Bacq

Chapitre 12. Le steuard et le banquier.

The next day, around half past two in the afternoon, a hobbite of

seventy years who hoped to pass for fifty, dressed in an ornamental

waistcoat of an eel-like green and yellow, arrived outside the Count of

Monte Fato's residence at Champs-Valinorées in a magnificent calèche

drawn by two oliphants with crowns on their heads.  He sent his valet

to inquire whether the Count was chez lui.  While waiting, the hobbite

contemplated, with an attention so minutious as to be almost

impertinent, the exterior of the palace, the garden, and the livery,

marked with an enormous red Eye, of those servants that could be

perceived coming and going.  He speculated that the spoons of such a

Durin-Khroizaz must be valuable indeed.

The valet returned shortly thereafter.  "I handed my visiting card to

the concierge," he said, "only to be informed that the Count was not

visible, and that the concierge would give the message to the valet de

chambre, for the concierge durst not approach his Excellency when the

latter bore the Ring."

"Ah, then this monsieur is an Ernil-i-Pharvenu, who glories in the

title Excellency," said Sacqueville-Danglars.  "N'importe; since he

has a credit with me, he will have to see me when he wants money,

whether he will or he nill."  With that, he departed for the Chambre

des Moutants.

From behind a jalousie, the unseen Count, veiled in shadow, studied the

baron with the aid of a lorgnette that suited his Lidless Eye

admirably, and with no less attention than Sacqueville-Danglars had

employed in examining the palace, garden, and liveries.  "A witless

worm he has become," he remarked.  "I have passed through fire and

death, only to bandy words with a vulgar capitalist."  He then

summoned Gali and Roguccio.

"How is it," he said with a frown, "that the best oliphants in the

Shiré are not in my stables?"

Gali writhed and grovelled on the floor; had he been able to speak, he

would have begged the Count "Don't hurt us!  Don't let kind

master hurt us, Précieux!"

"It is not your fault, Gali," said Monte Fato in Haradric, with an

unexpected gentleness in his voice and expression.  "If you seem to

have erred, think that it was fated to be so, that my éclat might

triumph all the more."  He then turned his baleful red Eye towards

his intendant.

"They were not for sale," said Roguccio.  "There are some things one

can embezzle once only, he said.  I did not rightly know what he

meant."

"There is nothing that cannot be bought with dominion over the mines of

Morie and three of the rings of the dwarves," said the Count with a

shrug.  "See to it."

"Does monsieur le comte speak seriously?" asked Roguccio.

Monte Fato regarded the Balrogue in astonishment that the latter had

dared question him.  "I have to pay a visit at five o'clock

tonight, and those oliphants shall be attached to my carriage."

"Permit me to remind your Excellency that it is now half past

four," ventured Roguccio.

"I know," said the Count.  "But where there is a whip, there is

as an infallible consequence a will."

Fifteen minutes later, the moumaques were attached to the Count's

carriage, which departed forthwith in the direction of the mansion of

Sacqueville-Danglars.

Baron Othon de Sacqueville-Danglars was counting spoons, according to

his habit, when the Count of Monte Fato was announced.  The Count

entered the antechamber, a small salon that was meant to recall the

Mines of Morie, but completely lacked their peculiar rusticated charm;

there the Count casually inspected the copies of Stridier and

Fanboiello that had been passed off as originals, despite the absence

of the former's characteristic mushrooms or the latter's inimitable

flame.  The baron nodded slightly, and gestured for the Count to sit.

The Count sat.  Sacqueville-Danglars offered the Count a high-elvish

sigarro yavanna, and took one himself.

"Do I have the honour of addressing monsieur de Monte Fato?" asked

Sacqueville-Danglars.

"And I, monsieur le baron Sacqueville-Danglars, chevalier of the

Legion of the Golden Tobacco Jar, member of the Chamber of Moutants? »

"Excuse me for not giving you your title at once, monsieur," said

Sacqueville-Danglars, nervously clutching a pendant with a white gem

shaped like the Bank of Arnor.  "We live under a popular government,

and I represent the interests of the People."

"So that, even while continuing the practice of calling yourself

baron, you have abandoned that of calling others count," replied

Monte Fato.

"Oh, I attribute no importance to that myself," said Sacqueville-Danglars. 

