The Keepers of the King's Peace - Edgar Wallace (short novels to read TXT) 📗

was brought to me that the
king had received a number of visitors of an unauthorized
character, and though I had, as I have reported to you, Illustrious
and Excellent Senhor, the most unpleasant experience at the hands
of the king, I deemed it advisable to go to the city of the Greater
M'fusi and conduct an inquiry.

"I learnt that the king had indeed received the visitors, and that
they had departed on the morning of my arrival carrying with them
one of their number who was sick. With this party was a white man.
But the most remarkable circumstance, Illustrious and Excellent
Senhor, was that the king had called a midnight palaver of his
councillors and high people of state and had told them that the
strangers had brought news of such sorrowful character that for
four moons it would be forbidden to look upon his face. At the end
of that period he would disappear from the earth and become a god
amongst the stars.

"At these words, Illustrious and Excellent Senhor, the king with
some reluctance took from one of the strangers a bag in which two
eyes had been cut, and pulled it over his head and went back into
his hut.

"Since then he has done many remarkable things. He has forbidden
the importation of drink, and has freed all labour men to their
homes. He has nominated Zifingini, the elder chief of the M'fusi,
to be king after his departure, and has added another fighting
regiment to his army.

"He is quite changed, and though they cannot see his face and he
has banished all his wives, relatives and councillors to a distant
village, he is more popular than ever.

"Illustrious and Excellent Senhor, I feel that at last I am seeing
the end of the old regime and that we may look forward to a period
of sobriety and prosperity in the M'fusi.

"Receive the assurance, Illustrious and Excellent Senhor, of my
distinguished consideration."

His Excellency went purple and white.

"Holy mother!" he spluttered apoplectically, "this is ruin!"

With trembling hands he wrote a telegram. Translated in its sense it was to this effect--

"Recall de Sagosta without fail or there will be nothing doing on pay day."

He saw this dispatched on its way, and returned to his bureau. He picked up the duc's letter and read it again: then he saw there was a postscript.

"P.S.--In regard to the strangers who visited the king, the man
they carried away on a closed litter was very sick indeed,
according to the accounts of woodmen who met the party. He was
raving at the top of his voice, but the white man was singing very
loudly.

"P.SS.--I have just heard, Illustrious and Excellent Senhor, that
the Hooded King (as his people call him) has sent off all his
richest treasures and many others which he has taken from the huts
of his deported relatives to one Bosambo, who is a chief of the
Ochori in British Territory, and is distantly related to Senhor
Sanders, the Commissioner of that Territory."

THE END


TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE:

Minor changes have been made to correct typesetter's errors; in all other respects, every effort has been made to be true to the author's words and intent.

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Publication Date: 08-10-2009

All Rights Reserved

Dedication:
TO PAT (P. M. C. W.)