THE MAN IN GRAY 



BY FRANK H. MELOON. 



"It isn't necessary for me to tell you," limbs of the spruces were so thick that 



remarked the man in the smoker to the we had to walk ten or fifteen feet apart 



rest of us who were listening to his con- to keep .them from snapping back into 



versation, "just how I happened to be our faces. 



fishing for trout in New Hampshire "On cur way we started up all sorts 



during the closed season. It just of game, and more than once wished we 



chanced that - we wanted trout, would had brought guns along with us. Rab- 



be satisfied with nothing else, and so bits ran across our path, foxes stood 



determined that we would have them." still at not many paces to peer in our 



At this, a clean-shaven man in gray direction, and even partridges scorned 



clothes looked over the top of his pa- to take flight but ran along the ground 



per a moment, but resumed his reading just out of striking distance. A soli- 



again as if the subject was of no inter- tary hen hawk, whose wings looked as 



est to him. if they might measure seven feet from 



"There is, in fact," continued the tip to top, circled in the sky above us, 

 speaker, "no other really edible fish ob- evidently watching our movements from 

 tainable in the vicinity of Monadnock a distance which would have been safe 

 mountain — the Great Monadnock, as it even if we had a couple of mounted 

 is sometimes called by the locality books rifles from the Krupps' gun works. 

 — for Cheshire county, which lies in the "At a long distance from us were 

 southwestern corner of the state, though several flocks of crows which we could 

 abounding in lakes and ponds, does not see making merry with unguarded corn- 

 furnish any great amount of good fish- fields, for the corn was ripe on the ear 

 ing. and the black rascals found it mighty 



"In the particular trout pond which good eating if we could judge by their 



we sought one afternoon late last fall actions. I remember one funny old fel- 



there is a species said to be obtainable low that I could just make out perched 



nowhere else in the world, but not on on a scarecrow and evidently a sort of 



that account tasting any different to the sentinel for the rest of the flock, 



palate. The pond is situated on a sort "We reached the side of the pond 



of tableland which is really a part of safely enough without breaking any of 



the mountain, and its bed is, we are our equipment, and lucky we were, too. 



told, the crater of an extinct volcano. We fished for a couple of hours and 



Geologists get queer notions sometimes, then, the sun being very nearly down, 



and I guess the idea of a volcano in we inspected our creels, found we had a 



New Hampshire is one of them. good catch, unjointed our rods and 



"We had some difficult climbs in get- started for the Llewellyn House, Dub- 

 ting to that pond and my two compan- lin, where we were stopping, 

 ions, Ned Seavey, a young fellow then "When about a quarter of a mile 

 fitting for the law at Dartmouth, and from the pond, Bob Jenkins stopped 

 Bob Jenki ~, the rosy-cheeked guide, a suddenly and called the attention of 

 strapping iellow of twenty or there- Ned and me to a flock of crows that 

 abouts, had as much difficulty as I, for was following along the verv way we 

 I am considered agile. At one place had come from the hotel. 'What of it?' 

 we came to I remember there were I asked. 'Fish wardens,' answered Bob 

 steps cut in the rock and we had laconically. 'How do you know ?' asked 

 to use both feet and hands to strug- Ned. 'They've been hanging 'round 

 gle up them. In other places the lower for two or three days/ was the answer, 



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