One evening--how it happened I cannot tell,--it was very hot and sultry weather, with thunder about, and at such times people are careless about closing doors and windows--one evening, by some mischance which no one ever could explain, the window of "birdie's room," as it had come to be called, was either left open, or flew open in some way. Hoodie was sure she had closed it when she went to bid her pet good night, but it was what is called a lattice window, and these are apt to fly open unless very firmly shut. Birdie was safe in his cage however, and the door of _that_ was fortunately--even when you hear what happened, children, you will agree with me that that part of it _was_ fortunate--quite fastened. Early next morning, one of the servants who slept in an attic above the ante-room, heard a noise below. She was a kind-hearted girl, and her first thought was of Miss Hoodie's bird. She got up at once, and hurrying down-stairs--it was not so very early after all, nearly six o'clock--ran to the ante-room. As she opened the door, to her horror a great big strange cat jumped out of the window. "Oh dear, oh dear," said Lucy, "can he have got at birdie?" The cage was not to be seen--but in another moment Lucy spied it on the floor, knocked down off the table by the cruel cat. He had not got at birdie--birdie lay in one corner, quite still as if dead, and yet when Lucy with trembling fingers unfastened the cage door and tenderly lifted out his little occupant, she could see no injury, not the slightest scratch. "His heart's beating still," she said, "perhaps it's only the fright of the fall," and she was turning to the window to examine birdie more closely, when a sound behind her made her start, and turning round she saw in the doorway the bird's little mistress, poor Hoodie herself. She was in her nightgown only--she had run from her room with her little bare feet, having heard Lucy passing down-stairs, with an instinct of fear that some evil had befallen her pet. "Lucy, Lucy," she cried, "what is the matter? It isn't anything the matter with birdie. Oh, dear Lucy, _don't_ say it is." Her voice somehow, as Lucy said afterwards, sounded like that of a grown-up person--all the babyishness seemed to have gone out of it--she did not cry, she stood there white as a sheet, clasping her hands in a way that went to Lucy's heart. "Oh, Miss Hoodie," she replied, the tears running down her face, for she was very tender-hearted, "oh dear, Miss Hoodie, don't take on so. I hope birdie's not badly hurt. The cat didn't touch him. It knocked over the cage, and it must have been the fall; but _perhaps_ he's more frightened than hurt."