shallow water. Even yet he did not turn over on his back, or show the white fin; but it was evident that he was through fighting.

Chichester and P't.i.t Louis stepped out on the sh.o.r.e, old Louis holding the canoe. P't.i.t Louis made his way carefully to a point of rock, with the wide-mouthed, long-handled net, and dipped it quietly down into the water, two or three feet deep. The fish was guided gently in toward the sh.o.r.e, and allowed to drop back with the smooth current until the net was around him. Then it was swiftly lifted; there was the gleam of an immense ma.s.s of silver in its meshes, an instant of furious struggle, the quick stroke of a short, heavy _baton_; and the great salmon was landed and despatched.

[Ill.u.s.tration: There was the gleam of an immense ma.s.s of silver in its meshes.]

The hook was well set in the outside of his jaw, just underneath his chin; no wonder he played so long, with his mouth shut! Bring the spring-balance and test his weight. Forty-eight pounds, full measure, the record salmon of the river--a deep thickset fish, whose gleaming silver sides and sharp teeth proved him fresh-run from the sea! It was a signal victory for an angler to land such a fish under such conditions, and Chichester felt that fortune had been with him.

He enjoyed a quarter of an hour of great satisfaction as the men poled the canoe up-river to the club-house. But there was a shadow of anxiety, of vague misgiving, that troubled him; and he urged the men to make haste. At the landing the Colonel and the Doctor were waiting, with strange, long, inscrutable faces.

"Did you get him?" they said.

"I did," he answered; "forty-eight pounds. Hold up that fish, Louis!"

"Magnificent," they cried, "a great fish! You've done it! But, man, do you know what time it is? Five minutes to ten o'clock!"

Nearly ten, and twenty miles of rough river and road to cover before high noon. Was it possible? In a second it flashed upon Chichester what he had done, what a fearful situation he must face. "Come on, you fellows," he cried, stepping back into the canoe. "Now, Louis, shove her as you never shoved before! Ten dollars apiece if you make the upper landing in half an hour."