Scruffy - A Diversion

by Paul Gallico

  Miss Boddy’s temperance was not the tight-lipped, spoil-sport, kill-joy type, nor was her hatred of war of the crack-pot, peace-marcher variety. She hated war because she was a woman of goodwill and common sense plus courage to speak out against the imbecility of human slaughter. She hated drink because of the damage it had done to her illusions concerning her father.

  Her life had been one long pattern of devotion, first to her father, then to the ape which surely represented the child that she had never had. Now this devotion was shifted to the man who had offered her his life and asked for hers. He became paramount to her and thus Amelia swiftly fell into her proper place, no less loved, but downgraded from child to beast, from obsession to household pet. If Lovejoy wanted her mated with the man in the moon she would not have protested. Thus she no longer objected to the alliance of Amelia and Scruffy since it seemed that such a union would make Lovejoy happy.

  Unfortunately, the one that continued to object was Scruffy.

  Tim’s euphoria brought about by what appeared to be the solution of his problems via the heroism and gallantry of Bombardier, now Sergeant Lovejoy, was short-lived and the pin that punctured it was, of course, the intransigence of Scruffy. Never had the old adage that you can drive a horse to water but you cannot make him drink had a more thorough illustration. By dint of bribery, threatening, cajoling and watching, Tim and the Sergeant had brought Scruffy to the point where he would tolerate Amelia in the same cage, but that was as far as he would go. And Amelia was now full in heat and psychologically as well as physically prepared. Scruffy stubbornly refused and resolutely kept his back turned. When she tried to approach him, or made advances, he either cuffed her, spat at her, or bit her.

  “It’s just damn bad luck,” Tim explained to Major Clyde. “He doesn’t like her looks.”

  “I didn’t know they cared,” said the Major. “I just thought that when—”

  “They don’t,” Tim asserted. “But HE does. That’s the trouble. Old Scruff is such a bastard he’s practically human. The more she chucks herself at him the less he seems to be inclined.”

  The Major nodded morosely. “I know,” he agreed. “There was a girl at a cocktail party once. Practically chased me into the bedroom. No go! A fellow likes to feel—”

  “The hunter, not the hunted,” Tim concluded with masculine illogic, having quite forgotten how Felicity had tracked him down.

  The point was that Scruffy could, but wouldn’t. Somehow, through osmosis or sheer instinct, the urgency of the affair and what was wanted of him had communicated itself. Scruffy would have made the perfect Russian Foreign Minister. Whatever anybody else was for, he was against.

  Nevertheless, Tim and the Sergeant kept a twenty-four-hour watch on the cage containing Scruffy and Amelia, divided into alternating eight-hour shifts, for they were the only ones on the Rock sufficiently familiar with the physiology and habits of primates to be able to know and be sure that a union had taken place.

  These vigils accomplished a dual purpose. They kept track of any possible goings on between the unhappy couple and at the same time mounted a thoroughly reliable twenty-four-hour guard upon the last two monkeys that stood between the British Empire and the downhill path. However, one reason for this close observation would come to an end within a week or so when that period of combustion which nature sets alight in all its two-footed and four-footed female victims burned out and Amelia would no longer be a candidate for motherhood. Tim had no doubt but that as soon as this moment was to hand and the lady was no longer pregnable Scruffy would want her for his very own. It was maddening and at the same time admirable. If ever there had been a truly free soul cast up on the shores of the planet who did exactly what he wanted with no consideration for anyone or anything, and got away with it, it was Scruff.

  With no one else to be trusted Tim had put himself and Lovejoy on a consecutive eight-hour watch schedule, midnight to eight in the morning, eight to four, and four to midnight, which meant that one of them stayed up on alternate nights keeping an eye on the pair from St. Michael’s Hut, a small shack close by the cages. This played hell with Timothy’s home life since Felicity was herself doing a ten-hour shift, locked up in the Coding Office. Their paths seemed to cross only occasionally and less and less frequently, sometimes for a hastily-snatched meal, sometimes as Timothy would be coming home to a bed still warm from Felicity’s departure. It was on one of those occasions when turn and schedule enabled Tim and Felicity to spend half an evening together that the O.I.C. Apes confessed to his wife that he, or rather they, faced defeat and at the same time was let in to a piece of intelligence which, had he not been so busy and occupied with affairs of state, he might have suspected and confirmed a good deal sooner.

