Chapter 144: Order No. of the Lunar Statistical Bureau
Chapter 144 The Lunestat One Order
36 Lancaster Gate, Bayswater District, London.
Night was falling and the stars were filling the sky.
The breeze whipped over Hyde Park, drawing the branches of the maple and birch trees to tremble in unison.
In the dining room on the first floor, the long, ivory-white table was filled with steaming dishes.
Dumas pointed to the plate covered with an iron lid in front of him and proudly introduced today’s dinner to the people holding forks and knives.
“Gentlemen, and ladies who exist in my fantasies, allow me to proudly present to you, the main course of the day!”
Darwin urged impatiently, having been thoroughly impressed by Dumas’ superior cooking skills for the past few days.
“Alexander, don’t sell yourself short, what exactly is for dinner tonight?”
Elder hemmed and hawed as he spoke with one eyebrow raised, “What we’re eating tonight is something good. After Fatty and I went to the West End to watch the theater, we had planned to take our shotguns and go to the countryside to take our chances, but it didn’t work out that the two of us really caught a good thing!”
Dumas sniffed and couldn’t help but glare at Elder, “Originally I should have scolded you severely, but on the basis that you fought your way into the river to catch the prey today, this matter is over.”
Elder bit into his spoon and spoke, “Come on, Fatty, you’re quick. I’ve been looking forward to this meal since I got home, so hurry up and lift the lid or the meat will get cold.”
Dumas sniffed, but did not procrastinate, he uncovered the lid, only to see white steam rumbling up, floating golden oil flowers of the soup pot was suddenly presented in front of everyone.
He cleared his throat and spoke, “Allow me to introduce you to this grand meal – Uxelles Sauce with Black Swan Stewed White Radish!”
Arthur, who was originally reading the newspaper with his teacup, shuddered in shock when he heard this and almost spilled his black tea in his pants pocket.
“Black swan stew with white carrots?” Arthur put down the newspaper and stretched his head to look at the soup pot, “Where did you get the swan from?”
Darwin was also taken aback by the name, he winced and his face changed color, “Eldad! Alexander doesn’t know the rules, don’t you know them too? Why don’t you persuade him a little? Don’t you know that all the swans in all of Great Britain are owned by the Crown?”
Dumas froze at his words, “Why do you Brits always have such weird rules?”
Elder also changed his color, and while winking at Dumas, he opened his mouth to stir, “What black swan? Alexander, can you stop talking nonsense! This is clearly a duck! Didn’t we all agree before?”
At that, he lifted his spoon and pulled out a piece of meat from the soup pot, pointing at it and blurting out, “Besides, if you ask it, is it a swan? It looks like a wild duck at a glance! Charles, how can you call yourself a naturalist when you can’t tell a duck from a swan? If ducks and swans are the same thing, are you and monkeys the same species?”
Darwin’s face reddened by Elder’s words, he snatched the spoon, picked up the piece of meat and threw it into his mouth, and just after chewing it for a couple of mouthfuls, he cursed angrily with his eyes wide open, “Elder, do you think that I haven’t eaten duck before? Can this thing not be a goose?”
Seeing this, Elder had the bright idea of pointing at Darwin to reveal to Arthur, “Nah, Arthur, you saw it all. Charles ate His Majesty’s swan.”
Seeing this, Arthur also had to put down the newspaper and spoke at Darwin in a difficult manner, “Charles, I know this may be a bit difficult. But if you’re not willing to change your mind, I’ll just have to put in a temporary extra shift and put you in a cell at Scotland Yard. But don’t worry, I’ve seen this week’s cell menu, it’s all brown bread with potatoes, not as good as black swan stew with white carrots, but it’s not starvation.”
Hearing this, Darwin’s rising anger had to be forcibly suppressed, he scratched his ‘wisdom heights’ where the vegetation was getting thinner and thinner, smacked his lips twice, and inquired in a heartfelt probing manner.
“Could it be that what I’m eating is really duck.”
