A closed-mouthed, largemouth tale ~ October 12, 1989

David Heiller

Every year about this time, Bob Dutcher comes to the American office and says “I’ve got some fish I’d like to show you, Dave.”

Then I grab my camera and follow him outside, where he and a fishing partner hold up chain of fish.

David, on a later, more successful trip.

That’s when I go blubbery and make a fool of myself. I cannot look at a five pound largemouth without weeping.

So last Friday Bob came into the office and said, “I’ve got some fish I’d like to show you, Dave.” Sure enough, he and his friend, Mike Anderson, held up a chain of fish. This time he had TWO five-pound bass on it, along with an assortment of other fish. (You don’t notice other fish when you are in the company of five pound bass.) I can’t describe a five pound bass. If they were people, they would be weight lifters or pro football players. They are almost grotesque; they are so huge and fat.

I held up well as I took the pictures, asked all the right questions, how they caught them, the bait they used. But I didn’t ask WHERE they caught the fish, because I knew what Bob would say, with his fish-eating smile:

“A local lake.”

Back in the office, after I had quit crying, I decided to try my luck at the elusive five-pound bass. The next morning, Noah and I headed out with a bucket of sucker minnows to a local lake. I had decided on Sand Lake, like Harley Sylves­ter had recommended at the bait shop. But at the last minute I changed my mind to Smith Lake.

As we sat in the front seat of the car, Noah as­ked me a question. “If you saw that guy from Askov going fishing right now, would you fol­low him?” He had this crooked smile on his face. I looked at him in shock.

A six-year-old poses a moral question.

I had been thinking just that same thing all morning. And to have a six-year-old pose such an unthinkable, moral question, one that hit at the very root of honesty and fair play.

I answered with a crooked smile of my own in one-half second: “YES!”

At Smith Lake, we parked our car behind a pick-up truck, unloaded our boat, and pushed off. Another boat drifted ahead of us, but I couldn’t see how they were doing. The wind blew us coldly across the lake behind them, along the lily pads. Noah had forgotten his stocking cap and a mitten in the car. He started complaining about the weather almost im­mediately.

Noah caught a small northern, maybe a pound, and threw it back. I pulled in a three pound northern. That was it. No bass, no other strikes.

After two hours, we headed in, shivering both from cruel cold and bulging bladders. There^’s nothing quite as painful as sitting in a boat with a kid who has to go to the bathroom on a cold day, unless you have to go yourself.

As we floated near the boat landing, the other boat on the lake, the one we had been drifting exactly behind, passed us by. There sat Bob Dutcher and Mike Anderson! I waved and yelled at Bob. He stopped. “I staked out your house last night and followed you here!” I said with a laugh. Bob didn’t smile.

“Catch any?” he asked. I held up my measly northern.

“How about you,” I returned. Mike held up a chain of fish. At the top was another five-pound bass! Now Bob smiled.

We returned to Smith Lake that evening, and caught a few more northerns. But the bass? That’s Bob Dutcher’s domain. I’ll keep trying though. At least I know the lake. Smith Lake. Or was it Jones Lake. I can’t seem to remember…