"Yes, a parrot is better than a doll, for a parrot can talk."
"A parrot is not better than a doll!" Sue cried.
"Yes it is," said Bunny. "It's alive, too, and a doll isn't."
"Well, I can make believe my doll is alive," said Sue. "Anyhow, Bunny Brown, you can't have a parrot or a monkey, 'cause Henry, the elevator boy, won't let 'em come inside Aunt Lu's house."
"That's so," Bunny agreed. "Well, anyhow, we can go in and ask how much they cost, and we can save up our money and buy one when we go home. We aren't always going to stay at Aunt Lu's. And our dog, Splash, would like a monkey and a parrot."
"Yes," said Sue, "he would. All right, we'll go in and ask how much they is."
Hand in hand, never thinking about their aunt and their mother, Bunny and Sue went into the animal store, in the window of which were the monkeys and the parrots. Once inside, the children saw so many other things—chickens, ducks, goldfish, rabbits, squirrels, pigeons and dogs—that they were quite delighted.
"Why—why!" cried Sue, "it's just like Central Park, Bunny!"
"Almost!" said the little boy. "Oh, Sue. Look at the squirrel on the merry-go-'round!"
In a cage on the counter, behind which stood an old man, was a bushy-tailed squirrel, and he was going around and around in a sort of wire wheel. It was like a small merry-go-'round, except that it did not whirl in just the same way.