Tales Of the Angler's El Dorado Nz Page 8

  When the gaff went in I leaped down and helped hold that wagging handle. The swordfish sent up mountains of water. Both Hodgson and I were lifted, thrown, dragged, but we held him while the other boatman lassoed the monstrous, looming tail.

  Then I fell back, exhausted and spent, to congratulate the Captain. He was wet with sweat, dishevelled and almost at the point of collapse. The battle had not been so long as others I had engaged in, but it had been strenuous, and, through emotion, fearfully wearing on the nerves.

  It took both crews to pull that swordfish upon the stern of the Captain's boat. Then we ran out to sea, as if such a capture was all in the day's work. Three miles out Captain Mitchell raised and hooked a striped Marlin that led him a chase. I was about to follow when I espied a sharp dark sickle tail above the water.

  "We've got trouble of our own, boys," I said, pointing. "Run over to that one."

  When within two hundred feet, the tail disappeared. In another instant the purple wings and bird-like shape of a swordfish appeared, as if by magic, behind our teasers.

  We went through the usual exciting procedure, and things turned out well. It was only when this swordfish began to leap that a great difference manifested itself. He leaped out like a greyhound. He went high into the air, fully fifteen feet over the water, and all of thirty feet in a long curve. We had to chase him full speed. Each leap appeared more wonderful, higher, longer, until they were incredible.

  He leaped seventeen times in succession, the last of which was marvelous in the extreme. I never had seen such an exhibition. So many leaps, such increasing speed, height, distance; such blazing of purple, silver, bronze; such quivering of body, wagging of bill, and sweeping of tail were surely the magnification of all other performances.

  After that he slowed down, sank deep and gave me an hour of very hard labor. Then he made another display of leaping, showing seven more times.

  When I finally had the Marlin on board our boat, I beheld the Captain approaching. His men signaled, and we were soon within hailing distance, but that did not suit the Captain. He had the boats come to a stop together. His face was beaming.

  "Most extraordinary thing!" he exclaimed. "By gad! I never saw the like. Our teasers raised two Marlin, one the usual size and striped, the other a big black fellow. They charged the teasers together. Then the big black one flashed at the other, and rammed him terribly. I saw the bill go in. The struck Marlin leaped out terrifically, and the black devil followed him. For half a mile that struck swordfish leaped out every few seconds...most extraordinary thing I ever saw."

  "Well!" I ejaculated. "What do you think of that?... I just had something wonderful happen too. Let's go back to camp before one of these fish sinks us."

  Mitchell's black Marlin was as grand on nearer view as he had been while leaping; but the wildness and blaze had faded with his life. He was a fish of the most graceful lines that ever blessed my sight. Verily he was a black-opal-and-silver hue with leaden fins. Nowhere the slightest mark of a stripe! The large, round pupil of his eye matched the color of his fins and the cornea retained all the iridescence of his body. His fins were perfectly turned to the shape of delicate, pointed scythes, with which he had slashed through the seas. How wonderfully nature had combined his ponderous size and majesty with beauty and grace! His shoulders were magnificent, his depth incredible, his bulk carrying clear to his enormously wide tail.

  There was a most remarkable contrast between this fish and the striped Marlin. First in the absence of purple stripes; secondly, in the short, heavy, blunt bill, it not being much longer than a foot; thirdly, in the low short dorsal fin; and fourthly, in the lower maxillary, which was also very short and which curved down, like a beak. This last feature is peculiarly that of a black Marlin. His pectoral fins were narrow, curved and very long. The queer little appendages between them, that in a sailfish are very extended in length and delicate as rapiers, were scarcely six inches long. They resembled feelers. What use could such a tremendous fish find in those two feather-like projections? I had no idea.

  He measured five and a half feet in girth and twelve and a half feet in length; a remarkable length considering the shortness of his bill. His tail spread forty-seven inches, and he weighed six hundred and eighty-five pounds.

  To that date, this was the world record for both flat and round bill swordfish. The time of the capture was something over two hours, a very short fight for such a marvelous fish. No doubt the effort required to propel his huge bulk into the air told greatly upon his strength. We differed as to number of leaps he made, but I remembered twenty-three. Never shall I forget one of them! It was breath-taking to see him, and nerve racking for me pulling on the leader and risking a break.

