A hundred yards further along we came upon a large fir tree that had fallen across the trail. It was too high to climb over and it looked like a nasty bushwhack to go around. John was in the lead and had enough bushwhacking for one day so he decided he would crawl under it. He handed Phil the leash with Buddy seemingly under control at the end of it and happily wagging his tail. 

John grumbled again as he got down on his knees. This time he held onto his fly rod pointing it backwards which would have kept it out of harms way had it not been for you know who, seemingly under control at the end of his leash, and right behind John. John began to crawl and worm his way under the tree. As he did this the tip of his fly rod wiggled enticingly right in front of Buddy’s nose. It was too much for Buddy! Buddy nipped at it the same way he liked to nip at caddis and mayflies flying in the air. Before any of us realized what was happening everyone but John heard the sickening snap of graphite. Buddy bit the tip off John’s fly rod! Phil, Rodger and I stood there in stunned amazement looking at Buddy as he proceeded in his inimitable way to run amok all over another fishing trip. 

With a grunt and a sigh John got up off the ground again, now sweating more than ever.  He looked at Phil and asked him to toss over Buddy’s leash. Phil tossed the leash and Buddy scampered under the tree and sidled right up to John as if everything in Fidoland was just hunky-dory. Rodger restrained himself from any comment by self medicating with nicotine. Phil held his fly rod close by his side protecting it. I was feeling lucky and somewhat smug that my rod was still in one piece. John gave us a puzzled look and then asked, “Hey guys, what’s up?” Rodger gave Buddy the evil eye before pointing to the tip of John’s fly rod. John looked up. We watched his face screwed up and Buddy beside him sitting on his haunches gingerly wagging his tongue and patting the ground with his tail. 

John declined to say anything; he just stood there looking exasperated and as stunned as we were. Then he got down on his knees for a third time and began to make his way back to the Trooper for a spare rod. We heard him mumble something about Sage having a good warranty as we watched him and Buddy disappear around a bend in the trail. I had to wonder if there was an organization as passionate as PETA that protected people from our furry friends.    

At last, Rodger, Phil and I arrived at the river. The trail led to a nice run that usually held a few good fish. Phil and I let Rodger have a go at the water first, figuring a fish would calm his nerves. Rodger turned to look at us and said, “If he comes back down here with that mutt I’m gonna kill it!” Rodger wasn’t feeling so easy going now. He put out his cigarette and stuffed the butt in one of the pockets of his vest, then unhitched an egg pattern from his hook keeper. 

Rodger looked the water over carefully and spotted a flash of silver. “There’s a fish,” he said excitedly, “I’ll get it.” And then just as Rodger was about to lobe his rig into the air Buddy came ripping out of the bush and made a beeline for the exact spot Rodger was aiming for. Buddy hit the water at mach speed throwing Rodgers cast all to hell. John wasn’t far behind Buddy and just in time to dash into the river and pull Buddy back from certain death. Rodger just about burst into flames his red hair all wild and crazy and bellowed out, “Tie that bloody mutt to a goddamn tree for Chrissakes!” 

It was time for a streamside Pow Wow. John finally got Buddy under control and on his leash again and tied to a tree. He reached into his pocket to get a doggie biscuit. Before giving it to Buddy he looked at the three of us standing by the river. We gave him the evil eye and shook our heads in disapproval. Reluctantly John dropped the biscuit back into his pocket. Buddy began to whimper and whine.    

The Pow Wow was short and sweet. Rodger lit up another cigarette. He looked at Buddy and then squarely at John and said, “You guys still haven’t got your sh!t together. I’m not into another Thompson River fiasco.” Rodgers words had a sobering affect upon John as he recalled that time on the Thompson. It was doubtful he or Buddy would ever get within a half mile of the river again during steelhead season. “Ok,” John reasoned. Buddy would stay on the leash.   

With the situation now under control it was high time for a drink. Phil pulled a flask out from his vest and said, “Here’s to good times.” After passing it around things lightened up. And then just as we were about to start fishing another squirrel up in the tree John had tied Buddy to began to chatter and razz Buddy down at the base of it. Buddy went ballistic! 

He ripped up and down the base of the tree and each time he did it his leash would violently jerk him back down to the ground. By his forth attempt to climb the tree the leash snapped. The squirrel ran out the entire length of a low branch and made a swan dive for the bushes. Buddy took off after the squirrel with John once again in hot pursuit after Buddy. Rodger looked at Phil and me and shook his head in defeat. All the scotch in the world couldn’t help.   

John spent what little there was left of the first afternoon of our fishing trip chasing Buddy while Rodger, Phil and I got some fishing in. Phil managed to hook and land a couple of nice rainbows and one big mother of a whitefish. I missed a few takes probably on account of being apprehensive about what the rest of our fishing trip might be like. Rodger grumbled something about being wound up too tight to execute a decent drift and didn’t catch anything either. And so went the first day of our annual Adams River fishing trip.  

That night we took rooms in the near by town of Chase. The only motel that would have anything to do with Buddy was right across the from the train tracks. Trains went by all night long and every time Buddy heard one he went into a barking fit. By the time we woke up early the next morning we were all bagged. Buddy appeared to be unfazed by a sleepless night.  

