"He has shut up at last! that's very lucky!" said Roncherolle to himself, stretching himself out in his reclining chair. "Parbleu! I seem to have a new neighbor as to whom I must felicitate the master of this house. If that had gone on, I couldn't possibly have stood it. The man must be an idiot to try to teach the parrot such stuff.--I shall meet him soon enough."

And Roncherolle yawned, closed his eyes, and was dozing again when suddenly the noise began anew beside him.

"Dutaillis is lovely! Come now! Dutaillis is lovely!"

"Good-day, Monsieur Brillant!"

"You beast!--Applaud, clap Zizi!"

"Zi--Zi--Zan--Zan--Monsieur Brillant. You make me sick!"

"And so do you me, you beast!"

"Par la mordieu! and you're a beast yourself!" cried Roncherolle, sitting up in his chair and grasping his cane again and hammering on the part.i.tion and on the floor. "Ah! you have the effrontery to keep on with your parrot lessons! Dare to begin again, and I will twist your pupil's neck, and throw his master out of the window! What a house! What service they have! Here I've been pounding and ringing for an hour, and no one comes! I say there! waiter! chambermaid!"

Again Saint-Arthur and his parrot held their peace. But the little dandy also jerked all the bell-cords that he could find in the three rooms of which his apartment consisted.

At that jangling of bells, the waiter and the chambermaid hastened up to their tenants on the third floor. The chambermaid no longer entered Roncherolle's room, because he had several times told her to go and wash herself, and then to go to the scrubber's. The waiter, who was called the "young man," and who had worked in the house for more than twenty years, was probably quite fifty-five years old. He was a man of medium height, but endowed with a very coquettish _embonpoint_, and a prominent abdomen, which, however, did not prevent him from having a wrinkled face, and a small wig which did not come down to his ears, and which he was constantly occupied in jerking to the right or to the left. Having never worn any other costume than a pair of short trousers and a small round jacket, like the waiters at restaurants, Beauvinet--that was the "young man's" name--always wore a white ap.r.o.n, one half of which he turned up to conceal the other half, when it had ceased to be spotlessly clean. All in all, Beauvinet was more presentable than the chambermaid and it was he who answered Roncherolle's bell when he rang.

So Beauvinet presented himself before the gouty gentleman, his ap.r.o.n turned up, and pulling his wig over his right ear, which necessarily caused the left side to rise; but one ordinarily obeys the most urgent need, and it was only on extraordinary occasions that Beauvinet pulled both sides of his wig at once; even then he dared not do it except with great precaution, because one day when he indulged in that manoeuvre, he had heard an ominous cracking on the top of his head, as if his wig were about to be transformed into a crown; and the perquisites of his position were too small to allow him to purchase a new wig.

"Monsieur rang, monsieur knocked, monsieur called, I believe?" said Beauvinet, showing his bloated and wrinkled face.

"Sacrebleu! yes, I did ring and I did knock; I would have set the house on fire if there had been any fire on the hearth."

"Fire! mon Dieu! is monsieur very cold? Why, it is warm----"

"Hold your tongue! and answer."

"Why, monsieur----"

"And try to let that shocking wig of yours alone; it annoys me to see you always jerking that sorry thing."

"Why, monsieur----"

"Silence! Who is it that lives here, in this apartment next to me? Is it a new neighbor that I have there?"

"Yes, monsieur, that fine apartment has only been let a week."

"To whom?"

"To a very fashionable, a very distinguished young man, who dresses as if he went to the opera every day, and who spends money----"

"Ah! I understand why you call him very fashionable; what is the man's name?"

"Monsieur Alfred de Saint-Arthur."

"_Bigre!_ that's a magnificent stage name! no one ever has such names except in farces or at the Gymnase."

"Beg pardon, monsieur, I don't understand."

"You are not obliged to. Listen, Beauvinet: your Monsieur Saint-Arthur, or Saint-Alfred, no matter which, has behaved very well for a week, as I didn't know that I had a neighbor; but why in the devil has he taken it into his head to have a parrot to-day, and to teach him to talk?"

