Pluck on the Long Trail Part 3

This morning we kept on up Ute Creek. It had its rise in Gray Bull Basin, at the foot of old Pilot Peak, about forty miles away. We thought we could make Gray Bull Basin in three days. Ten or twelve miles a day, with burros, on the trail, up-hill all the way, is about as fast as Scouts like us can keep going. Beyond Gray Bull we would have to find our own trail over Pilot Peak.

Everything was fine, this morning. Birds were hopping among the cedars and spruces, and in some places the ground was red with wild strawberries. Pine squirrels scolded at us, and we saw two rabbits; but we didn't stop to shoot them. We had bacon, and could catch trout higher up the creek. Here were some beaver dams, and around the first dam lived a big trout that n.o.body had been able to land. The beaver dams were famous camping places for parties who could go this far, and everybody claimed to have hooked the big trout and to have lost him again. He was a native Rocky Mountain trout, and weighed four pounds--but he was educated. He wouldn't be caught. He had only one eye; that was how people knew him.

We didn't count upon that big trout, but we rather counted upon some smaller ones; and anyway we must hustle on and put those ten miles behind us before the enemy got in touch with us again. Our business was to carry that message through, and not to stop and hunt or lose time over uncalled-for things.

The creek foamed and rushed; its water was amber, as if stained by pine needles. Sometimes it ran among big bowlders, and sometimes it was crossed by fallen trees. Thomas Fitzpatrick picked up a beaver cutting.

That was an aspen stick (beavers like aspen and willow bark best) about as large as your wrist and two feet long. It was green and the ends were fresh, so there were beavers above us. And it wasn't water-soaked, so that it could not have been cut and in the water very long. We were getting close.

We traveled right along, and the country grew rougher. There were many high bowlders, and we came to a canyon where the creek had cut between great walls like a crack. There was no use in trying to go through this canyon; the trail had faded out, and we were about to oblique off up the hill on our side of the creek, to go around and strike the creek above the canyon, when Kit Carson saw something caught on a brush-heap half in the water, at the mouth of the canyon.

It was a chain. He leaned out and took hold of the chain, and drew it in to sh.o.r.e. On the other end was a trap, and in the trap was a beaver. The chain was not tied to the brush; it had just caught there, so it must have been washed down. Then up above somebody was trapping beaver, which was against the law. The beaver was in pretty bad condition. He must have been drowned for a week or more. The trap had no brand on it.

Usually traps are branded on the pan, but this wasn't and that went to show that whoever was trapping knew better. The sight of that beaver, killed uselessly, made us sick and mad both. But we couldn't do anything about it, except to dig a hole and bury trap and all, so that the creek would wash clean, as it ought to be. Then we climbed up the steep hill, over rocks and flowers, and on top followed a ridge, until ahead we saw the creek again. It was in a little meadow here, and down we went for it.

This was a beautiful spot. On one side the pines and spruces covered a long slope which rose on and on until above timber line it was bare and reddish gray; and away up were patches of snow; and beyond was the tip of Pilot Peak. But on our side a forest fire had burned out the timber, leaving only black stumps sticking up, with the ground covered by a new growth of bushes. There was quite a difference between the two sides; and we camped where we were, on the bare side, which was the safest for a camp fire. It would have been a shame to spoil the other side, too.

We were tired, after being up part of the night and climbing all the morning, and this was a good place to stop. Plenty of dry wood, plenty of water, and s.p.a.ce to spread our beds.

The creek was smooth and wide, here, about the middle of the park. The beaver had been damming it. But although we looked about, after locating camp and unpacking the burros, we couldn't find a fresh sign. We came upon camp sign, though, two days old, at least. Somebody had trapped every beaver and then had left.

That seemed mean, because it was against the law to trap beaver, and here they weren't doing any harm. But the fire had laid waste one sh.o.r.e of the pond, and animal killers had laid waste the pond itself.

We decided to have a big meal. There ought to be wild raspberries in this burnt timber; wild raspberries always follow a forest fire--and that is a queer thing, isn't it? So, after camp was laid out (which is the first thing to do), and our flags set up, while Fitzpatrick the Bad Hand and Major Henry built a fire and got things ready for dinner, General Ashley and Kit Carson went after berries and little Jed Smith and I were detailed to catch trout.

We had lines and hooks, but we didn't bother to pack rods, because you almost always can get willows. (Note 18.) Some fellows would have cut green willows, because they bend. We knew better. We cut a dead willow apiece. We were after meat, and not just sport; and when we had a trout bite we wanted to yank him right out. A stiff, dead willow will do that.

Gra.s.shoppers were whirring around, among the dried trunks and the gra.s.s.

That is what gra.s.shoppers like, a place where it's hot and open. As a rule you get bigger fish with bait than you do with a fly, so we put on gra.s.shoppers. I hate sticking a hook into a gra.s.shopper, or a worm either; and we killed our gra.s.shoppers quick by smashing their heads before we hooked them.

