The Old Men at the Zoo

by Angus Wilson

  “So you don’t accept any of what I suggested?”

  Dr Leacock smiled. “Now don’t be touchy, Carter. Of course I do. I accept it all,” he paused, “in principle.” Here he burst into a loud laugh. “But seriously—when Falcon comes back, we’ll go into the question of the Secretary’s exact functions and establish a wide range of authority for you if your Civil Service mind insists on putting everything in black and white. But for the moment you must just get along as best you can. And very well you can do it, if you don’t start having all sorts of notions about reorganizing the place. Putting Englander in charge! Do you realize what the Committee’s attitude to that would be? But, of course, you don’t, you haven’t been here long enough. No good asking me why the old chap’s so disliked. It’s a case of Dr Fell. You know the rhyme? There’s something circuitous about him and then he’s never really been part of the place. Oh, he’s a good zoologist all right, but he’s never tried to get on with his colleagues or accept anything we’re doing here. Strictly between ourselves if there’s been another herpetologist in the country to touch him, he’d have been sent packing long ago. And having all that money doesn’t help. He’s been inclined to think he can buy his way in here and the Zoo’s too old an institution for that. He should have been in one of these commercial foreign Zoos he admires so much. Englander! I’d like to see the disasters that would follow that suggestion of yours,” Dr Leacock ended in loud laughter.

  Yet, if he was unwilling to take seriously any of the duties that lay outside Stretton, on that subject he seemed confident and convincing. To me, remembering the committee meetings of pre-Stretton days, it was amazing to hear him giving facts and figures instead of blustering his way through with pious hopes, moral generalizations and evasions unsuccessfully disguised by the hearty, downright tones in which they were uttered. He was willing to discuss shortcomings, to defer hopes and express doubts. He admitted that, until the two years of provisional agreement with Godmanchester were at an end, much of his work must inevitably be limited in scope; in particular, he was concerned lest Godmanchester’s autocratic attitude to his tenants and neighbours should make for a hostile local atmosphere in which minor breaches of security would be met with disproportionate alarm. The building up of the Historical British Reserve, which in his opinion was the most important experiment, he admitted would inevitably be slow; the Exotic Park needed constantly renewed imaginative approach if it was ever to be more than a conventional Zoo without bars. Yet, given continued public support and the goodwill of Lord Godmanchester, he seemed absolutely sure that, in the ten years he intended to continue in office, he would realize the beginnings of a new and revolutionary relationship between wild life and the British public. I was particularly struck by his saying that for the next two or three years, while the project became reality, he would be glad to see as little publicity as possible.

  Lord Oresby noticed this too, for he said to me, “Living in the country’s made Leacock a much more sensible, modest chap. But then town life these days is the ruination of everyone.”

  We were all able to agree in Godmanchester’s absence, that the only addition he could make to his munificent gift was to avoid interfering with it.

  Lord Oresby said, “Well, I suppose, Leacock, we can say that if the worst happens to the country and Godmanchester’s made Lord Privy Seal or whatever they’ll give him to keep him quiet, the Zoological Society at least will profit. I’m told the P.M. thinks it worth putting up with his presence at Cabinet meetings to make an end to this constant war scare newspaper campaign which is having such a shocking effect abroad. Foreigners still think of Godmanchester as the great English statesman, although, in my opinion, his reputation has always been overrated. He makes an excellent President for us, of course, because most of the time he just sits and looks wise and nods off to sleep. But you can’t run a modern government that way. At least I don’t think so. I’ve never been a politician so I can’t say.”

  Lord Oresby was always modest. Dr Leacock had no wish to be involved in talk against Lord Godmanchester, so he hastily agreed.

  “If more people,” he said, “would realize that politics is essentially a craft and a very specialized, professional craft at that . . . But there’s no doubt that Godmanchester has the stamp of statesman upon him. It’s really grievous to see him down there at Stretton eating his heart out because he can’t get his hand on the wheel, and trying to fill his mind with the little details of Zoo work to which he can’t give proper attention. It’s pathetic to watch. Like a giant trying to play with a doll’s house.”

  I could not let the Director’s flight of fancy pass altogether unnoticed.

  I said, “We surely shouldn’t compare the National Reserve to a doll’s house.”

  He attempted a laugh, “I was carried away,” he said, “but compared to world affairs, you know, it is. Again and again I’ve told Godmanchester, ‘Don’t bother yourself with all these details.’ I said it only yesterday. I’ve left a first rate man Filson in charge. But the tragedy is that a great man and a great benefactor should seem to be in the way; that I should still have to ask myself, what is Godmanchester up to?”

