With the firemen came Mazie. She had gone to the central alarm station in the hope of finding Johnny there. Instead she had found the Chief. When the first and second alarms came in from the Zoo alarm box, the Chief had bundled her into his car and they had raced for the park.
Hardly had she alighted from the Chief’s car at the scene of the fire than she felt a slight touch on her shoulder and, on looking up, saw that Jerry, the firemen’s monkey mascot, was on her shoulder.
She was not surprised at this, but so pleased that tears glistened in her eyes. From the time Jerry had saved her life by bringing a rope to her in the burning building, he had apparently thought of her as his especial charge.
Seeing the Chief about to enter the burning Zoo behind the firemen with the spurting hose in their hands, Mazie took his arm to enter with him. Though he frowned at her, he did not say no. It was a terrible sight that met her eyes. Just as they entered, the fire broke through the wooden partition between the office and that portion of the Zoo set apart for birds. The fluttering and screaming of frightened birds was almost more than she could stand. Beautiful yellow canaries, brown warblers, parrots of gorgeous green, magnificent birds of paradise, tropical birds with plumage as varied as the hues of the rainbow—they one and all beat their wings against their cages and cried for freedom as they never had cried before in all their captive lives.
“And all in vain,” the girl fairly sobbed.
“It’s no use,” muttered the Chief grimly, “we may save the animals, but this part of the Zoo is doomed. C’mon. Let’s get out.”
Reluctantly the girl turned away. As she did so she saw a single yellow canary in a small cage near the door—the commonest bird in the world. Why he was there alone she could not tell. She only knew that out of all that priceless collection here was one that might be saved. Seizing the cage, she tore it from its hanging, then followed the Chief into the outer air.
“Dear little bird,” she whispered, as she hung the cage high on the limb of a tree well away from danger, “I have given you a new bit of life. May you sing long and sweetly for that.”
Once more she joined the fire-fighting throng. She was hoping all the time to come upon Johnny. This was the kind of fire he was supposed to investigate. He must be here, but where?
“He might be in there,” she thought to herself as she followed a band of fire fighters into the long, low compartment occupied by the monkey tribe. Jerry, who was still on her shoulder, let out a scream of delight at sight of so many of his kind. His scream was answered by one long wail of terror, for at that very moment a broad tongue of fire came licking through the thin wooden ceiling of the room.