For Queen Rags and Buddy, who let me stray onto their property.
C.H.
Bird Alert
“Good kitty, Mulberry.” Janey Whitfield patted the fat orange tabby cat that had just jumped onto the sofa beside her. She giggled as he rubbed his face on her arm. “Your whiskers tickle! Aw, but that’s okay—you love me, don’t you?”
“He’s just hoping you’ll give him more food,” Zach Goldman said with a laugh.
Mulberry was Zach’s family’s cat. Janey was at Zach’s house, along with their friends Lolli Simpson and Adam Santos. Today was the first official meeting of the Pet Rescue Club—the group the four of them had decided to form after helping to rescue a neglected dog.
The meeting had started half an hour earlier. Zach’s dad had brought out some snacks, and the four kids were supposed to be discussing how to organize their new group. But, they’d been too busy eating and playing with Mulberry to do much discussing so far.
Lolli selected a piece of cheese off the tray on the coffee table. “Did you add the stuff about the Pet Rescue Club to the blog?” she asked Janey.
“Yes.” Janey pushed Mulberry away gently. Then she picked up her tablet computer and showed Lolli the screen.
Janey’s blog had started as a way for kids around their town to share photos of their pets. Janey loved animals, but she couldn’t have a pet of her own because her father was severely allergic to anything with fur or feathers. She’d thought that seeing pictures of lots of cute pets would be the next best thing to having her own.
Now the blog had another purpose, too. The Pet Rescue Club was going to use it to find animals that needed their help. So far Janey had written an update on the rescued dog and added a paragraph telling people to send in information on any animal that might need their help.
“Okay,” Adam said. “So we put something on the blog. Now what?”
Adam was a very practical person. He was so responsible that he already had a successful pet-sitting business, even though he was only nine. People all over town paid him to come to their houses to feed and walk their dogs while they were at work or on vacation.
Janey didn’t answer Adam right away. Mulberry was kneading his front paws on her leg and purring. Janey rubbed the cat’s head and smiled.
“I wish I could have a cat like Mulberry,” she said.
“Yeah, Mulberry is great!” Lolli leaned over to pet the cat. Mulberry turned around and butted his head against her arm.
Janey giggled. “And he’s so cute! Here, Mulberry—want a cracker?”
“Don’t give him that,” Zach said quickly. “It’s onion flavored and cats shouldn’t eat onion—it’s bad for them.”
“Really?” Janey wasn’t sure whether to believe him. Zach was always joking around and playing pranks on people. Still, she didn’t want to hurt Mulberry if Zach was being serious for once. She pulled the cracker away and glanced at Adam. “Is that true? Are onions bad for cats?”
Adam shrugged. “Probably. I know dogs aren’t supposed to eat onions.”
“Why are you asking him? Don’t you believe me?” Zach asked Janey. “My mom’s a vet, you know. She’s taught me lots of stuff like that.”
Before Janey could answer, a pair of twelve-year-old boys raced into the room. They were identical twins. Both of them were tall and skinny with wavy dark hair and the same brown eyes as Zach. It was raining outside, and the boys’ sneakers left wet tracks on the floor.
Janey knew the twins were two of Zach’s three older brothers. She couldn’t imagine living with that many boys!
“Check it out,” one of the twins said, pointing at Janey. “Little Zachie has a girlfriend!”
“No way—he has two girlfriends! Way to go, little bro!” the other boy exclaimed with a grin.
“Shut up!” Zach scowled at them. “And go away. We’re trying to have a meeting here.”
One of the twins stepped over and grabbed Mulberry off the sofa. “Yo, Mulberry,” he said, cuddling the cat. “Are these girls bothering you?”
“Mulberry likes us,” Lolli said with a smile. “He’s like the mascot of the Pet Rescue Club.”
“Okay.” The twin dropped Mulberry on the sofa again. The cat sat down and started washing his paw.
“Grab the umbrella and let’s go,” the other twin said. “The guys are waiting for us outside.”
One of the twins grabbed an umbrella off a hook by the back door. Then they raced back out of the room.
