Short Stories
act with all the evidence of the crime about him - the hooks,
the lines, the fish, and the man himself. This meant that we
must take Big Alec on the open water, where he could see us
coming and prepare for us one of the warm receptions for
which he was noted.
"There's no getting around it," Charley said one morning.
"If we can only get alongside it's an even toss, and there's
nothing left for us but to try and get alongside. Come on, lad."
We were in the Columbia River salmon boat, the one we
had used against the Chinese shrimp-catchers. Slack water
had come, and as we dropped around the end of the Solano
Wharf we saw Big Alec at work, running his line and remov-
ing the fish.
"Change places," Charley commanded, "and steer just
astern of him as though you're going into the shipyard."
I took the tiller, and Charley sat down on a thwart amid-
ships, placing his revolver handily beside him.
"If he begins to shoot," he cautioned, "get down in the
bottom and steer from there, so that nothing more than your
hand will be exposed."
I nodded, and we kept silent after that, the boat slipping gen-
tly through the water and Big Alec growing nearer and nearer.
We could see him quite plainly, gaffing the sturgeon and throw-
ing them into the boat while his companion ran the line and
cleared the hooks as he dropped them back into the water. Nev-
ertheless, we were five hundred yards away when the big fisher-
man hailed us.
"Here! You! What do you want?" he shouted.
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