It was going to be hard work, catching trout around this beaver pond.

The water was wide and smooth and shallow and clear, and a trout would see you coming. When a trout knows that you are about, then the game is off. Besides, lots of people had been fishing the pond, and the beaver hunters must have been fishing it lately, according to sign. But that made it all the more exciting. Little trout are caught easily, and the big ones are left for the person who can outwit them.

After we were ready, we reconnoitered. We sat down and studied to see where we'd prefer to be if we were a big trout. A big trout usually doesn't prowl about much. He gets a lair, in a hole or under a bank, and stays close, eating whatever comes his way, and chasing out all the smaller trout. Sometimes he swims into the ripples, to feed; but back he goes to his lair again.

So we studied the situation. There was no use in wading about, or shaking the banks, and scaring trout, unless we had a plan. It looked to me that if I were a big trout I'd be in a shady spot over across, where the water swept around a low place of the dam and made a black eddy under the branches of a spruce. Jed Smith said all right, I could try that, and he would try where the bank on our side stuck out over the water a little.

I figured that my hole would be fished by about everybody from the water. Most persons would wade across, and cast up-stream to the edge of it; and if a trout was still there he would be watching out for that. So the way to surprise him would be to sneak on him from a new direction. I went down below, and crossed (over my boot-tops) to the other side, and followed up through the timber.

I had to crawl under the spruce--and I was mighty careful not to shake the ground or to make any noise, for we needed fish. n.o.body had been to the hole from this direction; it was too hard work. By reaching out with my pole I could just flip the hopper into the water. I tried twice; and the second time I landed him right in the swirl. He hadn't floated an inch when a yellowish thing calmly rose under him and he was gone!

I jerked up with the willow, and the line tightened and began to tug. I knew by the color and the way he swallowed the hopper without any fuss that he was a king trout, and if I didn't haul him right in he'd break the pole or tear loose. I shortened pole like lightning and grabbed the line; but it got tangled in the branches of the spruce, and the trout was hung up with just his nose out of water.

Jiminy! but he was making the spray fly. He looked as big as a beaver, and the hook was caught in the very edge of his lip. That made me hurry.

In a moment he'd be away. I suppose I leaned out too far, to grab the line again, or to get him by the gills, for I slipped and dived headfirst into the hole.

Whew, but the water was cold! It took my breath--but I didn't care. All I feared was that now I'd lost the fish. He weighed four pounds, by this time, I was sure. As soon as I could stand and open my eyes I looked for him. When I had dived in I must have shaken loose the line, for it was under water again, and part of the pole, too. I sprawled for the pole and grabbed it as it was sliding out. The line tightened. The trout was still on.

Now I must rustle for the sh.o.r.e. So I did, paying out the pole behind me so as not to tear the hook free; and the minute I scrambled knee-deep, with a big swing I hustled that trout in and landed him in the brush just as he flopped off!

I tell you, I was glad. Some persons would have wanted a reel and light tackle, to play him--but we were after meat.

"I've got one--a big one!" I yelled, across to where Jed Smith was.

"So have I!" yelled little Jed back.

I had picked my trout up. He wasn't so awful big, after all; only about fifteen inches long, which means two pounds. He was an Eastern brook trout. They grow larger in the cold water of the West than they do in their own homes. But I looked for Jed--and then dropped my trout and waded over to help _him_.

He was out in the water, up to his waist, and something was jerking him right along.

"I can't get him out!" he called, as I was coming. "How big is yours?"

"Fifteen inches."

"This one's as big as I am--big native!" And you should have heard Jed grunt, as the line just surged around, in the current.

"Want any help?" I asked.

"Uh uh. If he can lick me, then he ought to get away."

"Where'd you catch him?"

"Against the bank."

"Swing him down the current and then lift him right in sh.o.r.e!"

"Look out he doesn't tear loose!"

"He'll break that pole!"

Fitzpatrick and Major Henry were yelling at us from the fire; and then Jed stubbed his toe on a rock and fell flat. He didn't let the pole go, though. He came up sputtering and he was as wet as I.

"Swing him down and then lift him right in!" kept shouting Fitz and Major Henry. That was the best plan.

"All right," answered Jed. "You take the pole and start him," he said to me. "I'd have to haul him against the current." I was below him, of course, so as to head the trout up-stream.

He tossed the b.u.t.t at me and I caught it. That was generous of Jed--to let me get the fish out, when he'd been the one to hook it. But we were Scouts together, and we were after meat for all, not glory for one.

I took the pole and with a swing downstream kept Mr. Trout going until he shot out to the edge of the pond, and there Fitz tumbled on top of him and grabbed him with one hand by the gills.

When we held him up we gave our Patrol yell:

B. S. A.! B. S. A.!

Elks! Elks! Hoo-ray!

Oooooooooooo!

CHAPTER IV