CHAPTER IV

He was called Loulou. His body was green, his head blue, the tips of

his wings were pink and his breast was golden.

But he had the tiresome tricks of biting his perch, pulling his

feathers out, scattering refuse and spilling the water of his bath.

Madame Aubain grew tired of him and gave him to Felicite for good.

She undertook his education, and soon he was able to repeat: "Pretty

boy! Your servant, sir! I salute you, Marie!" His perch was placed

near the door and several persons were astonished that he did not

answer to the name of "Jacquot," for every parrot is called Jacquot.

They called him a goose and a log, and these taunts were like so many

dagger thrusts to Felicite. Strange stubbornness of the bird which

would not talk when people watched him!

Nevertheless, he sought society; for on Sunday, when the ladies

Rochefeuille, Monsieur de Houppeville and the new habitues, Onfroy,

the chemist, Monsieur Varin and Captain Mathieu, dropped in for their

game of cards, he struck the window-panes with his wings and made such

a racket that it was impossible to talk.

Bourais' face must have appeared very funny to Loulou. As soon as he

saw him he would begin to roar. His voice re-echoed in the yard, and

the neighbours would come to the windows and begin to laugh, too; and

in order that the parrot might not see him, Monsieur Bourais edged

along the wall, pushed his hat over his eyes to hide his profile, and

entered by the garden door, and the looks he gave the bird lacked

affection. Loulou, having thrust his head into the butcher-boy's

basket, received a slap, and from that time he always tried to nip his

enemy. Fabu threatened to ring his neck, although he was not cruelly

inclined, notwithstanding his big whiskers and tattooings. On the

contrary, he rather liked the bird, and, out of devilry, tried to

teach him oaths. Felicite, whom his manner alarmed, put Loulou in the

kitchen, took off his chain and let him walk all over the house.

When he went downstairs, he rested his beak on the steps, lifted his

right foot and then his left one; but his mistress feared that such

feats would give him vertigo. He became ill and was unable to eat.

There was a small growth under his tongue like those chickens are

sometimes afflicted with. Felicite pulled it off with her nails and

cured him. One day, Paul was imprudent enough to blow the smoke of his

cigar in his face; another time, Madame Lormeau was teasing him with

the tip of her umbrella and he swallowed the tip. Finally he got lost.

She had put him on the grass to cool him and went away only for a

second; when she returned, she found no parrot! She hunted among the

bushes, on the bank of the river, and on the roofs, without paying any

attention to Madame Aubain who screamed at her: "Take care! you must

be insane!" Then she searched every garden in Pont-l'Eveque and

stopped the passers-by to inquire of them: "Haven't you perhaps seen

my parrot?" To those who had never seen the parrot, she described him

minutely. Suddenly she thought she saw something green fluttering

behind the mills at the foot of the hill. But when she was at the top

of the hill she could not see it. A hod-carrier told her that he had

just seen the bird in Saint-Melaine, in Mother Simon's store. She

rushed to the place. The people did not know what she was talking

about. At last she came home, exhausted, with her slippers worn to

shreds, and despair in her heart. She sat down on the bench near

Madame and was telling of her search when presently a light weight

dropped on her shoulder--Loulou! What the deuce had he been doing?

Perhaps he had just taken a little walk around the town!

She did not easily forget her scare; in fact, she never got over it.

In consequence of a cold, she caught a sore throat; and some time

later she had an earache. Three years later she was stone deaf, and

spoke in a very loud voice even in church. Although her sins might

have been proclaimed throughout the diocese without any shame to

herself, or ill effects to the community, the cure thought it

advisable to receive her confession in the vestry-room.

Imaginary buzzings also added to her bewilderment. Her mistress often

said to her: "My goodness, how stupid you are!" and she would answer:

"Yes, Madame," and look for something.

The narrow circle of her ideas grew more restricted than it already

was; the bellowing of the oxen, the chime of the bells no longer

reached her intelligence. All things moved silently, like ghosts. Only

one noise penetrated her ears; the parrot's voice.

As if to divert her mind, he reproduced for her the tick-tack of the

spit in the kitchen, the shrill cry of the fish-vendors, the saw of

the carpenter who had a shop opposite, and when the door-bell rang, he

would imitate Madame Aubain: "Felicite! go to the front door."

They held conversations together, Loulou repeating the three phrases

of his repertory over and over, Felicite replying by words that had no

greater meaning, but in which she poured out her feelings. In her

isolation, the parrot was almost a son, a love. He climbed upon her

fingers, pecked at her lips, clung to her shawl, and when she rocked

her head to and fro like a nurse, the big wings of her cap and the

wings of the bird flapped in unison. When clouds gathered on the

horizon and the thunder rumbled, Loulou would scream, perhaps because

he remembered the storms in his native forests. The dripping of the

rain would excite him to frenzy; he flapped around, struck the ceiling

with his wings, upset everything, and would finally fly into the

garden to play. Then he would come back into the room, light on one of

the andirons, and hop around in order to get dry.

