Missoula firefighters who raced to a burning home in the lower Rattlesnake Valley on Thursday morning were relieved to find no people at home when the fire broke out.

There were, however, pets, including a striped gray kitten with big blue eyes lying limp inside the front door.

"He wasn't breathing too well," said Firefighter Brett Cunniff, who scooped up the tiny body and gently carried it outside into the fresh, cool air. "So I put some oxygen on him."

Minutes later, the kitten was in the back of an ambulance, cradled in the arms of emergency medical technician Paige Ostanhowski, who held an oxygen mask to a button nose turning a healthy shade of pink.

"He's awake - and scratching," said Cunniff. ("He" eventually turned out to be a she.)

Meredith Gardner, 22, who lives next door, said she came home at about 10 a.m. from her University of Montana classes and saw flames through a back window in the house.

By the time Gardner called 9-1-1, a visiting friend of hers - Emily Maynard, 23, of Colorado Springs, Colo. - had driven up to her house.

"I saw the smoke and thought it was my friend's house at first," Maynard said. "My heart just stopped. I thought I'd left a burner on."