Chapter 15: fishing

Mr Keaton gave me some instructions and practice with the fishing rod. I got it pretty quickly and was ready to go.

We walked out along this sort of rocky spit that projected out into the lake on one side of the cove. There was a clear sandy area on the end where we could fish comfortably.

Twenty minutes went by, nothing happened. Randolph and I were becoming a little bit fidgety, constantly reeling our lines in and checking the bait.

"You have to be patient, guys. One of the essential requirements of fishing is patience."

Randolph and I pulled a face at each other.

Then I felt something touch my line, "Oh."

Again, harder this time and I wrenched the rod back. There was a fish, I could feel a fish on the end of my line. I started winding in frantically.

"Not too fast, Lynda. Slow and steady will do it."

It was a strange, exciting feeling reeling in the fish. It felt like a monster, but . . . as it emerged from the water, I saw it was not much bigger than my hand, a tiddler.

The others started laughing and I couldn't help joining in. "It felt huge," I gasped out.

Mr Keaton helped me unhook the fish saying, "Sorry, Lynda, but you are going to have to throw it back, it's under legal size."

I didn't mind and I watched the fish dart off after I placed it back in the water.

Nothing happened again for a further twenty or so minutes, then Randolph pulled one in. It was another tiddler.

"It's definitely bigger than Lynda's," he claimed.

"I'm not so sure," his father remarked.

I jumped in with, "I reckon it's the same one. How about that? Randolph's caught a secondhand fish."

We all started laughing. Randolph was trying to protest, but couldn't get the words out. Mr Keaton was chortling and saying, "I've never heard of a secondhand fish."

We calmed down, but nothing more happened so we eventually packed it in and went back to the house and reported our very limited 'success' to Mrs Keaton.

She laughed and told Randolph and me to go and have our showers, then addressed her husband with, "And you, loser, go and get the fire started, it's starting to cool down."