Page:Fantastic Volume 08 Number 01.djvu/116

 "Come up," I commanded, and I rapped hard on my rod with my jack-knife.

"Stop that," he yelled in anguish.

"Then come up and make like a fish," I said.

He sank deeper instead, to show me who was boss. "Look, let's talk this over," he suggested. "You seem a mite smarter than the other yokels who hooked me. I've cussed out a lot of fishermen in my day, but how come you can understand my lingo?"

Well, I wasn't going to be tricked into tipping him off about the fish-spotter. His contemptuous tone and calm decision to reduce a magnificent battle to a cheap dicker infuriated me.

I pointed out, "You aren't in a position to ask questions and bargain. You are the largest piece of fish-flesh I have ever tied into, and I'm here to fish, not bicker. If you want free, get to work. You'll never get hung up on lighter fishing gear than this." I knocked on the rod some more.

He came up a little with each knock, yelling, "NO, NO! Stop! So okay, it's a light rod. Why knock off the varnish?"

"I'm here for sport, not arguments," I repeated.

"Sport!" he sneered. "You call murder sport?"

Non-fishermen have advanced this point before to no avail, but the steelhead made it sound strangely convincing. "What chance," I demanded defensively, "did you give all those little trout that you ate? Was that sporting?"

"Small fry," he scoffed. "Not worth mentioning." I rapped hard, and he boiled about the surface for a moment, then he sank to the depths again muttering to himself, "Slow down, big boy. Don't be a fool! That's what he wants you to do."

I kept on rapping on the rod, and he finally yelled at me with furious candor. "You're driving me nuts!"

"Looks like you can't take it," I taunted. He eased up to the surface slowlyingslowly [sic] trying to take the strain off and cussing me every quart of the way.

Darned if he didn't surface, but just beyond my net. Then he swam off a bit and doubled back on me, which forced me to drop my knife and take in line in a hurry to keep from giving him dangerous slack. He moved up almost within reach of my net again, and I didn't like the way he was hooked through the lip. His scarred jaws showed where other hopefuls had snagged him. One good shake of his 116