'Is it that it talks?' asked the lady.
And the Phoenix replied in excellent French. It said,
'Parfaitement, madame!'
'Oh, the pretty parrakeet,' said the lady. 'Can it say still of
other things?'
And the Phoenix replied, this time in English, 'Why are you sad so
near Christmas-time?'
The children looked at it with one gasp of horror and surprise, for
the youngest of them knew that it is far from manners to notice
that strangers have been crying, and much worse to ask them the
reason of their tears. And, of course, the lady began to cry
again, very much indeed, after calling the Phoenix a bird without
a heart; and she could not find her handkerchief, so Anthea offered
hers, which was still very damp and no use at all. She also hugged
the lady, and this seemed to be of more use than the handkerchief,
so that presently the lady stopped crying, and found her own
handkerchief and dried her eyes, and called Anthea a cherished angel.
'I am sorry we came just when you were so sad,' said Anthea, 'but
we really only wanted to ask you whose that castle is on the hill.'
'Oh, my little angel,' said the poor lady, sniffing, 'to-day and for
hundreds of years the castle is to us, to our family. To-morrow it
must that I sell it to some strangers--and my little Henri, who
ignores all, he will not have never the lands paternal.
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