Arthur nodded rather sympathetically, “Charles, you’re young and we allow you to make mistakes. Let alone misrecognizing a duck and a swan, I’m willing to give you full understanding even if you say Elder became a monkey.”
Hearing this, Darwin could only raise his hand to cover his eyes as he said with a clear conscience, “It is indeed a duck, not a swan.”
Dumas gave an uncomfortable grimace, “You Englishmen are just a pain in the ass. All the swans in the country are royal, and with rules like that, those who don’t know think I’m in the Middle Ages. In France, we all keep the things like dogs, it’s not like they’re golden.”
Arthur loosened his neck and spoke, “You’re really right, this is indeed a law passed down from the Middle Ages. It’s just that Parliament has been too lazy to amend it, and no one wants to touch His Majesty’s mold. After all, the king of England is now on the verge of becoming a mascot, and to touch the royal family’s sensitive nerves due to their shrinking power over such a trivial matter is really not a wise move for a mature politician.”
Dumas served himself a bowl of soup, “Why don’t you guys revamp a Civil Code like Napoleon did? It’s simple, straightforward, and easily accessible. With all due respect, a modern country with medieval laws sounds like a joke.
I now somewhat understand why your judge looks so much at past precedents, perhaps he simply doesn’t want to rummage through a pile of rags to find centuries-old laws. Maybe if they rummage around, they’ll even find the Shroud of Jesus in there.”
As he spoke, he picked up a soup ladle to fish the meat out of the bowl, when suddenly, Dumas frowned, “Why does the portion feel wrong? Arthur, are there rats in the house?”
Arthur glanced at the red devil leaning on the windowsill who was peacefully burping, and the book case with the dodo cover painted in his cupped hands, and just shook his head slightly.
He lifted his fork to bring his own portion of swan into his mouth, frowning as he savored its flavor, “Doesn’t this taste like a regular goose?”
Speaking of this, Arthur couldn’t help but turn his mouth again and ask, “Alexander, by the way, have you finished writing your manuscript yet?”
Dumas returned nonchalantly, “Didn’t I go out with Elder today?”
“And yesterday?”
“Yesterday? Yesterday was more fun.” Dumas spoke cheerfully, “Yesterday I finished my lunch and went to the Speaker’s Corner in Hyde Park to kill time and find inspiration. As a result, I bumped into a very interesting guy over there, and his speech gathered a very large audience. Even a lot of street vendors couldn’t resist dropping what they were doing and standing outside the fence to listen to the content of his speech, and the expressions that surfaced on their faces made it clear at first glance that they weren’t paid to do so.”
When Arthur heard this, he immediately felt that something was wrong.
He picked up a dishcloth and wiped his mouth, “Really? What was the content of his speech?”
“It’s really no big deal, nothing more than encouraging workers to take the initiative to fight for their rights and persuading factory owners to lower their working hours. By the way, he also advocated for the establishment of pre-school education to allow school-age children to enter schools and whatnot.”
Arthur took a sip of tea and spoke, “I probably know who you’re talking about. That speaker, it’s Mr. Robert Owen, right? He has been traveling around conducting various political activities and leading the workers’ movement since he returned to England last year.”
Dumas froze, “You know him? Wow, but yeah, I almost forgot, you’re a Scotland Yard policeman. I’d be surprised if you didn’t know him. In France, Mr. Irving would have been invited to talk to the Paris police. Damn it! Perhaps I shouldn’t be talking to you about this. Now that you know he’s giving a talk in Hyde Park, I suppose you’re going to kick him out to-morrow?”
“Drive him away? That’s not so bad.” Arthur held his teacup and said, “Although I’ve always thought of Britain as a cesspool, the beauty of a cesspool is that anything can be thrown into it. If that were not the case, how could you, a republican in your own right, live in Britain, which is a constitutional monarchy?
Perhaps Mr. Owen’s ideas are a bit of a novelty for the authorities, but as long as they don’t pose enough of a danger, he can stay here.
Like I said before, the King is fast becoming a mascot, so the old thing of arresting people based solely on their personal likes and dislikes doesn’t work now.