  The evening when they were together until midnight, when it was Tim’s trick to go up to the cages, he had been more than usually downcast, failing to respond to all of Felicity’s attempts to lift his spirits. Cries of “Cheer up, chicken” were of no avail; her martinis instead of elevating acted as a depressant; she even tried a few shameless advances of which her husband, unlike him, did not even seem to be aware.

  “Oh, Tim,” Felicity groaned finally, “you mustn’t take it so to heart. I’ll buy you another Empire if this one goes.”

  “I feel so helpless,” Tim complained. “Here I am, Officer in Charge of Apes for the first time in history when it means something. The Brigadier’s depending on me; he said so. For two years I’ve been telling him I’m the only one who knows all about these blighters and now that it’s up to me to prove it I can’t get that blasted Magot to climb over the bolster.”

  Felicity said, “Shh—don’t be vulgar, darling. Have you tried forbidding him to have anything to do with her? Maybe if you segregated them now so that he couldn’t get to—”

  “Not with old Scruff. He knows that one. The Sergeant and I tried that the other morning. Scruff hopped up and down and clapped his hands. He was delighted and acted as though we had finally got it through our heads what he had been driving at. We had to put them back together again for our own self-respect. He wins, he always wins.”

  “I don’t suppose there is anything we could do for Amelia,” Felicity suggested.

  “Short of a month’s course at Elizabeth Arden’s—no,” said Tim. “And that wouldn’t get her eyes uncrossed. We have groomed her and brushed her; he doesn’t like her looks, he doesn’t like her smell; he’s not having any.”

  As though smitten by a sudden idea Felicity arose quietly and left the room. When she returned she held in her fingers a small bottle at the bottom of which was a minute amount of yellowish liquid.

  Tim looked at her and the little bottle inquiringly.

  “The supreme sacrifice,” Felicity said. “It’s all I’ve got left. There won’t be any more until after the war. You can have it.”

  “What is it?” Tim asked, his state being such that he was unable to recognize the bottle.

  “Chanel No. 5,” said Felicity. “Try it on Amelia. Maybe it’s just the touch that will get Scruffy.”

  For a moment Tim was inclined to be angry. His nerves were badly jangled from continued frustration and it was no time for joking. Then as suddenly as his anger had been about to flare, it vanished, for he was aware of two things—one that Felicity was serious and in her child-woman way really believed it might be of help, and the other that there was something oddly touching in the offer and behind it something even more touching, some kind of a mystery that he could not fathom. “Felicity,” he said, “it—I’m afraid it wouldn’t work, I don’t want to take it if it is your last.”

  Felicity was now regarding him with a most curious expression on her features and her voice suddenly sounded like a small faraway and wistful echo. “It worked for us,” she declared, and then pushed the little bottle across to him. “Take it, I don’t need it any more.”

  The universe about Tim’s eyes and ears began to do strange things, take on queer shapes, pulled out long and thin and
then patted down flat and round; it made curious noises, sweet music and the rolling sound of thunder, the floor beneath his chair was swaying gently and he had the feeling that his eyes were suddenly crossed at an angle even greater than those of Amelia. His tongue had gone up somewhere into the roof of his skull where he could no longer use it.

  Felicity, who as always knew when he was in difficulties, elected to play out the comedy for him. She came swiftly around to his side of the table, assumed his attitude and cried, “You mean—?” then nipped around back to her side to answer the question, “Oh, my darling, how clever of you to have guessed. Yes, it is true, you are about to become a father.”

  All the things pent up inside Major Tim Bailey exploded in one agonized cry, “Oh, my God, why couldn’t it have been Amelia!”

