However, she soon decided that the hearth-rug was the most delightful bed she had ever rested upon; and stretching out her limbs upon it, before the huge fire that was burning in the grate, she tried to collect her scattered ideas before she went any farther in these unknown regions. Suddenly the door opened. “Dear me! What a pretty cat!” cried a waiting-maid, entering the room, “and just when we are wanting another, too. My lady, the Countess, will be quite pleased.” Then, coming up to the cat, she took her in her arms, and began stroking her most affectionately. “Pretty Pussy! How did you ever get into the room? Oh, I see! They left the window open, and so you wandered in out of the street, poor little cat. It’s really quite lucky, just as the old one is dead.” So saying, she again stroked the cat, and carried her away into the inner room, where there sat an old lady in an easy chair by the fire eating her supper. “Please, your ladyship,” said the waiting-woman, “here’s a poor cat come into the house to-night, just as we were wanting one--will your ladyship be pleased to let it remain here?” “To be sure,” said the old Countess von Rustenfustenmustencrustenberg,--for it was she,--“it has come just in time to supply the place of poor old Finette. Put it into Finette’s bed to-night, Ermengarde, and give it a good meal first, for I dare say it is hungry enough, poor creature. Bring it here to me, and let me stroke it.” You may imagine how puss purred her very loudest as the Countess patted her, and called her a pretty cat. She thought herself now the luckiest cat in the world. How she wished that spiteful old owl could but know about it. Ermengarde now took her back into the first room she had entered, and setting her down on the hearth-rug, went out. Presently she returned, and placed before the cat a dish that held such a supper as she had never dreamed of. However, she did full justice to it in time; and then, after some more patting and petting, the maid again took her up, and placed her by the side of the fire in a very pretty basket lined with soft cushions. The next morning the cat was awake early; the sun was shining through the satin curtains of the splendid room, and everything in it looked so _very_ beautiful! How different from the old woman’s hut! So the cat sat up in the basket, and looked about her. After she had amused herself in this way for some time, Ermengarde opened the door. “Well, Pussy,” she said, “so you are wide awake, and ready, I dare say, for your breakfast.” Now for the buttered crumpets! thought the cat. The maid went out, and quickly brought back a large saucer of rich milk, with some roll crumbled into it. No buttered crumpets!