Crowded Out! and Other Sketches Part 2

The people now came fast and furious through the square, increasing in numbers every moment, but through the bustle and hurry and clatter of tongues, we could hear a woman's voice screaming in evident distress.

Mingled with it was another sound which may have mystified the general crowd, but which De k.o.c.k and I could easily place.

"It is the parrot!" I exclaimed, as we started to run.

"You have your wish, _mon cher_, is it not so? But take it not so fast; we will be there in time. _Ciel_! What a row!"

The steps leading up to the restaurant were thronged with people, including two or three policemen. The dining-room was ablaze with light, and still full of visitors, most of whom, however, were moving about in a state of agitation. The upper windows were also lighted and wide open.

The screaming suddenly ceased, but not the parrot.

"For goodness sake don't say I told you!" It went on, louder than ever, over and over again.

"d.a.m.n the bird!" exclaimed De k.o.c.k. "Policeman excuse me, but I am rather at home here. Let me go up, will you?"

"It looks bad, sir. I'd better keep behind."

"Oh. It isn't murder or anything of that sort. I know them, pretty couple, they are!"

The next moment we were in a kind of sitting room over the restaurant proper. Madame Martinetti lay as if exhausted on a sofa while the highly excited parrot sang and screamed and tore at its cage as if for life.

Giuseppe was nowhere visible. "Now then where's the other?" demanded the policeman who had just entered behind us, "There's always two at this business. Show him up, now." But Madame at first would deign no explanation. Presently on the entry of policeman No. 2 she admitted there had been a quarrel. Yes, she had quarrelled with her dear Giuseppe, (the officers grinned) and had driven him away. Yes, he had gone--gone forever, he had said so, never to come back, never, never!

"And leave this fine business to you, eh? No fear of that. I guess Mr.

Martinetti'll turn up all right in the morning, however, let us make a search, Joe." But Giuseppe was not found; there were no traces of a struggle, and the policemen having done all they could retired. My friend and I, by what right I know not were the last to leave the room.

De k.o.c.k stood for some moments looking out of the window. I approached the parrot who was still screaming.

"If throwing a cloth over your head would stop you, I'd do it, my dear," said I. To my surprise, it ceased its noise directly, and became perfectly quiet. Madame Martinetti looked around with a contemptuous smile.

"You have the secret as well," said she. The bird turned to her and then returned to me. I became quite interested in it. "Pretty Poll, pretty bird; would you like a cracker?"

De k.o.c.k laughed softly at the window. "A cracker to such a bird as that!

Ask it another." I actually, though with a timid air, opened the door of the cage and invited Polly to perch on my finger. She came, looking at me intensely all the while. I petted her little, which she took resignedly and with a faint show of wonder, then in answer to De k.o.c.k's summons put her back in the cage.

"I have the honour to wish madame a _bonsoir_," said he, but the lady was still sulky and vouchsafed no answer.

We were soon out in the street.

"Do you know," said De k.o.c.k slowly, lighting a cigar and looking up at the house, "Do you know, I thought something had happened."

"And don't you now."

"I am not sure," answered my friend.

CHAPTER II.

We were pardonably curious to see the papers next morning. The affair was dismissed in three lines, and although as De k.o.c.k swore, the case was one for Gaboriau, it certainly was not our business to look into it and in fact in a week's time I was back in Canada, and he up to his eyes in commercial pursuits. The main point remained clear, however, that Martinetti did _not_ come back, nor was he found, or traced or ever heard of again. Somebody took the business out of hand, as they say, and De k.o.c.k would occasionally write a P. S. to his letters like this--"Dined at poor Martinetti's, Chiante as usual. Ever yours." Or it would be--"Drank to the production of your last new comedy at Martinetti's." Once he stated that shortly after that memorable night Madame disappeared also, taking the parrot along. "I begin to think they are a pair of deep ones and up to some big game" he wrote. For myself, I never entirely forgot the circ.u.mstance, although it was but once vividly recalled to my mind and that was in a theatre in Montreal. An American company from one of the New York theatres was performing some farcical comedy or other in which occurred the comic song, admirably sung and acted by Miss Kate Castleton, "For goodness sake don't say I told you!"

The reminiscences forced upon me quite spoiled my enjoyment; I could see that pale, nervous woman, hear her screams, and hear too the fearful voice of the poor parrot. Where is it now, thought I? That same winter I was much occupied in making studies of the different cla.s.ses of people among the French-Canadians. The latter turn up everywhere in Montreal, and have a distinct "local color" about them which I was curious to get and hope to preserve for use some future day. I went everywhere and talked to everybody who might be of use to me; cabmen, porters, fruit dealers and tobacconists. I found much to interest me in the various Catholic inst.i.tutions, and I was above all very fond of visiting the large, ugly gray building with the air of a penitentiary about it called the Grey Nunnery. Going through its corridors one day I took a wrong turning and found I was among some at least quasi-private rooms. The doors being open I saw that there were flowers, books, a warm rug on the floor of one and a mirror on the wall of another. The third I ventured to step inside of, for a really beautiful Madonna and child confronted me at the door. The next moment I saw what I had not expected to see--a parrot in a cage suspended from the window! I made quite sure that it was not _the_ parrot before I went up to it. It was asleep and appeared to be all over of a dull grey color, to match the Nuns, one might have said. I stood for quite a little while regarding it. Suddenly it stirred, shook itself, awoke and seeing me, immediately broke out into frantic shrieks to the old refrain "And for goodness sake don't say I told you."

