SurviRal (31 page)

“Eating fresh is the best,” Jake said. “You thought your city-slicker lifestyle was as good as it gets, didn’t you? Now you’re going to experience real gourmet.”

“Can’t argue with you there. The food’s a lot better than I ever imagined. And you’re to thank, bringing all the goods we need. I shouldn’t have made fun of your bucketful of sunflower seeds. Those things are coming in handy, and not only for bird bait. Watching you and Jenny grind them to make oil for the pasta and cooking pans was inspiring.”

“Sunflowers can save the world, Clint. Just remember that.”

Turk’s Pond was inaptly named. Shaped like a whale, the 25-acre lake could hardly be described as a pond—although it was a fraction of the size of the more popular Two Buttes Reservoir ten miles northwest. Clint and Jake had occasionally hunted around Turk’s Pond over the years, but never fished it. They always meant to. It had a favorable reputation among Colorado fisherman for holding a half-dozen or so different varieties of good eating fish, including “wiper” bass, a striped bass hybrid species. One decent-sized wiper would make a good meal for a family. The lake also featured stocked cutthroat trout, but by now the early spring plantings of those would probably be all fished out, or eaten by the wipers.

As Turk’s Pond came into view, Clint flashed on the first time he and Jake ever went fishing. They were young boys on a camping trip in Ohio with their parents. Those were the happy days when their mom was still in the picture. Dad taught them how to hold a fishing pole and work a spinning reel on the shore of a similar-looking lake. Each of them caught fish. Clint remembered being thrilled to string up three small perch, only to be outdone by his younger brother when Jake somehow managed to hook and land a large walleye. It took him fifteen minutes to reel it in, all the while trying to follow Dad’s frantic instructions for playing it.

Clint thought about his fly rod tucked away in the Denver townhouse. He only used it twice. It was a Christmas gift from Jenny years ago. He didn’t think to bring it when they bugged out. Seeing the fly rods in the scabbards of Cal and Barbara’s horses ahead of him made him wish he had it.

On the other hand, it might be fun to try and catch fish with a hand-line. That was certainly more of a survival-style fishing technique, which would please Jake.

They didn’t have the lake to themselves. Other fisherman were about, but not too many. Plenty of places left on shore to fish from. Some of the others looked at the horseback riders a little nervously, but went back about their business as soon as Cal and Barbara strung up their fly rods.

Randal agreed to stay with the horses. Travis ran to find a spot with his already-rigged spinning outfit and was the first to have a line in the water.

“Where should we dig?” Clint asked Jake.

“Worms are everywhere. Shouldn’t matter. Here.” Jake handed him the hand shovel.

Clint dug while Jake worked on tying multiple knots in his bramble cordage around a rock he picked up. Jake was right; it only took a few turns of dirt before Clint had five good-sized nightcrawlers harvested. He hooked one up, tied the hook and a weight to his fishing line, swung it around in circles a few times and let it fly. It wasn’t a good cast and the worm flew off in the air.

Jake laughed. “You’re chumming the water. Maybe that will whip them into a feeding mood.”

Clint watched Jake assemble his rig. Jake was careful. He took his time attaching the hand-carved bone-hook to the cordage, and then slid a big nightcrawler sideways on the hook. He ended up putting three entire worms on it. That was ambitious. Clint had to dig for more.

They both eventually got their lines in the water more than a few feet from shore. Clint noticed that a fisherman on the opposite side of the lake wasn’t actually fishing—not in the traditional sense, anyway. He looked to be no older than a teenager, and was patiently stalking the shoreline with a homemade bow and arrow. The arrow had a line attached to it.

Jake pointed to him. “That kid’s bow-hunting carp.”

“Interesting,” Clint said. “When will our bows be done?”

Jake laughed again. “Now you’re more enthusiastic about them, aren’t you?”

“Yes. Yes I am.”