"Beg pardon, monsieur, but it isn't a parrot that the gentleman brought home this morning, it is a caca--a cato--mon Dieu! he told me the name----"

"A c.o.c.katoo, no doubt?"

"Yes, monsieur, that's the name; he is a fine creature, I tell you, with a thing on his head so that you'd swear he's a turkey with his comb."

"It belongs to the family of parrots. Well, this fellow and his bird make a frightful racket, which prevents me from sleeping; and when one has the gout, when one is in pain, one has no comfort except in sleep. I lost my temper too much just now, perhaps, but do you go from me and tell my neighbor that I am confined to my room by this infernal disease, and that I beg him, out of regard for my plight, to be kind enough not to give lessons to his bird so long as I am obliged to keep my room; he can be certain that I shall go out as soon as I am able to walk, and then he may pour out his heart to his bird at his leisure. If this Monsieur de Saint-Arthur is a decent man and has any breeding, he will comply with my request; if not--we will see.--You understand, Beauvinet?

Now go, and let your wig alone."

While this was taking place in Monsieur de Roncherolle's room, Josephine, the chambermaid, had answered Saint-Arthur's bell.

"What does this mean, girl?" he asked her; "isn't a man free to do what he pleases in his own room, in your house? When I pay cash, and I believe I do pay cash, can't I amuse myself by teaching sentences, droll remarks, to my c.o.c.katoo?"

"I should say so, monsieur! who would prevent you, pray? Certainly, monsieur is master in his own room; and he can do whatever comes into his head, without having anyone else interfere; and we are too flattered to have monsieur for a tenant, and monsieur must see that we come at once as soon as he rings."

"In that case, girl, why does a person, who evidently lives on this same landing, venture to knock on the wall, to yell like a deaf man, to swear and to threaten, when I am teaching Coco to talk? I bought the bird with no other purpose; as soon as he can talk well, I expect to present him to an actress, a friend of mine who adores me; and I do not propose to stop educating him because of a neighbor."

"What, monsieur! that gouty old fool in the next room had the face to call and knock? Oh! that don't surprise me, that man ain't afraid to do anything. Such a wretched tenant! how I wish he would leave us! he complains of everything in the house. To listen to him, you would think that he had always lived in chateaux; but you mustn't pay any attention to him, monsieur; and above all things, don't put yourself out. In the first place, you hire an apartment three times dearer than his, consequently you have the right to make three times as much noise."

"That reasoning strikes me as mathematical; but what sort of man is this neighbor of mine?"

"What sort of man? Bless my soul! he's the kind that has the gout; he growls and swears and yells; he's mad because he can't go out; and I have an idea that he'd like to raise the deuce still, although he's too old for that now; but he can't move, and that makes him angry."

"What! this neighbor of mine is old and helpless, and he dares to threaten me! Upon my word! that is too funny; it is really amusing! I believe that the wisest way is to laugh at him."

"Oh, yes! monsieur; but if you want me to go and speak to the old grumbler----"

"No, no, my dear, it isn't necessary; I don't need any intermediary in this sort of thing; I know how to handle it myself. Go, go; we will arrange matters with the neighbor."

And the dandified little Saint-Arthur, overjoyed to learn that his neighbor was old and ill, drew himself up and dismissed the chambermaid, pacing the floor of his room with a lordly swagger.

The servant had not been gone two minutes when Beauvinet knocked lightly at the door, then opened it and entered Saint-Arthur's room, saying:

"May I come in?"

"What is it now? what do you want of me?" asked the young dandy, scrutinizing Beauvinet's wrinkled face.

"Monsieur, it's me, Beauvinet."

"You! I don't know you."

"No, because Josephine asked the privilege of blacking monsieur's boots; but I also belong to the house."

"In the first place, my dear fellow, n.o.body blacks my boots, because I only wear patent leathers; and they are never blacked; that was a stupid remark of yours; go on."

"I was saying to monsieur that I belonged in the house."