  Fighting a great game fish is hard work, but it is not the hardest connected with the sport. With the strike and the following battle there is an excitement that makes time fly and labor seem nothing. Only when severe exhaustion and pain become manifest does the mind dwell upon the physical side of it.

  I have encountered but few anglers who could stand this game for any great length of time. The way we fish for sailfish, swordfish and tuna involves a searching of the sea, running miles and miles to locate a particular fish or find where a school is surfacing. The glare of the bright water is perhaps the hardest thing to endure, unless it is the vain hunt, day after day, without sighting what you want.

  Of course, in New Zealand waters we did not have this vain hunt, for we were always raising swordfish or getting strikes. We met, however, the other discomforts and endurance-testing features. Foremost of these was the rough sea. We had ten days of rocking boats, that each day, along in the afternoon, made things almost unendurable. Then followed nine perfect days which spoiled us. After that we struck a windy day. It appeared only a breeze when we started out, and deceived us. When we were miles offshore a strong wind blew down on us, kicking up a tremendous sea. At first the sensation of trolling over great blue white-crested roaring billows was most thrilling. There was the keen zest to see a swordfish come shooting through the swells at our teasers; and then the wonder of having him leap across the blue hollows and out of the curling combers.

  Captain Mitchell did hook one that danced over the sea in a most amazing way. It was so rough, however, that I could not hold my camera level. In fact, I could not do anything save hold on to the boat.

  That night I was worn out and as sore in body as if I had been beaten with a club. When I awoke I could not sit up. My back seemed broken. I had to work around sideways and finally got to a sitting posture, so I could dress. After some brisk exercise in the cool dawn I got rid of the soreness.

  My Marlin swordfish, numbers fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, caught during the last few days prior to the windy one, weighed two hundred and fifty-eight, two hundred and seventy-eight, and two hundred and fifty pounds, respectively. I also captured a fivehundred-pound reremai, an achievement I did not care to repeat. He was a strong, heavy brute and hard to lift.

  On February nineteenth we scoured the smooth opal sea all morning, and ran all over the territory we knew, looking for fins. But not a fin! We did not raise a Marlin either. At the lunch hour we stopped the engine and drifted. The English boatmen all loved their tea and it took half an hour to brew it, and another half hour to eat their lunch. My sandwich and apple required only about five minutes to dispose of. After that I put out a live bait, a big kahawai, and let out over a hundred feet of line, in the hope that while drifting I might get a mako strike.

  It was warm and pleasant on the sea, and the gentle rocking of the boat was not conducive to a wide-awake habit. To try to keep from dozing I watched the gannets and shearwaters. Suddenly I saw a big white splash about a mile off. I watched. Then a huge mako shot up white in the sunlight, turned clear over and dived back into his element.

  "Boys," I called, "I saw a mako jump. Hook up and run over there."

  We did so, and stopped as near the place as I could calculate, where I put my bait down again. Not
hing happened. I was slipping into a doze when I thought my line jerked through my fingers; still I could not be sure. After I had relaxed vigilance again the same thing happened.

  "I'll be dog-goned!" I soliloquized, somewhat puzzled. "Did something happen or was I dreaming as usual?"

  Some moments of tense waiting were unproductive. I had only imagined my line had jerked. So I settled back again in my comfortable chair, just about as content as a man could well be.

  Then came a tremendous jerk on my line. It whipped out of my hand. My reel spun round, though I had the light drag on. Frantically I bent over to grasp the rod and free the drag. Then the line paid out swiftly in a wonderful strike.

  "Gee, boys!" I shouted. "There's something doing here."

  "Mako!" exclaimed Frank brightly.

  "Sure that's a mako!" added Peter.

  "Well, maybe so; but there's a familiar feel about the way this fellow does business," I replied grimly, watching my line slip off. "Signal to the Captain's boat."

  By the time the Captain had run up close behind us I was hooked to a heavy, fast fish, and I had begun to suspect something too good to be true. Two hundred yards of line in one run! If that was mako work, I had to confess he was better than I thought him.

