mong the stones towards
the lake, when he caught sight of a boat in the middle of the rapid
stream. It was tied somewhat carelessly to the overhanging branch of a
tree, which bent and creaked with every lurch of the boat in the passing
rapids. Standing in the stern as unconcerned as if he was on an island
in a duck-pond, was Rollitt with his fishing-rod, casting diligently
into the troubled waters.

For the first time the junior enjoyed an uninterrupted view of the
object of his curiosity. He found it hard to recognise at first in the
eager, sportsmanlike figure, with his animated face, the big shambling
fellow whom he had so often eyed askance in the passages at Wakefield's.
But there was no mistaking the shabby clothes, the powerful arms, the
broad, square back. Rollitt the sportsman was another creature from
Rollitt the Classic, and Fisher minor was critic enough to see that the
advantage was with the former.

There was no chance of being detected. Rollitt was far too busy to heed
anything but the six-pounder that struggled and plunged and tore away
with his line to the end of the reel. Had all Fellsgarth stood
congregated on the banks, he would never have noticed them.

Ah! he was beginning to wind in now, gingerly and artfully, and the
fish, sulking desperately among the stones, was beginning to find his
master. It was a keen battle between those two. Now the captive would
dive behind a rock and force the line out a yard or two; now the captor
would coax it on from one hiding-place to the next, and by a cunning
flank movement cut off its retreat. Then, yielding little by little,
the fish would feign surrender, till just as it seemed within reach,
twang would go the line and the rod bend almost double beneath the
sudden plunge. Then the patient work would begin again. The man's
temper was more than a match for that of the victim, and, exhausted and
despondent, the fish would, sooner or later, have to submit to the
inexorable.

How long it might have gone on Fisher could never tell; for once, when
victory seemed on the point of declaring for the angler, and the shining
fins of the fish floundered despairingly almost within his reach, a
downward dash nearly wrenched the rod from his hands and sent him
sprawling on to the thwarts. The sudden lurch of the boat was too much
for the ill-tied rope, and to Fisher's horror the noose gave way and
sent boat and fisherman spinning down the rapids at five miles a