The Silky Seal Pup (4 page)

“Look, Meep! Mum and Great-Uncle Horace are there too,” whispered Zoe.

When everyone was inside, Zoe and
Meep crept up to the window and peeped through. Mr Pinch was standing at the front of the room, clearing his throat as if he was about to make a speech. Great-Uncle Horace was next to him, with Kiki perched on his shoulder. Suddenly the old bird spotted Zoe and Meep in the window and squawked in surprise.

Zoe held her breath – if horrid Mr Pinch saw them, she knew he’d tell them to leave immediately. She shook her head urgently at Kiki, hoping she wouldn’t make another sound. To her relief, the macaw nodded back.

“Quiet, please!” Mr Pinch announced sternly. “As you all know, the Rescue Zoo has been having some problems with money for a long time. Many of our animals are
very
expensive to look after,
and we are not making enough money to keep them all.” He glared at the keepers, as if it was all their fault.

A worried murmur went around the room. Zoe frowned, an anxious feeling in her tummy. What did Mr Pinch mean?

Great-Uncle Horace smiled comfortingly. “Now, everyone, there’s no need to be alarmed. I came home from Alaska the moment I got Mr Pinch’s message, and I’m sure that if we all work together, we’ll find a solution.” He scratched his head thoughtfully. “Hmm – perhaps we could have a cake sale? I do make a rather splendid carrot cake!”

Mr Pinch frowned. “I am afraid it’s
much
more serious than that, Mr Higgins,” he snapped. “We have almost no money left. And if we don’t find some very soon, the
Rescue Zoo will have to close!”

“What?” gasped Zoe, as Meep gave a squeak of horror. They stared at each other in disbelief. The Rescue Zoo couldn’t close!

Chapter Five

The Rescue Zoo in Danger

The whole meeting fell silent in shock. The zoo staff seemed as stunned as Zoe and Meep. “But…but what about the animals?” asked Will the penguin keeper, his face very pale.

“They would all be sent to other zoos,” Mr Pinch announced. “Without the
money to look after them, we would have no choice.”

Zoe’s heart was thumping fast.
The animals
. All her best friends in the world lived at the Rescue Zoo. There was Bella the polar bear, Oscar the elephant… And of course, there was Meep. Zoe didn’t know what she would do without her gorgeous, cheeky little friend, and even the thought of sending him away made her eyes fill with hot tears.

“But we
can’t
do that to our animals!” Alison, the bird keeper, exclaimed. “We promised that every creature at the Rescue Zoo would have a safe, loving home here, for ever and ever! We can’t make them leave!”

“And what about us?” cried Frankie, the giraffe keeper. “This isn’t
our
home, but we
love working here. Where will
we
go if the zoo shuts?”

The room was suddenly full of anxious chatter. With a nasty shock, Zoe realised something. The other keepers didn’t live at the zoo – but she did! The cottage at the Rescue Zoo was her home. If the zoo closed, there would be no need for a zoo vet any more. Lucy and Zoe would have to leave their beautiful, cosy cottage, and live somewhere else.

Great-Uncle Horace held up his hands for quiet. “Everyone! Please calm down,” he said. “The Rescue Zoo
cannot
close. I simply will not allow it. We won’t let the animals down. We must all think of a way to raise the money we need. I’m sure we will come up with an excellent plan.”

Great-Uncle Horace whipped his green
safari hat from his head. “I’ll leave my hat outside Mr Pinch’s door. When anyone has an idea, they can write it down on a piece of paper and put it in the hat. At the end of the day, we’ll read them all and decide what to do!”

He nodded encouragingly, but the zoo staff looked very upset. Zoe and Meep ducked behind a bench as everyone came out and started trudging back to their animals. Great-Uncle Horace was the last person to leave. He placed his hat by the door, then marched off towards Higgins Hall, with Kiki flying above him. “Time to check on the chrysalises, Kiki old girl!” Zoe heard him say as he rushed away.

“Meep, this is awful!” Zoe burst out. “I can’t believe it. Great-Uncle Horace is right – the Rescue Zoo just can’t close!”

“I’m scared, Zoe!” the little lemur chirped. His bottom lip was trembling, and his golden eyes were very wide and worried. “I don’t want to go to another zoo. I want to stay here with you!”

Zoe gathered him into her arms for a big hug. “And you will, I promise,” she told him firmly. “We’ll do everything we can to save the Rescue Zoo. We need lots of ideas – and I know who we can ask for help. The animals! Come on, Meep. We’ll start with the howlers – they can spread the word!”

The howlers were big, friendly monkeys. Some had bright-red fur, some were pale brown, and some were jet black – but they were all as loud as each other! That was where their funny name came from. Sometimes Zoe could hear them howling
when she was shopping with her mum on the other side of town! Zoe and Meep ran to their enclosure and Zoe called over the fence. “We need your help!”

The howlers scampered over quickly. “Can you get a message to all the other animals? Tell them they need to be awake at midnight, for an urgent meeting. I’ll explain more then,” Zoe told them.

The monkeys looked curious, but nodded. Together they tipped their heads back, took a deep breath and started to give great, gulping howls. Across the path, the warthogs heard the message and started grunting it to all their neighbours, while Ruby and the other parrots started up a noisy chorus. Soon the news about the midnight meeting was being screeched, grunted and roared through the whole zoo!

Chapter Six

The Midnight Meeting

“Time to go, Meep!” whispered Zoe, jumping out of bed.

