by Mavis Jukes
“Now we need the eggs,” said Austin.
His grandmother picked up the jar. She unscrewed the cap and wrinkled her nose. She rolled two sticky eggs over the rim of the jar and into the lid and handed the lid to Austin.
She set the jar back on the rock, but it tipped and clattered down the side of the boulder. The eggs spilled out onto the sand like a broken strand of beads. They got down on their hands and knees to pick them up.
“There,” said Austin's grandmother when the eggs were back in the jar. “Now how do we put them on the line? Aren't we supposed to have a float?”
“We tie on an egg hook and bite on some sinkers,” Austin told her. He stood up and took two pine needles out of her hair. He patted her back. Then he searched the fishing vest again.
“Bad news,” Austin reported after peering into a tiny empty plastic box. “We're out of egg hooks. But look!” He opened a silver tin and showed it to his grandmother. “Flies!”
They stared at the colored fishing flies.
“Flies that Grandpa tied,” said Austin. “Do you think we could fly-fish?”
“I don't see why not,” said Austin's grandmother.
chapter 5
Austin and his grandmother sat down beside each other on the damp ground, examining the fly box. There were rows of black hooks with wings of fuzz and feathers, all wrapped with shiny thread. “Look how little they are. Look how he wound the thread,” said Austin.
“I always said Grandpa would have made a good seamstress,” said Austin's grandmother. She took the tin box and selected a fly with an iridescent body and black wings. “Let's try this one.” She dropped it lightly into Austin's hand.
“Thread it through, like threading a needle,” she suggested to Austin. “Then we'll figure out a knot.”
“I'm not good at threading needles,” said Austin.
“I'll supervise,” she told him. “Give it a whirl.”
Austin folded back the brim of the baseball cap. He moved his tongue to the corner of his mouth and bit it softly. He shut one eye. He held the leader and the fly close to the end of his nose.
“Don't bite your tongue off,” said Austin's grandmother.
Austin smiled.
He kept concentrating on the eye of the hook. “Did it!” he whispered a moment later. “Now, you tie the knot!”
Austin's grandmother carefully took the fly from Austin and pinched it between two fingers and then tipped her head back so she could see through the bottom of her glasses. She fed the leader farther through the eye of the hook and twirled it a few times and wound it around and through.
“A crochet knot,” she announced after she had tightened it. “Modified. But no telling how it will hold in plastic. Give it a go!”
Holding the fly in one hand and the rod in the other, Austin walked to the edge of the water. He let the fly drift downstream, letting out line. Then he reeled it in. “I don't think this is how you do it,” he said. He let it float down, again and again.
“It's beginning to get dark,” said Austin's grandmother. “And I've chicken to fry—and a pie to bake!”
Austin looked over at his grandmother. “Let's stay and fish,” he said. “The flashlight works. And we can just eat blackberries for supper.”
“Good idea,” said his grandmother. “Blackberries in the dark! It's a family tradition.” She popped two blackberries into her mouth. “Heck with the pie,” she told him. “We'll bake together another time.” She ate blackberries, one after another, while Austin stood in the stream fishing.
She waded into the stream with a handful of berries for Austin.
“Thanks,” said Austin. “Your turn.” He traded the rod for the blackberries. “But wait! The fly is caught.” He waded downstream and pulled the line free of some willows.
His grandmother began to reel it in, with a leaf attached.
As she was reeling, the leaf disappeared under the water. “This is harder than it looks,” she told Austin. He was reaching for a cluster of berries.
The line grew tight.
“It's caught on the bottom,” she said.
He turned around.
“It's caught on something.” She stepped forward into the stream. The line got suddenly loose. “Never mind,” she told Austin.
The tip of the fishing rod began to bend as she reeled again. “Well, hell's bells!” said Austin's grandmother. “I think we've got a fish!”
A trout was thrashing in the water a few feet ahead of her.
“Keep the tip up!” cried Austin. “Keep reeling and keep the tip up!”
“Help!” said Austin's grandmother. “Where's the net?”
“No net!” cried Austin. “Just pull the fish out of the water!”
“Pull it out? You pull it out!”
They both lifted the rod. The fish splashed out of the water, arching wildly in the air, on the end of the line.
They swung it onto the bank.
It flipped over and over in the sand and in the moss, slapping its body against the ground. Finally Austin grabbed it. “Get the hook out of its jaw!”
Austin watched it gulp air with its pink gills while his grandmother worked to unset the hook. “It's a brook trout,” she told him. “What a beauty! See the blue spots? See the red centers?” She pushed the barb backward through the trout's bottom lip. “Ouch!” she said, for the fish. “Now what?”
“Let's throw it back,” said Austin. “Okay? It's good luck to throw back the first fish of the season. Grandpa said.”
“Good idea,” said Austin's grandmother. “Let's let it go.”
Austin knelt down at the edge of Two Rock Creek. With both of his hands in the water, he gently released the trout into the stream. It darted away into the shadows.