"But you know, one absolutely cannot enter the Dragon jaune without a title, 

and the domestics ..."

"You have your servants call you god-king; the shirrifes,

monseigneur; the journalists, monsieur; and your constituents, citoyen.

These are nuances that befit a constitutional government ordered along

the model of a colony of cherrystone clams.  I understand perfectly."

Seeing that he could not compete with Monte Fato on this terrain,

Sacqueville-Danglars sought to move the conversation to an area where

he felt more comfortable.

"Monsieur le comte," he said with a bow, "I have the honour of

receiving a letter from Bombadil and Forn, but I avow that I have not

wholly understood its meaning."

"How so?" said the Count.  "Can you not read the fiery letters?

Are the Adunaic legal constructions unclear?  Did the clerks of

Bombadil and Forn unduly mutate the phrase beau Idealen?"

"Non, monsieur ... Only this word unlimited ..."

"Is it not good Parler commun?"

"Perfectly.  But in matters of finance, the word is so vague, at

least for mortals."

"I see, then, that M. Sacqueville-Danglars only does business with

hobbites and lesser Men.  He is wise; for mortals that attempt to

exceed their limits not infrequently drown, and get their island sunk

besides."  The Count punctuated this remark by drawing on his cigar

and blowing a great ring of smoke with many smaller rings that followed

it, and which it devoured.

Sacqueville-Danglars ground his teeth, doubting whether he had read

rightly the purport of Monte Fato's gesture with the rings of smoke,

above all whether it signified that the Count's wealth was such that

he might try to buy him out.  It was the second time that he had been

defeated by that man, and this time on a subject where he ought to have

triumphed and left his adversary in the dusts of Gorgorot, the least

fashionable of the shopping areas of Mordor in the elder days.  The

Count, on the other hand, smiled with the best grace in the world, and

spoke with a naïveté that gave him several advantages.

"You see, monsieur," continued the Count, "I do not know exactly

how much money I will need."

The banker believed that victory was within his grasp.  He blew a

flaccid and extremely inelegant smoke-ring, smiled like a troll

consuming a burrito, and said, "Oh, monsieur, fear not to desire, for

the maison Sacqueville-Danglars, limited though it be, disposes of the

largest resources this side of the Mountains of Cologne, should you

require a million floquerins."

"A million?"  said the Count.  "And what on earth would I do with

that?  Bon Érou!  If I wanted a million, I would not open a credit for

such a misère.  I regularly annihilate a million floquerins a day in

order to save space."  And Monte-Fato removed from a pendant a small

ring and put it on with a charming smile that made the baron's blood

run cold; he had the unnerving sense that a hostile will pinned him

under its deadly, gaze, naked and immovable.

"Surety you crave?" continued Monte Fato.  "You seem to distrust

the house of Bombadil and Forn, or perhaps simply do not find their

music pleasing to your ears.  Mon Érou!  I foresaw the case, and

although entirely unversed in affairs, I've taken precautions.  Voici

donc parallel letters of credit from Glamhothschild, Thorinowitz,

d'Alqualonde, and the balrogue of Morie.  Regrettably, I left the

letter from Manvre at home; it needed cleaning from the effects of the

eagles."

Sacqueville-Danglars was conquered; he opened, trembling, the letters

that the Count handed him, and verified their signatures with a

minutiosity that had been offensive, were not his terror evident.

"Speak, monsieur le comte," he gasped.  "I am at your command."

"With the permission of monsieur le baron, we will call that

settled," smiled the Count.  "Now that we understand each other and

you have no more distrust, let us fix a sum for the first year: six

million, for example, and all profits from operations of your company

east of the Mountains of Cologne will be mine for ever, solely."

"So be it!" said Sacqueville-Danglars, suffocated.  "Do you want

gold, bank notes, or silver?"

"Half in golden rings, half in barrow-blades, s'il vous plaît."

The Count rose.

"I must confess one thing, monsieur le comte," said the baron.

"I believed myself to have an exact knowledge of all the finest

fortunes of Terre-moyenne, and yet yours, which seems considerable, was

entirely unknown to me.  Is it recent?"

