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•^ by IJdward C. Crossmarii
STEERING HIM INTO THE NET
I
a M completely helpless," spoke up
the puzzled stranger; "my past
experience won't take me out of
the babes in the wood class when it
comes to fishing tackle. What I
want is a man with a heart, a family,
and a Christian raising; a man who'll
neither try to sell me jeweled hilt rods
nor load me up with department store
flies that look like feather dusters. Are
you such a man?"
"I am," grinned the tackle seller; "I'm
all that and more because, when needed,
I constitute myself an advisory committee
of one to the unwary, refusing to
sell them the things they don't need as
well as selling them the things they do
need. What's on your mind, tarpon or
brook trout?"
"Trout and bass, I gather from my invitation.
I've a friend in the nut class
of the fishing bugs. He's written me to
come up this summer to his uncouth and
uncurried hangout near the Canadian
line, and he says that I'll get bass in a
726
lily-pad pond nearby and trout within a
short drive—brook trout. I've got a little
time at last, and a little money, and I feel
the fishing thing taking worse every day.
You pick me the outfit that'll not bring
on more than the normal amount of criticism
from another fisherman, that'll last
more than one season, that'll be good and
yet not flossy or de luxe, and I'll write
the check. Is that fair ?"
"It is," agreed the stout person on the
other side of the case; "just waltz this
way, and we'll begin with a trout rod
that'll make your hair curl. After we
get everything necessary together for the
entertainment of Brother Trout, we'll
go into this bass thing—bad idea to get
your head going round and round with it
the very first thing."
"Trout rods," he went on, as he
flanked long cases full of beautiful flies
and horrific rubber creatures with festoons
of hooks along their bellies, "are
made in grades from one ducat to sixty
sequins, while I saw one the other day