Bedtime stories about cats.

Mittens was a small gray kitten with one white paw, and she was not sleepy at all. The house was quiet, the lamps were off, and everyone else was in bed. Then she saw it: a moonbeam, lying on the kitchen floor like a long silver ribbon.

Mittens crept toward it, tail high. She patted it with her white paw. The moonbeam did not move. She pounced. The moonbeam slid away, as if it wanted to play.

She followed it across the rug, past the sleeping dog, and up the stairs, one soft step at a time. The moonbeam stretched through a door that was open just a crack.

Inside, a little boy was fast asleep, and the moonbeam lay across his blanket like a silver path. Mittens climbed up, very gently, and stepped onto it.

It was warm there, and soft, and it smelled like home. Mittens turned around once, twice, three times, and curled into a ball in the middle of the moonbeam. She gave one tiny yawn, and the moon watched over them both until morning.

Biscuit was a very old cat with orange fur and long white whiskers. Every night, when the family went to bed, she jumped onto the windowsill to do her most important job. Biscuit counted the stars.

She started with the brightest one, high above the chimney. "One," she purred. Then the little twinkly one near the tree. "Two." Then a pair that sat side by side like sleepy eyes. "Three, four."

The more she counted, the slower she went. Five was over the garden gate. Six was behind a cloud, so she waited for it. Seven, eight and nine were very faint, and Biscuit had to blink to see them.

Her eyes were getting heavy now. The window was cool, but her cushion was warm, and the house was full of quiet breathing. She found the tenth star, tiny and far away. "Ten," she whispered.

And that was as far as Biscuit ever got. Her chin sank onto her paws, her tail wrapped around her nose, and the stars kept shining over the sleeping house, waiting for her to count them again tomorrow.

Pepper was a black cat with golden eyes, and she had the deepest purr in the whole street. It went rrrrr, rrrrr, soft and rumbly, like a tiny engine far away.

At bedtime, Pepper went for a walk around the house. First she sat beside the baby's crib and purred. Rrrrr, rrrrr. The baby's eyelids fluttered, and the baby was asleep.

Next she curled up by Grandpa's chair, where he was reading with his glasses on his nose. Rrrrr, rrrrr. His book slid slowly onto his lap, and he began to snore a gentle snore.

Then Pepper padded into Lily's room. Lily was wide awake, with the covers pulled up to her chin. "Pepper," she whispered, "I can't sleep." Pepper jumped onto the bed, settled against Lily's tummy and purred her very best purr.

Rrrrr, rrrrr. Lily could feel it, warm and steady, like a lullaby you could hold. Her breathing slowed down to match it. Soon Lily was asleep, and Pepper, who had worked very hard all evening, closed her golden eyes and fell asleep too.