The Animal Story Book Part 15

[Ill.u.s.tration: 'PRITCHARD REAPPEARED NEXT MOMENT WITH A HARE IN HIS MOUTH']

'Michel, you open my eyes to a whole vista of terrors. But we are going to try to cure Pritchard of hunting. When he is cured of hunting, he will be cured of stealing.'

'Never, sir! You will never cure Pritchard of his vices.'

Still I pursued my plan, which was to put Pritchard's fore-leg through his collar. By this means, his right fore-foot being fastened to his neck, and his left hind-foot being cut off, he had only two to run with, the left fore-foot and the right hind-foot.

'Well, indeed,' said Michel, 'if he can hunt now, the devil is in it.'

He loosed Pritchard, who stood for a moment as if astonished, but once he had balanced himself he began to walk, then to trot; then, as he found his balance better, he succeeded in running quicker on his two legs than many dogs would have done on four.

'Where are we now, sir?' said Michel.

'It's that beast of a stake that balances him!' I replied, a little disappointed. 'We ought to teach him to dance upon the tight-rope--he would make our fortunes as an acrobat.'

'You are joking again, sir. But listen! do you hear that?'

The most terrible imprecations against Pritchard were resounding on all sides. The imprecations were followed by a shot, then by a howl of pain.

'That is Pritchard's voice,' said Michel. 'Well, it is no more than he deserves.'

Pritchard reappeared the next moment with a hare in his mouth.

'Michel, you said that was Pritchard that howled.'

'I would swear to it, sir.'

'But how could he howl with a hare in his mouth?'

Michel scratched his head. 'It was he all the same,' he said, and he went to look at Pritchard.

'Oh, sir!' he said, 'I was right. The gentleman he took the hare from has shot him. His hind-leg is all over blood. Look! there is M.

Charpillon running after his hare.'

'You know that I have just put some pellets into your Pritchard?'

Charpillon called out as soon as he saw me.

'You did quite right.'

'He carried off my hare.'

'There! You see,' said Michel, 'it is impossible to cure him.'

'But when he carried away your hare, he must have had it in his mouth?'

'Of course. Where else would he have it?'

'But how could he howl with a hare in his mouth?'

'He put it down to howl, then he took it up again and made off.'

'There's deceit for you, gentlemen!' exclaimed Michel.

Pritchard succeeded in bringing the hare to me, but when he reached me he had to lie down.

'I say,' said Charpillon, 'I hope I haven't hurt him more than I intended--it was a long shot.' And forgetting his hare, Charpillon knelt down to examine Pritchard's wound. It was a serious one; Pritchard had received five or six pellets about the region of his tail, and was bleeding profusely.

'Oh, poor beast!' cried Charpillon. 'I wouldn't have fired that shot for all the hares in creation if I had known.'

'Bah!' said Michel; 'he won't die of it.' And, in fact, Pritchard, after spending three weeks with the vet. at St.-Germains, returned to Monte Cristo perfectly cured, and with his tail in the air once more.

IX

Soon after the disastrous event which I have just related the revolution of 1848 occurred in France, in which King Louis Philippe was dethroned and a republic established. You will ask what the change of government had to do with my beasts? Well, although, happily, they do not trouble their heads about politics, the revolution did affect them a good deal; for the French public, being excited by these occurrences, would not buy my books, preferring to read the 'Guillotine,' the 'Red Republic,' and such like corrupt periodicals; so that I became for the time a very much poorer man. I was obliged greatly to reduce my establishment. I sold my three horses and two carriages for a quarter of their value, and I presented the Last of the Laidmanoirs, Potich, and Mademoiselle Desgarcins to the Jardin des Plantes in Paris. I had to move into a smaller house, but my monkeys were lodged in a palace; this is a sort of thing that sometimes happens after a revolution. Mysouff also profited by it, for he regained his liberty on the departure of the monkeys.

As to Diogenes, the vulture, I gave him to my worthy neighbour Collinet, who keeps the restaurant Henri IV., and makes such good cutlets a la Bearnaise. There was no fear of Diogenes dying of hunger under his new master's care; on the contrary, he improved greatly in health and beauty, and, doubtless as a token of grat.i.tude to Collinet, he laid an egg for him every year, a thing he never dreamt of doing for me. Lastly, we requested Pritchard to cease to keep open house, and to discontinue his daily invitations to strange dogs to dine and sleep. I was obliged to give up all thoughts of shooting that year. It is true that Pritchard still remained to me, but then Pritchard, you must recollect, had only three feet; he had been badly hurt when he was shot by Charpillon, and the revolution of February had occasioned the loss of one eye.

