CHAPTER IX

A BIRD’S AFTERNOON TEA

“I’ll give you something,” I said, “if you’ll come into my house with me.”

He gave me a long, searching look, then he said, “I’ll trust you, but how shall I get in, and if I get in, what about that meek looking dog who is nevertheless a dog?”

“Oh, Billie Sundae would not hurt any guest of mine,” I said, “and the window is always open a crack in the afternoon to air the sitting room, because no one sits there till evening.”

“Is Mrs. Martin not at home?” he asked.

I glanced at the big yellow boarding-house set away back from the street next Chummy’s house and said, “At half past four she is going in there to have tea with a friend.”

“What do you offer me for afternoon tea?” asked Chummy.

I was rather taken aback, for this question did not seem a very polite one to me. However, I reflected that he had had a street upbringing, and could not be expected to observe fine points of etiquette, such as not asking your host what he is going to set before you.

“Your question is very businesslike,” I said gaily, but with a thought of giving him just a gentle dig, “and I may say that there will be first of all a few crumbs of sponge cake.”

“That’s nice,” he said, clacking his horny beak with satisfaction.

“Then a nice little nibble of fresh, rosy-faced apple.”

“Fine!” he exclaimed. “It’s very hard for sparrows to get fresh fruit this weather.”

“Then I have a small bit of hard boiled egg left from breakfast,” I said.

“Egg!” he almost screamed, “and they at a dollar a dozen.”

I was slightly surprised that he mentioned the price of eggs. However, I went on, “The Martins always have the best of food, even if they have to save on clothes. Don’t you see how shabby Mrs. Martin and our Mary look?”

“The flowers in Mrs. Martin’s hat are pretty,” said the sparrow, “but they look as if they had been rained on. Now what comes after the egg?”

I was just a little put out at this question, and I said, “A nice drink of cold water.”

“Of course I can always get that outside,” he said.

“When everything is frozen?”

“There’s always Lake Ontario,” he said, “that doesn’t freeze over.”

I was afraid he would think I was impolite, and no matter how abrupt he was with me, I as entertainer should be courteous to him. So I said, “The greatest treat comes last. I’ve noticed you from the window several times, and I have been sorry to see your worried look, and I felt we should become acquainted, so I saved you a nice lot of hemp seed.”

“You saved seeds for me,” he exclaimed.

“Certainly, why not?”

“Why, I never had anyone do that for me before,” he said, “except my parents.”

“I do it to please myself,” I said. “If I could tell you how I love to see all birds safe and happy and with their crops sticking out.”

“Your talk has a good sound,” he said gravely. “I wish Squirrie could hear you. He says, ‘Birds, if my tummy is full and comfy, I don’t care if yours is shrunk all to wrinkles.’”

“Ha! ha! ha!” cried a wicked little voice, and I nearly fell head foremost out of the hole in the wall. As Chummy and I talked, we had gradually edged forward to his front door, and looking up we saw that impudent red squirrel hanging over the roof edge, listening to us.

Chummy was so angry, that he made a wild dart up to the roof, and gave a savage peck at Squirrie’s eyes. Of no use, the little rogue had scampered in again.

Chummy and I flew to the top of the front porch, and sat breathing hard and fast.

Mrs. Martin opened the door of our house and came out. I gazed down at the beloved brown figure and uttered a glad, “Peep!”

She whistled back to me, “Dear O! Cheer O!” then looking up, she said “Eh! making friends. Tell your sparrow bird that I bought some rice for him to-day, and I think he will like it better than the bread crumbs I have been putting out on the food table lately.”

The grateful Chummy leaned forward, gave his tail a joyous flirt, and said “T-check! chook! chook!”

“I’ll throw some right here for him in the morning,” said Missie, and she pointed to the hard-packed snow under the library window. “There’s such a crowd round the food table.”

Chummy gave a loud, joyful call. He was sure of a good tea to-night and a fine breakfast in the morning, and what more could a sparrow ask than two meals in advance?

“If she had feathers, she would be a very beautiful bird,” he said, as we watched her going toward the boarding-house, “and that is more than you can say of some of the women that go up and down this street.”

“What a sad looking boarding-house that is,” I said as we watched her going toward it. “Those black streaks up and down its yellow walls look as if it had been crying.”

Chummy was staring through the big drawing-room window that had fine yellow silk curtains.

“Just look at those women in there,” he said, “they have a nice fire, a white table and a maid bringing in hot muffins and cake and lovely thin slices of bread and butter to say nothing of the big silver tea-pot and the cream jug, and a whole bowl of sugar. I wish I had some of it, and they sit and stuff themselves, and never throw us any of it, and when summer comes they wouldn’t have a rose if we didn’t pick the plant lice off their bushes.”

