They rowed quickly back, and upon reaching the boat-house they found that Dick was there, and had just put the finishing touch to a casting net which they had been occupied in making for some time.
"Bravo! that is capital!" said Frank. "We can now catch some bait with it."
Before casting the net into the water they practised some time with it, for it is very difficult to throw a casting-net properly. After a little practice the boys were able to throw the net so that it described something like a circle on the ground, and then they took it to the shallow parts of the broad, and in a dozen throws they obtained a quantity of small roach and bream, as well as some large ones. Putting some of the roach into a bait-can, they rowed to the pool where the big pike lay, and first of all tried him with a live bait. But the float was undisturbed, save by the movements of the bait. Then they tried trolling with a dead gorge-bait, then spinning, and then a spoon, but with the like ill success.
"I tell you what," said Frank, at length, "a big fish like that requires something out of the common to induce him to bite. Let us put a big bream on, and try and tempt him by size." So they put a bream a pound and a half in weight on the gorge-hook, and worked the heavy bait up and down every part of the pool, but still without success, and the autumn night came on and put a stop to their fishing.
"We must catch him somehow," said Frank.
"Let us set trimmers for him," suggested Jimmy in despair.
"No, no; we will catch him by fair means if we can."
The big pike, the biggest which they had ever seen, occupied their thoughts all that evening. As Frank was dressing the next morning a happy thought occurred to him, and when he met his friends after breakfast he said,—
"I have got an idea how we may catch that pike. You remember how he took the water-hen under? He decidedly prefers flesh to fish. What do you say to catching a water-hen and baiting our hook with it?"
"The very thing," said Jimmy.