Not to mention that there’s also a small group of MPs in Parliament who support some of Mr. Owen’s views, and MPs are partly in favor of lowering working hours and establishing underage education, in addition to disagreeing with the arguments for communal ownership of property.”
Elder sniffed and also recoiled, “Why should there be public ownership of property? I’ve been floating my money around on a boat day in and day out! I don’t want to take the fruits of my labor and distribute them to those Irish drunks who have nothing better to do.”
Arthur asked again, “And what if it was for you and your uncle to have a little communal property?”
“With my uncle?” Elder’s eyes lit up and he slapped the table, “Why didn’t I think of that! So there’s an option for the property commons?”
Darwin sniffed and helplessly shrugged his shoulders, “Elder, that’s not called public ownership of property, that’s called roadblock robbery. And it’s still both not wanting to move the knife, but also wanting to rob your uncle’s money.”
“Heh!” Elder rolled his eyes, “After making half a day, this Robert Owen is still not trying to take my hard earned money to feed those rude Irishmen.”
Hearing this, Dumas couldn’t help but ask at Arthur with interest, “I thought you weren’t interested in this issue, but I didn’t realize you actually knew so much about it.”
Arthur leaned back in his chair and stretched, “It’s just a job requirement. After all, what’s a Superintendent of Police for if you don’t even know your potential job targets? Something like arresting people in handcuffs can be done by just about anyone.”
Seeing that he started to snort again, Dumas didn’t give him any room to press further, “So what do you think about this whole public ownership of property thing?”
Arthur just smiled, “I’m a Scotland Yard cop, I have no personal political views.”
“Do you?” Dumas was rather disappointed, “I thought you were different from the other policemen. But yes, how could I have gotten the illusion that there are good people in the police?”
Hearing this, Arthur sipped his tea and said, “However, I can paraphrase some of the others, such as John Locke’s famous quote.”
“Whoa? What did he say?”
Arthur smiled and put down his teacup, “Property cannot be publicly owned, and power cannot be privately owned. Although I feel that Mr. Locke is perhaps a bit too absolute in saying this, but if it is said the other way around, if property is publicly owned, it will result in privately owned power, which is not another novel understanding.
Mr. Irving’s ideal is certainly beautiful, but he has been working on public farms in the Americas for several years, and we have all seen what he has done in the end. Perhaps the beautiful new world he talks about can be realized one day, but I am pessimistic that I will never see that day.
Therefore, rather than his grandiose slogans, I would rather look at the several motions he has actually proposed, such as lowering the working hours and establishing skills schools for the youth. If these were to come to fruition, I think the problem of underage crime in the London area at least would be greatly alleviated.”
Hearing this, the Red Devil on the sidelines couldn’t help but laugh and rub his hands together as he stepped forward, “Wow! My dear Arthur, how could you not see that day? Heaven will be right in front of your eyes if you want it to be.”
Arthur sniffed and just sipped his tea, “Anyone who promises heaven to mankind tends to bring hell to earth. I don’t harbor any illusions about heaven because I know what kind of world I live in.”
Dumas smiled thoughtfully as he spoke, “Would you be interested in going with me tomorrow to hear Mr. Irving’s speech?”
Arthur smiled and drew a letter from the bag hanging behind him, a document from the Ministry of the Interior.
“Actually, I’d go if you didn’t invite me, it’s a priority for me for some time to come.”
Dumas’ eyebrows jumped as he vaguely saw the word ‘top secret’ on that document.
“You’re going to spy on Mr. Irving? Isn’t freedom your favorite thing to talk about, you limeys? Is this British freedom?”
Arthur began by writing a few lines on the paper, then glanced at him.
He smiled and rested his hand on the dining table, crossing his fingers and dragging his chin, “What do you think? Alexander? Freedom isn’t about doing whatever you want, it’s about not doing whatever you want. Besides, it’s a little better for me to keep an eye on Mr. Owen than to hand it over to the War Department’s military police, isn’t it?”
(End of chapter)