Robert W. Chambers

The Maker of Moons and Other Short Stories

Warsaw 2022

Contents

The Maker of Moons

i

ii

iii

iv

v

vi

vii

viii

The Bridal Pair

The Case of Mr. Helmer

The Messenger

The Demoiselle D’Ys

i

ii

Out of the Depths

A Pleasant Evening

i

ii

iii

iv

The Purple Emperor

i

ii

iii

The Yellow Sign

The Maker of Moons

I am myself just as much evil as good, and my nation

is–And I say there is in fact no evil;

(Or if there is, I say it is just as important to you, to

the land, or to me, as anything else.)

Each is not for its own sake;

I say the whole earth, and all the stars in the sky are

for Religion’s sake.

I say no man has ever yet been half devout enough;

None has ever adored or worshipped half enough;

None has begun to think how divine he himself is, and

how certain the future is.–WALT WHITMAN

I have heard what the Talkers were talking–the talk

Of the beginning and the end;

But I do not talk of the beginning or the end.

Chapter i

Concerning Yue–Laou and the Xin I know nothing more than you shall know. I am miserably anxious to clear the matter up. Perhaps what I write may save the United Stares Government money and lives, perhaps it may arouse the scientific world to action; at any rate it will put an end to the terrible suspense of two people. Certainty is better than suspense.

If the Government dares to disregard this warning and refuses to send a thoroughly equipped expedition at once, the people of the State may take swift vengeance on the whole region and leave a blackened devastated waste where to-day forest and flowering meadow land border the lake in the Cardinal Woods.

You already know part of the story; the New York papers have been full of alleged details.

This much is true: Barris caught the “Shiner,” red handed, or rather yellow handed, for his pockets and boots and dirty fists were stuffed with lumps of gold. I say gold, advisedly. You may call it what you please. You also know how Barris was–but unless I begin at the beginning of my own experiences you will be none the wiser after all.

On the third of August of this present year I was standing in Tiffany’s, chatting with George Godfrey of the designing department. On the glass counter between us lay a coiled serpent, an exquisite specimen of chiselled gold.

“No,” replied Godfrey to my question, “it isn’t my work; I wish it was. Why, man, it’s a masterpiece!”

“Whose?” I asked... “Now I should be very glad to know also,” said Godfrey. “We bought it from an old jay who says he lives in the country somewhere about the Cardinal Woods. That’s near Starlit Lake, I believe–”

“Lake of the Stars?” I suggested.

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