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The Maestro – by Phillip Caputo
David Wilson could be described as a bulky leprechaun. At five-eleven and about 190 pounds, his frame is that of an ex-running back who could use a few laps around the field. His square face topped by curly, ginger-brown hair and set off by pale, merry eyes, makes you think of an Irish bartender telling an off-color joke. To say that he loves to fish would be like saying that Julia Child loves to cook. No niggling purist, he can, and will fish for anything that swims with anything that casts a line and hook, but his greatest joy is orchestrating angling weekends for his friends. He’s caught enough fish in his life, from half-pound brook trout to giant Bluefin tuna, that catching them doesn’t thrill him half as much as watching other people catch them. Last August, he phoned my wife and me in Connecticut from his office in Miami where he works as a financial planner. He said he was going to flee the stifling South Florida summer for Montauk, where his family maintains a cottage and where he intended to spend a weekend in early September fishing for blues and stripers. A confirmed bachelor at thirty-nine, Wilson…