“I’ll finish carving the bows by tomorrow, but then we’ll have to let them dry a couple weeks before tillering them. We can make arrows in the meantime, and forage for better cordage material. As a matter of fact, I noticed some yuccas on the far side of the lake.”

Clint wasn’t the most patient fisherman. After a half-hour of no bites, and hearing Travis shout with excitement a hundred yards away, he pulled in his line and left Jake alone. Jake didn’t object. He was busy hacking away at a willow sapling with his knife; God only knows why.

Cal and Barbara were fly fishing along an open bank where they had some back-casting room. Travis fished close to them, but not far out. Clint saw a bend in his rod right next to a cattail cluster and knew he must be catching pan fish. Sure enough, when Clint reached him he bulled a bluegill up from the weeds. It was pretty good sized, too. Big enough to eat, anyway.

Clint decided catching any fish was better than catching none, and decided to work the cattail beds with Travis. But he needed a better way to control the line. He looked around until he found a tree branch and tied a short section of line to it. Travis was a nice kid and didn’t complain about Clint invading his hole. In fact, he seemed happy to have some company.

Clint started catching fish. Most were too small to keep, but after an hour or so he had three good ones strung, same as Travis. That’s when he heard the sound of a fly reel singing and looked up.

Barbara’s rod was horseshoed. She succeeded in turning the fish after a long run and eventually worked it back to shore. Her husband pulled his line in and stood next to her offering encouraging words. Clint decided to pull up and go watch the fight.

“Sure wish my fly rod wasn’t up in Denver,” Clint said when he was next to Cal.

“I have extra rods,” Cal said. “Next time I’ll loan you one. Probably shouldn’t raid my own inventory, but the way things are going, may as well utilize my resources. Who knows when or if we can open the shop back up.”

“You’re a storekeeper?”

“Yep. We own a marine store up at Two Buttes.” Cal raised his voice. “Don’t horse him, Barb! That’s a good one!”

Minutes later, Barbara landed an impressive six-pound wiper. Travis came over and the four of them marveled at it before everyone returned to their own fishing. Clint and Travis continued plunking bluegill, with only an occasional keeper. But one of Clint’s keepers was a hefty black crappie. Right after he added it to his stringer, Cal began whooping and hollering. He was into a nice fish himself.

This time Jake came all the way over to see the fish landed. It was another nice wiper of about five pounds. The Sherwoods now had enough meat to feed a small crowd.

“Hey Jake,” Travis said. “Did you move one of the horses over to your fishing spot?”

“No. Your Dad has them all tied next to him. Why?”

“That bush over where you were fishing is shaking, like an animal is rustling it or something.”

Jake turned his head. “That’s my spring snare!” He took off running.

Clint and Travis ran after him.

“Is he trying to trap rabbits here?” Travis asked as they ran.

“I guess so,” Clint said. “That or birds.”

But when they arrived, Clint saw that the bramble cord tied to the willow bush was under water at the other end, and pulling on the bush ferociously.

“You used a spring-snare trap for fishing?” Clint asked.

“You betcha.” Jake grabbed the line and started a tug-of-war.

“Cool!” Travis said.

Whatever was pulling on the cordage was heavy. Several times the line stripped through Jake’s hands so fast Clint could almost feel the burn pain in his own palms. But Jake would get right back to tugging. For a minute Clint was transported back in time, watching his six-year-old brother reel that big walleye in all over again.

The time travel ended when Clint caught a glimpse of what was on the end of Jake’s homemade line: a big catfish. Jake finally managed to haul it ashore. It was eight pounds if it was an ounce. By that time, Cal and Barbara had come over to see Jake’s fish landed. Since everyone but Randal was together again, they moseyed over to see how he was doing.

Randal proudly displayed two nice-sized largemouth bass on his stringer when he saw them all coming.

“Well, looks like we have a mess o’ fish already,” Randal said. “Why don’t we get riding back before it gets too hot. Let’s have an old-fashioned fish fry at my place this afternoon. Since we have so much, maybe you can round up some of the other neighbors to come join us, Travis.”

