Then he would come back into the room, light on one of the
andirons, and hop around in order to get dry.
One morning during the terrible winter of 1837, when she had put
him in front of the fire-place on account of the cold, she found
him dead in his cage, hanging to the wire bars with his head down.
He had probably died of congestion. But she believed that he had
been poisoned, and although she had no proofs whatever, her
suspicion rested on Fabu.
She wept so sorely that her mistress said: "Why don't you have him
stuffed?"
She asked the advice of the chemist, who had always been kind to
the bird.
He wrote to Havre for her. A certain man named Fellacher consented
to do the work. But, as the diligence driver often lost parcels
entrusted to him, Felicite resolved to take her pet to Honfleur
herself.
Leafless apple-trees lined the edges of the road. The ditches were
covered with ice. The dogs on the neighbouring farms barked; and
Felicite, with her hands beneath her cape, her little black sabots
and her basket, trotted along nimbly in the middle of the
sidewalk. She crossed the forest, passed by the Haut-Chene and
reached Saint-Gatien.
Behind her, in a cloud of dust and impelled by the steep incline,
a mail-coach drawn by galloping horses advanced like a whirlwind.
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