IF IT WAS unseasonably warm in Boston, it was actually hot in New York. In their rooms at the great Tower Hotel, overlooking Central Park, the penguins were feeling the heat badly.
Mr. Popper took them up to the roof garden to catch whatever cool breeze might be blowing. The penguins were all charmed by the sparkling lights and the confusion of the city below. The younger birds began crowding over to the edge of the roof and looking down at the great canyons beneath them. It made Mr. Popper very nervous to see them shoving each other, as if at any moment they might succeed in pushing one over. He remembered how the South Pole penguins always did this to find out what danger lay below.
The roof was not a safe place for them. Mr. Popper had never forgotten how badly frightened he had been when Captain Cook had been so ill, before Greta came. He could not risk the chance of losing one of his penguins now.
Where the penguins were concerned, nothing was ever too much trouble for him. He took them downstairs again and bathed them under the cold showers in the bathroom. This kept him busy a large part of the night.
With all this lack of sleep, he was quite drowsy the next morning when he had to call the taxis to get to the theater. Besides, Mr. Popper had always been a little absent-minded. That is how he made his great mistake when he said to the first taxi-driver: —
“Regal Theater.”
“Yes, sir,” said the driver, threading his way in and out the traffic of Broadway, which greatly interested both the children and the penguins.
They had almost reached the theater, when the driver suddenly turned. “Say,” he said, “you don’t mean to say those penguins are going to be on the same bill with Swenson’s Seals, do you?”
“I don’t know what else is on the bill,” said Mr. Popper, paying him. “Anyway, here’s the Regal.” And they piled out and filed in the stage entrance.
In the wings stood a large, burly, red-faced man. “So these are the Popper Performing Penguins, huh?” he said. “Well, I want to tell you, Mr. Popper, that I’m Swen Swenson, and those are my seals in there on the stage now, and if your birds try any funny business, it’ll be too bad for them. My seals are tough, see? They’d think nothing of eating two or three penguins apiece.”
From the stage could be heard the hoarse barks of the seals, who were going through their act.
“Papa,” said Mrs. Popper, “the penguins are the last act on the bill. You go run back quick and get those taxis and we’ll let the penguins ride around a while until it’s time for their number.”
Mr. Popper hurried out to catch the drivers.
When he returned, it was too late. The Popper Performing Penguins had already discovered the Swenson Seals.
“Papa, I can’t look!” cried the children.
There was a sound of dreadful confusion on the stage, the audience was in an uproar, and the curtain was quickly rung down.
When the Poppers rushed onto the stage, both penguins and seals had found the stairway leading to the Swenson dressing-room and were on their way upstairs.
“I can’t bear to think what’s happening up there,” said Mr. Popper, with a shudder.
Mr. Swenson only laughed. “I hope your birds were insured, Popper,” he said. “How much were they worth? Well, let’s go up and look.”
“You go up, Papa,” said Mrs. Popper. “Bill, you run out of the theater and call the police to come and try to save some of our penguins.”
“I’ll go get the fire department,” said Janie.
When the firemen, with a great clanging, came and set up their ladders so that they could get in through the window of Mr. Swenson’s dressing room, they were a little vexed to find that there was no fire at all. However, when they found six black-mustached seals, sitting barking in the middle of the room, with twelve penguins parading gaily around them in a square, they felt better.
Then the policemen came in their patrol, and climbed up the ladder which the firemen had left against the building. By the time they too came through the window, they could scarcely believe their eyes. For the firemen had put firemen’s helmets on the penguins, which made the delighted birds look very silly and girlish.
Seeing the firemen so friendly with the penguins, the policemen naturally took sides with the seals and put policemen’s caps on them. The seals looked very fierce, with their long black mustaches and black faces underneath.
The penguins under their firemen’s helmets were parading in front of the policemen, while the seals, in their policemen’s caps, were barking at the firemen, when Mr. Popper and Mr. Swenson finally opened the door.
Mr. Popper sat down. His relief was so great that for a moment he could not speak.
“You policemen had better get your hats off my seals now,” said Mr. Swenson. “I got to go down on the stage and finish the act now.” Then he and his six seals slipped out of the room, with a few parting barks.
“Well, good-bye, ducks,” said the firemen, regretfully removing their helmets from the penguins and putting them on their own heads. Then they disappeared down the ladder. The penguins, of course, wanted to follow, but Mr. Popper held them back.
Just then the door flew open, and the theater manager burst into the room.
“Hold that man,” he shouted to the policemen, pointing at Mr. Popper. “I have a warrant for his arrest.”
“Who, me?” said Mr. Popper, in a daze. “What have I done?”
“You’ve broken into my theater and thrown the place into a panic, that’s what you’ve done. You’re a disturber of the peace.”
“But I’m Mr. Popper, and these are my Performing Penguins, famous from coast to coast.”
“I don’t care who you are, you haven’t any business in my theater.”
“But Mr. Greenbaum is going to pay us five thousand dollars for a week at the Regal.”
“Mr. Greenbaum’s theater is the Royal, not the Regal. You’ve come to the wrong theater. Anyway, out you go, you and your Performing Penguins. The patrol is waiting outside.”