'Oh! do be quick, Cincinnatus,' said the little boy under his breath again; and to hasten matters, he gave the cat a poke in the ribs with his cold bare toes.
'Miau,' cried Cincinnatus quite sharply, jumping on one side, for he was taken rather by surprise. Subsequently he added in the cat language:—'Manners, my good child, manners! Let us before all things cultivate a polite address and a calm, unagitated exterior.'
Meanwhile Peter had succeeded in shutting the door quietly, and that, to his great relief, without catching a single glimpse of one of the blobbety-bodied, spindle-legged house-bogies. He pattered across the room as fast as ever he could, and jumped into his warm bed again.
'He is young and inexperienced,' murmured Cincinnatus reflectively. 'I am magnanimous. I scorn to bear malice.'
And he, too, jumped into the warm bed.
Now, this was really charming. Little Peter pushed up the bedclothes in front, making them into a snug, little, dark cavern, inside which there was just room enough for himself and Cincinnatus.
'See,' he said, 'we will play at robbers. I will be the captain and you shall be my first lieutenant.'
But unfortunately, Cincinnatus did not seem to care very much about that particular game. He had arrived at an age and temper of mind at which material comfort is far more valuable than pleasures derived from a lively exercise of the imagination. Perhaps you do not quite understand what that means? Well, so much the better. For my part, I hope you never may understand it. There are a number of things in this world that it is very much the best to be ignorant about if you can possibly manage it. Cincinnatus, anyway, understood it well enough, so he tucked his fore legs under his chest, until nothing was visible of them but just the furry elbows, and laid his tail neatly along his soft side, and settled himself down on the warm sheet, with his eyes more than half shut, purring all the while as loud as if he had got a small steam-engine inside him.
'That's not the way to play at robbers,' said little Peter.