It happened one day during that exciting period, that Michel was so anxious to see what was going on that he forgot to give Pritchard his dinner. Pritchard therefore invited himself to dine with the vulture, but Diogenes, being of a less sociable turn, and not in a humour to be trifled with, dealt poor Pritchard such a blow with his beak as to deprive him of one of his mustard-coloured eyes. Pritchard's courage was unabated; he might be compared to that brave field marshal of whom it was said that Mars had left nothing of him whole except his heart.

But it was difficult, you see, to make much use of a dog with so many infirmities. If I had wished to sell him I could not have found a purchaser, nor would he have been considered a handsome present had I desired to give him away. I had no choice, then, but to make this old servant, badly as he had sometimes served me, a pensioner, a companion, in fact a friend. Some people told me that I might have tied a stone round his neck and flung him into the river; others, that it was easy enough to replace him by buying a good retriever from Vatrin; but although I was not yet poor enough to drown Pritchard, neither was I rich enough to buy another dog. However, later in that very year, I made an unexpected success in literature, and one of my plays brought me in a sufficient sum to take a shooting in the department of Yonne. I went to look at this shooting, taking Pritchard with me. In the meantime my daughter wrote to tell me that she had bought an excellent retriever for five pounds, named Catinat, and that she was keeping him in the stable until my return. As soon as I arrived, my first care was to make Catinat's acquaintance. He was a rough, vigorous dog of three or four years old, thoughtless, violent, and quarrelsome. He jumped upon me till he nearly knocked me down, upset my daughter's work-table, and dashed about the room to the great danger of my china vases and ornaments. I therefore called Michel and informed him that the superficial acquaintance which I had made with Catinat would suffice for the time, and that I would defer the pleasure of his further intimacy until the shooting season began at Auxerre.

Poor Michel, as soon as he saw Catinat, had been seized with a presentiment of evil.

'Sir,' he said, 'that dog will bring some misfortune upon us. I do not know yet what, but something will happen, I know it will!'

'In the meantime, Michel,' I said, 'you had better take Catinat back to the stable.' But Catinat had already left the room of his own accord and rushed downstairs to the dining-room, where I had left Pritchard. Now Pritchard never could endure Catinat from the first moment he saw him; the two dogs instantly flew at one another with so much fury that Michel was obliged to call me to his a.s.sistance before we could separate them. Catinat was once more shut up in the stable, and Pritchard conducted to his kennel in the stable-yard, which, in the absence of carriages and horses, was now a poultry-yard, inhabited by my eleven hens and my c.o.c.k Caesar. Pritchard's friendship with the hens continued to be as strong as ever, and the household suffered from a scarcity of eggs in consequence. That evening, while my daughter and I were walking in the garden, Michel came to meet us, twisting his straw hat between his fingers, a sure sign that he had something important to say.

'Well, what is it, Michel?' I asked.

'It came into my mind, sir,' he answered, 'while I was taking Pritchard to his kennel, that we never have any eggs because Pritchard eats them; and he eats them because he is in direct communication with the hens.'

'It is evident, Michel, that if Pritchard never went into the poultry-yard, he would not eat the eggs.'

'Then, do you not think, sir,' continued Michel, 'that if we shut up Pritchard in the stable and put Catinat into the poultry-yard, it would be better? Catinat is an animal without education, so far as I know; but he is not such a thief as Pritchard.'

'Do you know what will happen if you do that, Michel?' I said.

'Catinat will not eat the eggs, perhaps, but he will eat the hens.'

'If a misfortune like that were to occur, I know a method of curing him of eating hens.'

'Well--but in the meantime the hens would be eaten.'

Scarcely had I uttered these words, when a frightful noise was heard in the stable-yard, as loud as that of a pack of hounds in full cry, but mingled with howls of rage and pain which indicated a deadly combat.

'Michel!' I cried, 'do you hear that?'

'Oh yes, I hear it,' he answered, 'but those must be the neighbours'

dogs fighting.'