News from the Moon by Brian Stableford

Author:Brian Stableford
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Black Coat Press
Published: 2011-11-12T00:00:00+00:00

X. How the bimane Generals

imprisoned by the English regained their liberty.

Bora-Bora’s treasure.

The lamentable fate of La Belle Léocadie.

On the English side, the joy was unconfined. The colony was reconquered, nothing remaining in quadrumane hands but the little fort and the Governor’s mansion defended by Dick Broken.

The day after the landing, Sir Roderick Blakeley,58 Commander-in-Chief of the English expedition, made his entry into reconquered Melbourne. The city was celebrating, the English flag flying at every window. It was strange to see all the bimanes, finally reassured, pressing around the conquerors and heaping felicitations upon them. The most frightened bimanes were holding their heads high again; every trace of the conquest was disappearing. Already the word “quadrumane” was forbidden, erased from every edifice on which it had been inscribed.

The quadrumane artistes of the Melbourne Opera were shamefully cast out by their bimane colleagues. The performances of Coco’s opera were halted, the maestro himself having vanished.59

Lastly, as a final ignominy, there was already talk of raising a statue to the man whom more bimanes than ever were calling the heroic Croknuff.

In the afternoon, a long column of prisoners filed between two hedges of bearded highlanders, preceded by a tartan-kilted bagpiper playing merry tunes. Among the prisoners still clad in scraps of their uniforms, Colonel Makako stood out by virtue of his disheartened expression. At the sight of Lady Arabella Cardigan, standing beside Sir Roderick Blakeley, he bellowed lugubriously while lifting his arms in the air.

Lady Arabella leaned towards the General, who smiled while making a sign. The liberated Makako was immediately placed in the hands of the astute Englishwoman.

Let us say at once, so that our readers should be in no doubt as to the fate of the ex-Colonel, that he now became part of Lady Cardigan’s household. Lady Arabella, true to her promise, had no wish to separate Makako’s destiny from hers. She took him with her to England, to the Cardigan estate, which Makako had deluded himself that he might one day visit as its master.

Unfortunately, Makako is not master there–far from it! At first, he was comfortably lodged in a barred cage in the depths of the great greenhouse of Cardigan Castle, but his submissiveness and misery soon resulted in his being permitted a measure of liberty. Makako is no longer in chains; he vegetates while dreamily indulging his delusions of grandeur and sadly polishing Lord Cardigan’s boots. He still sees Lady Arabella from time to time, when she deigns to grant him permission to fulfill the functions of a trusted domestic servant by carrying her letters to her on a silver platter.

Lady Arabella’s guests do not always treat him kindly, and Makako’s aristocratic heart groans. Despite his unhappiness, the old feudal spirit of the patrician monkey of Borneo still persists. Makako lords it over the servants, and still refuses disdainfully–for lack of time–to enter into communication with a reporter from a great Liberal newspaper, who contacted him in the hope of extracting a few interesting memoirs.

Let us return to Melbourne, where Dick Broken’s monkeys were defending themselves desperately.

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