“Sorry about that,” Zach muttered. “They are so annoying.”
“They’re not so bad.” Lolli smiled. She got along with everybody—even obnoxious boys. “Anyway, what were we talking about?”
“About how cats can’t eat onion,” Zach said. “They shouldn’t have chocolate, either. Did you know that?” He stared at Janey.
She shrugged. “No. That’s interesting.”
“Yeah,” Lolli agreed. “There’s lots to know about having a pet! When we first got Roscoe, I thought all he needed was a bowl of water and some dog food. But there’s a lot more to it than that!”
Roscoe was the Simpsons’ big, lovable dog. Lolli and her parents had found him at the Third Street Shelter a few years earlier. He was a mix of Labrador retriever, rottweiler, and who knew what else.
“I have an idea,” Janey said. “You already said Mulberry was our club mascot. We should make Roscoe a mascot, too. We can post their pictures on the blog to make it official.”
“Good idea,” Lolli said. “I have a cute picture of Roscoe we can use.”
“We should take a picture of Mulberry riding on my skateboard,” Zach said. “That would be cool!”
“Veto,” Janey replied.
Zach frowned at her. “Can’t you just say no like a normal person?” he said. “Oh, wait, I forgot—you’re not normal.”
Janey ignored him. “Veto” was her new favorite word. Janey liked finding interesting words and using them. Saying veto was her new way of saying no.
“Hey Janey,” Adam spoke up. “I think I heard your tablet ping.”
“Really?” Janey had dropped her tablet on the sofa. Now Mulberry was sitting on it. She pulled the tablet out from under the cat. “Sorry, Mulberry. That might be an animal who needs our help!”
Lolli leaned over her shoulder. “What does it say?”
“It’s not a posting on the blog,” Janey said. “It’s alerting me to a new e-mail.”
She clicked into her e-mail account. The message was from a classmate named Leah. Janey read it quickly.
Hi Janey,
I heard you’re helping animals now. I need help! I just got home from my soccer practice and found out my pet canary is missing!
Runaway Cat?
“Oh, no!” Janey exclaimed, reading the e-mail again.
“What’s wrong?” Adam asked.
“The e-mail is from Leah,” Janey said. “She says her canary is missing!”
“Leah has a canary?” Lolli said. “I didn’t know that.”
“I didn’t either. But if it’s missing, we should try to help her find it,” Janey said. “Zach, can I use the phone?”
“Sure, that’ll be five dollars, please,” Zach said.
Janey ignored the joke. She rushed into the kitchen and grabbed the phone. Leah had put her number at the end of the e-mail.
“Janey?” Leah said from the other end of the line. “I was hoping you’d call. I’m so worried about Sunny!”
“What happened?” Janey asked.
“I must have forgotten to latch his cage after I fed him this morning before school.” Leah sounded upset. “When I got home, the cage door was open and Sunny was nowhere in sight!”
“Oh, no,” Janey exclaimed.
“
That’s not even the worst part,” Leah went on. “My bedroom window was open! What if he flew outside? I might never find him!”
Janey glanced at Lolli, Adam, and Zach. They had followed her into the kitchen and were all listening to her half of the conversation.
“Don’t worry, Leah,” Janey said. “The Pet Rescue Club is on it! We’ll be right over.”
She hung up and told the others what Leah had said. “I don’t like the idea of keeping birds cooped up in cages,” Lolli said uncertainly. “Shouldn’t they be free to fly around?”
“I don’t know,” Janey said. “But Leah sounded really worried.”
“Then we should help her,” Lolli said.
“Definitely,” Zach agreed, and Adam nodded.
Mulberry had followed Janey into the kitchen, too. He rubbed against her legs. Then, suddenly, he meowed and rushed over to the screen door leading outside.
“Mulberry, what are you doing?” Lolli asked.
“Look!” Adam pointed. “There’s another cat out there!”
Janey saw it, too. A cute black cat with big green eyes was looking in at them from outside!
“Where did that cat come from?” Lolli wondered.
