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The unhappy Coquerico stripped of all his feathers, the soldier took him and laid him on the gridiron. "Oh, fire, do not burn me!" cried he, in an agony of terror. "Oh, beautiful and brilliant fire, the brother of the sun and the cousin of the diamond, spare an unhappy creature; restrain thy ardor, and soften thy flame; do not roast me!"
He had not yet ended his song when one of the pope's guard, who chanced to hear him, laid hands on the insolent wretch who dared thus to insult the saint, and carried him home in order to roast him for supper. "Quick!" said he to his wife on entering the house, "give me some boiling water; here is a sinner to be punished." "Pardon, pardon, Madame Water!" cried Coquerico.
With his own hand he nailed him to the highest steeple in Rome, where he is still shown to travelers. However high placed he may be, all despise him because he turns with the slightest wind; black, dried up, stripped of his feathers, and beaten by the rain, he is no longer called Coquerico, but Weathercock, and thus expiates, and must expiate eternally, his disobedience, vanity, and wickedness.
"I am, or was, the valet of M. de Stahler, monsieur," he replied. I showed him my card. "To me 'M. de Stahler' is the Grand Duke Ivan. What other servants had he with him?" I asked, although I knew very well. "None, monsieur." "Where and when was he taken ill?" "At the Theatre Coquerico. Montmartre, at about a quarter past ten o'clock to-night." "Who was with him?" "No one, monsieur.
"Oh, wind," murmured Coquerico, who still breathed, "oh, kindly zephyr, protecting breeze, behold me cured of my vain follies. Let me rest on the paternal dunghill." "Let you rest!" roared the wind. "Wait, and I will teach you how I treat ingrates." And with one blast it sent him so high in the air that, as he fell back, he was transfixed by a steeple. There St. Peter was awaiting him.
With a stroke of your beak you can restore me to life. I am not an ingrate; if you oblige me, you may count on my gratitude the first rainy day, when the water from heaven shall have restored my strength." "You are jesting," said Coquerico. "Do I look like one whose business it is to sweep the brooks? Apply to those of your own sort." And with his sound leg, he leaped across the streamlet.
Have patience, therefore, my worthy friend; mockers always have their turn; it does them good to repent and to learn to respect those whose birth, wit, and beauty should screen them from the jests of a fool." And Coquerico, bristling his plumage, crowed three times in his shrillest voice and proudly strutted onward.
The woman said no more, but set before him a bottle of his favourite wine, and soon he began to wish to display his prize. 'Show me what you can do, cock, cried he. And the cock stood up and flapped his wings three times, crowing 'coquerico' with a voice like a trumpet, and at each crow there fell from his beak golden drops, and diamonds as large as peas.
"My good mother," replied Coquerico, "when a hen hatches a duck she is always frightened on seeing it run to the water. You know me no better. It is my nature to succeed by my wit and talent. I must have a public capable of appreciating the charms of my person; my place is not among inferior people."
"You will remember me when you least expect it," murmured the brook, but with so feeble a voice that it was lost on the proud cock. A little farther on, Coquerico saw the wind lying breathless on the ground. "Dear Coquerico, come to my aid," it cried; "here on earth we should help one another.
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