In spite of the crappy night, Phil and I were keen to get to the river by first light. Rodger insisted he and John stop at the local coffee and donut shop for a caffeine and sugar hit first. Phil and I would meet up with them at the river mouth. As we were leaving the motel I had doubts John and Buddy would ever be welcome back. While driving to the river Phil said, “I think Rodger’s going to need more than coffee, sugar and cigarettes to make it through another day with Buddy.”  

Phil and I arrived at the Haig-Brown parking lot at daybreak. The air was chilly and a veil of mist hung above the ground. Hoar frost muted brilliant fall colors. The first streaks of daylight cast horizontal beams of light across pink flat bottomed clouds. Phil and I hiked to the mouth of the river. Dead sockeye salmon in fleshy shades of color and covered in frost littered a surreal shore line. Here and there carcasses were stacked into neat piles; the heads appeared to have been cleanly cut off of them. The Adams River flowed by. A pair of bald eagles made a huge spiraling circle overhead. Upstream on the other side of the river a bear walked out of the water with a struggling salmon in its mouth. Life and death were inextricably linked together. And as we watched dawn on the river unfold time seemed to stop. Sleeplessness and all of Buddy’s antics from the day before seemed trivial. A new day was beginning.  

After fishing for an hour or so we began to wonder why John and Rodger were taking so long to show up. By ten o’clock the fish at the river mouth stopped biting our egg patterns. Our toes were numb from the cold water and our bellies were growling for food. We decided to head back to the parking lot hoping we would bump into Buddy with John and Rodger in tow. 

Our friends were not to be seen. The only truck in the parking lot was Phil’s. Phil and I looked at one another apprehensively, neither of us wanting to consider any notion that Buddy might have had something to do with the guys not showing up. On the way back to Chase we kept our eyes peeled for John’s Trooper.  

We decided to go back to the motel on the off chance John and Rodger might still be there. It was worrisome when we pulled up and didn’t see the Trooper parked in front of John and Rodgers room. Phil thought we should check in with the manager to see if there might be a message. 

The manager looked tired and pissed off. Evidently he hadn’t slept either. He gave us a message scribbled on a piece of paper and in an offhanded way said he hoped our friends weren’t planning on coming back for another night. We apologized for Buddy’s all night barking fits. On our way out of the motel office we heard the manager mumble something about vehicle trouble. Outside we read the message. All it said was: At auto garage in town. We jumped back into the truck to find the garage.  

Not far from the center of town we pulled up to a grimy looking building with a tow truck parked in front of it. A mechanic in dirty blue coveralls was outside changing a tire on a car. I rolled down the window and waved for his attention. He looked at us cautiously before standing up. I asked if a couple of guys and a dog in an Isuzu Trooper had been there. At the mention of Trooper and dog the mechanics face screwed up. His only response was to look down at a torn leg of his coveralls. Phil and I looked at one another neither of us wanting to think what we were thinking. We headed back to the river to look for John and Rodger.   

Parked in the bush off the side of the road a quarter mile or so from the river we spotted a vehicle that looked just like John’s Trooper. Phil stopped the truck and turned around. As we closed in to see if it was John and Rodger we were flabbergasted.  

John’s wooden pram was no longer on the roof and one side of the Trooper was all scraped up and the roof partially caved in. The front windows were rolled down. Rodger was drinking from a half crushed can of Budweiser in the passenger seat, fiendishly smoking a cigarette and blowing smoke out the window. John was in the driver’s seat staring straight ahead and looking shell shocked. All their gear was in a tangled heap in the back of the Trooper and on top of it was Buddy all perky and wagging his tail. 

Phil and I stood there quietly taking in the whole scene, and just about as we were to ask what happened John cut in and in a half daze said, “I don’t want to talk about it now. I just want to go fishing.” 

Rodger mumbled something under his breath about the bloody mutt, hot coffee, and a box of donuts on the gear shift console between the front seats. He restrained himself from saying anything more which was probably good because he looked like a nuclear reactor about to reach critical mass and explode. Phil and I got back in the truck and headed for the river with John and Rodger not far behind in the Trooper.  

Once again we were all back in the Haig-Brown parking lot. John got out of the Trooper and stepped back to look at it. It was truly a miracle it still ran and John and Rodger and Buddy were ok. There were streaks of blue paint on the roof where John’s wooden pram had been. He just stood there painfully looking at it and then he said, “I gotta do something about that dog.” Buddy was in the Trooper wagging his tail. 

John was ready to tell us what had happened. Rodger was still in damage control, chain smoking and edgy. John said it was the pram that saved them. It absorbed the impact and blew apart when the Trooper flipped over onto its roof and into the ditch at the side of the highway not far outside of Chase. It was Buddy who caused the accident. He could not resist the temptation to lunge from the back of the Trooper into a box of fresh warm donuts John and Rodger had placed on the gear shift console shortly after they left the coffee and donut shop. And in his inimitable way Buddy managed to hit the gear shift leaver and jam the Trooper’s automatic transmission into reverse just as they hit a patch of black ice on the highway at 70 km an hour.