"Non, monsieur," replied Monte Fato.  "On the contrary, it is one

of the most ancient.  It was a family treasure that it was forbidden to

touch, until, after a defeat and a respite, the treasure arose again;

the time fixed by the ringlord has only recently revolved.  Your

ignorance is therefore only natural, and, moreover, you will know it

better in time.  But that can wait; as Gandault observed, those who

have prepared a soirée prefer to keep their secret."  The Count

accompanied the last words with one of those pale smiles that had

caused so much fear in Arafrantz d'Imrahil.

 "Later I will request that you do me the honour of seeing my spoons,

all ancient, for I do not like the moderns, and all elvish, for I do

not appreciate les artistes hobbitains," said Sacqueville-Danglars.

"You are right, monsieur.  For the moderns generally have a great

defect, that of not having had time to become ancient; and the hobbites

a worse defect still - that of not being elves."

The baron nodded sagely.  "But all that will wait for another time.

For now I will content myself, with your permission, to present you to

my wife, the Baroness Sacqueville-Danglars.  Excuse my eagerness,

monsieur le comte; but a client like you is almost part of the family."

Monte Fato bowed in recognition of the honour that Sacqueville-Danglars

extended to him; and the baron rang a bell.  A lackey appeared.

"Is Mme. Lobélie de Sacqueville-Danglars at home?"

"Yes, monsieur le god-king," replied the lackey.

"And who is with madame?  M. de Brie?" asked Sacqueville-Danglars

with a bonhomie that amused the Count, who was already informed of the

transparent secrets of the baron's domestic life, which was not

invisible at all, but horribly and uniquely visible, even had not the

Count possessed the Eye.

"Yes, monsieur le god-king," replied the lackey.

"My wife has married beneath her station," explained Sacqueville-Danglars

as he led Monte Fato to the baroness's quarters. "She is a demoiselle of

the Braceguirdelles, a widow by her first marriage of M. le colonel marquis

de Proudefont."  The Count nodded.

The baron, followed by the Count, traversed a long row of apartments

remarkable for their heavy sumptuosity and pompous bad taste (the

imitations of the arc-de-triomphe of Ar-Pharazon were really too much),

and arrove at the boudoir of the Baroness Sacqueville-Danglars. The

fashion of this boudoir was such that it was built on seven levels,

each delved into the hill, and about each was set a velvet curtain; it

was greater and stronger far than the baron's office, and far more

beautiful.  The seventh level was impenetrable by any save Lothien de

Brie, who alone knew the password.  The chairs were of chalcedony; the

doors represented pastoral scenes in the style of Ondrehillier; two

pretty inset pastels, finally, made this small chamber the only one in

the mansion to possess any character.  It is true that it had escaped

the general plan of Sacqueville-Danglars and his architect Ioret, and

that the baroness and Lothien de Brie alone had selected the décor.

So Sacqueville-Danglars despised that coquettish little réduit, and

was in any case never admitted there save in the company of another; it

was not in reality Sacqueville-Danglars who presented guests, but he on

the contrary who was well or badly received according to whether or not

the baroness found the guest agreeable.  He was rarely admitted in the

company of a Dwargue, for example, and still more seldom in the company

of a posteur d'usenet.

As they arrived, Monte Fato veiled himself in shadow, for a jeu

d'esprit.  Mme. de Sacqueville-Danglars, whose beauty could still be

cited despite her one hundred and eleven years, was at the piano, while

de Brie sat at her feet on the steps of the dais upon which she was

elevated, and leafed through an album. "I greet you," she told her

husband, "and maybe you look for welcome.  But truth to tell, your

welcome is doubtful here; troubles follow you like obnoxious street

gamins.  The last guests you introduced to me, those dreadful

Glamhothschilds, were three usurers in a highly unfashionable grey, and

yourself the most unfashionable of the four!"

"The courtesy of your boudoir has lessened somewhat of late,

madame," replied Sacqueville-Danglars stiffly.  "My guest is the

Count of Monte Fato, who possesses jewellery that is worth many a

financier, even the mightiest."  The Count materialised, extinguished

his shadow, and bowed.

The baroness looked surprised and pleased.  She rose and gave her

husband a smile, which was not habitual on her part, and the Count a

curtsey that was at once ceremonious and gracious. Lothien exchanged

with the Count a gesture of half-acquaintance, and snapped his fingers

at the baron with a jovial "Coq-à-woupe!"

"Madame la baronne," said Sacqueville-Danglars, "Permit that I

present to you M. le comte de Monte Fato, who has been recommended to

me by my half-elven agents in Lottaloria in the most insistent terms.

