“Well, I fished with the worms for a while but nothing happened and I began to get pretty well discouraged. I quit fishing and lay down on my stomach to get a drink out of one of the pools. The water was just as clear as crystal and just as I lay down I saw a big old trout shoot under a big rock at the bottom of the pool. That proved there were trout in there anyway.
“The rock where he disappeared was right beneath me and I picked up my line with the big worm still on the hook and let it down just as quietly as I could until it was right in front of the rock. Nothing happened for a long time and I thought the trout was gone, but all of a sudden I saw him again.”
“Were you holding the line in your hand?” inquired Grant.
“Yes; it was just like a drop line. The rod was lying in back of me on the ground and all I had done was to let out a lot of line. Well, the old trout sort of poked his nose out and took a look around. He went up to the worm and took a smell of it; at least that’s the way it looked. He didn’t bite it though and a second later he went whizzing back underneath the rock again. I thought he was gone for good but in a few seconds back he came; the worm seemed to attract him even if he didn’t try to eat it. He kept hanging around it all the time, sort of sniffing at it first one side and then the other.
“All of a sudden I had an idea.”
“Whew,” whistled Fred softly.
“I decided,” continued George paying no attention to the interruption, “that I’d try to pull the line up all of a sudden and hook him in the stomach. I didn’t see why such a thing wasn’t possible and I meant to try it the first chance I had. Old Mr. Trout still hung around the worm but it seemed as if he was never going to get right over the hook. Finally he started to swim away slowly and I thought it was all over. He only went a few feet though and then turned back. The worm seemed to fascinate him.
“He went right up to the hook and sort of looked it over again; then he turned his back on it so to speak, and kept perfectly still, just wiggling his fins. I lowered the hook a little and he never moved. I lowered it a little more and held it there. All at once he turned leisurely around and came right square over the hook. I yanked the line with all my might and there he is.”
George pointed proudly to the big trout lying at his feet.
“That’s a great way to fish for trout,” exclaimed Fred in disgust.