So it was the parrot after all! Of that I felt sure, despite the changed color, not only because of the same words being repeated--two birds might easily learn the same song, but because of the bird's manner. For I felt certain that the thing knew me, recognized me, as we say of human beings or of dogs and horses. I felt an extraordinary sensation coming over me and sat down for a moment. I seemed literally to be in the presence of something incomprehensible as I watched the poor excited bird beating about and singing in that way. The words of the song became painfully and awfully significant--"for goodness sake don't say I told you!" They were an appeal to my pity, to my sense of honor, to my power of secrecy, for I felt convinced that the bird had seen something--in fact that, to use De k.o.c.k's convenient if ambiguous phrase, _something had happened_! Then to think of its recognizing me too, after so long an interval! What an extraordinary thing to do! But I remembered, and hope I shall never forget, how exceeding small do the mills of the G.o.ds grind for poor humanity. I would have examined the creature at once more closely had not two of the nuns appeared with pious hands lifted in horror at the noise. They knew me slightly but affected displeasure at the present moment.

"Who owns this bird?" said I. It was still screaming.

"The good Sister Felicite. It is her room."

"Can I see her?"

"Ah! _non_. She is ill, so very ill. She will not live long, _cette pauvre soeur_!"

I reflected. "Will you give her this paper without fail when I have written upon it what I wish?"

"_Mais oui, Monsieur_!"

In the presence of the two holy women standing with their hands devoutly crossed, and of the parrot whom I silenced as well as I could, and in truth I appeared to have some influence over the creature, I wrote the following upon a leaf torn out of my scratch-book: "To the Soeur Felicite. A gentleman who, if he has not made a great mistake, saw you once when you were Mdme. Martinetti, asks you now if in what may be your last moments, you have anything to tell, anything to declare, or anybody to pardon. He would also ask--what _was done to the parrot_? He, with his friend M. De k.o.c.k, were at your house in New York the night your husband disappeared."

"Give her that," said I to the waiting sister, "and I will come to see how she is to-morrow."

That night, however, she died, and when I reached the nunnery next day it was only to be told that she had read my note and with infinite difficulty written an answer to it.

"I am sorry I should have perhaps hastened her end," said I. "Before you give it to me, will you permit me to see her?"

"_Mais oui, Monsieur_, if monsieur will come this way."

Until I gazed upon the dead I did not feel quite sure of the ident.i.ty of this pious Sister of Charity. But I only needed to look once upon the ghastly pallor, the ugly lip mark and the long slender figure on the bed before me to recognize her who had once been Mdme. Martinetti.

"And now for the paper," I said.

"It will be in the room that was hers, if monsieur will accompany." We walked along several corridors till we reached the room in which hung the parrot, I quite expected it to fly at me again and try to get rid of its miserable secret But no! It sat on its stick, perfectly quiet and rational.

"I cannot find dat paper, it is very strange!" muttered the good sister, turning everything over and over. A light wind playing about the room had perhaps blown it into some corner. I a.s.sisted her in the search.

"It surely was in an envelope?" I said to the innocent woman.

"Yes monsieur, yes, and with a seal, for I got the _cire_--you call it _wax_--myself and held it for her, _la bonne soeur_."

"It is not always wise to leave such letters about," I put in as meekly as I could "Where was it you saw it last?"

"On dees little table, monsieur."

Now, "dees little table" was between the two windows, and not far, consequently from the parrot's cage. My eye travelled from the table to the cage as a matter of necessity, and I saw that the bottom of it was strewn with something white--like very, very tiny sc.r.a.ps of paper. "I think you need not look any further," said I. "Polly, you either are very clever, or else you are a lunatic and a fool. Which is it?"

But I never found out The parrot had got the letter by some means or other and so effectually torn, bitten and made away with it that nothing remained of it for identification except the wax, which it did not touch and left absolutely whole. The secret which had been the parrot's all along belonged to the parrot still, and after having devoured it in that fas.h.i.+on it became satisfied, and never--at least, as far as I am aware--reverted morbidly to the comic refrain which has but one significance for me.

I took the bird and kept it. I have it now with me. It has been examined hundreds of times; for a long time I was anxious to know the secret of its changed color, but I have never deciphered it. It is healthy, in good condition, sweet-tempered and very fond of me. It does not talk much, but its talk is innocent and rational. No morbid symptoms have ever appeared in it since I took it from the nunnery in Montreal.

Its plumage is soft and thick, and perfectly, entirely gray. My own impression is that it was naturally a gray parrot and had at that time of my sojourn in New York, either been dyed or painted that peculiar pea-green which so distinguished it then. I wrote to De k.o.c.k before leaving for England and told him something of the story. I have seen the last of Madame; in all probability I shall see the last of the Pea-Green Parrot, and I cannot help wondering when I enter a cafe or ride on an omnibus whether I shall ever run across Giuseppe Martinetti in the flesh, or whether the last of him was seen in truth, five years ago.