"But I am sympathising with you—I am——"
"Sympathising!" said the Emperor, still maintaining a posture of protection and defence; "what for? what over?"
"Your manly attempt to shoot James Bush," said Mr. Rodney, giving himself away with extraordinary indifference to the opinion of the civilised world on criminal affairs.
At the name the Emperor's manner changed. His black eyes blazed, and he shook the field-glass as if it had been a fist.
"It was him, then," he cried—"it was him as I saw through the telescope!"
"The telescope!" said Mr. Rodney, suddenly penetrated by a ray of light.
He turned rapidly in the wicker-chair, and threw a distracted glance towards the embrasure. In it, reposing upon a window-seat, was an enormous telescope. Mr. Rodney began to comprehend, and to see the necessity of reconsidering his position under these much less violent circumstances.
"Then you didn't fire at him?" he said, with an abrupt lamb-like serenity.
"Fire at him!" said the Emperor. "What are you talking about? When he went for Mrs. Lite's lilies I said I'd skin him; and so I would have, or telephoned Mr. Harrison to, if he hadn't dropped into the ground for all the world like a mole or a badger. I don't know where he went to, though I had my eye to the telescope, and Mrs. Lite she was looking through the field-glasses."