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Updated: August 29, 2024
I got tired, and lay down in the shade of the Rock of Red Pigeons you know it. I fell asleep. Something waked me. I got up and heard the finest singing you can guess: not like any I ever heard; a wild, beautiful, shivery sort of thing. I listened for a long time. At last it stopped. Then something slid down the rock. I peeped out, and saw Parpon toddling away."
Parpon looked at Armand furtively. "The wild hawk comes back to its nest," he said. "Well, well, what is it you want with the poor Parpon?" He sat down and dropped his chin in his hands, looking round keenly. Armand nodded to Medallion, and Medallion to the priest, but the priest nodded back again. Then Medallion said: "You and I know the Rock of Red Pigeons, Parpon. It is a good place to perch.
"Elise!" he said sentimentally, and drank. The blacksmith kissed his daughter, and his hand rested on her head as he lifted the cup, but he said never a word. Parpon took one sip, then poured his liquor upon the ground, as though down there was what he loved best; but his eyes were turned to Dalgrothe Mountain, which he could see through the open door.
The Avocat coughed, and said hesitatingly to Armand: "I asked Parpon the dwarf to come, monsieur. There is a reason." Armand raised his eyebrows in surprise. "Very good," he said. "When will he be here?" "He is waiting at the Louis Quinze hotel." "I will send for him," said Armand, and gave the message to Sylvie, who was entering the room.
She drew back. Presently she peered again, and once more withdrew. She gazed round, and then made another tour of the hill, searching. She returned to the precipice. As she did so she heard a voice. She looked and saw Parpon seated upon a ledge of rock not far below. A mocking laugh floated up to her. But there was trouble in the laugh too a bitter sickness. She did not notice that.
"If she should see him!" said Valmond tentatively, for a sudden thought had come to him that the mother of these misfits of God was Madame Degardy. Parpon sprang to his-feet. "She shall not see him. Ah, you know! You have guessed?" he cried. "She is all safe with me." "She shall not see him. She shall not know," repeated the dwarf, his eyes huddling back in his head with anguish.
He had so lost himself in the dream, that it had become real, and he himself was the splendid adventurer, the maker of empires. True, he had only a small band of ill- armed men, but better arms could be got, and by the time they reached the sea who could tell! As he sat alone in the quiet dusk of his room at the Louis Quinze waiting for Parpon, there came a tap at his door.
The murmuring of the people drew the Cure's attention, and then, seeing Parpon, he came forward. Parpon drew from his breast a bag, and put it in his hands, and beckoning down the Cure's head, he whispered. The Cure turned to the altar and raised the bag towards it in ascription and thanksgiving, then he turned to Parpon again, but the dwarf was trotting away down the aisle and from the church.
"Till I've no more wind in my bellows!" responded Lajeunesse, raising his hand, "if he keeps faith with my Madelinette." "On the honour of a soldier," said Lagroin, and he crossed himself. "God save us all!" said Parpon. Obeying a motion of the dwarf's hand, Lagroin drew from his pocket a flask of cognac, with four little tin cups fitting into each other.
As Parpon hastily entered, Madame Degardy hobbled out of the shadow of the trees, and furtively watched the hut. When a light appeared, she crept to the door, opened it stealthily upon the intruders of her home, and stepped inside. Parpon was kneeling by Elise, lifting up her head, and looking at her in horrified distress.
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