Augusta Huiell Seaman - The Curious Affair at Heron Shoals

“Oh, my goodness—look who’s coming! Why on earth did they have to land over here just now—and spoil our lovely afternoon?”

“Why, who is it?” demanded Ted, looking in the direction she indicated but seeing only in the distance, two people, evidently a woman and a young lad of sixteen or seventeen, plodding along through the sand.

“Never mind, I can’t explain right now!” muttered Marty. “I don’t think they’ve seen us yet. We’ll have a chance to get into the Station by that little back door. Hurry, and keep as much out of their sight as possible!”

She sprang up, with Ted following her and wondering very much what it was all about and the reason for this hasty retreat. Skirting around the side of a dune, they managed to slip into the rear door of the Station that led into its former kitchen without, so Marty wildly hoped, being seen by the advancing pair. As they stood panting for breath in the dismantled kitchen, Ted demanded:

“Who are they? Why don’t you want to see them?”

“Because they’re troublemakers!” cried Marty impatiently. “They always have been! They’re enemies of Nana’s. That’s another thing I don’t know what it’s all about, for Nana won’t tell me. But I think it goes back to some quarrel or other way back in Grandpa’s time. This Mrs. Kilroy’s father and Grandpa were both coast-guards in this Station at the same time. And something happened and they had a falling-out. It’s all very silly, seems to me, so long ago and both of them dead now! But Mrs. Kilroy has never forgotten it and comes over here and tries to fight it all out with Nana every once in so often. Nana always sends me away so I shan’t hear it. But it generally makes her pretty sick afterward. They must have rowed across the Bay this afternoon and walked up the beach. Queer thing, too! Thusy seems to be mixed up in that quarrel. I once was out in the garden picking peas, when Mrs. Kilroy was here and was just leaving. And she called back to Nana, just as she opened the door, ‘And that parrot ought to be ours, by rights, and you know it!’ Of course, as I wasn’t supposed to hear what they were saying, I couldn’t ask Nana about it. It’s all very curious!”

Just at this point they glanced out of the little window and saw the pair in question trudging through the sand past the Coast-Guard Station, on their way to the old house back in the cedars. They were casting curious glances at the Station, for the Professor was still playing, and they were plainly bewildered at these sounds of melody emerging from so unlikely a source. The young lad made a motion as if to steer his mother up toward the Station door to investigate, but she pulled him back peremptorily, and they continued on their way. At the same moment the music stopped. Monsieur had also seen them through the window and called out to Marty and Ted, whom he had heard talking in the kitchen:

“Who ees zis who goes by zis so unfrequented place?” The two came into the mess-hall where the pianos stood and Marty explained to him the unlooked-for invasion. And Ted supplemented the account by giving him some of the curious facts about Thusy that he had just learned from Marty. Monsieur ran his hands through his hair and wrinkled his brows in solemn thought. Then he broke in.

“Ah! Zee parrot! How strange ees zis mystery about heem! But listen, mes enfants—moi, I make one deescoveree about heem only yesterday. I talk to heem in zee French—oh, zee very long while! He do not answer, but I keep right on. Alors—after long, long time, vat you theenk happen? I keep saying to heem, ‘Bon jour, Thusy!’ Over and over I say eet. And zen I wait. And zat parrot, he put hees head to one side, and he look like he theenk hard, and zen he say, ‘Bon-bon-bon jour—monsieur!’ ” He stopped impressively and waited for their reaction. Both looked slightly puzzled for a moment and Ted was first to catch the implication of Thusy’s response.

“But that’s wonderful!” he cried. “If Thusy had just been repeating what you said, it would have been ‘Bon jour, Thusy!’, wouldn’t it? Instead he put in ‘monsieur.’ But maybe that’s because he’s heard us calling you ‘Monsieur.’ ”

“Non, non!” cried the Professor, running his hands wildly through his much-disheveled hair. “Zat can not be so. Not enough has he heard you say zat to me. Only two-three times. Zat ‘Bon jour, monsieur!’ he learn from some one long ago who teach heem zee French. He say eet so perfect—like he learn to say eet long ago!” And he ended impressively:

“Mes enfants, leesten to me! Zat bird—he once belong to some one who ees French. He know more French zan zat. And me, I am going to find out how much he know!”

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