Shadow yapped excitedly, his little tail wagging. Zoe smiled. “Thank you! I’m glad you like it,” she said. “Listen, Shadow – about your family. Don’t worry about that, because today we’re—”
Zoe was about to explain all about the plan to raise money for Shadow’s family to come over to the zoo, but just then she heard the crackle of the loudspeaker again.
“Wonderful costumes, everyone!” came Great-Uncle Horace’s voice. “Now, please make your way to the green in front of the gift shop – it’s time for the concert!”
Just then, Ethan rushed down the path towards the wolf enclosure.
“Oh! Hi, Zoe!” he called, sounding surprised to see her. “Shouldn’t you be over at the concert area now?”
Shadow whined curiously, wanting to know what was going on. “I’ll be back as soon as I can, Shadow, I promise,” Zoe whispered, then turned to smile shakily at Ethan. She rushed back down the path to join the rest of her class. This was really it!
Chapter Eight
Howling Halloween
“Zoe, there you are!” said Miss Hawkins, spotting Zoe and ushering her to her place. “We thought you were going to miss it!”
Zoe’s class were standing in two lines, the people in the back line standing on a bench so that they could see. Three microphones on stands had been set up in front of them, like at a real concert. As Zoe squeezed in between Nicola and Jack, she glanced around nervously and almost wished she had missed it. The zoo was completely full, and it seemed like thousands of people were staring right at Zoe, even though she knew it couldn’t really be that many.
Lucy stepped up to the front, smiling encouragingly at Zoe, and spoke into one of the microphones. “Hello, everyone. Welcome to the Rescue Zoo Halloween Spooktacular, and thank you all very much for coming. As you know, we’re raising money tonight so that we can reunite our newest animal with his family. We thought we would introduce you to him, to thank you all for being so generous already.”
There was a ripple of excitement through the crowd as Ethan brought Shadow to the front and stood next to Lucy. Zoe realised that must have been why Ethan had come over to Shadow’s enclosure in such a hurry.
“Oh wow, he’s so cute!” Nicola said, grinning over at Zoe.
“This is Shadow, the grey wolf pup, who travelled here all the way from Alaska,” Ethan announced.
Shadow gave an excited bark and a little howl, and everyone in the crowd laughed.
“Now, please give a special round of applause for Class Three from our local school, who are going to perform a Halloween song,” added Lucy. “Our zookeepers will be bringing collection buckets round during the song, in case you’d like to make a donation.”
The crowd clapped as Miss Hawkins started the music and Zoe’s class took a deep breath. Miss Hawkins had chosen a couple of lines for each pair to sing by themselves. Then they were all supposed to join in together for the chorus.
Jenna and Sareeta started singing.
“Spiders and slugs, creeping on the wall…”
Zoe and Nicola were going to be singing together next, and when it got to their lines, Zoe felt her knees wobble.
“Wild grey wolves, running through the trees…” she began very quietly, hearing Nicola sing much more loudly next to her.
Then she heard a little howl. Shadow was joining in! Zoe turned and saw the wolf pup wagging his tail happily, and looking straight at her with bright eyes. The crowd chuckled, and one little boy said, “They’ve taught the wolf how to sing along too! That’s so clever!”
Zoe smiled at Shadow, and as the little pup howled happily again, she felt confident enough to sing the next line more loudly. Seeing Shadow right there reminded her why she was singing in the first place, and she really wanted to do her best. Then it was time for the whole class to sing the chorus, and Shadow burst into an even more enthusiastic howl as he heard the song get louder, and Zoe raised her voice even louder too, grinning widely.
When the song finished, the audience cheered and clapped, and some people even called for them to sing it all over again! Zoe found herself beaming, relieved it was over – but she also realised that she’d enjoyed herself. Singing wasn’t so bad if you had friends to sing along with you!
Meep scampered over from where he had been perched with Lucy, watching the performance. “Zoe, you did it!” he squeaked excitedly, hopping up on to Zoe’s shoulder and giving her a cuddle. “Hooray!”
Miss Hawkins stepped up to the microphone then, smiling. “Thank you! If you liked our song, please do make a donation to help us bring Shadow’s pack over to the zoo.”
She pointed to the collection buckets that the zookeepers were still carrying around the crowd. Zoe grinned as she saw people digging into their pockets and putting money into them. Soon they looked very full!