It may have been the Devil who arranged the thing, but the fact of the case is
that Losson had for a long time been worrying Simmons in an aimless way. It
gave him occupation. The two had their cots side by side, and would sometimes
spend a long afternoon swearing at each other; but Simmons was afraid of
Losson and dared not challenge him to a fight. He thought over the words in
the hot still nights, and half the hate he felt toward Losson be vented on the
wretched punkah-coolie.
Losson bought a parrot in the bazar, and put it into a little cage, and
lowered the cage into the cool darkness of a well, and sat on the well-curb,
shouting bad language down to the parrot. He taught it to say: "Simmons, ye
so-oor," which means swine, and several other things entirely unfit for
publication. He was a big gross man, and he shook like a jelly when the parrot
had the sentence correctly. Simmons, however, shook with rage, for all the
room were laughing at him--the parrot was such a disreputable puff of green
feathers and it looked so human when it chattered. Losson used to sit,
swinging his fat legs, on the side of the cot, and ask the parrot what it
thought of Simmons. The parrot would answer: "Simmons, ye so-oor." "Good boy,"
Losson used to say, scratching the parrot's head; "ye 'ear that, Sim?"
And Simmons used to turn over on his stomach and make answer: "I 'ear.
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