“Landed my trout Scarlet Ibis top of the heap glory be won every blamed thing sure am grateful to you and high mucky-mucks kindly pass on thanks and accept most.
J. C. Vance.”
There was a momentary astonishment on the face of Conway Fitzhugh as he stared over the yellow paper at Bradlee; the varied expressions of surprise on the dozen faces of the other men were a psychological assortment; Fitzhugh suddenly arrived with a jostle of quick laughter.
“Oh—that boy!” he said, and handed the telegram back across the table. “That delightful boy—I’m glad he won his case. Give him my congratulations.”
“A youngster—a friend of mine—and of Fitzhugh’s—” Bradlee explained vaguely to no one in particular, but the smile and the look of clean pleasure were still there, and every one felt at once as if a draught of sweet air had found its way into the room and had refreshed them.
“Now, gentlemen,” said W. R. H. Bradlee, “as I was saying—”
THE CAMPAIGN TROUT
THE CAMPAIGN TROUT
Josef and I were lifting our canoe into Lac Lumière from the Dammed Little River when we saw paddles flash up the lake. The “garçons,” Blanc and Zoëtique, the brace of younger guides, had been out to the club for mail; as that happened only once in ten days we hustled.
I ought to mention that the Dammed Little River is not so named entirely for love of blasphemy, but because it is little and is dammed—it was over that dam that we lifted the canoe. I’ll grant you, however, that it may add a tang to the harmless stream to call it by the fierce name, and also it makes you feel pleasantly like a perfect devil to swear that way without sin. Anyhow that’s where we were that September afternoon, Josef and I, just back from a two days’ hunting-trip to Lac Sauvage country. I’d missed a moose, and I knew I was going to get jeered when I got back to camp and told my brother Walter, who never leaves much to reproach himself with when there’s an opening for jeerings. But I might as well face the music; and besides, there was the first mail for ten days a mile ahead between two glints of sunlight coming and going—the paddles. So we hustled, as aforesaid.