Page:Chesterton - The Wisdom of Father Brown.djvu/46

THE WISDOM OF FATHER BROWN by the King of Italy, but by the King of Thieves. Who is the King of Thieves?"

"A great man," replied Muscari, "worthy to rank with your own Robin Hood, signorina. Montano, the King of Thieves, was first heard of in the mountains some ten years ago, when people said brigands were extinct. But his wild authority spread with the swiftness of a silent revolution. Men found his fierce proclamations nailed in every mountain village; his sentinels, gun in hand, in every mountain ravine. Six times the Italian Government tried to dislodge him; and was defeated in six pitched battles as if by Napoleon."

"Now that sort of thing," observed the banker weightily, "would never be allowed in England; perhaps after all we had better choose another route. But the courier thought it perfectly safe."

"It is perfectly safe," said the courier contemptuously; "I have been over it twenty times. There may have been some old jail-bird called a King in the time of our grandmothers; but he belongs to history, if not to fable. Brigandage is utterly stamped out."

"It can never be utterly stamped out," Muscari answered, "because armed revolt is a reaction natural to southerners. Our peasants are like the mountains, rich in grace and green gaiety, but with the fires beneath. There is a point of human 32