"What you 'bout? Where you been?" demanded the parrot.
"Sleeping in my bed as I have a right to, Miss Saucebox," returned Lulu, laughing as she opened a cupboard door and brought out a paper of crackers. "There, take that and see if you can hold your tongue till folks are ready to get up."
The bird took the offered cracker and began eating it, standing on one foot, on its perch, and holding the food in the claws of the other, while it bit off a little at a time, Lulu looking on with interest.
"You'll have to behave better than this, or you'll get banished to the attic, or the kitchen, or some other far-off place," she said, shaking her finger threateningly at Poll.
Then, after turning down the light, she ran back to bed.
"Are you asleep, Eva?" she asked in a whisper.
"No dear; wide awake."
"Then let's talk; for I'm as wide awake as I can be."
"But didn't your father say you were to try for another nap?"
"I understood him to mean only that I might if I chose, not that I must; but perhaps he meant that he wanted me to; so I'll keep quiet and try."