After supper, the Count took a promenade with Gali from his villa in Barroue-Don to his palais on Champs-Valinorées, which he reached at nightfall. Monte Fato leaned against a tree and, with that Eye that so seldom erred, sounded the double avenue, examined the passers-by, and shot a glance down the neighbouring streets to see if any had prepared an ambush. Convinced that no one was lying in wait for him, he ran to the small door with Gali, entered precipitously, and, by the servants’ stairway, whereof he had the key, he entered his bed-chamber, without opening or deranging a single curtain, without that the concierge Camoul the Esterling himself could suspect a spy on the stairs. He opened the secretary that was carven of fimbréthil-mahogany (the Count was quite the connoisseur of mahogany, and was able to distinguish precisely 338 different shades of it), and assured himself that no papers were missing. Satisfied, he removed his Ring from its pendant and put it on. Gali bowed in abject dread. Thus armed, the Count held the life of Elves, Men, and Dwarves in his hands. Gali had no need of weapons, for none strangled a gobelin nor snacked thereon with deadlier impact than he. Both were concealed by the miasma that issued forth from the Ring.
As the clock struck midnight, the Count heard a light sound next to the cabinet, followed in short order by three more; by the fourth, the Count knew that a firm and practiced hand was at work cutting the four corners of the window next to the cabinet with a silmaril.
