The ice was dead gray. It stretched as far as you could see looking north up the big, ragged lake. Snow that had once brightened the surface had melted into hills of slush or two-inch-deep sheets of water that the wind riffled passing through. Beneath the water the ice showed bleakly. It was still safe, still over a foot thick, far from the blackness that would herald its final rottenness.
At the access parking lot stood remnants of a once-bustling ice-fishing village, shanties that had been hastily pulled during the thaws to prevent them being locked in when the weather turned again. The few ice houses still on the lake were owned by hard-core regulars who would fish them daily or nightly keeping watch on the weather.
It was the worst time of year in the North Country. Roads crumbled or turned to mud. Shrinking snow revealed mounds of preserved winter litter. Trees stood exhausted and bare. The crows had returned, though, and their sharp rasping knifed across the woodland valleys. You could say it was spring, the way it is spring in the North.
The two men and the big black Labrador retriever were 50 yards out heading south on the ice toward a long point guarding the entrance to a bay. The dog ran ahead, quartering, returning to check. Its owner, Bud Tuttle, pulled the sled that carried most of their equipment. The dog was very happy.
“Ought to harness your energy, foolish dog,” Tuttle told the Lab. “This sled is getting waterlogged and heavy.”
“Let me haul it for awhile,” the other man said. He was a little shorter, but broader than Bud. His name was Earl Waite. The two were old friends who had not seen one another for some time.
“Nah,” Bud told him. “I only let friends haul coming back—when I’m beat from digging holes.”
“Right,” Earl laughed.
Far off the point were several ice fishermen. Some had set out tip-ups but most worked short jigging rods or sticks for yellow perch.
“Don’t know why they keep fishing out that far,” Bud Tuttle said. “Those schools of yellows are moving in here by now. Those fish want deeper water they can find it off the point. Then it shallows fast soon as you get to the bay mouth. Course there’s a better chance at a passing trout or salmon outside, but I pick up trout right at the drop, too.”
Around the point, not far from it, stood a fragile shanty of wood framing and black roofing paper. “Look at that shack,” Bud continued. “That’s old René Tatro’s. He’s in there most all the time day or night. Anybody catches fish through a hole in the ice, it’s him.”
They sloshed a little way on without talking, then Earl said, “I haven’t had a good perch feed in so long, almost forgot how they taste.”
“Should get them,” Bud said.
Earl took the auger and started the first hole. Bud set a jig rod and a Styrofoam cup of live maggot bait near the drilling, then dragged the sled through the slush-water angling toward the point. The dog splashed ahead like a spring colt. The first hole done, Earl walked over and the two men grabbed the auger together, alternating grips along the handle to cut the second hole fast. Then Earl returned to the first hole. He freed the hookless attractor spoon and ice flies secured to the jig rod guides and baited the fly hooks. He sent the silver spoon followed by the flies on droppers above it down the hole, found bottom and cranked up a few turns.
“Work from the bottom up, you never know where you’ll hit them,” Bud called over. “I’ll be in a little deeper water here.”
“You using the same rig?”
“I put on one of those Rapala jigs—you know, the things that swim around in little circles. Never can tell when a stray trout or pike might eat. I got the flies on above it.”
It was quiet across the lake, then came the floating strains of a song sung in a dry, cracking voice.
“Who’s singing?” Earl called over.
“That’ll be old René in his shack,” Bud laughed. “All the time he spends in there, guess he gets lonely. Keeps a bottle a rum for company. If he gets really tuned we’ll have some music.”
The first holes produced nothing and the two moved just off the point, drilling at new spots, Earl farther out, Bud closer in. Strains of a song in Quebec French came across to them from the shanty.
“He hasn’t got started,” Bud said. “You’ll see. He switches back to English sometimes.”
The dog appeared around the corner of the musical shanty, snuffing its edges.