  For the first time Felicity was genuinely shocked and hurt, even though a part of her understood. “I suppose because you are not that kind of ape,” she cried in outrage. “If that’s all you think of—”

  Tim was across the table, his arms about her as the enormity of what he had said penetrated through the chaos into which he had been plunged. “Darling, I didn’t mean that, you know it. I want to be a mother—you to be a mother I mean—are you? Will you? I’m proud! I’m excited! I’m the exultant male! Watch me, I’ll stand drinks all round. I’ll take space in the Rock Gazette.”

  Felicity was mollified. “You’ll do no such thing,” she said. “Save the treat until I produce it and as for exulting in the Gazette or anywhere else you’ll keep your big mouth shut.”

  “But why, my darling, why? This is the sort of thing one wants to clarion.”

  Felicity took his face between her hands and kissed it. “Not if Mum-to-be also happens to wear the insignia of Second Officer Bailey of the W.R.N.S.”

  “Oh Gord,” said Major Bailey, unconsciously paraphrasing the Sergeant, as the light dawned.

  “That’s my bright boy,” said Felicity. “One whisper that Officer Bailey is that way and out she goes from the Navy; once out of the Navy and off she goes from the Rock. End of paradise enow.”

  “But—but,” stammered Tim, “what happens when—when. Well, you know.”

  Felicity smiled a grave and satisfied smile. “Oh, I’ve thought of that,” she said. “I was known as the fat girl once. I can be again.”

  2 0

  Mr. Ramirez Plays Cupid

  John Lovejoy, now promoted to Sergeant, had been considering his forthcoming nuptials with what might be described as mixed emotions. He had plenty of time, alone in the barracks, to reflect upon the meaning of such a step and the effect it would have upon his life. He was aware that something stronger than himself had willed that he should spend the rest of his days with this agreeable, pleasant and sweet-tempered woman. The Sergeant didn’t argue with this. It was only that for a man who had spent twenty-five years of his life as a soldier and a bachelor the price was a little steep. No more Monkey Juice, no more drinks of any kind; no more standing up against a mahogany bar with the comfortable feeling of a glass in the fingers, a glow in the stomach and a fluency to the tongue.

  The Sergeant was neither a drunk nor even a compulsive drinker. He imbibed only socially or under stress of great sorrow or crisis which, of course, made the embrace of teetotalism that much more difficult since there was no drama connected with it.

  Not that Lovejoy couldn’t from time to time drink himself into a state verging upon total inebriation, but it called for, as has been indicated, an occasion, a piece of bad news, a piece of good news, a great joy, a great sorrow. Such a happening was about to be visited upon the Sergeant and one which strangely enough managed to combine the two opposites—and this was his wedding to Miss Constance Boddy. He would be exchanging one kind of companionship for another, happiness and sadness thus would walk hand in hand.

  Lovejoy felt no qualms of conscience at the idea he was contemplating of enjoying one final bang-up party. He was entitled to it both as a bachelor about to embark on a matrimonial voyage and as a man bidding farewell to spirits. The calamity that befell him was that he found it incumbent upon him to take leave of each one individually.

  And the sad thing was that it happened not on the evening that Sergeant Lovejoy had intended it should, which was before the day when he would present himself with his bride-to-be to the Chaplain and which he had set aside for just this purpose with three of his best friends and drinking companions in the regiment, but several nights previous, and shamefully alone in the Admiral Nelson with none other than Treugang Ramirez.

  Sheer chance, coupled with the dogged persistence with which Treugang Ramirez had clung to Sergeant Lovejoy as a source of information about the apes, paid off in the most unexpected manner and gave the little home-grown saboteur his long-awaited opportunity to deal the death blow to the morale of the British garrison as well as the civilians marooned on the Rock.

  For the secret that there were now but two apes left, that all efforts to import them in quantity from Africa had failed and that the British were pinning their hopes on one obstreperous, cantankerous and obstructionist monkey mating with a total stranger he had not laid eyes upon up to a fortnight before, had remained a secret indeed.

  The two Intelligence officers, Majors McPherson and Clyde, had done a highly creditable job in tightening up security where the apes were concerned and putting forth counter-propaganda. Since the construction of Tim’s cages by the apes’ village and the closing of the area by troops, no one could get close enough to verify how many apes there were.

