The Purple Emperor, who was roaming
about the café, snooping into everything that did not concern him, came
upon the packages and examined the postmarks and addresses. One of the
packages was square and heavy, and felt like a book. The other was also
square, but very light, and felt like a pasteboard box. They were both
addressed to the Red Admiral, and they bore English stamps. When Roux, the postman, came back, the Purple Emperor tried to pump
him, but the poor little postman knew nothing about the contents of the
packages, and after he had taken them around the corner to the cottage
of the Red Admiral the Purple Emperor ordered a glass of cider, and
deliberately fuddled himself until Lys came in and tearfully supported
him to his room. Here he became so abusive and brutal that Lys called
to me, and I went and settled the trouble without wasting any words. This also the Purple Emperor remembered, and waited his chance to get
even with me. That had happened a week ago, and until to-day he had not deigned to
speak to me. Lys had posed for me all the week, and to-day being Saturday, and I
lazy, we had decided to take a little relaxation, she to visit and
gossip with her little black-eyed friend Yvette in the neighbouring
hamlet of St. Julien, and I to try the appetites of the Breton trout
with the contents of my American fly book. I had thrashed the stream very conscientiously for three hours, but not
a trout had risen to my cast, and I was piqued. I had begun to believe
that there were no trout in the St. Gildas stream, and would probably
have given up had I not seen the sea trout snap the little fly which
the Purple Emperor had named so scientifically. That set me thinking. Probably the Purple Emperor was right, for he certainly was an expert
in everything that crawled and wriggled in Brittany. So I matched,
from my American fly book, the fly that the sea trout had snapped up,
and withdrawing the cast of three, knotted a new leader to the silk
and slipped a fly on the loop. It was a queer fly. It was one of those
unnameable experiments which fascinate anglers in sporting stores and
which generally prove utterly useless. Moreover, it was a tailed fly,
but of course I easily remedied that with a stroke of my penknife. Then I was all ready, and I stepped out into the hurrying rapids and
cast straight as an arrow to the spot where the sea trout had risen. Lightly as a plume the fly settled on the bosom of the pool; then came
a startling splash, a gleam of silver, and the line tightened from the
vibrating rod-tip to the shrieking reel. Almost instantly I checked the
fish, and as he floundered for a moment, making the water boil along
his glittering sides, I sprang to the bank again, for I saw that the
fish was a heavy one and I should probably be in for a long run down
the stream. The five-ounce rod swept in a splendid circle, quivering
under the strain. "Oh, for a gaff-hook!" I cried aloud, for I was now
firmly convinced that I had a salmon to deal with, and no sea trout at
all. Then as I stood, bringing every ounce to bear on the sulking fish, a
lithe, slender girl came hurriedly along the opposite bank calling out
to me by name. "Why, Lys!" I said, glancing up for a second, "I thought you were at
St. Julien with Yvette." "Yvette has gone to Bannalec. I went home and found an awful fight
going on at the Groix Inn, and I was so frightened that I came to tell
you." The fish dashed off at that moment, carrying all the line my reel held,
and I was compelled to follow him at a jump. Lys, active and graceful
as a young deer, in spite of her Pont-Aven sabots, followed along the
opposite bank until the fish settled in a deep pool, shook the line
savagely once or twice, and then relapsed into the sulks. "Fight at the Groix Inn?" I called across the water. "What fight?" "Not exactly fight," quavered Lys, "but the Red Admiral has come out
of his house at last, and he and my uncle are drinking together and
disputing about butterflies. I never saw my uncle so angry, and the Red
Admiral is sneering and grinning. Oh, it is almost wicked to see such
a face!" "But Lys," I said, scarcely able to repress a smile, "your uncle and
the Red Admiral are always quarrelling and drinking." "I know--oh, dear me!--but this is different, Monsieur Darrel. The Red
Admiral has grown old and fierce since he shut himself up three weeks
ago, and--oh, dear! I never saw such a look in my uncle's eyes before. He seemed insane with fury. His eyes--I can't speak of it--and then
Terrec came in." "Oh," I said more gravely, "that was unfortunate. What did the Red
Admiral say to his son?" Lys sat down on a rock among the ferns, and gave me a mutinous glance
from her blue eyes. Yves Terrec, loafer, poacher, and son of Louis Jean Terrec, otherwise
the Red Admiral, had been kicked out by his father, and had also been
forbidden the village by the Purple Emperor, in his majestic capacity
of mayor. Twice the young ruffian had returned: once to rifle the
bedroom of the Purple Emperor--an unsuccessful enterprise--and another
time to rob his own father. He succeeded in the latter attempt, but was
never caught, although he was frequently seen roving about the forests
and moors with his gun. He openly menaced the Purple Emperor; vowed
that he would marry Lys in spite of all the gendarmes in Quimperlé;
and these same gendarmes he led many a long chase through brier-filled
swamps and over miles of yellow gorse. What he did to the Purple Emperor--what he intended to do--disquieted
me but little; but I worried over his threat concerning Lys. During
the last three months this had bothered me a great deal; for when Lys
came to St. Gildas from the convent the first thing she captured was my
heart. For a long time I had refused to believe that any tie of blood
linked this dainty blue-eyed creature with the Purple Emperor. Although
she dressed in the velvet-laced bodice and blue petticoat of Finistère,
and wore the bewitching white coiffe of St. Gildas, it seemed like a
pretty masquerade. To me she was as sweet and as gently bred as many a
maiden of the noble Faubourg who danced with her cousins at a Louis XV
fête champêtre. So when Lys said that Yves Terrec had returned openly
to St. Gildas, I felt that I had better be there also. "What did Terrec say, Lys?" I asked, watching the line vibrating above
the placid pool. The wild rose colour crept into her cheeks. "Oh," she answered, with a
little toss of her chin, "you know what he always says." "That he will carry you away?" "Yes." "In spite of the Purple Emperor, the Red Admiral, and the gendarmes?" "Yes." "And what do you say, Lys?" "I? Oh, nothing." "Then let me say it for you." Lys looked at her delicate pointed sabots, the sabots from Pont-Aven,
made to order. They fitted her little foot. They were her only luxury. "Will you let me answer for you, Lys?" I asked. "You, Monsieur Darrel?" "Yes. Will you let me give him his answer?"