Bryson City Tales (26 page)

“Jim,” chortled Don, “you'd have trouble catching a cold!” They both laughed again.

“Tell you what, Doc,” Jim said to me. “My wife's been looking for a good doc. I'll bring her over your way next time we need to see someone. In the meantime, watch the company you keep!” He pointed a thumb toward Don and erupted in a belly laugh. “You all take care. I'm off to catch criminals.”

He revved up the patrol car and took off down the road. As he drove off I breathed a deep sigh of relief. For some reason I felt I had just been the recipient of the gift of mercy.

“Doc, that's one nice guy and one good officer. They don't make many like him.”

We climbed into Don's truck, and on the way home he once again explained his favorite way to prepare the trout. “Doc, these guys are too small to fillet—and you don't need to anyway. Their bones are too small and too soft to matter. So here's what you do. Just rinse them off real good with clean water. Don't even have to scale them or take off the head. Then slit open the stomach and remove the guts. Clean 'em out well and then wash out the cavity. Should be no problem for you, Doc. After all, that's what you do every day!” He laughed at his picturesque characterization of my profession.

“Then you take some lemon pepper and sprinkle it over the entire fish, inside and out. Then take a pat of butter—don't use that margarine stuff—just a pat of butter, and place it in the cavity. Then wrap each fish in aluminum foil. Get your grill going at about medium heat and grill the fish for about ten minutes on each side. Boy, oh boy, you are going to eat like a king.”

I thanked him for his kindness and for a wonderful day. While waiting for Barb and Kate to return home from their Saturday errands in town, I began to clean and prepare the fish. That night we had our first meal of genuine Smoky Mountain trout. Barb cooked green beans and corn, along with yeast rolls. The wonderful aroma in the house matched the sweet evening we spent as a family—an evening of storytelling and laughter, an evening that defined what family was all about. The warmth of that evening wafted through all of Sunday and on into the evening.

First thing Monday morning, however, the feeling completely morphed into horror. The radio clicked on at the prescribed 6:00 A.M., and then I heard it—from the mouth of Gary Ayers himself.

“Good morning, folks. Boy, law enforcement over in Cherokee was busy, busy, busy yesterday. Seems a bunch of tourists were caught coming out of the woods with creels of illegal trout. Yep, folks. These guys had caught a bunch of brook trout. Not only did they catch an endangered species, but all of the fish were under the eight-inch minimum, and they went over the six-fish limit. Worse yet, these guys didn't
even have licenses. And if that's not enough, they were found to have used kernel corn—and you all know that the park only allows fishing with artificial bait. Well, folks, law enforcement will be buying some new patrol cars this week. They arrested these guys, and they're in jail, without bail, over in Sylva. Looks like they'll get a $1,000 fine per rainbow trout, $2,500 for each brook trout, $2,500 for fishing with bait, plus $1,500 for trout fishing without a license. Folks, we'll need an adding machine to figure out the damage. Not only that, officers have confiscated the criminals' cars. Now for this morning's weather report . . .”

I was mortified. I felt a cold sweat break out on my brow.

“Honey,” murmured Barb softly, as she lay curled up beside me in bed, “didn't Don tell you that you didn't need a license?”

“That's right. But he also told me there was no limit on the number of fish or the size of the fish or the type of fish. He also told me that we could use bait.”

I paused to consider the implications—and then the headline in the
Smoky Mountain Times
: “Local physician buried under the Sylva jail after murdering ten endangered brook trout caught without a license and with illegal bait.”

I barely made it through morning rounds at the hospital. The first thing I did after arriving at the office was to give my fishing mentor a call.

“Don, did ya hear 'bout those boys being arrested over in Cherokee?”

“Yep, sure did. Mighty unfortunate for them. Mighty unfortunate.”