Chapter Twenty Three

Clint decided to stay at the Butler’s while Jake went to fetch Jenny and Harold. Travis, who was apparently the one person who knew all the neighbors, took off on his bicycle to invite as many as he could find to come over and enjoy some fresh fish. Joanne and Randal debated on the best way to cook it all. It was decided to grill the wiper filets and break out the fryer for everything else, tapping into their precious stash of flour and oil for the occasion. The power had recently come back on, having been out all morning during the fishing expedition, so it figured to stay on for the afternoon, based on the recent blackout patterns.

“How does that snare trap work?” Cal asked Clint as they stood by the stable admiring the horses.

 Clint chuckled. “It’s so simple I’m embarrassed I didn’t understand it, either. Just a sapling or bush branch bent over, so it’s under pressure to spring back, loosely latched to something with some bait attached to the latch. When the animal—or fish—grabs the bait it pulls the latch free and the bush snaps back up, in this case setting the hook on a large channel cat. What amazes me is he used a hook he carved himself out of bone, and cordage for line that he made from plants.”

“I’d sure like to learn that,” Cal said. “Maybe we can get Jake to teach us later.”

“That would probably make his day. And if I know him, he’ll be bringing some of his survival stuff back for cooking the catfish with.”

Cal was an interesting guy. Clint found their conversation to be naturally engaging. He barely noticed all the other neighbors arriving over the next couple of hours, including Jenny and Harold. At one point Clint simply looked around and saw a yard full of people. Jenny was talking to Joanne Butler, and Harold had a drink in his hand—which he held up when he saw Clint look in his direction. Clint decided to find out what it was.

Scotch on the rocks. The Butlers had opened their liquor cabinet, plus some of the others had run back home to grab special bottles when they saw what kind of party was developing here. It was the chance to meet all your neighbors, and everyone seemed anxious to do so. Clint poured himself a tumbler of Johnnie Walker and wandered into the kitchen.

There was Jake at a cutting board, working on the big catfish. Not surprisingly, he brought two small containers back from the cabin with him. One contained his oat flour and the other had a freshly-ground batch of sunflower oil. He also lugged a bucketful of potatoes over to make French fries from.

“This will be a completely city-slicker free meal, brother.” Jake carefully cut the catfish into strips and handed them to Randal, who dunked them in raw eggs before dredging them in oat flour. “Every ingredient produced locally, except for the salt. Nothing from a store, nothing dropped out of a helicopter after being stolen from its rightful owner.”

By the way Randal smiled, Clint could tell Jake had a new recruit. He left them to their farmer talk and strolled back outside. Harold was now chatting with a muscular man in his fifties wearing a red flannel shirt. Clint surmised that they were talking about guns by the way they moved their arms. He decided to join them.

“Clint, this is Arnold Gainer. Lives two houses southwest of here. A bachelor, like me.”

 “I like living alone,” Arnold added. “Not that I’m unsociable. Rather fond of the Butler boy, in fact. Sure glad Travis came and got me for this.”

“Yeah,” Clint said. “Travis might be the glue that combines our neighborhood. So you aren’t afraid of being by yourself over there?”

“No.”

Harold laughed and put his hand on his new friend’s shoulder. “It’s the home invaders who should be afraid if they ever came to Arnold’s house.”

Their conversation turned back to firearms. Clint casually stepped away after a short while, being way out of his league there. He was tempted to go talk to Cal some more, but knew he should make the effort to meet the other neighbors.

“Clint? Clint Stonebreaker!” a voice said from the side.

Clint turned to see a familiar handshake coming at him from the direction of the chicken coop. The image of the blonde-haired young man with a smile full of crooked teeth confused him for a moment. Clint’s brain took a few seconds to figure out why. It’s because the image was out of place. Clint had only ever seen this person at work before—and at this moment, the Denver Oracle offices were as far away from the Butler’s yard as Mars.