--he won't run out quickly and jump on the bed, will he?" she said.

"No," answered Sara. "He's as polite as we are. He is just like a
person. Now watch!"

She began to make a low, whistling sound--so low and coaxing that it
could only have been heard in entire stillness. She did it several
times, looking entirely absorbed in it. Ermengarde thought she looked
as if she were working a spell. And at last, evidently in response to
it, a gray-whiskered, bright-eyed head peeped out of the hole. Sara
had some crumbs in her hand. She dropped them, and Melchisedec came
quietly forth and ate them. A piece of larger size than the rest he
took and carried in the most businesslike manner back to his home.

"You see," said Sara, "that is for his wife and children. He is very
nice. He only eats the little bits. After he goes back I can always
hear his family squeaking for joy. There are three kinds of squeaks.
One kind is the children's, and one is Mrs. Melchisedec's, and one is
Melchisedec's own."

Ermengarde began to laugh.

"Oh, Sara!" she said. "You ARE queer--but you are nice."

"I know I am queer," admitted Sara, cheerfully; "and I TRY to be nice."
She rubbed her forehead with her little brown paw, and a puzzled,
tender look came into her face. "Papa always laughed at me," she said;
"but I liked it. He thought I was queer, but he liked me to make up
things. I--I can't help making up things. If I didn't, I don't
believe I could live." She paused and glanced around the attic. "I'm
sure I couldn't live here," she added in a low voice.

Ermengarde was interested, as she always was. "When you talk about
things," she said, "they seem as if they grew real. You talk about
Melchisedec as if he was a person."

"He IS a person," said Sara. "He gets hungry and frightened, just as
we do; and he is married and has children. How do we know he doesn't
think things, just as we do? His eyes look as if he was a person.
That was why I gave him a name."

She sat down on the floor in her favorite attitude, holding her knees.

"Besides," she said, "he is a Bastille rat sent to be my friend. I can
always get a bit of bread the cook has thrown away, and it is quite
enough to support him."

"Is it the Bastille yet?" asked Ermengarde, eagerly. "Do you always
pretend it is the Bastille?"

"Nearly always," answered Sara. "Sometimes I try to pretend it is
another kind of place; but the Bastille is generally
easiest--particu