One morning during the terrible winter of 1837, when she had put him

in front of the fire-place on account of the cold, she found him dead

in his cage, hanging to the wire bars with his head down. He had

probably died of congestion. But she believed that he had been

poisoned, and although she had no proofs whatever, her suspicion

rested on Fabu.

She wept so sorely that her mistress said: "Why don't you have him

stuffed?"

She asked the advice of the chemist, who had always been kind to the

bird.

He wrote to Havre for her. A certain man named Fellacher consented to

do the work. But, as the diligence driver often lost parcels entrusted

to him, Felicite resolved to take her pet to Honfleur herself.

Leafless apple-trees lined the edges of the road. The ditches were

covered with ice. The dogs on the neighbouring farms barked; and

Felicite, with her hands beneath her cape, her little black sabots and

her basket, trotted along nimbly in the middle of the sidewalk. She

crossed the forest, passed by the Haut-Chene, and reached Saint-

Gatien.

Behind her, in a cloud of dust and impelled by the steep incline, a

mail-coach drawn by galloping horses advanced like a whirlwind. When

he saw a woman in the middle of the road, who did not get out of the

way, the driver stood up in his seat and shouted to her and so did the

postilion, while the four horses, which he could not hold back,

accelerated their pace; the two leaders were almost upon her; with a

jerk of the reins he threw them to one side, but, furious at the

incident, he lifted his big whip and lashed her from her head to her

feet with such violence that she fell to the ground unconscious.

Her first thought, when she recovered her senses, was to open the

basket. Loulou was unharmed. She felt a sting on her right cheek; when

she took her hand away it was red, for the blood was flowing.

She sat down on a pile of stones, and sopped her cheek with her

handkerchief; then she ate a crust of bread she had put in her basket,

and consoled herself by looking at the bird.

Arriving at the top of Ecquemanville, she saw the lights of Honfleur

shining in the distance like so many stars; further on, the ocean

spread out in a confused mass. Then a weakness came over her; the

misery of her childhood, the disappointment of her first love, the

departure of her nephew, the death of Virginia; all these things came

back to her at once, and, rising like a swelling tide in her throat,

almost choked her.

Then she wished to speak to the captain of the vessel, and without

stating what she was sending, she gave him some instructions.

Fellacher kept the parrot a long time. He always promised that it

would be ready for the following week; after six months he announced

the shipment of a case, and that was the end of it. Really, it seemed

as if Loulou would never come back to his home. "They have stolen

him," thought Felicite.

Finally he arrived, sitting bold upright on a branch which could be

screwed into a mahogany pedestal, with his foot in the air, his head

on one side, and in his beak a nut which the naturalist, from love of

the sumptuous, had gilded. She put him in her room.

This place, to which only a chosen few were admitted, looked like a

chapel and a second-hand shop, so filled was it with devotional and

heterogeneous things. The door could not be opened easily on account

of the presence of a large wardrobe. Opposite the window that looked

out into the garden, a bull's-eye opened on the yard; a table was

placed by the cot and held a wash-basin, two combs, and a piece of

blue soap in a broken saucer. On the walls were rosaries, medals, a

number of Holy Virgins, and a holy-water basin made out of a cocoanut;

on the bureau, which was covered with a napkin like an altar, stood

the box of shells that Victor had given her; also a watering-can and a

balloon, writing-books, the engraved geography and a pair of shoes; on

the nail which held the mirror, hung Virginia's little plush hat!

Felicite carried this sort of respect so far that she even kept one of

Monsieur's old coats. All the things which Madame Aubain discarded,

Felicite begged for her own room. Thus, she had artificial flowers on

the edge of the bureau, and the picture of the Comte d'Artois in the

recess of the window. By means of a board, Loulou was set on a portion

of the chimney which advanced into the room. Every morning when she

awoke, she saw him in the dim light of dawn and recalled bygone days

and the smallest details of insignificant actions, without any sense

of bitterness or grief.

As she was unable to communicate with people, she lived in a sort of

somnambulistic torpor. The processions of Corpus-Christi Day seemed to

wake her up. She visited the neighbours to beg for candlesticks and

mats so as to adorn the temporary altars in the street.

In church, she always gazed at the Holy Ghost, and noticed that there

was something about it that resembled a parrot. The likenesses

appeared even more striking on a coloured picture by Espinal,

representing the baptism of our Saviour. With his scarlet wings and

emerald body, it was really the image of Loulou. Having bought the

picture, she hung it near the one of the Comte d'Artois so that she

could take them in at one glance.

They associated in her mind, the parrot becoming sanctified through

the neighbourhood of the Holy Ghost, and the latter becoming more

lifelike in her eyes, and more comprehensible. In all probability the

Father had never chosen as messenger a dove, as the latter has no

voice, but rather one of Loulou's ancestors. And Felicite said her

prayers in front of the coloured picture, though from time to time she

turned slightly towards the bird.

She desired very much to enter in the ranks of the "Daughters of the

Virgin." But Madame Aubain dissuaded her from it.

