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Page:Caine - An Angler at Large (1911).djvu/229

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OF TWO MISCREANTS
211

cigarette, which was accepted with the air of conferring a favour, and drew him out upon his hateful amusements.

His collection of butterflies was practically complete, it appeared. No, he had only been at it five years, but this part of the country was exceptionally rich in lepidoptera. He was quite modest about his success. The wife—as you might say, the cook—she was at his elbow, but he spoke of her as if she were in the other hemisphere—had helped him. As he spoke I became aware that the said wife was moving anxiously about in front of me, net in hand, and, following the direction of her eagle gaze, which darted hither and thither from one side to the other of my own head, I perceived a dusky shape, a moth, that fluttered against the sky. The lust of capture shone in the woman's eye. Her mouth was tense with its suppression, for she knew that the usages of polite society forbid the moth-netting of unknown men. Yet the prospect of the insect escaping was agonising to her. I courteously moved aside. The net swooped. She retired in the direction of the death-bottle.

Yes, the wife was very keen, very keen. She had, that evening, taken—taken, not caught, is the word—emarginata. It was she who last summer discovered the Marbled Whites in a