Read the excerpt from "How a Cat Played Robinson Crusoe." In her restlessness, she wandered to the farther side of the island where, in a sunny recess of the shore facing the mainland, she found a patch of bare sand, free of ice cakes and just uncovered by the tide. Opening upon this recess were the tiny entrances to several of the mouse tunnels.

Close beside one of these holes in the snow the cat crouched, quivering, intent. For ten minutes or more she waited, never so much as twitching a whisker. At last, a mouse thrust out its little pointed head.

How does this scene help develop the plot of the story?