Believable or not, just at that moment when I stood there under the
bough arguing, reproaching and beguiling by turns and puzzled beyond
measure--out of the Nowhere darted a little scarlet flame of
frenzy--Tweetie himself--with his feathers ruffled and on fire with fury.
The robin on the branch actually WAS an Impostor and Tweetie had
discovered him red-breasted if not red-handed with crime. Oh! the sight
it was to behold him in his tiny Berseker rage at his impudent rival. He
flew at him, he beat him, he smacked him, he pecked him, he shrieked bad
language at him, he drove him from the branch--from the tree, from one
tree after another as the little traitor tried to take refuge--he drove
him from the rose-garden--over the laurel hedge and into the pheasant
cover in the wood. Perhaps he killed him and left him slain in the
bracken. I could not see. But having beaten him once and forever he came
back to me, panting--all fluffed up--and with blood thirst only just
dying in his eye. He came down on to my table--out of breath as he
agitatedly rearranged his untidy feathers--and indignant--almost
unreconcilable because I had been such an undiscriminating and
feeble-minded imbecile as to be for one moment deceived.
His righteous wrath was awful to behold. I was so frightened that I felt
quite pale. With those wiles of the serpent which every noble woman
finds herself forced to employ at times I endeavored to pacify him.
"Of course I did not really believe he was You," I said tremulously. "He
was your inferior in every respect. His waistcoat was not nearly so
beautiful as yours. His eyes were not so soul compelling. His legs were
not nearly so elegant and slender. And there was an expression about his
beak which I distrusted from the first. You HEARD me tell him he was an
Impostor."
He began to listen--he became calmer--he relented. He kindly ate a
crumb out of my hand.
We began mutually to understand the infamy of the situation. The
Impostor had been secretly watching us. He had envied us our happiness.
Into his degenerate mind had stolen the darkling and criminal thought
that he--Audacious Scoundrel--might impose upon me by pretending he was
not merely "a robin" but "The Robin"--Tweetie himself and that he might
supplant him in my affections. But he had been confounded and cast into
outer darkness and again we were One.
I will not attempt to deceive. He was jealous beyond bounds. It was
necessary for me to be most discreet in my demeanor towards the head
gardener with whom I was obliged to consult frequently. When he came
into the rose-garden for orders Tweetie at once appeared.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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