"Lazybones! why, it's close on eight o'clock!"
But he would hop on her shoulder, and put his little round head to her lips as if to ask pardon.
"Monsieur Friquet! I say, Monsieur Friquet!"
"Chirp! chirp!"--which meant: "Well, what? I'm all attention!"
"Monsieur Friquet, I want your advice. What shall we have to eat for Sunday?"
"I hear you! Biscuit! biscuit! But people can't live only on biscuit! We must have something else _to go with it_. Suppose we bought a couple of artichokes! Do you like artichokes, Monsieur Friquet? Yes? Ah! I knew an artichoke would please you. Wait here for me, and I'll run round to the greengrocer's."
So the Sunday wore away in happy play and merry nonsense between the pair.
What more was needed to transform the sharp thorns of pain into fragrant roses of content? She had invested the bold little chattering fellow with all the treasures of her tenderness; on him she lavished all her care and devotion; he was father and mother and family to her, and where he was, was home.
They lived long and happily together, and their love was never interrupted.
Have you ever noticed the melancholy pensive look masterless dogs assume at the hour when the press thins, and the passers-by slacken their pace on the side-walks, like waters from a tap running dry?
As the silence deepens they appear from every side, these poor, friendless beasts, their meagre forms slinking through the fog and gloom; up and down the streets they prowl, noses to the ground, and tails drooping, like so many lost souls. Some have sound legs to run on, others can hardly drag themselves along; but all have hollow flanks and protruding ribs. They are out in search of food, nosing in the refuse heaps, scratching in the mud, filching from the scavengers bones as fleshless as themselves.
What the world lets fall from its table is still a banquet for their starving bellies. They are not hard to please; till the wan light of dawn surprises them, they hunt the streets, rain-soaked and frost-bitten; then they creep back into mysterious holes and corners, where they curl themselves up in a round and sleep away the livelong day.
Most of them are wild and shy, for they have only known the blackest side of life--cuffs and kicks, wretchedness and desertion. For them no hope survives the shipwreck of friendships betrayed; alone they live and alone they creep into a hole to die--creatures of the dunghill whose obsequies will be performed by the scavenger's cart.