I will only add that he comes to Annuminas with the intention of

spending six million floquerins in a year; that promises a series of

balls, soirées, dîners, medianoches, and mushroom-popping contests,

in which I hope monsieur le comte will not forget us, as we ourselves

will not forget him in our little fêtes."

"You arrive in a perfectly dreadful season, monsieur le comte,"

said the baroness. "Annuminas is detestable in summer: there are no

balls, no mushroom soirées, no auctions, no golfimboules; only hordes

of disagreeable dwarf-tourists.  The Opéra elfique is in Forodeterre

cooling the Snowblemen; the Opéra du Shiré left for the havens long

ago, and is everywhere except Annuminas; and as for the

Theatre-Hobbites, you know it's nowhere.  All that remain are a few

pitiful races.  Will you partake in races, monsieur le comte?"

"I shall do everything that one does in Annuminas, madame la

baronne," replied Monte Fato, "if I am so fortunate as to find

someone who can instruct me in the habits of the Shiré."

At this moment, Madame de Sacqueville-Danglars' favourite chambermaid

entered and whispered in her ear, whereat the baroness became paler

than the celebrated forodois hero, Frosty-Nelson.

"Monsieur," said the baroness to her husband.  "What does it mean

that my moumaques are no longer in their stables?  Nothing similar has

happened since the fell winter of 1547, when drunken trolls belonging

to the Huguenot faction stole all the tobacco in the Grands Smiaux."

"Madame, you know that these moumaques both cost more to feed than a

household, and are most impractical on roads made for rabbit-transport."

The baroness shrugged her shoulders with an expression of deep

contempt.  Sacqueville-Danglars approached his wife and spoke to her in

a low voice, without that she responded other than with a crushing

glance.  Meanwhile, the Count showed his newly acquired oliphants to De

Brie, who was a noted amateur, and had even memorised a poem on the

subject.

"Par la lingerie de Luthienne!" cried De Brie.  "If I am not

mistaken, those are your very own horses, attached to the Count's

car!"

Sacqueville-Danglars was stupefied.

"Is it possible?" said the Count, feigning astonishment.

"It is incroyable!" stammered the baron.

"How much did you pay for them?" inquired De Brie.

"But I don't really know," said the Count.  "One or two of my

coats of mithrile, I believe; but I leave such matters to my

intendant."

While De Brie communicated this information to Mme. de Sacqueville-

Danglars, her husband looked so out of countenance that Monte Fato

seemed to take pity on him.

"You see what ingrates women are," he said.  "They are worse than

the douaniers of the Mountains of Cologne, who never do what one bribes

them to do.  They always love most what is most harmful, and there's

really no alternative but to give them their head, and let them learn

their lesson by breaking it."

With this, he made his excuses, as did De Brie, and left Baron de

Sacqueville-Danglars to the wrath of his wife, colder and rather more

tempestuous than the storms of Charadras.

