THE BLACKBIRD
We are in for a hunting yarn!--Give me chloroform!
BRIFFAUT
It sometimes happens--the thing is exceptional, of course--My master
knows because he has read about it.--It sometimes happens--An
extraordinary phenomenon to be sure! which is likewise observed among
moor-fowl.--It happens--
PATOU
What happens?
BRIFFAUT
That the pheasant-hen--Ah, my dear fellows--!
CHANTECLER
[_Stamping with impatience._] The pheasant-hen what?--what?
BRIFFAUT
Makes up her mind one day that the cock-pheasant goes altogether too
fine. When the male in springtime puts on his holiday feathers, she sees
that he is handsomer than she--
THE BLACKBIRD
And it makes her sore!
BRIFFAUT
She leaves off laying and hatching eggs. Nature then gives her back her
purple and her gold, and the pheasant-hen proud and magnificent Amazon,
preferring to put on her back blue, green, yellow, all the colours of
the prism, rather than under a sober grey wing to shelter a brood of
young pheasants, flies freely forth--Light-mindedly she sheds the
virtues of her sex, and having done it--sees life! [_He sketches with
his paw a slightly disrespectful gesture._]
CHANTECLER
[_Dryly._] Pray, what do you know about it?
BRIFFAUT
[_Astonished._] Is he annoyed?
PATOU
[_Aside._] Already!
CHANTECLER
In short, the pheasant your master missed--
BRIFFAUT
Was a she!--[_He stops and scents the air.
Pages:
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48