wedge of moon hung low in the eastern sky, and towards the western horizon the brilliant gold of an hour earlier had faded to yellowish pewter. Aside from the close-up hum and zizz of swarming mosquitoes and the rhythmic, distant swish of the traffic on Route 6, out there in the canoe Lily and I seemed cocooned in the liquid silence of the evening.
She had been right about the trout. The rings of surface-feeding fish caught wiggly reflections from the night sky, expanded them outward, broke the fragile light into pieces, and scattered them until they seemed to sink into the depths of the pond. They were fat, healthy rainbows, averaging a foot or so in length, and they sucked in the little white-winged dry fly I cast to their swirls.
I released the first few I caught without boating them by tracing the leader down to the fly in their mouths with my fingers and twisting the tiny hook free. Finally, Lily said, ‘Hey, that could be our breakfast,’ so I lifted the next two into the canoe and snapped their necks.
She had changed into snug-fitting white jeans and a rust-coloured flannel shirt. She had the sleeves rolled up to her elbows and had left several buttons on the front undone. She was adept with the paddle, although once she had pushed us up into the cove across the pond she barely had to paddle at all. Down there in the bowl formed by the hills on all sides, there was no breeze to ruffle the surface of the water, and we drifted slowly on unfelt currents of moving air, just fast enough to give me new fish to cast to.
We hardly spoke. When we did, it was in whispers. ‘See that one over there?’ she’d say, or ‘Damn. Missed him,’ from me. The quiet of the place commanded respect.
There was a hypnotic rhythm to it—false cast once, twice, shoot out the line, watch it settle like a silvery snake on to the black skin of the water, squint at the barely visible white wings of the little fly, twitch it once, pause, then the swirl, the lift of the rod tip, the pulse at the end of the line, a leap or two, quick bursts of shimmering light against the darkness, then the thrumming resistance as I stripped in the line with a rainbow trout hooked on the end of it.
I sat up in the bow with my back to Lily, surrounded by the place, my head empty of all else, intent only on the fishing and the silence and the pond. No thoughts of Jeff, being kept alive by machines in Hyannis, of myself, waking up with an elbow digging into my chest and a knife at my throat, of stolen Mayan jaguars, road pizzas, murdered watchdogs. In that canoe, it was mindlessly sensual, and I was cleansed and filled and satisfied with the delicate organic smell of night air and water and coolness, the sounds of tiny wavelets slapping against the sides of the aluminium canoe, the feel of the dampness of the air as it gathered into droplets in the hairs on my arms, the silhouettes of shadowy night birds and bats swooping and darting over the pond and now and then bursting its skin with their wingtips.
And I was aware of Lily. I remembered the feathery kiss she had brushed on to my cheek, and her scent, flowers and perspiration.
I also remembered Maroney’s suspicions. She could have planned it. He was right. She could have.
Out on that pond, I didn’t believe it. Nobody who handled a canoe so effortlessly, who honoured so fully the silence of the place and the gentle art of fly casting for evening trout, could be a criminal.
So we drifted and I cast and I let the darkness absorb me until, inevitably, I struck too hard at a trout that might have been bigger than the others, and the frail leader snapped. I sat there for a moment, letting the limp line trail out on the pond. Then I reeled in.
‘Had enough?’ said Lily softly.
‘I never get enough of this. Busted off my fly. Too dark to tie another one on.’
I lit a Winston—my first since I had stepped into the canoe. I always suspected that if I could do nothing but fish I would quit the
She had been right about the trout. The rings of surface-feeding fish caught wiggly reflections from the night sky, expanded them outward, broke the fragile light into pieces, and scattered them until they seemed to sink into the depths of the pond. They were fat, healthy rainbows, averaging a foot or so in length, and they sucked in the little white-winged dry fly I cast to their swirls.
I released the first few I caught without boating them by tracing the leader down to the fly in their mouths with my fingers and twisting the tiny hook free. Finally, Lily said, ‘Hey, that could be our breakfast,’ so I lifted the next two into the canoe and snapped their necks.
She had changed into snug-fitting white jeans and a rust-coloured flannel shirt. She had the sleeves rolled up to her elbows and had left several buttons on the front undone. She was adept with the paddle, although once she had pushed us up into the cove across the pond she barely had to paddle at all. Down there in the bowl formed by the hills on all sides, there was no breeze to ruffle the surface of the water, and we drifted slowly on unfelt currents of moving air, just fast enough to give me new fish to cast to.
We hardly spoke. When we did, it was in whispers. ‘See that one over there?’ she’d say, or ‘Damn. Missed him,’ from me. The quiet of the place commanded respect.
There was a hypnotic rhythm to it—false cast once, twice, shoot out the line, watch it settle like a silvery snake on to the black skin of the water, squint at the barely visible white wings of the little fly, twitch it once, pause, then the swirl, the lift of the rod tip, the pulse at the end of the line, a leap or two, quick bursts of shimmering light against the darkness, then the thrumming resistance as I stripped in the line with a rainbow trout hooked on the end of it.
I sat up in the bow with my back to Lily, surrounded by the place, my head empty of all else, intent only on the fishing and the silence and the pond. No thoughts of Jeff, being kept alive by machines in Hyannis, of myself, waking up with an elbow digging into my chest and a knife at my throat, of stolen Mayan jaguars, road pizzas, murdered watchdogs. In that canoe, it was mindlessly sensual, and I was cleansed and filled and satisfied with the delicate organic smell of night air and water and coolness, the sounds of tiny wavelets slapping against the sides of the aluminium canoe, the feel of the dampness of the air as it gathered into droplets in the hairs on my arms, the silhouettes of shadowy night birds and bats swooping and darting over the pond and now and then bursting its skin with their wingtips.
And I was aware of Lily. I remembered the feathery kiss she had brushed on to my cheek, and her scent, flowers and perspiration.
I also remembered Maroney’s suspicions. She could have planned it. He was right. She could have.
Out on that pond, I didn’t believe it. Nobody who handled a canoe so effortlessly, who honoured so fully the silence of the place and the gentle art of fly casting for evening trout, could be a criminal.
So we drifted and I cast and I let the darkness absorb me until, inevitably, I struck too hard at a trout that might have been bigger than the others, and the frail leader snapped. I sat there for a moment, letting the limp line trail out on the pond. Then I reeled in.
‘Had enough?’ said Lily softly.
‘I never get enough of this. Busted off my fly. Too dark to tie another one on.’
I lit a Winston—my first since I had stepped into the canoe. I always suspected that if I could do nothing but fish I would quit the
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