“Come, come,” I said, “you are too hard on those nice ladies who are all working for the soldiers, and must have good food to sustain them. I am sure they don’t realize what birds do for them. If they did, they would not wear us on their hats.”

“Human beings would all die if it weren’t for us birds,” said the sparrow. “Poisons and sprays are all very fine to kill insect pests, but there’s nothing like the bill of a bird.”

“Mrs. Martin says that farmers are beginning to find that out,” I replied, “and are making wise laws to protect birds. Women don’t understand, except a few like our Mary and her mother.”

The sparrow sighed. “I suppose you have heard that half the wild birds are dying this winter. The crows say that little brown and gray and blue bodies are scattered all over the snow.”

“Even though the ground is snowy,” I said, “couldn’t they still get the larvae of insects on the branches?”

“The branches are ice glazed. The other day when the city people were saying how beautiful and how like fairyland everything looked here, the birds were staring in dismay at their food supply all locked up.”

“The farmers should have put out grain for them,” I said.

“They do in some places, but birds will never be properly looked after till the Government does it. They are servants to the public, and the public ought to protect them—but I am forgetting my afternoon tea. Shall we go in?”

“Yes, yes,” I said hastily, and I flew before him to the window.

Chummy stayed on the sill while I spoke to Billie who was lying on the hearthrug before the fire.

“Allow me to introduce my friend Chummy Hole-In-The-Wall,” I said. “He is going to make the neighborhood safe for me,” I added pointedly, for Billie dislikes strangers.

She wagged her tail slightly, very slightly, and lay down again, as if to say, “Have any friend in you like, but don’t bore me.”

Chummy is a very sensible bird. He did not fuss and fidget about coming into a house, and say that he was afraid something might hurt him. He merely said, “This is a very unusual thing for a sparrow to do, and a number of my friends outside are wondering why I came in. However, I am very hungry and I trust you. But of course you understand, you will be held responsible for my safety.”

I smiled. I knew what he meant. A number of bright-eyed sparrows had been watching me as I talked to him. If anything happened to him in this room, Green-Top’s beatings would be nothing compared to the one they would give me.

“You are as safe here as in your hole in the wall,” I said earnestly. “Now do come into my cage. You can’t reach the things very well from the outside.”

He went right in, and it did me good to see him eat. After he had stuffed himself, he said, “If I could tell you how sweet these seeds taste, and how delicious it is to get a bit of gravel. There isn’t an inch of ground visible in this whole city. Snow feet deep—never was anything like it before. Nearly every sparrow has indigestion from sloppy, wet, or frozen food, and no gravel to grind it.”

“Be thankful you are not a European bird,” I said. “They have had perfectly dreadful times of suffering over there.”

“Have you heard the story about the little British canary that was killed during the war by one of its own guns?” asked Chummy.

“No,” I said, “I haven’t.”

“Well,” he replied, “you know when the Allies mined under the enemy’s line, they carried canaries in cages with them so that if there was any fire damp in the big holes they made, they could tell by the canaries’ actions. Well, one little war bird flew away from his task. He evidently was an idle bird, and did not wish to work. He perched on a small bush in the middle of No Man’s Land and began to sing, ‘I won’t work, I won’t work. I want to play.’

“The Allied soldiers were in a terrible fright. If their enemies saw the canary, they would know they were mining, and would send shells at them and kill them all. So the Allied men signaled to their infantry to fire on the bird. They did so, but he was so small a target that they could not strike him, and he hopped from twig to twig unhurt. Finally they had to call on the artillery, and a big trench gun sent a shell that blew birdie and his bush into the air.”

“What a pity!” I said sadly. “If he had done his duty and stayed with the workers, he might be yet alive. I can tell you a cat war story, if you like.”

“What is it?” asked Chummy.

“The tale of a cat and her kittens. One day the Allied soldiers saw a cat come across No Man’s Land. She walked as evenly as Black Thomas does when he is taking an airing on this quiet street. No one fired at her, and she crossed the first line of trenches, the support behind them, and went back to the officers’ dugouts. She inspected all of them, then she returned across this dangerous land to the enemy’s lines. The trenches were pretty close together, and the men all roared with amusement, for on this trip she had a tiny kitten in her mouth.

“She carried it back to the best-looking dugout, and laid it on an officer’s coat. Then she went back and got a second kitten, and then a third. The soldiers cheered her, and no one thought of harming her. Mrs. Martin’s nephew wrote her this nice story, and he said that the mother cat and her three kittens were the idols of the soldiers and always wore pink ribbons on their necks. They called them Ginger, Shrapnel, and Surprise Party.”

“What a good story,” said the sparrow thickly.

His beak was full of sponge cake, and, seeing it, I said warmly, “Oh, Chummy dear, if I could only feed all the poor hungry birds as I am feeding you, how happy should I be!”