Next, he thoroughly shook up his “detonating mixture”, got out of the “bunker” and looked at the dinghy with a happy grin. The guy sashayed towards the SUV, walked round it casting amorous glances at this foreign monster. He glanced back and, seeing no unnecessary witnesses, with un– speakable pleasure, he started to plot a sweet water trail from an anthill located behind the mighty trunk of the “best tree on the glade” that cast a blissful shadow – the car was parked next to it exactly owing to Eugene’s exorbitant endeavors – towards the hateful “tractor”. Whistling a patriotic tune to himself, he threw some sweet water on the wheels and lower door chinks of the SUV with particular inspiration.
The guy regretted a single thing: there were no spectators of the scene who would appreciate at its true value the inventiveness and acting talent of the performer. Only a bird sitting on a top pine-tree branch with its head bent awry was curiously watching the fuss of a ground biped which was absolutely incomprehensible for its bird’s nature. Having emptied the entire bottle, “avenged Susanin” had a sigh of great relief and, as if being a devoted Green Peace member, started delightfully watching how the first scout ants were successfully overcoming the invisible distance he had drawn. Eugene’s mood turned apparently better. However, his crazy enthusiasm did not run out at that.
Having waited until the sun slightly warmed up the water, Eugene decided to indulge in underwater hunting and to catch at least one worthwhile fish. He glanced over the water expanse in search of a fish Klondike and rested his gaze on a boat drifting near the far bank and attracting him like a magnet. Vano was there for already half an hour with Victor who had offered himself to be Vano’s fishing mate. And suddenly Eugene’s advantageous mind was visited by his unfailing “muse” – a gorgeous mythical woman with an inexhaustible sense of humour as the guy visualized her.
Having unpacked a massive aqualung, sweating over its weight, Eugene carried it to rush bushes, making a small detour through a forest so as to remain unnoticed. And, at the very moment when the guy was enthusiastically putting on the aqualung, the rush bushes began rustling suspiciously. Stas’ crown came into view in the middle of the bushes. Eugene’s friend appeared at the most interesting point, as they say.
“Oh! And I’ve been thinking where you are! I saw you taking the aqualung and walking to the forest, as if you were going to dive. I decided to please myself with such an entertaining spectacle.”
“No way!” Eugene grinned. “Don’t you dare touching my bright idea with your dirty hands!”
Right before Stas’ appearance, Eugene was completing to invent his great maneuver on how to convince the men fishing nearby that not simple fish could be found in this place, but gigantic ones similar to sharks. He was enjoying himself with such idea of a true fishing commotion. Stas’ appearance didn’t make a part of Eugene’s strategic plan, for he had always believed: if two people came to know something, than even a pig could find it out. Yet, at the same time he was eager to impart his huge idea of a laughable enterprise with someone. And who else could size up such submarine performance, but Stas who'd always been an unintentional witness of Eugene’s lifelong adventures? In his turn, Stas was bored of their unsuccessful fishing. Thus, when Eugene expounded his idea to him, his friend not simply supported it, but expressed his eagerness to participate in Eugene’s underwater adventure, having added the initial plan with some new refined details. Stas brought his aqualung to the departure point, i.e. to the rush bushes, put on the equipment and submerged simultaneously with Eugene, believing they both remained unnoticed by their half-asleep fishing companions.
The couple swam under Vano’s inflatable boat at the depth. At that moment, Victor was sitting at the stern with a fishing-rod in his hands. Fish was not biting at all, and it seemed like it even didn’t approach the fat worm which Victor had dug out in his grandmother’s kitchen garden the day before. Victor strenuously fought sleepiness, trying to focus his eyesight on a steadily wavering float. However, his pupils were further turning towards his bridge, and his eyes were closing all by themselves, temptingly replacing the monotonous river view with a sweet, untroubled dream. Only thanks to his incredible will effort, his vigilant conscience and the awareness of his fisherman’s duty, Victor periodically managed to unfasten his lead-like eyelids.
Vano was sitting at the other side of the boat with a spinning rod. His fishing was much more vigorous. He continuously dropped out his minnow into the water, now here, now there, not losing hope to catch at least something. It seemed like this man was not even familiar with “tiredness”, “sleepiness”, “dejections” notions. While Vano was recurrently winding the fishing-line round the spinning bobbin, his glance roved over the water surface not far from the boat. Then he looked askance at dormant Victor, archly smiled and providently moved aside from the boar edge. He quickly reeled the fishing-line on and began to replace the minnow with enthusiasm, as if nothing had happened.
At that very moment, “the saboteurs” were already straight at the planned whereabouts. Eugene carefully swam up to the worm inertly twitching on Victor’s rod and strongly pulled the fishing-line. Slumberous Victor nearly flopped into the water from surprise, having clutched at the rod instinctively. An excessive dose of adrenalin burst into his blood, like a sudden hurricane, and agitated sundry dust-forming “trash” in his human brain “garret”, namely some archaic hunting instincts. Victor’s eyes turned round in a flash, and he excitedly called out to Vano, having completely forgotten that “fish preferred silence”:
“I got it! I caught it, I caught it!”
The fishing-line tightly stretched, having bent the rod into a steep arc, and started to spin. Not believing his fishing luck, Victor persistently endeavored to pull it.
“Wow! What a fish! It’s probably a huge pike!” he kept saying boastfully, concentrating his delighted gaze on the muddy water depth.
Vano imitated sheer elation for his companion on his face and began helping him fussily with advices how to drag out the huge fish. Fishing passion was flaring up “on board”.
“Look, look how strongly it’s conducting!” the “happy fisherman” was bragging about, dizzy with his unprecedented luck. Victor even half-rose in agitation. “Give me the net, I’ll lead it closer now!”
At that moment, the fishing-line sharply stretched towards the middle of the river, and a mighty blow at the boat bilge immediately followed. Because of such an unexpected tremor, Victor, being busy with his “huge pike” chase, failed to keep the balance and fell overboard. The instinct of self-preservation in the face of such river monsters prevailed over the fishing instinct. Having dropped the rod, Victor started getting back into the boat at an unbelievable speed and, being panic-stricken, nearly overturned it together with Vano. If it were not Father John’s timely assistance, nobody knew how everything would eventually end.
“Wow! Wow!” Victor repeated like saying a prayer, with his teeth chattering either of cool water or of fear. “Have you seen this? It’s given such a blow! It’s probably this big, not less…”
Along with these words, his fishing “disease” further expanded.
“Yeah, looks like an old cat-fish,” Vano nodded, diligently expressing an awakened interest of an amateur fisherman.
“A cat-fish?! Wow! Yet, have you really seen it?! There is a whole shoal of them here! It’s dragged such a rod away, skunk!”
“Well, this cat-fish weighs something around sixty kilos,” the fishing-mate stirred up the passion and started plying the oars. “My spinning rod definitely won’t help us to cope with them.”
“Yeah,” Victor agreed, secretly being happy that their boat was rapidly moving away from the place of his recent “joy” which had ended with a total horror for him. “We need a stronger fishing-line, and bigger hooks…”
Evidently,
