It was past the noon angelus when Padre Alonzo came waddling along the path, and he found the garden still—still, and filled with the sun-drawn incense of trees and flowers.

“Sst! sst! Tony will be too warm, I fear,” he was saying aloud as he neared the cage. “The little one shall go to a cooler spot.” And with this conclusion, he halted beside the perch of the parrot and lifted the chirping canary down to his knee.

“Buenos dÍas,” he said to Loretta, pausing a moment; “a good day, truly, but over-hot, so that my cassock makes of me a living olla, for I am beaded with water drops from top to toe.”

The parrot shifted a little, and again set her head sidewise, as if she were puzzled and listening. Next, she edged toward him, and uncertainly, putting a foot down, clasping and unclasping the pole, trying it cautiously. Against the vertical piece that made her perch like a cross, she teetered awkwardly and stopped.

“Loretta,” said the padre, in some concern, “hast anything in thy craw? Well, gulp down a stone and grind thy grist. What one swallowest that must one digest.”

The gravel crunched behind him. He glanced back, to see Padre Anzar advancing, brown cowl shading hollow eyes.

Padre Alonzo colored guiltily. "Tony must go to the shade,” he said. “The sun is hot to the cooking-point.”

Padre Anzar paused a moment, glowering up at Loretta. “Then may it singe the plumage of that vixen,” he answered. “She desecrates our garden.” Another frown, and he passed on.

Padre Alonzo watched him out of sight before he again addressed the parrot. “I fear thou must mend thy ways, Loretta,” he said. “Here it is Christmas Day, and yet Anzar has no good words for thee. But see,”—he held up a plump hand, displaying one of Gabrielda’s sweet biscuits—“riotous as thou art, I have remembered. And now tell me, what hast thou given Tony?”

As though in mute answer, the parrot suddenly lowered her head toward him, and he saw that over the gray of her feathered face was a splash of scarlet, as if a vivid fuchsia petal had fallen there.

“Loretta!” he cried anxiously; “Loretta! thine eyes!”

She lifted her head until her beak pointed past the giant crucifix and straight into the glaring sun.

“Buenos dÍas,” he prompted tenderly, alarmed now at her unusual silence and the indifference shown his offering; “Loretta, buenos dÍas.”

But she was settling herself upon her cross-like perch as if for the night. “A-aw, To-o-ny! To-o-ny!” she returned with a little sleepy croak; “buenas noches! buenas noches!”

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The University Press, Cambridge, U. S. A.