The cat does not budge an inch. But still she answers with a pitiful "Mew!"
Cats cannot talk; but they can think. This cat looks in at the window and sees the boy. This is what she thinks.
"That boy looks like a boy that I knew when I was a kitten. I was a pet then. Now I am a cat without any home. Nobody cares for me. I go from house to house; but nobody takes me in. I wonder if I can't make that little boy take pity on me. I will try.
"Ah! he treats me like everybody else. He tells me to go away. Pretty soon he will say, 'Scat!' and throw water on me. No: he will not do that. He is so much like the little boy who used to pet me when I was a kitten, that I will not run away from him. I will beg to be let in."
So the cat sat still and said, "Mew!"
And the cat did not make a mistake. The little boy did take pity on her at last. He toddled off to his mother as fast as his legs would carry him, and got a pan of milk, which he set on the floor.
His mother opened the window for him, and the strange cat came in. How eagerly she lapped up the milk! She was really a very nice cat. The little boy soon began to make a pet of her.
And the cat was happy, and the boy was happy; and I don't know which was the happier of the two.