The alley cat and the dragon

The friendship between Old Alley Cat and Baby Dragon gives the rescue on Wild Island its intimate motive: while the island’s animals treat Baby Dragon as a convenient ferry, Old Alley Cat knows him as a companion and carries his plight beyond the island. She cannot free him herself, but her secret visits, promise, and account of his captivity set Elmer Elevator’s rescue in motion.

Friendship in Captivity

Baby Dragon had fallen from a low-flying cloud onto the riverbank about four months before Old Alley Cat arrived on Wild Island. Too young to fly well and with one wing badly bruised, he could not return to his cloud. The animals saw his arrival as a solution to their long-standing difficulty crossing the wide river: they tied a large rope around his neck and waited for his wing to heal, intending to use him to carry passengers and mail.

Old Alley Cat’s connection with him took shape within that captivity. She hid in the bushes and talked with him when nobody else was around, and described them as great friends. The concealment matters: their companionship exists apart from the public arrangement in which the animals claim his strength for their own use. To Old Alley Cat, he is not a means of crossing the river but a friend enduring an unjust life.

Care and the Promise to Help

Once Baby Dragon’s wing healed, the animals trained him to carry passengers. Old Alley Cat reported that they worked him all day, sometimes all night, loaded him too heavily, and twisted his wings and beat him when he complained. He remained tied to a stake by a rope long enough to let him cross the river, but not to escape. Even the Crocodiles, whom he regarded as his only other friends, greeted him only about once a week, and sometimes forgot.

The rope also made the captivity difficult to undo: Old Alley Cat described it as exceptionally strong and knotted so extensively that untying it could take days. When she left, she promised Baby Dragon that she would try to help him someday, although she could see no way to do so. Her promise is not a rescue plan yet; it is the lasting consequence of their friendship, and a commitment she later acts on indirectly.

Turning Friendship into Advocacy

When Elmer Elevator spoke of wanting to fly, Old Alley Cat recognized a possible way to help Baby Dragon. She explained that, if Elmer could rescue him, Baby Dragon might willingly let him ride, provided Elmer treated him kindly. The proposed journey therefore depends on more than the dragon’s ability to fly: Old Alley Cat makes kindness part of the exchange and presents rescue as a chance to form a relationship based on care rather than coercion.

Old Alley Cat gave Elmer information from her own knowledge of Wild Island, including the rope and the animals’ treatment of Baby Dragon. Although she was too old to accompany him, her account prepared him to understand what he encountered. At the river, he recognized that the rope ran to the crank used to summon Baby Dragon; the Gorilla could force him across by twisting his wings or haul him back with the rope. Old Alley Cat’s testimony thus turns what might look like a transport system into a mechanism of confinement and pain.

Rescue and the Limits of the Relationship

When Elmer reached Baby Dragon, Baby Dragon ran from the bushes, calling out for him to hurry as the pursuing animals crossed the river. Elmer went to him with a sharp jackknife and began sawing through the rope, telling him to stand still. The cutting gives practical effect to Old Alley Cat’s promise: the friend who had once spoken to Baby Dragon in hiding had enabled someone else to reach him and break the restraint.

Old Alley Cat is not present at the rescue, and the account does not describe what becomes of her friendship with Baby Dragon afterward. Its influence is nevertheless clear in the chain of care it creates. Her private companionship makes his suffering visible; her promise leads her to tell Elmer what he needs to know; and Elmer’s kindness and action offer Baby Dragon a way out of the role the island’s animals imposed on him.