Two hours later, Mme. de Sacqueville-Danglars received a charming letter

from the Count of Monte Fato, declaring that, as he did not wish to

begin his stay in Annuminas by driving a lady to despair - especially one

who, though born in the body of a maid, had an esprit at least the

match of his - he begged her to accept the restitution of the

oliphants.  They had the same harness as before; only, in the centre of

the rosettes that they wore on their ears, the Count had placed a small

silmaril.

~~~

That evening, the Count of Monte Fato travelled to his residence in

Barroue-Don, accompanied by Gali.  The next afternoon, the Count

summoned Gali to his cabinet and questioned him in Haradric.

"Gali, you have often spoken, or rather signed, of your skill with

rope, is it not so?"

Gali nodded and stood up proudly.

"But will you stop two moumaques in their tracks, blundering in blind

wrath like grey moving towers of evil?"

Gali smiled.

"Eh bien, listen," said Monte Fato.  "Tout à l'heure a car

will pass by, drawn by two moumaques of Harade, careering down the

boulevard.  Should you be crushed in the effort, you must stop that car

before my gate - the one with the newly renovated Teeth of Mordor."

Gali danced a jarjaromirade, waving a fish in token of obedience.  The

Count thanked the Sudron in the manner of his own people, by hissing

Poisssson; Gali then went to smoke a chibouque on the corner that

separated the house from the road, bringing rope from Lottaloria with

him.

Suddenly, there was heard a distant rolling, that approached with the

rapidity of an aroused Ent; then a calèche whose driver sought in vain

to hold back the oliphants advancing furiously, with their enormous

ears extending like sails, and their long snouts poised like a serpent

or industrial labourer on the verge of striking.  Within the calèche,

a woman and a cat held each other tight, unable for force of terror to

cry out.  Four or five smiaux, or residences hobbitaines, were

destroyed. "Gare aux moumaques!" cried the onlookers.  "May the

Valards render them insensible with absinthe!"  "This would never

have happened under Aragon XVIII," grumbled an elderly monsieur with

a pipe.  "I knew affairs were going downhill when Aragon-Philippe

tore down Sarehole in order to build the Champs-Valinorées."

Gali put aside his chibouque, pulled the rope from his pocket, flung

it, enveloped the forelegs of the oliphant to the right, and dragged it

to the ground; he then inserted his chibouque into the trunk of the

second oliphant, which immediately sat upon the ground and enjoyed a

good smoke - for so permeated is Terre-moyenne with pipe-weed that

the very cherrystone clams partake thereof.

The Count dashed from the palace, followed by several servants, and, as

soon as the driver had opened the door, removed from the calèche the

lady and her unconscious cat.  Monte Fato brought them both into the

salon and said, while placing them on a sofa of genuine dragon-scales,

"Fear not, madame; you are saved."  The lady turned, and saw the

Count, and yet not the Count, for some strange incense in the room made

him appear as a king returning from exile on an obscure Mediterranean

island to his native land.

She gazed mutely at her cat, with a look more eloquent than the prayers

of the Eldards.

"Oui, madame, I understand," said the Count, examining the feline.

"But be calm: no harm has come to him, and it is fear alone that has

brought him to this pass."  Opening a phial from Goundabaden-Baden,

encrusted with gold, he fed the cat one drop of a liquor red as the

politics of the Orcs.  The cat, although still pale, opened its eyes

immediately.

"Where am I?" cried the lady, delirious with joy.  "And to whom

do I owe such happiness?"

"I am he who is the unfortunate cause of your chagrin, for I bought

the oliphants from Sacqueville-Danglars; but the baroness seemed so to

regret them, that I sent them back, begging her to accept them from my

hand."

"Are you then that marvel of Terre-moyenne of whom the minstrels

sing, the Count of Monte Fato?"

"Oui, madame," said the Count.

"I am Béruthielle de Villefaramir, and this is my cat, or rather my

prince of cats, Thibaut."

The Count bowed as if he had never seen her name spelled nor heard it

spoken.

During a moment of silence, Monte Fato contemplated the cat whose owner

covered it with kisses. This creature was a mighty cat and coal-black

and evil to look upon, and when he mewled it turned the blood cold and

made poodles fall lifeless to the ground; and he had evidently partaken

of far too much catnip for one his age.  His first movement was to

disengage himself brusquely from his owner's arms, and to open the

cabinet whence the Count had obtained the elixir.

"Do not touch that, my friend," said the Count.  "For it contains

substances that are perilous even to breathe; if you dare, sooner or

later the dark power will devour you."

At this moment, Gali entered, and Madame de Villefaramir made a

movement of joy.

"See, Thibaut, the good servant who risked his life to save you from