  Thus, the source of information upon which the German propaganda machine was relying from inside the Rock was dried up. Their broadcasts continued in the same vein, but lacked the venom, bounce and conviction of the earlier ones. Counter-propaganda put out by Clyde, McPherson and Co. had the ape pack flourishing again and breeding normally, and these fables were generally accepted on the Rock, but the situation was tenuous in the extreme.

  Although the troops guarding the cages were a picked lot and sworn to secrecy one of them might blab and reveal the true situation. Or some officious secretary might remind the Prime Minister of the signal sent to the Rock with regard to keeping the apes up to strength and suggest that perhaps the P.M. would wish to see how these had been carried out. This would loose an official inquiry. What they needed was a bona fide ape birth on the Rock with the publication of an equally bona fide photograph of mother and child. Bluff wouldn’t do in this instance, Major Clyde recognized. It had to be the real thing. Major Clyde was certain that if he could produce this birth upon the Rock, a genuine one, genuinely substantiated, the Germans would cease to credit their own propaganda and would begin to believe his. The campaign would be considered a failure; the agents who could be better used in other projects would be called in and the funds cut off. Within three months, thus unhampered, the British would be able to instigate an ape hunt in Africa and within a short time begin the importing of Macaques in fresh numbers to avert not only the immediate danger, but to satisfy any nosey-parker questioners in Parliament as well. It was subtle, long-range thinking and planning, all held up and being brought to nought by probably the only time in the entire history of the primates when the biological urge hadn’t done so.

  Thus while there was still a gleam of hope that it might work before it was too late, it was wholly unforeseen misfortune that Sergeant Lovejoy should drop into the Admiral Nelson at a time when it was usually deserted, ten o’clock in the evening, to find Treugang Ramirez lurking there nursing a beer. It had been a continuing ten-day lurk for Ramirez, always waiting, always hoping, for Lovejoy had not visited his favourite pub, or any other pub for that matter, ever since he had arrived back at the Rock with Miss Constance Boddy and Amelia.

  Nor was there any back-sliding or mischief inherent in the visit of Lovejoy. He had not come to sneak a drink, but to have a word with the proprietor as to the bachelor party and farewell to spirits he intended to stage two nights hence. For with a sense of tact and fitne
ss newly acquired since his association with Miss Boddy he had no intention of being caught falling down drunk in the public bar, and so had come to engage a private room for himself and three of his regular cronies where they could enjoy their evening away from prying eyes.

  At the entrance of the Sergeant, Ramirez had to look twice to make sure that it was the same man, for Lovejoy wore not the usual rumpled and stained denims which was his ape uniform, but clean ones, the trousers creased to knife-sharp edge, his hair properly cut and his cap set at the smart Rock angle. On his sleeve gleamed the three chevrons newly sewn there by a woman’s hand. It was not the old Gunner Lovejoy who had entered but a brand-new Sergeant Lovejoy.

  But once he had taken in the apparition it didn’t take Treugang long to twig. “Sergeant,” he cried, “Sergeant Lovejoy. What a surprise! You have been promoted! Have I not always said you deserved it? Congratulations, oh, a thousand congratulations!”

  “Oh,” grunted Sergeant Lovejoy, “it’s you.” Ramirez leaning up against the bar grasping a beer was a reminder of the bad old days, or the good old days, whichever way one chose to regard the matter.

  The Sergeant now addressed the barman, “Boss in, Joe?”

  The barman paused only long enough in his eternal polishing of the bar to reply, “Back in half an hour. Had to see a man.”

  Sergeant Lovejoy consulted his watch. It had just gone ten. Then ten-thirty or shortly after would see him in plenty of time to discharge an errand or two and drive up to Ferdinand’s Battery to take over the midnight-to-eight watch over the non-goings-on between Scruffy and Amelia. He and Major Bailey had a thorough understanding as to the importance of the operation, but didn’t fuss over the matter of a few minutes. Tim departed promptly at the stroke of midnight. Lovejoy arrived simultaneously or a minute or so later. Several times their cars had passed on the road, one going up and one going down.