Soon they were all very good friends and Henri was telling them all about Luppe and Pierrot and Medard and Lisa and Gran’père and the yellow bird in its wooden cage. When Mère Marie and Pierrot returned, Henri was feeling much rested but rather hungry, and one of the girls gave him a pear from her basket.
Henri turned and waved his hand to them as Mère Marie led him away, and the girls laughed and shouted after them: “Au revoir, Mère Marie! Au revoir, Henri! Au revoir, Monsieur le Chien!” And Henri laughed, too, for that was a very droll way to address Pierrot.
The cart was lighter going home, so Mère Marie allowed Henri to ride part of the way, and Pierrot trotted or walked steadily along like the willing worker he was getting to be.
That day Luppe was better, but Père Jean thought he had best have a good rest; so he was given a comfortable bed of straw in an unused stall in the little thatched stable, and Mère Marie and Henri and Pierrot went again to the city without him. And again Luppe howled at their departure and was very despondent all day.
One cannot say whether Luppe died of a broken heart or whether it was his advancing years and the rheumatism. Père Jean did not realize what it meant to Luppe to be deprived of his work in life; and, anyway, what else could he have done? The poor old dog failed rapidly. He would not eat, and he scarcely responded to the attentions which the whole family showered upon him. Only on the last day his eyes followed Gran’père about with dumb pleading in them; and when Gran’père at last knelt beside him, Luppe painfully dragged himself up into the old man’s arms, and, with a great sigh, died.
Mère Marie and Henri and Lisa all wept, Lisa the loudest, and Gran’père and Père Jean were both very quiet and sober. It is not fitting that a man should mourn a dog as he mourns a brother or even a cross old uncle, but sometimes a dying dog leaves just as deep a feeling of loss. Luppe, with all his little faults, had been one of the family for so long that home would never seem quite the same again without him.
They buried him under the grapevine, in a sheltered spot, and many a human grave has been watered by less genuine tears. Then Lisa brought blue cornflowers and red poppies and laid them on the little mound, and they all went silently back to the house.
Thus was old Luppe gathered to his fathers and young Pierrot reigned in his stead.