  We were soon to know. Leacock, anxious to naturalize the wild cat at Stretton, had gone up to Perthshire and Argyllshire to interview local gamekeepers. I found to my surprise that I was jealous of this visit, so proprietary had my interest in the British Reserve grown. In Leacock’s absence Filson telephoned me to report that a young mountain lynx was missing from its cave in the Exotic Park. I was struck by the confidence that authority had given him; his voice, as he assured me that all was under control, carried conviction and even an independence of my opinion. He would always be a ‘respectful’ man, but, even at his age a little command seemed to have transformed him from an old retainer to a man of action.

  “You can tell the Director, Sir, that if it causes any trouble in the farms or so, I shall have it destroyed. As much to give confidence to the local people as for anything else.”

  Leacock, on his return, was more than content with this.

  “This security problem’s absolutely vital,” he said. “Whether Godmanchester agrees or no, I’m having the whole place reviewed from that angle. Meanwhile Filson’s quite right, confidence is what we must aim at.”

  He was full of fascinating information about the home range, mating and nesting of the British wild cat. Seeing my enthusiasm, he suggested that I should go down with him for a day or two to study Stretton’s terrain in relation to these data.

  “It’ll mean,” I said, “that licensed naturalists will have to go armed. But the interest of getting the wild cat to breed outside Scotland would be tremendous.”

  The night before we left London saw a very severe frost. The morning produced the unusual sight of a heavy December snowstorm. But I wanted to get out of London. Dr Leacock was unwilling to pilot his aeroplane in such weather and I was able to indulge my eccentric weakness for a luxury train. As I gazed from the window at a whitening world, I felt that now the testing time of all our hopes was to begin. How would the Exotic Park stand up to winter conditions? How would the keepers and wardens maintain their surveillance of the Reserves under snowbound conditions? How would the high spirits of Leacock and his cockney staff react to the isolation and monotony of a severe English winter in the country?

  Filson at the station seemed more bent than ever. His eyes watered and his cheeks and nose were blue with cold. Leacock met the crisis at once.

  “Did you recapture the beast?” he asked.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Good chap! Had he done a lot of damage?”

  “No, Sir. But I’m afraid it was known locally that he’d got loose before we recaptured him. I gave strict instructions but you know how talk spreads down here, Sir. He hadn’t gone beyond the Reserve limits I’m happy to say. He made his meal off a pair of Egyptian geese, the property of the Society. All the same local talk’s been bad.”

  “Damn,” said L
eacock. “Damn. Did you give the news of his recapture plenty of local publicity?”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  “And that he had been destroyed?”

  “I sent the information to the local farms and to the Stretton District Council and to Colonel Shipley’s agent at Swart Hall. But he cancelled my instructions.”

  “Colonel Shipley’s agent cancelled your instructions! What do you mean?”

  “No, Sir, Lord Godmanchester.”

  “Good Lord! I see.” Leacock led us towards his Landrover in the station car park. “Come on, Carter. Pile in, Filson. Now,” he announced as he drove us through the thickening white flurry, “the sooner we’re back the better. Tell us exactly what happened, Filson.”

  “Well, Sir, as soon as ‘Marmie’—that’s what Strawson and his keepers called the lynx—was traced, I gave orders that he was to be shot. He was seen crouching high up in one of the chalk quarries. He’d found himself a cave and I reckoned it was just a question of keeping a couple of men there until hunger drove him out and they could pick him off. Strawson was all against it, he reckoned that they could lure him out with bait and net him. But if the beast was to be shot anyhow, that seemed to me an unnecessary risk. Ah, that was what brought him out so strong against me.” Authority had given Filson decision but not command of language. He seemed to become as clogged with words as the windscreen wipers with thickening snow. Both obstructions were beginning to irritate the Director.

  He said, “Who? Lord Godmanchester?”

  “No, no, Sir. He knew nothing of it then. No, it was Straw-son. It was the first he’d realized of my determination. He came out strong against me, as I said. No knowledge of mammals, rare and costly beast, criticism of his management, slip that wouldn’t happen again—I had the lot of it. But I wasn’t going to budge. He begged me for that animal, Sir. He bred it himself, Sir, at Regent’s Park. And from what he’d always said they’re not easy to breed in captivity. But I simply said to him, ‘You’re not taking risks with human life again’. He understood all right. Well he disregarded my orders, Sir, and caught the thing in a net. I shouldn’t have known of it but one of the young keepers found out and told me. When I knew, I went straight for Strawson and gave orders for its immediate destruction. What I hadn’t reckoned with was his going to Lord Godmanchester. And before I could say another thing, Lord Godmanchester cancelled my orders. I was very angry, Sir, I must tell you. And I had words with him. I daresay that did more harm than good.”

  The old man must have been reliving his anger, for I saw bis body shaking as he sat back in the seat. Leacock said nothing.

  It was I who asked, “But why was Lord Godmanchester against the animal being shot?”

  Leacock cried, “What on earth does it matter?”

  I realized that he was in an almost hysterical rage. I reflected that with these frozen roads covered by a light snow an angry man might kill us all before we had a chance to do justice to the errant lynx. But it seemed no time for frivolous observations.

