Having climbed over log and boulder to a road which cleft the mountain, he kept on to the north, descending again presently to the level of the camp, smoking abstractedly and whistling now and then for Richard Whittington, who was prone to ramble.  Philip was debating whether or not he had better turn back, for the moon was already edging the black ravine with fire, when a camp fire and the silhouette of a lonely camper loomed to the west among the trees.  Philip puffed forth a prodigious cloud of smoke and seated himself on a tree stump.

“My!  My!” said he easily.  “Must be our invalid and his rumpus machine.  Whittington, we’re just in the mood to-night, you and I, to wander over there and tell him that he’s not getting half so much over on us as he thinks he is.  I’ve a mind to send you forward with my card.”

Philip’s eyes narrowed and he laughed softly.  Tearing a sheet of paper from a notebook he took from his pocket, he scribbled upon it the following astonishing message: 

“The Duke of Connecticut desires an audience.  Do not kick the courier!”

Accustomed by now to carry birch-bark messages to Diane, Richard Whittington waggled in perfect understanding and trotted off obediently toward the fire with Philip close at his heels.

Conceivably astonished, the camper presently picked up the paper which Mr. Whittington dropped at his feet, and read it.  As Philip stepped lazily from the trees he turned.

It was Baron Tregar.  Both men stared.

“The Duke of Connecticut!” at length rumbled the Baron with perfect gravity.  “I am overwhelmed.”

Philip, much the more astonished of the two, laughed and bowed.

“Excellency,” said he formally, “I am indeed astonished.”

“Pray be seated!” invited the Baron, his eyes more friendly than those of his guest.  “I, too, have taken to the highway, Poynter, on yonder motorcycle and I have lost my way.”  He sniffed in disgust.  “I am dining,” he added dryly, “if one may dignify the damnable proceeding by that name, on potatoes which I do not in the least know how to bake without reducing them to cinders.  I bought them a while back at a desolate, God-forsaken farmhouse.  Heaven deliver me from camping!”

With which pious ejaculation the Baron inspected his smudged and blistered fingers and read again the entertaining message from the Duke of Connecticut.

“Why take to the highway,” begged Philip guilelessly, “when the task is so unpleasant?”

“Ah!” rumbled the Baron, more sombre now, “there is a man with a music-machine—­”

“There is!” said Philip fervently.

The Baron looked hard at His Highness, the Duke of Connecticut.  The latter produced his cigarette case and opening it politely for the service of his chief, smiled with good humor.

“There is,” said he coolly, “a man with a music-machine, a mysterious malady, a stained skin and a volume of Herodotus!  Excellency knows the—­er—­romantic ensemble?”