"Do you take me for a brigand?" demanded the gentleman with the stern look which he was able to assume instantly. "Besides, I have not yet been here twelve hours."
"Forgive me, monsieur, but it is not so simple as that," said his host. "My brother is the mayor-postmaster. He is even now downstairs and knows that you have arrived. He has seen supper brought to your room."
The stranger paused for a moment over his ragout while the flame of the two candles on the table continued to mount steadily. There was no expression whatever on his face now. His legs continued stretched out under the table in a nonchalant manner. Suddenly he drew them up under him determinedly, and leaning forward with a quizzical grin as though he anticipated something amusing, remarked, "Show him up."
"Monsieur will not come down? My brother, the postmaster . . ."
"Postmaster be damned!" snapped the gentleman. "Who do you think I am?"
With a deprecatory gesture, the innkeeper disappeared. There was the sound of a short colloquy downstairs, a door opened, and two pairs of heavy feet stumbled up the stairs. The gentleman addressed himself unconcernedly to his ragout. The footfalls came down the hall and ceased. The gentleman helped himself to a particularly savoury morsel, swallowed it slowly, and looked up as if his thoughts were elsewhere.
Standing in the door, with the broad, white expanse of the innkeeper behind him, was an almost equally rotund personage with a wide, stupidly cunning face. A huge cocked hat with a moth-eaten cockade was pressed down importantly upon his brow to which it managed to impart by wrinkling the rolls of fat a portentous and official frown. There was in the man's manner a combination of obsequiousness and truculence either of which was ready to triumph over the other as events might decide. To the gentleman at the table there was no doubt as to which attitude was going to win the day, however. His spurred boot shot out swiftly from beneath the cloth. Catching a chair deftly, he kicked it precisely into the middle of the room.
"Sit down," said he.
The man advanced somewhat gingerly and sat, only to find himself looking directly into the stranger's face. Seeing the latter eyeing his hat with surprise and disapproval, after an evident inward debate, he removed it and laid it on his fat knees.
"Monsieur, the innkeeper's brother, I believe," said the stranger looking at him with the ghost of a twinkle. "No one could doubt that at least."
"And the mayor-postmaster," began the little man puffing out his cheeks.
"How am I to be sure of that?" asked the stranger leaning back and looking at the man grimly. "Have you your documents with you?"
The pompous look upon the face of the astonished official collapsed from his cheeks as if they had been a child's balloon pricked by a pin. He squinted anxiously from his ferret eyes and began to feel his pockets dubiously. "Not with me," he admitted, still fumbling. Then his hands sank back onto his hat again. The situation was unprecedented. Already he was almost convinced that he was falsely impersonating himself.
"Extraordinary!" said the gentleman regarding him doubtfully.
"But, but, I am the mayor, the postmaster. All the village knows it! Is it not true, Henri?" he demanded appealing desperately to his brother.
"Indeed, monsieur, it is," replied the innkeeper. "The cure lives but a few doors above and can verify it. Surely . . ."
"Well, well," replied the stranger, "I am inclined to believe you." He raised a hand to deprecate the need of the cure.
"See," cried the mayor-postmaster with a flash of inspiration on his dull face, "here is my cockade!" He shifted his hat suddenly and turned that dingy mark of office toward his doubter. "Monsieur has been looking at the wrong side! He did not see the cockade when I entered."
"Ah, that is different," smiled the gentleman. "Can you blame me —when I was looking at the wrong side?"
"Certainly not, monsieur," both voices replied together.
"In that case I shall be glad to show my own papers." He reached in his pocket and drew out a long folded sheet. "You see," continued he frowning, "I always carry my identification about me. And it would be well," he added, fixing the flustered man before him with a cold stare while rapping the knuckles of his extended hand with the edge of the document, "if you would do the same when you demand the credentials of a military gentleman."
The shot went home. With a flushed face and far from steady hand the fat man took the extended paper. He unfolded it nervously and began to read. He was almost afraid to find whom he had offended.
It was a special leave of absence issued by the Minister of War and dated from Versailles permitting M. Denis Moore, subject of His Most Christian Majesty, captain-interpreter attached to the first regiment of the royal horseguard, to travel upon private affairs in all the kingdom of France during the space of four months. Upon the expiration of leave he was to report back for duty at Versailles. The script was in the beautiful, round hand of a clerk of the war office, yet the eyes of the mayor moved over it slowly while his lips spelled out the words. At the bottom of the document, however, much to his relief, he came upon a block of good solid print. There, along with such other exalted personages as the intendants of provinces and the mayors of cities, he thought he found himself included amongst "all loyal subjects of the king" as bound to render aid, protection and assistance to the said Captain Denis Moore in all his lawful designs whatsoever. Nor as an officer of the royal household was the captain to be hindered, taxed, prevented, or delayed in his going to and fro on pain of the explicit displeasure of the king himself. "And of this ye shall take good heed."
"It is the Minister of War," said the captain, pointing to a signature whose many flourishes the poor man was in vain trying to decipher. Face to face with the signature of so great a man as the Minister of War the mayor-postmaster felt himself to be something less than dust. He also felt himself in the distinguished presence of an unusual man. Under the circumstances, it would be best to waive the usual small fee for examination. No, he would say nothing about it! He folded the paper carefully and handed it back. "Monsieur the captain will excuse the interruption I hope," he said, preparing to leave the room with evident relief.
"Without doubt," said the captain, "but sit down. I have something further to consult about with you. Come in," said he to the innkeeper, "and kindly close the door. Can we be overheard?"
"By no one!"
"You will both understand," continued the captain, "that what I am about to say to you is the king's business and goes no further than this room." He glanced significantly at both of them. While their voluble reassurances continued to flow, he again unfolded the paper.
"You will note," said he, pointing to the line upon which the phrase occurred, "that I am on 'private business.'" The mayor nodded sagely. "Now follow me"—his finger ran on down the page—"and that you are 'bound to render aid, assistance, and protection.' It is that, monsieur the mayor, which I am now about to ask of you. Draw your chairs up closer while I explain." It was not long before the three heads were so close together over the table that a fly could scarcely have crawled between them.
In a lower voice than he had been using, and with that confidential air of being about to impart a matter of capital import, the captain continued. "There arrived today at the Chateau de Besance a certain gentleman, the Marquis da Vincitata. He is on his way back to Genoa. He was sent last year on a special diplomatic mission by the Grand Duke of Tuscany to the court of Versailles. The matter was one of such extreme importance that you will understand I cannot possibly discuss it with you at all."