the wrath of the oliphants," she said.  "Thank him, for without his

aid we would assuredly both be dead, and the halls of Mandaux are not

amusing at all."  The cat turned its head disdainfully, and said,

"Get you gone; for you smell of tuna, a fish so tasteless that I

cannot tolerate its odor."

The Count smiled, as if the feline had fulfilled one of his hopes; but

Gali looked as offended as if he had been accused of smoking an

inferior variety of hashberry.

"Monsieur," said Mme. de Villefaramir, rising, "is this house your

habitual abode?"

"Non, madame; it is merely a little pied-à-terre I bought myself; I

live at Champs-Valinorées, No. 30.  But I see, madame, that you have

recovered and wish to be on your way.  I will order Gali, this boy who

smells of tuna" - he smiled at the cat - "to attach the

moumaques to my car and drive you home."

"I would not dare with those oliphants."

"Have no fear; under the hand of Gali, they will be as tame as

Acefalot, the legendary equine seducer."  And so it happened; for

after Gali had fed them some narcotic fish, they were barely able to

sustain a trot.

The Count followed this marvel by paying a princely sum for the

restoration of the buildings destroyed by the charge of the moumaques;

for hobbites can work like bees when the mood and the financial

incentive strikes them.  The façades were entirely redone, with a

Haradric eye-motif that the inhabitants found enchanting, and were with

the typical bon sens hobbitain renamed Smiaux Meilleurs.

On arriving home, Mme. de Villefaramir immediately wrote a letter to Mme.

de Sacquevile-Danglars, telling her that, although yesterday she had

with difficulty restrained herself from mocking the baroness's

enthusiasm for the Count, she now found that enthusiasm to be as far

beneath his true value as the wine-cellars of Sauron are beneath the

eagle-borne cafés of Manvre.  Before long, tongues were wagging in the

fashionable monde of Annuminas: Réginard related the occurrence to his

mother; Château-Renard sang of it at the Foxtrot-Club; De Brie in the

salon of the minister; Pierre-Jacques-Philippe-Michel

Boyen-Xènes-Baguines himself paid the Count the compliment of devoting

twenty lines to the affair in the Leaf du Shiré.  And the

aelurophilous lady's husband, M. de Villefaramir, hastened that very

evening to visit the Count at Champs-Valinorées.

Well-received at the Court, whether the reigning monarch belonged to

the elder branch or the cadet branch, whether the minister were

doctrinaire, conservative, or radical; hated by many, but protected by

some, without, however, being loved by any, even his mistresses,

Villefaramir held one of the highest positions of the magistrature, a

position to which he clung with the tenacity of a Gollon clinging to

the style of the Précieux long after it had fallen from fashion.  His

salon, though rejuvenated by a young wife and the daughter of a

previous marriage, remained the most severe in Annuminas.  Cold

civility, absolute fidelity to governing principles, profound contempt

for theories and theoreticians, deeming them but the webs of wizards

and the hopes of fools - such were the elements of M. de

Villefaramir's public and private life.  None opposed him, for fear

that they, like Guillaume Piedblanc, the former leader of the popular

party, would find themselves transported to the Château des

Locqueholles.  The office of steuard constituted an inexpugnable

fortress, whose advantages he exploited to the fullest; although in

verity, had he and not the Count received the Ring, it had overthrown

not only him, but the dynasty of the Telbourbons as well.

M. de Villefaramir made few visits, preferring to send his wife in his

stead; he was never seen at the theatre, or the opera, or the ballet;

when he gave balls, he only appeared for a quarter of an hour.

Sometimes, but rarely, he played a hand of whist; but he always ensured

that his adversaries were both worthy of him (at the very least a

duchess), and very poor players.  Others accounted for this distance

through the cares of office, when they were really only a calculation

of pride, a quintessence of aristocracy, the application, in short, of

the maxim: Getting past the Watchers is the labor of tarques.

The valet de chambre announced M. de Villefaramir at the moment when

the Count was bent over a table, studying the itinerary from Rivendeau

to the Profondeur de Heaume in Rohan.  The steuard entered with the

same grave and deliberate step he employed when entering the Cour des

Usenettes.  His nature was unchanged from the time when he served in

Hobbitonne and judged the case of Samouard Gamgès.  He was dressed

entirely in black, save his cravate that was adorned with the white

tree.  An untrained eye might, perhaps, have found Villefaramir far

more like a great wizard: older, more handsome, and more royal; such an

eye, however, would have to be as blind as the ear of Bombadile was

tone-deaf.

Master of himself, and indeed of the entire world (albeit somewhat