“Ace, get over here,” Bud yelled. The dog came up panting, nuzzled Tuttle’s leg. “Good boy.” He rubbed the dog’s ears. “You leave the old man’s shack alone, hear.” Then he straightened. “Old Tatro’s got a smelt system in there. Got a whole long trench he keeps open; a bunch of fishing lines spaced along it on a rack. Lines come off little wood spools, go through open brackets. Fish hits, he just plucks the line off, hand-over-hands it in unless it’s a big one. They use the same thing up to the St. Lawrence fishing Tommy cod. Slick as owl dung in the rain. He won’t get smelt now, though. Perch are just fine with him, too.”
“Sounds like a production line,” Earl said.
“He catches ‘em, old geezer. I worry one day he’ll slip through that trench after enough a that rum.”
Earl counted offline in two-foot pulls. “It’s deep,” he said to himself. He cranked up until he figured he was at 15 feet. Overhead, streaks of thin clouds backed by a high, gray dome gave the sky the look of cool, polished tombstone. Far to the north the lake was empty. It seemed a very lonely place and Earl was glad he had company.
After a time, his second hole producing nothing, Earl started in. Bud had done no better. With Ace leading they headed around the point to the bay side closer to the old man’s shanty. The black and gray shack sagged toward the left. “He builds it up new every year,” Bud said. “It’s not the strongest thing.”
They drilled new holes inside the drop edge where the bottom rose from 40 to 18 feet. They drilled closer together, more for company than any insight into fish location.
René’s shanty had been quiet for some time. Suddenly the old man’s disembodied voice boomed across the ice. He sang in English this time, high in his nose in grand country fashion. First something about Texas ladies, then he segued into “… 90 miles an hour down a dead-end road … you gotta be bad to have a good time…. ” It was all delightfully incongruous for the time and place. Then Earl felt a peck and he struck with the jig rod.
He used the tip of the rod and his non-rod hand in a kind of alternating cat’s cradle to pick up line and bring the fish in. He dropped the monofilament on the ice, the perch following.
“Nice,” he said, “nice perch.”
The fish was fat, gleaming brassy-gold, its black vertical bars vivid. It splayed its sharp-pointed gill covers, arched its spiny dorsal. Earl brought it to the bucket on the sled.
Hearing excitement Ace trotted back from one of his circuits, coming up just as a fish hit Bud’s rig. “Just a couple feet off bottom,” he said happily.
“That’s where mine hit.”
The dog danced, lunged for Bud’s fish. “Ace, back!” Tuttle ordered. The dog backed reluctantly, wanting the fish. “You’ll get fin-pricked,” Bud grumbled affectionately, “not to mention slobbering dinner.”
They took two more fish each but it was not fast and they spread out, drilling new holes, looking for the main school. They tried shallower, drilling a hole line, then moved out on the drop again and here they hit the school.
The fish were so tightly concentrated that holes a couple of yards apart meant the difference between an occasional fish or rapid action. They ended with four holes drilled in a cluster, alternating between them as one cooled and another became productive.
In his shack old René started in again singing “ … we got winners we got losers, we got bikers we got truckers … an’ the girls next door dress up like movie stars … I love this bar, I love this bar….”
“He’s getting there,” Bud laughed.
“So are we,” Earl said sticking another fish.
“Let’s string out these holes and connect them,” Bud said. “Make a trench like old René’s so we can keep moving right on top of the fish.”
They augered new holes, connected the old ones. Then Bud grabbed the long steel ice spud from his sled and widened the slot. The opening was a long, rough rectangle.
Ace stayed with them now, feinting at each new fish, whining happily. Over in his shack René had launched into a sad-sweet ballad in Quebec French. Two crows circled overhead eyeballing for scrap bait. Just then Bud struck but this time his little jigging rod bowed over, line tearing from, the reel with a soft zipping sound. “No perch!” he yelled.
Quickly Earl reeled in, ran over. The fish finished its first run and Bud was getting line back now, reeling smoothly. Then the fish went again. It was a shorter run but deeper, and when the fish was turned it came only a little way before going a third time, this run toward the point and just beneath the ice. Bud thrust his rod half down into the trench. “He’s awfully close to the top. He’ll cut me off on the ice edge if I let him.”