“I don’t know.” Janey stepped closer and peered at the cat. “It’s not wearing a collar or tags. But it looks healthy—just wet from the rain.”
“I think I know where that cat lives,” Zach said. “I’ve seen her in the window of a house across the street.”
Lolli looked concerned. “Uh-oh. What if she slipped out when her owners weren’t looking? They’ll be worried sick.”
Adam nodded. “We should take her home.”
“Yeah.” Zach grinned. “This is the perfect chance for the Pet Rescue Club to rescue another pet!”
Janey felt impatient. “Okay, but hurry,” she said. “Leah is waiting, remember?”
Zach ran to tell his father where they were going. Then the kids all went outside. Zach had to nudge Mulberry away from the door to stop him from following them.
The black cat was just as friendly as Mulberry. She rubbed against Lolli’s legs and purred.
“Good kitty,” Lolli said. “Can I pick you up?”
The cat purred louder. “I think she’s saying yes,” Janey said with a smile.
Lolli picked up the cat. “Which house is it?” she asked, squinting in the light rain.
“That one.” Zach pointed to a white house with black shutters. “My parents have met the people who live here, but I don’t know them at all. They only moved in last summer.”
All four kids checked for traffic and then crossed the street. The cat stayed snuggled in Lolli’s arms.
Janey led the way up the steps onto the front porch of the white house. There was no doorbell, but there was a brass knocker shaped like a seashell. Janey reached up and rapped the knocker two or three times.
They waited but there was no response. “Maybe they’re not home,” Adam said.
“Try knocking one more time,” Lolli suggested.
“Here, let me do it. Janey knocks like a girl.” Zach pushed past the others and knocked harder. “There. If they’re home, they should hear that.”
Janey rolled her eyes at Lolli. Lolli just smiled.
Finally, there was the sound of footsteps from inside. Then the door swung open. A young woman was standing there. She was wearing sweatpants, and her hair was in a messy ponytail. A chubby baby with rosy cheeks was balanced on one hip.
“Oh, hello, kids,” the woman said. “What are you doing with Hall Cat?”
“Hall Cat?” Lolli giggled. “Is that really her name?”
The young woman smiled back, though she didn’t look that happy. “Yes, that’s her,” she said. “Was she bothering you? Sometimes she’s too friendly for her own good.”
“No, she wasn’t bothering us,” Janey said. “We thought you might be looking for her, though. We found her outside.” She smiled at the baby. He was staring at her with big, blue eyes.
“Yes, my husband let her out a little while ago.” The young woman shifted the baby to her other hip. “Hall Cat is sweet, but ever since the baby came, she always seems to be underfoot.” She wiped a spot of drool off the baby’s chin. “I’m afraid I might trip over her and drop him.”
“Oh.” Janey looked at Hall Cat. The cat was still purring away in Lolli’s arms, looking content and calm. “Um, maybe you didn’t know, but being outside can be dangerous for a house cat. She could get hit by a car, or—”
“This is a quiet neighborhood,” the young mother broke in. “Anyway, we had to do something. What if she scratched the baby while she was trying to play with him? I can’t take that chance.”
She sounded so worried that Janey couldn’t help feeling sorry for her. But Janey was worried about Hall Cat, too.
“Maybe you could keep the baby’s door shut,” she said. “Or—”
Just then the baby let out a loud gurgle. The young woman glanced at him.
“Thanks for being so concerned about Hall Cat, kids,” she said. “But trust me, being outside is the best option we have right now. My husband and I don’t want to take her to the shelter, so she’ll just have to adjust.”
“The shelter?” Zach sounded alarmed.
“But—” Janey began.
Suddenly the baby opened his mouth and started to wail. His mother winced, then hugged him to her, rocking him back and forth.
“Sorry, I really have to go,” she said. “You can leave Hall Cat on the porch if you want—she seems to like it there. Bye now!”
Before Janey could come up with another way to change the woman’s mind, the door swung shut.