“For them?
For them?!
How about for
us?
Grissom, that could have been
us!
Are you nuts? Why didn't you tell me about the license? Why didn't you tell me about the size limit? Why didn't you tell me about the maximum number of fish we could take? Why didn't you tell me that only artificial lures are allowed? Grissom, we could be in jail!”

“Now, Doc. Just calm down a bit and let me explain.”

I'm sure he could hear my angry breathing.
This had better
be good,
I thought.
It had better be good!

“Doc, those guys are foreigners. They were catching fish that weren't theirs. Those of us who grew up here—we know what's ours and what's not. Doc, those fish belonged to us before they belonged to the park. The park knows that, and so do we. We don't take what we don't need, and we eat all we take.”

“But, Don, if Jim had looked in our creels, we'd be in jail.”

“Doc, you don't think he saw our creels? You don't think he knew? It's just the way things is around here. Jim knows it. I know it. Now you know it. But if it will make you feel any better, I'll come up there at lunchtime and help you apply for your license. And, in the future, we'll catch us some bigger trout, OK?”

After I hung up I didn't feel any better at first. But as I thought about it a bit, I began to understand the feelings of the locals a little better—especially those whose parents and whose parents' parents had grown up in Swain County, especially those who had lost their property to the government when the national park was formed. Many still considered it, in a way, their land—and land that still provided them food.

After that day I didn't ask where the turkey or deer or hog or bear meat I received in payment for medical services came from. I just accepted it with a grateful heart. And I was thankful for an afternoon in the woods, seeing and hearing some things that refreshed and invigorated my spirit and soul. I wouldn't have been there except for Don. I was thankful for one of the best meals of my life. I wouldn't have enjoyed that except for Don. I was thankful that at least this one local fellow was starting to consider me one of the “locals.” I was also thankful for the mercy shown to me by a law enforcement officer who understood the
spirit
of the law as well as the letter of the law.

Louise and Mitch had begun to teach me the ways of mountain medicine. Don began to teach me the way of the land. Jim showed mercy. I thought of the words of wise King Solomon in the Old Testament:

There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under heaven:
a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,
a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,
a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain,
a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,
a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,
a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.

A time to die, a time to live. A time to learn, a time to be thankful. And, I thought to myself,
That's just the way it is!

chapter twenty-two

SOMETHING FISHY

I
was on my way out of the operating room, having assisted Ray with an emergency appendectomy on a young newlywed. She and her husband had been honeymooning at one of the local inns. Suddenly Louise burst through the OR doors.

Ray and I looked at each other.
Who was she after this time?

“Dr. Larimore,” she squawked, “I need you in the ER. You won't believe what I've got. I've been here in this hospital for
a
lot
of years, and
I
don't even believe what's in there!”

She turned and tried to escape through the rapidly closing doors, which caught her squarely on the shoulders. She gave the doors a shove and shouted back over her shoulder, “Now!”

Ray and I looked at each other again. “Mind if I join you after I get the patient settled in the recovery room?” he asked.

“Sounds like it might be interesting. Come on down,” I chuckled as I sped through the OR doors.

When I got to the ER, things seemed calm. Louise was writing a note at the nurses' station, and two of the three patient bays had drapes pulled around them. There were no paramedics to be seen.

As I walked in, Louise stood up. “There's two patients, Doctor. The first one will live but needs a lot of suturing. The second one was DOA, but the first patient will not let her out of his sight until the game warden arrives.”

This has got to win the prize as the most unusual patient history
ever presented to a doctor,
I thought to myself. I must have looked totally confused.

She continued. “Before your jaw completely dislocates, come look.”

The smile on her face was devilish. She pulled the curtain of bay 2 open, and my eyes beheld something they had never seen before nor ever seen since in an emergency room. It was a fish. Now, not just any fish but a
gigantic
fish! The ER gurney is about seven feet long, and this fish occupied at least two-thirds of its length. It was massive. My jaw dropped. The jaws of the fish were also open, with horrific-looking teeth and some blood on the sheet by the mouth—I presumed from being hooked. Louise was snickering.