  "Mako, and a big one!" yelled Frank, as we ran after the fish.

  "Sure, that's the way a mako acts," said Peter, with great satisfaction.

  "Ahuh! Well, you boys grab the cameras and look out," I replied. "This bird I've hooked is going to fly."

  We were running full speed. My line was still slipping off the reel, and a long stretch of it had come to the surface. More of it showed.

  "Look out! He's coming up!" I shouted. "Get ready!... Oh, it's a broadbill!"

  I was not so astonished. I had been wondering. But I was tremendously elated, and tingled all over. The boatmen whooped, and from the Captain's boat behind rose wild yells of excitement.

  "Watch sharp. He's coming out again," I called.

  The second leap was enough to dazzle any boatmen, let alone two who had never seen a broadbill. It was a forward jump, quite high and long, allowing us time to see his bronze bulk, his wide, black tail, his huge, shiny head and waving sword. I though my boatmen had gone crazy; and the manifestations of the occupants of the other boat were no better.

  The broadbill did not show again. After several long, amazing runs, that made us hustle to keep pace with him, he sounded, and the hard fight was on. He kept steadily out to sea, and gained line despite all my efforts and the help of the boat. After a while he sounded deep, fully a thousand feet, and there he anchored himself. I had the heart-breaking task of pumping him up inch by inch.

  "Broadbills are alike, in any old sea!" I exclaimed, during this procedure. It took me half an hour to work him to the surface.

  To make a long story short, I fought him with all the strength I had, and with all the play the great tackle would stand. Toward the end of the fight he sounded even deeper, and this time he quit down there. I knew it, but did not tell the boatmen. I laboured strenuously, with keen calculation and some conservation of strength, to lift him from the depths. How familiar the heaving chest, the wet face, arms, neck, breast, the aching back and blistered hands! Could it really be true that I had caught a broadbill, way out in New Zealand? At last I had him up so that we could see the gleaming pale color, then the massive shape, the long fierce-looking sword. What the boatmen said I could never remember, but it was a medley of whirling words. I had the swordfish whipped, and he gave little trouble at the boat.

  Captain Mitchell and his crew came close to look and to yell, to congratulate me and give a few whoops for New Zealand waters.

  We were about four miles off the cape. Loading the swordfish, we ran in to exhibit him to the seven or eight boats fishing there. I shall not soon forget the expression of those anglers. Such a marvelous and amazing fish as the broadbill had never been imagined by them. We went on to the camp, which we reached before sundown and in time for some picture-taking. We all made guesses as to the weight of my fish; and I, for once, hit it correctly, four hundred pounds even!

  The boat crews were keen to take the fish to Russell to exhibit. I not only consented to that, but told them to have the broadbill cut up so everybody in the village could eat some of it. They returned with the glowing accounts of the week-end visit at home. The broadbill swordfish created a sensation in the little town; and as late as eleven o'clock at night people were inspecting the fish with torches.

  A couple of days later--both of which were unproductive of everything but good luck for me--we came in to the cape about four o'clock. There were fifteen boats around the great rock, most of them near, some far off; and five of them were fast to fish, working out to sea with the anglers sitting comfortably in chairs on the bows. Not a bent rod among the five! Eight of the other boats had one or two swordfish on board.

  This circumstance might not have been remarkable for Cape Brett anglers, but it was exceedingly so for me. Manifestly the Marlin had come in to feed that day. They were all small fish for those waters, and of a uniform size, around two hundred pounds. I had not the slightest doubt that large fish had been hooked and lost. We trolled twice round the island without raising anything, then proceeded to Bird Rock. The sun was now low and red in the west. The sea, colored like an opal, was without ripple. Acres of kahawai were darkening the surface, and myriad little white gulls were hovering and fluttering over them. The fish raised a white caldron on the water and a sound exactly like a brook rushing over stones. The birds were screaming. Every now and then the kahawai leaped as one fish to escape some enemy underneath, and made a prolonged roar in the water.

