"Why do we need another boat?" Ramsay queried.
"For setting gill nets," Hans replied. "You are not a fisherman unless you know how to set a gill net, and you cannot set a gill net unless you have a proper Mackinaw boat." He petted the oaken beam again. "As responsive as a canoe it shall be, but as strong as a pound boat! This one shall not break no matter what happens. The lake will not breed a storm that it will be unable to ride out."
That night Ramsay's was the first watch. He rowed the pound boat from one to another of their three pound nets. No strange vessel disturbed the lake, no hostile creature approached. Ramsay gave his watch over to Hans, and slept until dawn. They fished, processed their catch and loaded thirty thousand pounds of whitefish onto the Jackson when she nosed into their pier.
Ramsay went with Hans and Pieter to a place where some mighty cedar trees, that had grown for centuries, had been cut when the snow was deep. Their weathered stumps thrust six feet or more above the green foliage that surrounded them, and Hans chose very carefully. He wanted only those stumps with a fine, closely knit grain, those which, even in death, showed no cracks or flaws. He found three of which he approved, and Ramsay and Pieter used a cross-cut saw to cut them off very close to the earth. Ramsay began to understand the project in Hans' mind.
Because of weather conditions, pound nets, at the very most, could be used for only about three to four months out of every year. The seine, though under no circumstances would Hans fish in the spawning season, could be dragged in until the bay froze. But gill nets could be used for seven or eight months if one had a proper boat, and Hans wanted to build one that would ride out any storm.
It was not to be an ordinary Mackinaw boat, but one such as Lake Michigan had never seen. Its oaken keel had been chosen with an eye to the heaviest seas and the ice that speckled those seas in spring or fall. Though some fishermen used cedar planking for the ribbing of their boats, and steamed it until it could be bent into the desired shape, Hans intended to cut his directly from cedar stumps that had already endured five hundred years and ten thousand storms. Then the Spray II would be sheathed with the best possible cedar planking and calked with the best obtainable oakum, or rope soaked in tar.
They would not float her this season. Neither effort nor expense were to be spared in the building of the Spray II, and constructing her properly would be a winter's job. But as soon as the ice broke next year she would be ready to float, and they would be ready to set their gill nets.
Ramsay grinned fleetingly as he tossed bushels of ground corn into the pond so that the numerous sturgeon he had imprisoned there would have enough to eat. It seemed so very long ago that he had thrown in with Hans and Pieter and decided to become a fisherman, and he still hadn't two silver dollars to jingle in his pocket. Not one day, scarcely one hour had been free of grueling labor. But they had two pound boats, three pound nets, had bought another seine, and with spring they would have the Spray II. In addition, there was enough of the season left, so that they should be able to catch plenty of fish before either ice or the spawning period curtailed operations. That would give them enough money to buy gill nets, as well as anything else they needed. None of the four partners would come out of this season with money in their pockets. They would own a sufficient amount of equipment for next year, and much of what they earned then would be profit.
That night Ramsay took the third watch. He rowed softly from one pound net to the other, always keeping in the shadows so that there was small danger of his being noticed. He had been out about an hour, and had two more to go, when he saw a boat approaching.
It came from the north, Three Points, and its row locks were so well greased that not the faintest sound came from them. The oarsman was expert; he dipped and raised his oars so that there was no splashing. Ramsay raised the shot gun. He leveled it.