incognito) as the Count was, he examined with a visible curiosity the

magistrate who, like all the untrustworthy, was ever distrustful, and

saw in Monte Fato rather a chevalier of industry in search of new

terrain, or a malingering orc who had deserted the army, than a prince

of the Holy Mushroom or a sultan of the Thousand and One Pipeweeds.

"Monsieur," said Villefaramir with that yelping tone affected by

magistrates in the public forum, and which they cannot or will not

abandon in conversation.  "The signal service you have performed in

saving the life of my wife and her cat imposes upon me the duty of

thanking you.  I come therefore to fulfil this duty and to offer you my

recognition."

"Monsieur," replied the Count in turn, with a coldness more glacial

than the alps of Charadras or the women of Forodeterre, "I am highly

content to have preserved a cat for its owner, for it is said that the

love of a woman for her feline companion is of the most pleasing to

Yavanna; and this happiness should dispense you, monsieur, from a duty

whose execution no doubt honours me, for I know that you are less

prodigal of the favour you bestow upon me than the Dwarves are of their

debentures, but which cannot equal my interior satisfaction."

M. de Villefaramir, astonished at this sally more brutal than the

laughter of the Roi-Sorcier of Anguemar, trembled, and a disdainful

frown indicated that he did not consider the Count to be a gentleman,

or gentilhobbite, or even a gentildwargue.  He looked around for some

object on which to fasten a conversation that seemed broken and in need

of being reforged.

"You take an interest in cartography?" he said, indicating the map

on which the Count was intent.  "It is a study of many years,

especially for one such as you who have doubtless traversed all the

regions on your map."

"Oui, monsieur," replied Monte Fato.  “I have chosen to make of

the human, elvish, dwarvish, orkish, entish, roggish ... well, it is a

long list, and you Arnorians are an impatient people, so I will simply

say, of all speaking peoples ... what you have done for the exceptions:

that is, I have split them apart (for the most part, only

metaphorically) to execute upon them a physiological study.  For that,

said Gandault, is the path of wisdom.  At the least, it is a very

interesting algebraic theorem ... But be seated, monsieur, I beg."

Villefaramir sat on a very elegant stone dwarf that Jadis Joppelin,

Duchess of Narnia and archmistress of Poudeglomme, had sold the Count

in exchange for Sudron Delight.  "If, like you, monsieur le comte,"

said he, "I had nothing to do, I would find a happier way to pass the

time, such as sending anonymous troll letters to the newspaper or

writing quizzes about myself."

"You have a point, monsieur," said the Count.  "Humans are a

rather depressing study - although, fortunately, I have other

business.  But you just said that I have nothing to do.  Do you,

monsieur, think you have something to do?  Or, to speak more clearly,

do you think what you do is worth calling something to do?"

The astonishment of Villefaramir redoubled at this second coup so

rudely fired by this strange adversary; and, from a social point of

view, his retreat before the inexorable wit of Monte Fato was almost a

rout.  Then, like the Rohanois after they had seized the tobacco of

Saroumand, he rallied.  "Monsieur," he said, "you are a

foreigner, and have, as you yourself have said, spent much of your life

among orcs, balrogues, and other bêtes noires; you do not, then, know

how justice, expeditious as a raging moumaque in barbarous lands, in

Arnor is as prudent and methodical as an Ent who partakes of opium."

"Yes, indeed I do, monsieur.  It is the ancient ticklium ulmo of

the elves.  It is especially of the justice of all lands of

Terre-moyenne that I occupy myself, and I have compared the criminal

procedures of all the speaking peoples; and I must say, monsieur, that

it is the law of retaliation, or lekhs talyoniz, that I find most

according to the Music of the Aînés that opened the opera of our

existence."

"It must then have been an opera of very few notes, monsieur; and

following that law, magistrates would indeed have little to do, beyond

perhaps presiding at banquets and judging sack races.  But among us, no

man cometh to the laws of Terre-moyenne but through the books.  Arduous

is the task of learning the twelve volumes of the Code de

Terre-moyenne, with its various and contradictory readings; and the

interpretation of the Letters of Aracharlemagne have occasioned more

than one bitter dispute."

"Such as the one about whether the wings of balrogues constitute real

property," replied the Count in a somewhat blasé tone of voice.

"Yes, yes.  But all that you know of the code of Arnor, I know not

only of that code, but also of the codes of all nations: the laws of

the Snowmen, Haradrins, Elves, Dwarves, Ents, Balrogues, Marchouigres,

and Trolls Flambés, are as familiar to me as those of the Hobbites and

Dounédains."

"But to what end have you learned all that?" cried Villefaramir,

astounded.