A most important event occurred: Paul's marriage.

After being first a notary's clerk, then in business, then in the

customs, and a tax collector, and having even applied for a position

in the administration of woods and forests, he had at last, when he

was thirty-six years old, by a divine inspiration, found his vocation:

registrature! and he displayed such a high ability that an inspector

had offered him his daughter and his influence.

Paul, who had become quite settled, brought his bride to visit his

mother.

But she looked down upon the customs of Pont-l'Eveque, put on airs,

and hurt Felicite's feelings. Madame Aubain felt relieved when she

left.

The following week they learned of Monsieur Bourais' death in an inn.

There were rumours of suicide, which were confirmed; doubts concerning

his integrity arose. Madame Aubain looked over her accounts and soon

discovered his numerous embezzlements; sales of wood which had been

concealed from her, false receipts, etc. Furthermore, he had an

illegitimate child, and entertained a friendship for "a person in

Dozule."

These base actions affected her very much. In March, 1853, she

developed a pain in her chest; her tongue looked as if it were coated

with smoke, and the leeches they applied did not relieve her

oppression; and on the ninth evening she died, being just seventy-two

years old.

People thought that she was younger, because her hair, which she wore

in bands framing her pale face, was brown. Few friends regretted her

loss, for her manner was so haughty that she did not attract them.

Felicite mourned for her as servants seldom mourn for their masters.

The fact that Madame should die before herself perplexed her mind and

seemed contrary to the order of things, and absolutely monstrous and

inadmissible. Ten days later (the time to journey from Besancon), the

heirs arrived. Her daughter-in-law ransacked the drawers, kept some of

the furniture, and sold the rest; then they went back to their own

home.

Madame's armchair, foot-warmer, work-table, the eight chairs,

everything was gone! The places occupied by the pictures formed yellow

squares on the walls. They had taken the two little beds, and the

wardrobe had been emptied of Virginia's belongings! Felicite went

upstairs, overcome with grief.

The following day a sign was posted on the door; the chemist screamed

in her ear that the house was for sale.

For a moment she tottered, and had to sit down.

What hurt her most was to give up her room,--so nice for poor Loulou!

She looked at him in despair and implored the Holy Ghost, and it was

this way that she contracted the idolatrous habit of saying her

prayers kneeling in front of the bird. Sometimes the sun fell through

the window on his glass eye, and lighted a spark in it which sent

Felicite into ecstasy.

Her mistress had left her an income of three hundred and eighty

francs. The garden supplied her with vegetables. As for clothes, she

had enough to last her till the end of her days, and she economised on

the light by going to bed at dusk.

She rarely went out, in order to avoid passing in front of the second-

hand dealer's shop where there was some of the old furniture. Since

her fainting spell, she dragged her leg, and as her strength was

failing rapidly, old Mother Simon, who had lost her money in the

grocery business, came very morning to chop the wood and pump the

water.

Her eyesight grew dim. She did not open the shutters after that. Many

years passed. But the house did not sell or rent. Fearing that she

would be put out, Felicite did not ask for repairs. The laths of the

roof were rotting away, and during one whole winter her bolster was

wet. After Easter she spit blood.

Then Mother Simon went for a doctor. Felicite wished to know what her

complaint was. But, being too deaf to hear, she caught only one word:

"Pneumonia." She was familiar with it and gently answered:--"Ah! like

Madame," thinking it quite natural that she should follow her

mistress.

The time for the altars in the street drew near.

The first one was always erected at the foot of the hill, the second

in front of the post-office, and the third in the middle of the

street. This position occasioned some rivalry among the women and they

finally decided upon Madame Aubain's yard.

Felicite's fever grew worse. She was sorry that she could not do

anything for the altar. If she could, at least, have contributed

something towards it! Then she thought of the parrot. Her neighbours

objected that it would not be proper. But the cure gave his consent

and she was so grateful for it that she begged him to accept after her

death, her only treasure, Loulou. From Tuesday until Saturday, the day

before the event, she coughed more frequently. In the evening her face

was contracted, her lips stuck to her gums and she began to vomit; and

on the following day, she felt so low that she called for a priest.

Three neighbours surrounded her when the dominie administered the

Extreme Unction. Afterwards she said that she wished to speak to Fabu.

He arrived in his Sunday clothes, very ill at ease among the funereal

surroundings.

"Forgive me," she said, making an effort to extend her arm, "I

believed it was you who killed him!"

What did such accusations mean? Suspect a man like him of murder! And

Fabu became excited and was about to make trouble.

"Don't you see she is not in her right mind?"

From time to time Felicite spoke to shadows. The women left her and

Mother Simon sat down to breakfast.

A little later, she took Loulou and holding him up to Felicite:

"Say good-bye to him, now!" she commanded.

Although he was not a corpse, he was eaten up by worms; one of his

wings was broken and the wadding was coming out of his body. But

Felicite was blind now, and she took him and laid him against her

cheek. Then Mother Simon removed him in order to set him on the altar.