He stood up and dried his hands on the back of his jeans. He looked at his grandmother. “Grandpa would like us doing this—wouldn't-he,” said Austin. “He would be happy we're learning to fly-fish at Two Rock Creek.”
“Yes,” said Austin's grandmother. “And tomorrow well learn how to drive the tractor.” Austins eyes grew wider. “You think we can't start that tractor?”
“I think we can start the tractor,” said Austin. “And I think we can mow the grass around the barn.”
“And we can fly-fish, so Saturday we're going with Wayne,” said Austin's grandmother. She put everything back into the fishing-vest pockets and handed the vest to Austin. “Here. You put this on.”
She helped Austin into the vest. Then she picked up the creel and the fishing rod.
chapter 6
Austin followed his grandmother up the stream bank. “I skidded down this on the way over,” she huffed. “Rump over teakettle!” She offered her hand to Austin and they helped each other over the top. They threaded their way through the woods between black oaks and pines.
Austin walked beside his grandmother as they crossed the fields to the ranch. Her boots squeaked and thumped.
When they reached the house, Austin's grandmother flopped into the wicker chair on the porch. “I set something in the corner cupboard for you, Austin,” she said. “It belonged to someone special for many years. It's really not something for a boy to have—but still and all, I want it to be yours. Go and find it!”
Okay,” said Austin.
“But promise me you'll handle it carefully— it's not something to play with.”
“I promise,” said Austin.
He went into the house and turned on the kitchen light. He took off the fishing rest and the Yankees cap and hung them on the doorknob. He turned on the living room light and opened the corner cupboard. He saw teacups and saucers. He saw his grandfather's fishing knife sitting on the edge of the shelf.
“Can you reach it?” called his grandmother from the porch.
“Yup,” said Austin.
For a long while the house was quiet. Austin's grandmother sat on the porch in the dark. Then she opened the screen door and clumped into the kitchen. She took off the rubber boots and sto
od them up on the linoleum near the fishing vest and thè baseball cap. She set the creel on the counter.
Then, in her stocking feet, Austin's grandmother walked through the kitchen into the living room. She glanced over at the corner cupboard. The fishing knife was still on the shelf.
“Austin?”
“In here,” said Austin.
He was sitting on the edge of the bed. Beside him was the saucer of beads. He had threaded a needle and was knotting the thread. Leaning against the cowboy pillow case was the antique doll. The brim of her bonnet was turned back. She was watching Austin, with blue glass eyes.
“She's supervising,” said Austin.
His grandmother stood there, with her hands in her sweater pockets, staring at the antique doll. “So I see.”
Austin looked up. “Thank you,” he told her.
His grandmother smiled. “Well! I'm glad you found each other.”
She sat next to Austin on the bed and carefully took the needle from him. She set it on the saucer, among the coral beads.
“And Austin—”
She picked up Austin's hand and pressed the pocketknife into his palm, and closed his fingers around it.
“This is yours, too.”
Also by Mavis Jukes
Like Jake and Me
A Newbery Honor Book
A School Library Journal Best Book
An ALA Notable Book
Alex doesn't think he has very much in common with his stepfather. Jake is like the cowboys in the movies, with dirt-covered boots, a Stetson hat, and an eagle tattoo on his chest-He's strong and brave and doesn't seem to be afraid of any thing. Alex is a lot different. He dances around the tree in the yard and can spin in midair-He wants to help Jake with the chores, but sometimes he gets in the way-And he certainly doesn't feel as brave as Jake—he's even too scared to pull out his loose front tooth.
But when a giant, furry wolf spider crawls onto his stepfather's neck, Alex discovers something surprising about himself and about Jake: they may actually be more alike than he thought.
From award-winning author Mavis Jukes comes a funny and heartwarming exchange between a boy and his stepfather as they realize their similarities and celebrate their differences.
“A story of a child coming to terms with a stepparent, written with humor and insight. … An upbeat, sensible book.”
—The New York Times
He called it home. …
THE MOST BEAUTIFUL PLACE IN THE WORLD
by Ann Cameron
Winner of the Child Study Association
Children's Book Award
Imagine a place in the mountains on the shores of a blue lake, surrounded by spectacularvolcarioes, bright green fields, and flocks of colorful wild par-rots. This is San Pablo, Guatemala, and it is young Juan's home.
But although Juan's homeland is beautiful, his life is not. His mother has abandoned him, and his grandmother makes him work hard shining shoes to earn his keep. More than anything, Juan longs to go to school and learn to read. How can he make his grandmother understand his dream?
“Genuine and touching.” —The New Yorker
Published by Yearling, an imprint of Random House Children's Books
a division of Random House, Inc., New York
Text copyright © 1985 by Mavis Jukes
Illustrations copyright © 1985 by Thomas B. Allen
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any
form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording,
or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission
of the publisher, except where permitted by law. For information address
Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers.
Visit us on the Web! www.randomhouse.com/kids
Educators and librarians, for a variety of teaching tools, visit us at
www.randomhouse.com/teachers
eISBN: 978-0-307-55471-0
Reprinted by arrangement with Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers
June 2001
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