Monte Fato smiled.  "Bien, monsieur," he said. "I see that,

despite your reputation as an homme supérieur, you see everything from

the vulgar and material point of view of society, that begins with man

and ends in fish and chips and mushrooms and prancing ponies; and that

view is as narrow and restricted as a hole that a hobbite is too fat to

escape."

"Explain yourself, monsieur," said Villefaramir, more and more

astonished. "I do not understand you ... very well."

"I say, monsieur, that you have a mind of metal and wheels, and see

only the outward workings of the machine, like the scholar who studies

the works of Trolquien to discover the plate tectonics that led to the

sinking of Mordor, in ignorance or indifference to the superb artistry

and deeper intentions with which he writes.  You view an ent as

firewood, a balrogue as a renewable energy source, and a literary

classic as a means to show yourself cleverer than your adversaries.

Thus you are blind to those whom Érou and the Valards have placed

above all the ministers and kings of the earth, and veritably an

invasion of dragons or trolls would benefit your civilisation

enormously.   The nations took Sauron, who came to conquer them, as an

invader like any other; and Ulmon had to reveal himself in majesty

before Tueur realised he was more than a peculiarly annoying

flâneur."

"Alors," said the steuard, marvelling, and uncertain whether he was

dealing with a crank, a wizard, or a madman.  "You regard yourself as

one of these exceptional beings to which you refer?"

"Why not?" said the Count, coldly.

"Pardon, monsieur, said Villefaramir.  "I see you are a philosophe,

and not merely a captain of industry.  It is not usual among us for one

who has obtained great wealth by mysterious means - not that I

question, I only repeat - to lose their time in philosophical

rêveries, made at most to console those whom destiny has disinherited

of earthly goods."

"Monsieur, do you never exercise your regard to see at once upon what

kind of man it is fallen?  Should not a magistrate be, not only the

best interpreter of the law, not only the most cunning refuter of the

lies of Morgot, but able to wrestle with his adversary in thought, as

if possessed of a palantir, and to penetrate the mind deeper than the

dwarves penetrated Morie, and awakened the balrogue from a slumber

induced by dissipation?"

"Then, you yourself?"

"I, I am one of those exceptional beings whose power is such that

none can foresee its fall while the world lasts.  You believe me a

Dunédain, n'est-ce pas, because I speak the Parler commun with the

same facility and purity as you.  Gali, my Haradric slave, believes me

a Haradrin; Shélobe, my spider, believes me an arachnid; Roguccio, my

intendant, believes me a balrogue.  Do you not then understand that no

living man can hinder me?  For I am the Wit, the Ring-maker, the Count

of Many Colours!"

Villefaramir looked, and saw that the Count's smoking, which had

seemed black, was not so, but was woven of all colours, so that the eye

was dazzled and the mind bewildered.

"But, monsieur, can you say that, for you live in Arnor, where

Arnorian laws are enforced and fashion imposed still more strictly?"

he said.

"Sans doute," replied the Count.  "But I know the hearts and

minds of mortals better than they do, so that the steuard du roi who

durst prosecute me would be far more embarrassed than I."

"Do you mean," said Villefaramir hesitantly, "that all in

Terre-moyenne have committed faults?"

"Faults, or crimes," replied Monte Fato, casually.

"Monsieur, by your brilliant conversation you lift me above common

levels as a hobbite were to grow wings and fly to the moon, that he

might offer pipe-weed unto Tilion.  But even at those exalted levels

one must sometimes utter cruel truths, such as that the décor on the

moon is rather lacking; and so I do now, in telling you that you

sacrifice to pride: as you are above the others, so Érou and the

Valards are above you."

"They are above everyone!" said the Count in a voice so deep that

Villefaramir shuddered.  "I reserve my pride for Men, who rise

against him who surpasses them, as a child might threaten an Uruc-haï

with a blunderbuss or an elf with a fashion statement.  But I abandon

that pride before the power that took me out of the nothingness I was,

and made me Lord of the Rings."

"Then, monsieur le comte, I admire you," said Villefaramir,

employing for the first time, in that strange dialogue, this

aristocratic formula.  "But beware!  Disease and death you may

escape, since you wear the Ruling Ring; but Érou may still crush you,

even as he did when he transformed my father into a potato as a

punishment for voting Sharcoléonist."

The Count smiled.

"Adieu, monsieur," continued Villefaramir.  "I now depart, taking

with me a memory of esteem that I hope will be agreeable to you when

you know me better; for I am not a common man, and in me the blood of

the Dunédains runs pure."

The Count bowed, and accompanied the steuard to the door with the

civility of the Orcs.