CARUSO AND DOCTOR SANDY
THE next day being Saturday it was thought best, after a family council,
for Blue to take Caruso to the Scotchman of whom Thomas Fitzpatrick had
told him.
“You won’t be gone so very long, will you?” asked Doodles anxiously.
“A good part of the afternoon, I’m afraid,” his brother answered. “Do
you mind staying alone?”
“Oh, no! only I was thinking I shall miss Caruso.”
Blue heard this with a little dismay, for he thought it not unlikely
that he should be obliged to leave the bird for treatment. He wondered
whether he ought to prepare Doodles for such a possibility, or wait and
let things come as they would. Finally he ventured:—
“Maybe the bird doctor will want to keep him a day or two.”
A shadow fell on the fair little face.
“Well,” replied the boy slowly, “I can get along if he has to stay. You
tell the man to not think about me at all, but just to do what’s best
for Caruso—oh, won’t it be nice if he can fix Caruso’s wing all right!”
The sorrow of the possible separation was forgotten in the joy of the
moment.
It was a long, hard tramp up the Temple Hill Road; but Blue Stickney,
with abounding strength in every muscle of his lithe little body, was
scarcely conscious of fatigue when he spied the rambling, dilapidated
structure known as the Hayward place, and presently he was on the porch
of the white house beyond.
A stocky little man opened the door, whom the boy rightly conjectured to
be the owner himself. His face was framed in an abundance of wavy
reddish─gray hair, and his keen blue eyes looked kindly at his visitor
over a pair of silver─bowed spectacles.
Blue briefly told his errand, bringing a smile to the face of the little
man when he mentioned the name of Fitzpatrick.
“I dinna ken a better mon,” he observed, with a strong Scotch accent. “I
am glad to welcome ony freend o’ his.”
As they entered the big, sunny room on the left of the wide hall, the
boy looked about in plain astonishment, for on every side, high and low,
were birds—birds in cages, and birds free to fly wherever they would.
“My, what a lot!” he exclaimed under his breath.
Mr. Gillespie gave him a pleased nod over Caruso’s cage, from which he
was carefully removing the newspaper covering.
The bird, contrary to his usual custom with strangers, did not appear to
be at all afraid of the Scotchman, but, turning his bright eyes this way
and that, surveyed with evident curiosity his attractive surroundings.
The first to give him a musical salutation was a cardinal in the bay
window, which began a series of soft, sweet whistles. These notes seemed
to rouse the rest of the family, for shortly a concert was in full
swing.
The singing strangely excited Caruso. He pranced from end to end of his
perches, occasionally standing motionless as if to listen, and then
darting off again in a wild dance. At last he could keep silent no
longer, and a flood of music poured from his bursting throat which all
but drowned the other voices. Indeed, in a moment he had the stage quite
to himself, and was singing as he had never sung even for his beloved
little master.
Blue actually held his breath, as if fearing to miss a note of the
marvelous performance; and the old Scotchman, accustomed as he was to
all manner of feathered songsters, gazed at the disabled gray bird in
surprise and admiration. It was as if the robin, the oriole, the
cardinal, the song sparrow, the bluebird, and a host of others, were in
that little swelling throat. And this was interspersed with the mewing
of cats, the grunting of pigs, the cackling of hens, the call of the
Katy─dids, and the myriad sounds of country life. The singer finally
ended with the first notes of “Annie Laurie,” breaking off suddenly in
the middle of a measure to stand with drooping head, as if trying to
recollect the rest.
Without hesitation Sandy Gillespie caught up the air where Caruso
dropped it, and whistled it through, the bird still motionless upon his
perch.
That was enough. Memory gave back to the singer what he had almost lost,
and with a little prelude of his own he slipped into the old song,
stopping only with the last note.
“Weel dune, birdie! weel dune!” praised the Scotchman in a soft voice,
while Caruso pirouetted about like a pleased child.
The man smiled, and going to a tiny wall cupboard fetched something
which he placed in the bird’s cage.
Caruso watched him narrowly, and the instant he was well away swooped
the dainty before Blue could discern what it was.
The boy caught a twinkling glance thrown him from over the spectacles,
and he answered it with inquiring eyes.
“Meal worms,” said the Scotchman. “Naething they like better. What d’ye
feed him?”
“Oh, ’most anything!” was the indefinite answer.
Mr. Gillespie shook his head. “Na, na, that winna do!” He picked up a
small box on the table, and, emptying the bird’s food cup, replaced its
contents with a little from the package.
That it was satisfactory to Caruso was apparent from the zest with which
he ate it.
“Best thing for mockin’ birdies,” asserted the Scotchman, handing Blue
the box. “Ye buy it at th’ shop.”
The boy read the price in dismay, “Fifty Cents.” They could never afford
such costly food.
“Th’ wee wing wi’ sune be a’ right, I’m thinkin’,” Mr. Gillespie was
saying. “Ye maun leave th’ birdie wi’ me, an’ when we’re gude freends I
can find oot th’ tribble.”
So Blue, feeling that his errand was accomplished, bade the little man
good─bye, promising to come up again by the middle of the next week.
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