Ace danced close, tail wagging, excited as the men.
“I got him coming,” Bud said. He reeled faster now, gaining line. Then they saw the fish.
“Trout! Nice rainbow,” Earl said. He raced for the sled. “You got a net?”
“Ah, no,” Bud said worriedly. The fish was at the surface. It thrashed, showering Bud on his knees, reaching for it. Then it ran again forcing him to punch the rod into the trench.
“I have heavy line,” Bud said. “If I can get him to hold on top a second I can scoop him with one hand, just swing him over.”
The fish came. It lay on the surface, Bud holding it with raised rod, reaching under its belly with his other hand, scooping it, the fish arcing brightly through the air to the ice, gleaming, bold magenta stripe on its side. It arched its body, hard muscles lifting it from the ice. Earl grabbed it but instantly it slipped away. The fish spun on the ice, flopped, and Ace was on it but not fast enough. The rainbow’s last effort took it from between the dog’s feet back into the trench, the Lab after it, hitting the frigid water, diving.
“Ace!” Bud bellowed. He pounded with his boot heel on the ice. Earl jabbed his own jig rod under, searching. Bud ran to the sled, came back with the ice sieve, dropped to his belly. His arm up to the shoulder in the water, Bud swung the sieve in wide circles under water searching frantically for the dog.
“Ace, Ace!” he called. “Oh the damned, stupid …” He rolled over on the ice, his hand gone angry red. “I can’t hold onto this scoop.”
“Here give it to me.” Earl grabbed the sieve. He was down now scooping at the other end of the wide trench.
A scream sliced the air. They saw René’s shanty rock once before one black paper wall exploded, flimsy framing splintering, spewing the old man in green suspenders and baggy wool trousers. His white hair fared in ragged streamers, his eyes rolled madly and from his sunken cavern-dark mouth came a wavering, tortured wail. René Tatro hit the ice running. He slipped to all fours, regained his feet, staggering for shore, not seeing the anglers, not seeing anything now but the safety of shore.
“La bête … sauvage!” he screamed, “the beast, the beast!”
He reached the shore, crashed into the woods. The two anglers were running now, heading for the destroyed shanty, reaching it, staring in. Inside was a shambles. Tackle was strewn everywhere. A half-filled can of corn had scattered kernels like confetti. Bits of lunch joined the yellow niblets. An empty rum bottle lay on its side. And in the middle of it all was Ace, tail beating as he wolfed down everything edible.
“Ace you fool!” Bud told the dog. “Come here.” The dog even gave up eating to come. Bud grabbed the Lab around the shoulders and Ace shook his hindquarters showering both men.
“Can’t believe this,” Earl said.
“Oh yeah, it’s real. Look at that setup. Ace must have boiled right up the middle of René’s ice trench looking like the devil himself.”
They both began laughing. They sat in the debris and could not stop laughing.
“That poor geezer. If he didn’t think it was old Ned he likely thought it was the lake monster we’re supposed to have,” Bud said wiping tears from his eyes.
“Oh, I remember that—like the one in Loch Ness,” Earl said.
“Ace you are a monster all right. Nothing’s hurt with the fishing setup anyway,” Bud pointed. “But the shack’s sure finished.”
“I’m shutting down this stove,” Earl said. Ace squirmed to get back at the flood.
“No more, you. You’ve done enough for the day,” Bud told the dog. “I’m gonna call poor René. He won’t believe me. Maybe I shouldn’t tell him the truth. I bet he goes on the wagon for a while. Got to fix his shack for him. I wonder if I can ever get him back on the ice again. ”
“We better get out of here before we freeze,” Earl said. “I’m starting to feel it. ”
“Same here. I think my arm’s frozen,” Bud said.
They staggered to the sled, started back fast toward the access, looking at one another, beginning to laugh again so hard that walking became difficult. The dog ran in front pleased with it all.
Finally Earl said, “You know, along with everything we have enough fish for supper.”
“Good thing,” Bud told him. “Nobody’ll believe the rest.”
Overhead along the shoreline two crows headed north into the silence of spring.