They bored.
Then, satisfied that she was unobserved, Mere Riquette abandoned all
further pretence, and stalked silently about the room. The starlight
just made visible her gliding shadow, as first she visited the made-up
sofa-bed where the exhausted mother snored mildly beneath the book-
shelves, and then, after a moment's keen inspection, turned back and
went at a quicker pace into the bedroom where the children slept.
There the night-light made her movements easily visible. The cat was
excited. Something bigger than any mouse was coming into her life just
now.
Riquette then witnessed a wonderful and beautiful thing, yet witnessed
it obviously not for the first time. Her manner suggested no surprise.
'It's like a mouse, only bigger,' her expression said. And by this she
meant that it was natural. She accepted it as right and proper.
For Monkey got out of herself as out of a case. She slipped from her
body as a sword slips from its sheath, yet the body went on breathing
in the bed just as before; the turned-up nose with the little platform
at its tip did not cease from snoring, and the lids remained fastened
tightly over the brilliant brown eyes, buttoned down so securely for
the night. Two plaits of hair lay on the pillow; another rose and fell
with the regular breathing of her little bosom.
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