SAUL

12:26 

Collin sipped the tea and tightened his grip on the branch. 
"Are you ok there Collin,” Russell said from above him. "You could climb higher up next to me, there’s plenty of room.” 
"No, this is fine, this is high enough. I can see the hole in the weed that you were talking about and the shallows by the island look interesting.” He gestured with his cup toward the island. The branch that he was standing on swayed; he tightened his grip a little more. 
"You can forget the island until dusk,” Russell said. “Keep to the deeper water or on the top.” 
As if on cue a large mirror broke the surface, turned over in a slow fat lazy way and disappeared into the depths. 
"Nice,” Collin said. "How about you Russ, where are you setting up?" 
Looking up he realised that Russell had gone. He looked down and Russell was on the ground looking back with a smile. Collin made a clumsy decent to join him, Russell had started to assemble his rod. Collin took a second look, for some reason he had been expecting something a bit more Chris Yates, maybe an old split cane rod and centre pin reel. Far from it, the rod was a beautiful Greys X-Flite coupled with a Shimano 10,000. Collin watched Russell tie a small barb-less hook to the line and that seemed to be it. Collin walked to his own rods on their pod, baited and ready to cast. 
"I will have to find that hole with the marker rod.” 
Russell walked to the edge of the water and picked up a small stone, after a moments thought he tossed the stone in. 
"There you go Cole’ just there.” 
Collin was going to ask if Russell was sure, but thought better of it. He dutifully dropped his left rod on to the spot, sank the line and set the indicator. 
"Where do you think the other one should go?" 
Russell had disappeared again. 

Fifty meters down the bank Russell was up to his waist in warm water on the edge of some light reeds. He was sitting on a sunken tree trunk waiting. A light mesh net draped over him concealed his outline, his rod held up in the air, like a crafty gnome he waited. Russell watched a single grain of maize nicked on to the hook as it swung gently a few inches from the water's surface. He listened to a crash in the reeds behind him which made him do nothing, the reeds a few feet away from him were disturbed from beneath, Russell did nothing. A mirror of some considerable size rolled directly in front of him, less than six feet away. Nothing: he waited and listened. Ten minutes later a crash in the reeds behind him made him gently lower the rod so that the maize was touching the water. He noticed the reeds move next to him, he released the bail arm. The maize sank slowly into the water. He closed the arm as soon as he saw the loose line start to pull away. A millisecond later the rod tip ripped down with massive force. 

Collin relaxed in the chair, rods out bivvy set, time for a beer. He pulled a can from the cool box. There had been a crashing sound from down the bank a short while ago, in a petty way he hoped that it was Russell falling in. More realistically, he thought that Russell would come back with a twenty pounder under each arm, having caught them using only his hat. 

Twenty five minutes later a voice behind him made him jump. 
"I just had a super mirror down by the stream.” 
He turned round slowly trying not to look surprised, Russell was crouching next to his chair holding out an expensive digital camera. Collin wiped some spilt beer from his chin and then looked at the display screen. It was indeed a fantastic fish, fully scaled, rich in colour. 
"Beautiful,” he said. "What's it weigh?” 
"Twenty four.” 
"Lovely, are they all like this in here?" 
"Judging by the shape and colour it is one of the original strains. I doubt that it has ever been restocked. It's a very old lake I was catching carp over twenty when I was in my teens. I have records of fish looking exactly...” 
Russell tapped Collin lightly on the knee and pointed at the tip of Collin's left rod. They watched the tip tremble in an odd fashion. The tip tore violently round to the left the indicator slamming to the top, the buzzer screaming a continuous tone. Collin was on it. Russell laughed as he watched the beer can roll down the bank after Collin. The buzzer stopped and Collin was into the fish. 
"Hole in the weed, pva bag,” he glanced briefly back to Russell smiling. "Thanks Russ, this feels big.” 
The fish was pulling slow and heavy in the deep water. Russell was next to Collin now telling him to avoid a potential snag. Collin took more control and steered the fish back toward him. After ten heart pounding minutes he had it in front of him and allowed Russell to land it. The fish only weighed fifteen pounds, stunning to look at, slim and fit, but only fifteen pounds. Collin would have sworn that the carp had fought like a mid twenty. He released the mirror with a bit more respect than when he hooked it. If that was only a fifteen what did a twenty four fight like? He had a little more respect for Russell.