The morning queue at the flowerbed formed before the baker's first loaf. Sparrows hopped from tulip to tulip, each taking a place on the gnome's shoulder. One by one they tried the brim, nodded to his painted nose, and set the hat back as if they had only been checking the weather.
We asked at the kiosk across the path. "They never keep it," said a woman with a paper bag of seed. "They just want a second of shade and a better view of the daisies."
A note in the park keeper's book read: please keep the line to one bird at a time, and do not borrow the hat past tea. By the next dawn the same three sparrows came earlier still, waiting without hopping ahead.