The Moon Endureth | Page 8

defection of his American possessions?"
"The nation takes it well enough, and as for his Majesty's feelings,
there is small inclination to inquire into them. I conceive of the whole
war as a blunder out of which we have come as we deserved. The day
is gone by for the assertion of monarchic rights against the will of a
people."
"May be. But take note that the King of England is suffering to-day
as--how do you call him?--the Chevalier suffered forty years ago. 'The
wheel has come full circle,' as your Shakespeare says. Time has
wrought his revenge."
He was staring into a fire, which burned small and smokily.
"You think the day for kings is ended. I read it differently. The world
will ever have need of kings. If a nation cast out one it will have to find
another. And mark you, those later kings, created by the people, will
bear a harsher hand than the old race who ruled as of right. Some day
the world will regret having destroyed the kindly and legitimate line of
monarchs and put in their place tyrants who govern by the sword or by
flattering an idle mob.
This belated dogma would at other times have set me laughing, but the
strange figure before me gave no impulse to merriment. I glanced at

Madame, and saw her face grave and perplexed, and I thought I read a
warning gleam in her eye. There was a mystery about the party which
irritated me, but good breeding forbade me to seek a clue.
"You will permit me to retire, sir," I said. "I have but this morning
come down from a long march among the mountains east of this valley.
Sleeping in wayside huts and tramping those sultry paths make a man
think pleasantly of bed."
The Count seemed to brighten at my words. "You are a marcher, sir,
and love the mountains! Once I would gladly have joined you, for in
my youth I was a great walker in hilly places. Tell me, now, how many
miles will you cover in a day?"
I told him thirty at a stretch.
"Ah," he said, "I have done fifty, without food, over the roughest and
mossiest mountains. I lived on what I shot, and for drink I had
spring-water. Nay, I am forgetting. There was another beverage, which
I wager you have never tasted. Heard you ever, sir, of that eau de vie
which the Scots call usquebagh? It will comfort a traveller as no thin
Italian wine will comfort him. By my soul, you shall taste it. Charlotte,
my dear, bid Oliphant fetch glasses and hot water and lemons. I will
give Mr. Hervey-Townshend a sample of the brew. You English are all
tetes-de-fer, sir, and are worthy of it."
The old man's face had lighted up, and for the moment his air had the
jollity of youth. I would have accepted the entertainment had I not
again caught Madame's eye. It said, unmistakably and with serious
pleading, "Decline." I therefore made my excuses, urged fatigue,
drowsiness, and a delicate stomach, bade my host good-night, and in
deep mystification left the room.
Enlightenment came upon me as the door closed. There in the threshold
stood the manservant whom they called Oliphant, erect as a sentry on
guard. The sight reminded me of what I had once seen at Basle when
by chance a Rhenish Grand Duke had shared the inn with me. Of a
sudden a dozen clues linked together--the crowned notepaper, Scotland,
my aunt Hervey's politics, the tale of old wanderings.
"Tell me," I said in a whisper, "who is the Count d'Albani, your
master?" and I whistled softly a bar of "Charlie is my darling."
"Ay," said the man, without relaxing a muscle of his grim face. "It is
the King of England--my king and yours."

II
In the small hours of the next morning I was awoke by a most unearthly
sound. It was as if all the cats on all the roofs of Santa Chiara were
sharpening their claws and wailing their battle-cries. Presently out of
the noise came a kind of music--very slow, solemn, and melancholy.
The notes ran up in great flights of ecstasy, and sunk anon to the tragic
deeps. In spite of my sleepiness I was held spellbound and the musician
had concluded with certain barbaric grunts before I had the curiosity to
rise. It came from somewhere in the gallery of the inn, and as I stuck
my head out of my door I had a glimpse of Oliphant, nightcap on head
and a great bagpipe below his arm, stalking down the corridor.
The incident, for all the gravity of the music, seemed to give a touch of
farce to my interview of the past evening.