For the rest of Saturday morning, Zoe and Meep had raced around the zoo, telling all the animals to be ready for the meeting. After that, they’d gone back to the cottage. Zoe had found a notepad and a pencil, and they’d spent the whole
afternoon scribbling down ideas. Even when Lucy had sent them to bed, they’d whispered under the covers as the minutes ticked away. Zoe had been sleepy and yawning, but now it was nearly twelve o’clock, she suddenly felt wide awake!

Zoe pulled a jumper over her pyjamas and grabbed her torch. She and Meep listened outside Lucy’s bedroom to make sure she was asleep, then sneaked out of the cottage. The zoo was very dark, but Zoe could see a yellow light shining from a window at the top of Higgins Hall. It looked like Great-Uncle Horace was awake.
I wonder if he’s thinking of ways to help the zoo, too?
Zoe wondered.

They started walking quickly along the path. “We’ll visit Star first,” Zoe told Meep. “I want to check she’s OK.”

Lots of the animals at the Rescue Zoo were nocturnal, which meant they were awake at night, like the bats and the coyotes, who slept in the day and woke up when the stars came out. But tonight every creature was awake for Zoe’s meeting, and the path was buzzing with noise. The cheeky orangutans shouted out, wanting to know what was going on. “You’ll find out soon!” replied Zoe.

Star was trembling nervously when they opened the door to her enclosure. She gave a happy squeal when she saw them. Zoe couldn’t help smiling as she picked the baby seal up and gave her a cuddle. “You can’t be frightened of the dark tonight,” she told Star, tickling her fluffy tummy. “All the animals are wide awake. Come and see.”

The next stop they made was at the parrot enclosure. Zoe unlocked the gate with her paw-print necklace and they slipped inside. Ruby, Cupid and Rio fluttered down from the trees to meet them, and Ruby gave a curious squawk.

Zoe took a deep breath. “The Rescue Zoo is in trouble,” she explained to the parrots. “We’re running out of money, and if we don’t think of a way to make some more, it will have to close down.”

Ruby and her friends stared at Zoe, speechless for once. Then they all started squawking anxiously. “Don’t worry, we won’t let that happen!” Zoe
reassured them gently. “But we need everyone to put their thinking caps on if we’re going to raise the money we need. Can you fly around and ask the other animals for their ideas?”

Ruby gave a solemn nod. Then she spread her wings and sailed out of the enclosure door into the night air. Cupid and Rio followed, and the parrots flew over the zoo, screeching Zoe’s message.

As the animals heard the news, there were loud snorts and whinnies of alarm.

Zoe had to call up to the parrots, “Please, tell everyone to keep quiet! If my mum or Great-Uncle Horace hear all the noise, they might come outside to see what’s going on. I’ll be in trouble if they find me out of bed!”

A few minutes later, Cupid fluttered down on to Zoe’s shoulder and squawked eagerly. “The lions want to have a roaring contest with the visitors?” repeated Zoe, hiding a smile. “Hmm…I’m not sure people would pay to enter that. But a competition sounds fun.”

Rio squawked from the top of the fence, and Meep squealed with laughter. “The monkeys think people will pay to have swinging lessons,” the little lemur giggled.

Zoe grinned. “I don’t think Mr Pinch would be very happy if the visitors started
climbing the trees!”

Then Ruby came back from the hippo enclosure, chattering excitedly. “Hmmm, visitors won’t want to buy the gloopy mud from their lagoon,” said Zoe, shaking her head. “The hippos might love wallowing in it, but people would rather have a nice clean bath. Keep thinking!”

“I know! What about a show?” Meep suggested, jumping up and down excitedly. “Lots of people already pay to see the penguin feeding show!”

“A show is a great idea, Meep!” Zoe grinned. “But it has to be something really special and different. Something the visitors don’t normally see.”

She paused thoughtfully. Just then, Star wriggled in her arms and gave a tiny, adorable sneeze. Zoe giggled and bent
down to rub her cheek against Star’s fluffy head. As she did, there was another sneezing sound. It was exactly the same – but this time it hadn’t come from Star. Cheeky Ruby had copied it perfectly.

The parrots chuckled to themselves. Zoe laughed too – then stopped as she had a brilliant idea. “That’s it, Ruby!” she gasped. “You and your friends could put on a show making the sounds of the other animals! You’re so good at it, and it’s a really unusual talent. I think the visitors would love it!”

Ruby fluffed her feathers proudly. “And we could sell everyone who comes to the show an information sheet, all about Amazon parrots,” Zoe added. “We could put in lots of fun stories about the three of you.”

The parrots all squawked approvingly.

Suddenly Zoe’s mind started whirring. “Wait – I have an even better idea,” she exclaimed. “We could sell information sheets about
all
the animals at the Rescue Zoo! We can include lots of Great-Uncle Horace’s brilliant animal
facts, and explain where every animal comes from, and what they like to eat.”

Meep clapped his tiny hands eagerly. “I want to help, Zoe!” he said, bouncing up and down.

Zoe felt so excited, she wanted to start right away! Suddenly she heard a tiny snoring sound. To her surprise, she saw that Star had fallen asleep, curled up peacefully in her arms.

“I think we’d better take this little one back to her own bed,” she whispered to the parrots. “Thank you for everything.”

The parrots nodded, looking very pleased and proud to have helped.

Zoe and Meep wished the parrots goodnight and started walking back to the seal enclosure, chatting quietly so they didn’t wake Star. Zoe couldn’t keep the smile from her face. They had come up with
two
brilliant ideas for saving their home. Now it was time to put them both into action!

“We’ll start first thing tomorrow morning, Meep,” Zoe whispered eagerly. “There’s no time to lose!”