Part TWENTYSIX – continued from last week’s episode –
Scoop and Skip had once lured Rusty outside (fourth time he should have never listened to his cousins) with the promise of lemon meringue pie if he would help them hand-dig a “SMALL TRENCH” twenty feet long, three feet wide, and three feet deep. Uncle Jazzy was under the lasting impression (while napping under the nearest shad tree) that his sons needed physical labor to wear down their senses for getting into trouble. The placement of a culvert under the constantly low-lying mudded path that led down to the barnyard seemed like a fitting project.
Two feet down into the trenching project an all-out dirt clod fight erupted. And of course, with Rusty’s inability to hit the broad side of a shed he quickly fell victim to an onslaught of dirt clods. Luckily, they were only a few minutes into this barrage before he took a direct hit below his left eye and was split wide open to the upper portion of the cheekbone.
Blood flowed from the gash as Uncle Jazzy raced him to the clinic. As they flew past the Friedelburg brothers fishing on the Pine River Falls bridge, the speeding station wagon blew all three hats from the pin-head-tops of “A”, “B”, and “C” into the churning waters below.
Sally and Rusty needed a plan to lure Buzz from his dwelling. But the offer of lemon meringue pie would most likely be insufficient. They opted to take a stalking and physical offensive.
Their next stop was to Buzz’s shambled boathouse near the lakeshore. Not daring to expose themselves by light… The couple quietly lurked within… Straining their eyes and feeling their way around for anything that might be used for weapons.
“Rusty… I don’t think an aluminum fish landing net is going to scare anyone,” Sally sighed as he stood holding a Musky basket that sported a 4’ X 4’ hoop. “Unless you think he’s going to stand still long enough to capture him like a Monarch butterfly.”
“Big criminal… Big net…” he thought to himself. Along with other scattered idiocies.
Great Uncle Herron (Doobie Flathers side of the family) was the first to take young Rusty musky fishing. There were plenty of heralded fish stories on the ride to the boat ramp, and something else in a thermos that didn’t smell like coffee. Herron referred to it as “shine… Adults only sonny boy!”
Most of the morning was spent trolling cranks on Huggy Bear Reef just offshore from Cackleberry Island on the west end of Little Traverse Lake. Multiple passes back and forth produced numerous walleyes. “Damn lake is full of ‘em,” Uncle Herron snorted…
Rusty took note that each fish required a follow up sip by his uncle from the coffee thermos. His mood became increasingly cheery…
And then IT happened. Final pass of the morning… Announced as “The fat lady is signing, and I’m due for a nap Rusty.” Uncle Herron’s rod bent in half and touched the surface of the water.
“Reel in boy! Reel in! I got myself a dandy,” barked his uncle.
As the mighty beast surfaced toward the boat… Rusty stood frozen like a guard at the queen’s palace with a landing net in hand. The giant fish appeared to have an overbite… With monstrous fangs protruding outward and glistening in the sun.
“Them teeths sharp as diamonds Rusty… You keep the net down in the water and I’ll swim ‘er into the basket.”
Rusty was late on the net with the first pass as the musky flared from the skiff and took line in a 180-degree direction. Uncle Herron held steady as the level wind on the reel screamed for relief.
Stretching five-foot-tall at the time… Rusty calculated the fish was another three inches his length.
“Ok… This time… When I get her to the boat… Just have the net down in the water and leave it there,” was the order.
No such luck! On the second pass… Rusty was once again late with the net… He could muster nothing more than a slight punch to the fish… Right in the snout with the end of the aluminum hoop.
The silence in the boat was deafening… Except for the second run the mighty beast was taking. Rusty prayed to the fish gods above for the musky not to spool his uncle’s reel clean of line.
“Third time a charm boy… This is by gosh bigger than any musky I ever seen talked about!”
The proverbial moment of truth came as Rusty lowered the net into the water, as instructed, and waited for the fish to swim in. Uncle Herron had her perfectly directed. Show time!
Then… Just as the beast entered the great net… Rusty (too early) panicked and began to hoist upward.
Only half the length of the fish (headfirst) was in the basket… The hooks from the crankbait were caught in the netting… And the back half of the fish flopped with its tail still in the water.
Uncle Herron thrust down his trolling rod and launched toward the tail of the musky with both hands extended. Too late!
The next moment in time is forever etched in Rusty’s brain. He stared at the head of the enormous beast… Watched it make three head shakes… Spit the lure from his glistening teeth… Wink once with its left eye… And power kick its way out of the net.
Uncle Herron was on the floor of the boat with bruised ribs from landing on the side of the gunnel. Head hung low in defeat.
The thermos of “shine” was empty by the time they got back to the boat ramp. The only sound in the truck on the way home were slight sniffles from Uncle Herron.
This would be their last musky adventure together. And at the time Rusty was thankful. For a young kid, deep-down he was damn GLAD they didn’t have to put that fish in the boat with them!
Rusty put Buzz’s musky net back into the corner of the boathouse. Sally was probably right.
Feverishly set for revenge, Sally picked the lock on the back door of Buzz’s house with a strong piece of bailing wire she’d scavenged from the inside of his boathouse. Rusty stood guard with a wooden paddle in one hand and a shiny and freshly sharpened fish gaff in the other. How odd he thought that a man would worry about locking his own occupied house, when he was disturbed enough to capture two people and place them inside a dead-bolted fish cleaning facility.
Slowly opening the back door, they made their way through the four-season porch and into the kitchen. All was quiet as they crept down the hallway on the main floor making their way toward the foot of the stairs that would lead them to the lamplit bedroom on the upper level.
After stepping on the back of Sally’s heal… TWICE… She stopped and raised a forearm in his direction accompanied with a BACK-OFF-GLARE.
Sally now carried the fish gaff, leading the way up the stairs, while Rusty trailed with fists clenched to the wooden paddle. Pressed against the wall they moved in sync slowly up the edges of the wooden flight.
Back in her teen days Sally had used this technique on more than one occasion when sneaking inside her parent’s home well after curfew. She had learned early on to tiptoe the more solid edges along the wall of the staircase… Thus, avoiding the potential wooden moan that could leave her grounded without use of the home phone or shared car keys for an extended period.
Standing on the cusp of the second story bedroom door they exchanged quizzical glances. The wood framed door was deadbolted from the outside, and they could faintly hear what sounded like late night news coming from a television within the room. “What the hell” they matched thoughts with silent shoulder shrugs.
Sally had kept the knife sharpening cylinder file she had commandeered from the fish cleaning house in the long side pocket of her Patagonia pants. Never know when you might need to sharpen a fish gaff or bust off a paddle lock.
– To Be Continued –