“But what did you say to her that got her so offended?”

“All I said was, ’You don’t belong in an English garden; you ought to be in a milliner’s window.  That’s all.”

“You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Cheapside.  Don’t you realize that this bird has come thousands of miles to see me—­ only to be insulted by your impertinent tongue as soon as she reaches my garden?  What do you mean by it?—­If she had gone away again before I got back to-night I would never have forgiven you—­ Leave the room.”

Sheepishly, but still trying to look as though he didn’t care, Cheapside hopped out into the passage and Dab-Dab closed the door.

The Doctor went up to the beautiful bird on the ink-stand and gently stroked its back.  Instantly its head popped out from under its wing.

THE TENTH CHAPTER

LONG ARROW, THE SON OF GOLDEN ARROW

“Well, Miranda,” said the Doctor.  “I’m terribly sorry this has happened.  But you mustn’t mind Cheapside; he doesn’t know any better.  He’s a city bird; and all his life he has had to squabble for a living.  You must make allowances.  He doesn’t know any better.”

Miranda stretched her gorgeous wings wearily.  Now that I saw her awake and moving I noticed what a superior, well-bred manner she had.  There were tears in her eyes and her beak was trembling.

“I wouldn’t have minded so much,” she said in a high silvery voice, “if I hadn’t been so dreadfully worn out—­That and something else,” she added beneath her breath.

“Did you have a hard time getting here?” asked the Doctor.

“The worst passage I ever made,” said Miranda.  “The weather—­Well there.  What’s the use?  I’m here anyway.”

“Tell me,” said the Doctor as though he had been impatiently waiting to say something for a long time:  “what did Long Arrow say when you gave him my message?”

The Purple Bird-of-Paradise hung her head.

“That’s the worst part of it,” she said.  “I might almost as well have not come at all.  I wasn’t able to deliver your message.  I couldn’t find him.  Long arrow, the son of golden arrow, has disappeared!”

“Disappeared!” cried the Doctor.  “Why, what’s become of him?”

“Nobody knows,” Miranda answered.  “He had often disappeared before, as I have told you—­so that the Indians didn’t know where he was.  But it’s a mighty hard thing to hide away from the birds.  I had always been able to find some owl or martin who could tell me where he was—­if I wanted to know.  But not this time.  That’s why I’m nearly a fortnight late in coming to you:  I kept hunting and hunting, asking everywhere.  I went over the whole length and breadth of South America.  But there wasn’t a living thing could tell me where he was.”

There was a sad silence in the room after she had finished; the Doctor was frowning in a peculiar sort of way and Polynesia scratched her head.