A voice from bay 1 spoke, “That's one monster of a fish, ain't it, Doc? I've ne'er seen a muskie so big. Think she's shore 'nuff a record. Maybe even a worlt record.”

“What's this
fish
doing in our ER?” I asked.

“Well, Doctor,” Louise piped up, “Mr. Crisp here would not be evaluated unless I agreed to let his fish accompany him.”

“Doc, that thar is a record fish. Can't let her outta my sight till she's properly measured and weighed. I caught her fair and square. I'd rather bleed to death than let her outta my sight.”

“Bleed to death?” I inquired.

“Oh, yes, sir,” exclaimed Louise. “Come
looky at this.” She pulled the curtain back to reveal a white-as-a-sheet Mr. Crisp, who otherwise looked just fine—aside from his right arm, which was covered with a bloodstained hospital drape. Louise went to the patient's right side and slowly peeled back the sheet that was clotted to his arm. He winced.

“What happened?” I cried—trying not to sound as shocked as I really was. The arm looked as though it had been through a meat grinder. No bones were showing, but there was clotted blood from just above the elbow to the wrist.

“Well, Doc, I was down near the Almond boat dock, jigging for crappie. The lake's down a good forty feet, so to get to the shore you've got to walk down the edge. Thar ain't no trees or stumps 'round the cove thar, just the water's edge. But I know a place where thar's a rock. When the water's that low, you can get to the rock. On the side of the rock thar's an underwater cliff, about fifteen or twenty feet straight down. Great place to fish.”

His eyes bored into mine. “Doc, you ain't gonna tell no one about my spot, are you?”

“No sir, Mr. Crisp, your secret spot's safe with me.”

“Well anyhow, I was just standing there at the edge of that rock, a jiggin' for crappie, like I said. Had caught a bunch of them critters. Had them on a stringer in the water. But I had the end of the stringer under my foot, since thar warn't no place to tie it to.”

“Go on,” I encouraged. The story was getting more curious by the minute.

“Well, I commenced to hearin' a slurpin'.”

“A slurping?” I asked.

“Yep, Doc, a slurpin'.” He then mimicked one deep long slurp, followed by another.

“What was it?”

“Well, I tell ya, Doc, I didn't rightly know m'sef. Ne'er heerd such a noise. Then I realized it was at my feet. I just plumb froze. Then, while that slurpin' continued, I slowly aimed my eyes down at my feets. And thar was the most unusual sight my eyes had e'er beholded.”

I couldn't believe what my mind told me was coming, but he sure enough said it anyway.

“At my feets, which were thar on the edge of the rock, thar was that muskie.” He pointed to the fish in the bay to his left. “Doc, that's a deepwater fish in Lake Fontana. They don't ever come up to the surface. You've gotta troll real deep for them. But thar she was, a comin' up right at the surface with her mouth wide-open, just like a big ol' shark, and then she'd just suck in one of my crappie and then she'd a close her jaws and just fillet that thang while she backed up. Just filleted 'em one at a time, and then she'd come back for the next one. Why, I've ne'er beholded such a thang.”

He was quiet for a moment, almost in a trance.

“Then what happened?” I asked.

“You
won't
believe this, Doctor,” Louise commented, shaking her head from side to side. “Just won't believe this a'tall.”

“Well, Doc, I only had three crappie left on that stringer,” Mr. Crisp continued. “So I had to commence my planning real quick-like. I slowly bent down and took my pole—and very, very slow-like passed it from my right to my left hand while I was continuin' to stoop. That muskie then slurped up my second-to-the-last crappie. But she either didn't see me or didn't care, 'cause she backed up and then came up for the last 'un. But, Doc, I was ready.”

“You were ready?”

“Yes sir, I was ready.”

“So what happened?” I was scared to ask. I knew the answer. Not only could I not believe it when I
thought
it, I still couldn't believe it when he said it.