“There’s no one to throw big stones here. That was Mr Jack.”
“Well, did he throw stones?” I said wonderingly.
“No! What a fellow you are! A jack—a pike—a big fish—took one of the young moorhens for his dinner.”
“Why, I thought pike lived on fish,” I cried.
“They live on anything. I’ve seen them swallow young ducks and water-rats and frogs—anything they can get. We’ll come and set a trimmer for that gentleman some day.”
“I suppose I’m very stupid,” I said; “but I’ve always lived in London, and have very seldom been in the country. I don’t know anything about birds and fish.”
“You soon will. There’s always something to see here. Herons come sometimes, but they don’t stop, because it’s too deep for them to wade except in one place; and there’s a hawk’s nest over yonder in an old fir-tree, but Bob Hopley shot the old birds, and you can see ’em nailed up against his lodge. There was a magpie’s nest, too, up in a big elm tree not far off; but never mind them now. Let’s catch some—Hist! look there. See ’em?”
“No,” I said, looking down into the water where he pointed.
“Come here. Lie down flat, and slowly peep over the bank through that grass. Go softly, or you’ll frighten them off. Then look down.”
I did as he told me, and as I looked down into the clear, deep water, that looked almost black from its depth, I could see quite a shoal of fish, with their sides barred with dark stripes, sailing slowly about between me and the dead leaves and rotten branches which strewed the bottom of the pool.