Search and Rescue
“I still don’t think we should have left Hall Cat outside,” Zach said. It was a few minutes later, and the Pet Rescue Club was halfway to Leah’s house. She only lived a few blocks away in the same neighborhood.
“I know.” Janey shrugged. “But what else could we do? Break into her owners’ house and sneak her back in?”
“We’re supposed to be the Pet Rescue Club.” Lolli kicked at a stone on the sidewalk. “We should try to figure out how to help Hall Cat.”
“We will,” Janey said. “Right after we help Leah find her bird.”
She felt sorry for Hall Cat, too. But she was even more worried about Leah’s canary.
Soon the Pet Rescue Club was ringing Leah’s doorbell. Leah answered right away. She was a tall, skinny girl with freckles and glasses. Normally she was always smiling or laughing, but today she looked anxious and sad.
“Thanks for coming,” she said. “Come in and I’ll show you Sunny’s cage.”
Janey and the others went inside. Leah’s four-year-old brother was sitting on the living room floor playing with a toy car. Two cats were watching him. One was a gray tabby, and the other was mostly white with brown and orange patches.
“Cute kitties,” Lolli told Leah.
“Thanks.” Leah barely glanced at the cats as she headed for the stairs. Janey guessed that she was too worried about Sunny to think about anything else.
The Pet Rescue Club followed Leah to her bedroom upstairs. The room was painted pale yellow with white trim. Along one wall was a bird cage. It was very tall, with several perches, a mirror, and colorful hanging toys.
“Wow.” Lolli sounded impressed as she stepped closer for a better look. “This is a really nice cage!”
“Thanks,” Leah said with a sad sigh. “Sunny loves it—at least I thought he did.”
“It’s so big,” Zach commented. “Is it really all for one little bird?”
“Yes.” Leah touched the cage. “Canaries need lots of room to fly. That’s why Sunny’s cage is so big.”
“Really? That’s interesting.” Janey read everything she could about animals. But she didn’t know that much about pet birds. “So you don’t have any other canaries to keep Sunny company? Do you think that’s why he flew away?”
Lolli nodded. “That makes sense. Mayb
e he was looking for a friend.”
“Dogs like having other dogs around,” Adam agreed.
“Actually, male canaries do better living alone,” Leah said. “And like I said, Sunny seemed really happy. I don’t know why he’d try to escape!”
“We should try to find him.” Adam walked over to the window and looked out. “Maybe he’s still in your backyard.”
All five of them hurried downstairs and out the back door. For the next half hour, they searched Leah’s backyard. The yard was pretty big, and had lots of shrubs and flowers. Janey didn’t like getting her hands dirty, but she was willing to do it to help an animal. She pulled back the branches of a prickly rose bush, looking for a flash of yellow. But there was no sign of Sunny.
“Here, birdie, birdie!” Zach called. He whistled loudly.
“Not like that,” Leah corrected. “He likes it when I whistle to him like this.”
She let out a soft, musical whistle. Janey tried to imitate it, and couldn’t do it. But Adam imitated the whistle perfectly!
“Dude!” Zach said with a laugh. “You sound like a canary! I always knew you were a birdbrain!”
“Quit joking around,” Janey told him. “We need to find Sunny before it gets dark.”
“I know.” Zach shot a look at Leah. “Sorry. I’ll look over there behind the shed.”
Another twenty minutes passed with no sign of Sunny. Finally, the back door opened and Leah’s mom looked out.
“Leah, are you out there?” she called. “Sorry, but it’s time for your friends to go home now. You need to set the table for dinner.”
“But we haven’t found Sunny yet!” Leah sounded frantic.
“I’m sorry, honey.” Her mother did sound sorry, but she also sounded firm. “Maybe Sunny will find his way home on his own. There’s nothing else you can do right now.”
Leah sighed as her mother disappeared. “I’m so worried,” she told Janey and the others, her voice quavering. “Poor little Sunny! He’s not used to being out on his own.”
“I know.” Janey put an arm around her shoulders. “Try not to worry. The Pet Rescue Club will figure something out. I promise.”
No Time for Hallie Page 1