  I trolled round, while Captain Mitchell let down a dead yellowtail for bait, and drifted. Soon he had a strike and hooked something heavy that moved away slowly, without showing. Another boat came along and followed the Captain's out to sea.

  Meanwhile I tried letting down a live bait, which presently was seized by what turned out to be a forty-pound yellowtail. I tried again without reward. The sun was setting, the time nearly six o'clock, and Captain Mitchell was working farther out to sea. I began to suspect he had attached himself to another black Marlin or a huge reremai.

  Suddenly I espied a thin long sickle fin quite near the rock. Not long did it take us to throw out teasers and draw a kahawai in front of the waving tail. It vanished. Next instant a purple-finned Marlin rushed our teasers, then my bait. He took it, spat it out. Then he flashed back, from one teaser to the other, then at my bait again. But he refused to touch the kahawai. I reeled in to put on a yellowtail. Meanwhile we were running quite fast, with the teasers out, and the Marlin knocking at them with his bill. It was great fun and most exciting. As we passed near a school of kahawai the swordfish left the teasers and sheered at the kahawai. They smashed the water. Then he came back at us and chased the teasers clear to the rudder. I dragged my yellowtail over his back time and again. Finally he left us. But presently he rose again farther out, making a ripple and showing a foot of his slender blue tail. We headed him as before, and precisely as before he charged us, this time going straight for my bait. He took it, went down, and came back for the teasers. I struck him and had a hard tussle with him, deep down. Captain Mitchell returned just as we were trying to lasso the tail of my Marlin, and had the fun of seeing us thoroughly drenched by the spouts of water.

  "Lost my fish!" called Mitchell, tragically. "Big black Marlin. Hook pulled out. By gad! he was a lunker!... Terrible day of bad luck for me! Broke one rod, bent my reel..."

  "But you hooked the fish," I interrupted. "I was watching, you lucky fisherman. Can't understand why your black Marlin did not jump aboard your boat."

  We reached our little bay in the ruddy afterglow of sunset, and went ashore with our fish. They proved to be splendid specimens of the striped Marlin, mine weighing two hundred and ninety-two and the Captain's three hundred and two. He was disconsolate because I had not hooked the big black Marlin he lost. T
hat was nothing to what I was.

  Chapter VIII

  MONSTER FROM THE DEEP

  The Cavalli Islands strongly impressed me as being a remarkably favorable place for big game fish. I clung to that belief. We had not seen any kahawai or other schools of bait there, but as we had left early in the day I did not consider our failure as conclusive. So I planned to go again and stay overnight.

  We went. I never shall forget that trip. We arrived there about the middle of the afternoon. What a difference from our former visit! The sea was alive with schools of bait. Big fish were smashing the water, gulls were screaming, all around there were continuous sound and the haunting moan and roar and wash of the restless sea.

  I had my chance at a great black Marlin. He loomed a massive purple shadow behind my bait, became clear and sharp, a magnificent and appalling sight. He struck viciously at my bait--took it--sheered away--while I shook in my seat. But he felt the hook and threw it... That loss colored my thoughts for long. But the late afternoon and sunset were reward almost for any loss, let alone that of an incurable fisherman.

  All day the smoke from forest fires had blown out over the sea, and that, with the gathering clouds, had prepared a beautiful veil through which the red sun burned. There were lights on the water that did not belong on land or sea. The shafts of rock stood up bronze and gold through the smoke. The schools of kahawai spread and rippled on the dark water, every now and then crashing a wide white area of spray that turned into a million diamonds of gold and fire.

  Far out a storm gathered, a dark, violet cloud massed low above the horizon; and in the west the sun became lost in a haze of dusky rose. I seemed to smother in the fragrance of burning autumn leaves. My ears were filled with the low, sad surge of the sea. Sunset, twilight, dusk; then we ran round the main island to a protected bay.

  After supper we went ashore in the dingy. A strong breeze had blown away the smoke and clouds, and from a clear sky the white moon shone. Again, for the thousandth time, I walked alone on a lonely beach, listening to the grating roar of the pebbles that the sullen surge drew down. Lines of Matthew Arnold's great poem, "Dover Beach", lingered in my mind.