A Floating Compass

I trotted out through the garden gate to the courtyard fountain to listen to the soft trickle of water. Leaning my question-mark card securely against a damp stone balustrade, I paused to look across the shallow basin. A dry yellow ginkgo leaf had fallen onto the calm pool, floating like a little fan beside a stray wooden clothes peg. I reached forward with both front paws, gently nudging a fallen pine twig into the water. With patient taps, I guided the twig until it rested across the cleft of the floating leaf, pointing steadily toward the sunny archway like a tiny, quiet compass.