  Filson said, “Well he didn’t like it, Sir, because it was climbing down to local opinion and it seems he’s always refused to take notice of them. A lot of nobodies, he called them. There’s been rows in the past both with him and her. And from what Mrs Filson hears they’ve never been received by the county, for all his being so famous. Of course, he justified his view by distances. ‘No possible danger,’ he said, ‘nearest farm nearly fifteen miles away, Colonel Shipley’s estate over thirty I But that wasn’t it, Sir, I’m sure. Well to tell the truth I think he liked Strawson appealing to him.”

  Leacock said, “You did quite right, Filson. And you can take it from me that the animal will be destroyed.”

  He dropped me at the pub and, when I asked if he wanted me any more that day, he said,

  “No, Carter, but I shall ask you to be at the Great Cat pits at eleven sharp tomorrow morning.”

  I was not the only person present at the appointed hour. It had stopped snowing, though the sky was grey and heavy with promise of more snow to come. The air was cold and damp with a white mist that crept into every fold of ones clothing. I was in a depressed, irritable mood. I had tried the evening before to reconnoitre in the larch woods that covered the slope of the hilly land to the west of the British Reserve, but gusts of sleety rain blown into my face by the strong southwest wind had sent me back to the pub. The parlour had provided me with a fire that scorched my face and draughts that sent cold water running down my back. My bedclothes seemed to me suspiciously damp. There was no prospect of watching the badger setts during that visit, for the ground, it seemed, had been hard frozen for over a week. I longed for Martha and home; or, at least, for the office and the cup of coffee that I took with Mrs Purrett as ‘elevenses’. An array of mackintoshed men, a few furcoated women and a huddle of shooting brakes and two motor cycles were no substitute. The scene was that of a point to point on a really bad winter’s day, and I had never been one for intrepid outdoor sport,

  Dr Leacock was bustling about like a housemaster encouraging his fifteen on the touchline. And Mrs Leacock, clapping together her hands in their fur backed gloves, was chatting briskly with the strangers like a good housemaster’s wife. The uniformed keepers were drawn up in a line—with Filson, a proud old prefect and Strawson, his doughy face white and blue, the fat boy in disgrace. But when one looked towards the field, as it were, to the pits in which the great cats were housed, there was nothing whatever to see: the lions and leopards and pumas had all sensibly withdrawn into the depths of their caves. The great Siberian tiger perhaps might have put on a show for us in the snow, but he was as yet in London.

  I stood withdrawn at the side, sketching this school fantasy, because I had an uneasy sense that the Director was about to do something foolish and embarrassing. My instinct was right.

  Getting up on to a little wooden platform that had been erected in front of the ditch that divided us from the lynx’s pit, he addressed the company.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” he said, “I have asked you to be here on this very unfriendly morning because I am anxious that we here of the National Reserve should demonstrate to you, our neighbours from Stretton and the surrounding country, the very great friendliness that we feel towards you, and the real concern we have that our presence here should never endanger your interests. I think you have all heard that a lynx escaped from captivity a few days ago. I have every hope that with the extra precautions now being taken no beasts are likely in future to go beyond the very extensive liberty they enjoy in this place. Even should they do so, as you will see in this case, the chance of their passing the Reserve boundaries before they are found is very small. But an animal that has found means to escape is properly an object of suspicion. For this reason I have given orders that all such animals shall, on recapture, be destroyed.” Here he turned to the staff. “As in this case there was some misunderstanding, I want this order to be clearly understood.” Then he addressed himself directly to Strawson. “Have you carried out the orders I gave you now, Strawson?”

  I thought for a moment that Strawson was going to walk away; but he mumbled something in reply and then spoke to the younger keeper who was in charge of the Felidae. Both men disappeared to the back of the caves. As we stood there in the cold, I hardly knew where I dared to look—at Leacock erect on his platform like a leader of men, at Mrs Leacock still doing the lady bountiful, at the farmers and odd gentry frozen, impatient and amazed, at the nervous whispering villagers, or at the younger keepers who were nudging each other with embarrassment and smothering their guffaws. But we had not long to wait. From the cave at the back of the pit emerged the lynx, its tapering ears and slanting eyes, its slender form and dappled colour beautiful even in that dead grey light. It seemed so little ferocious, more like a poor house cat dazed from a glancing blow of a bicycle wheel. It stretched a little in the cold air, then rose, wobbling on its legs. A moment later the young keeper appeared with a rifle on the rocks above. He fired and the bea
utiful animal coiled back for a second in the air, gave a faint mewing cry, and fell dead. A village woman screamed and a child began to howl.

  Dr Leacock got off his platform and began shaking hands and talking to people in the crowd.

  “You’ll come back for a snifter, won’t you?” he said, “I’m sorry it was so abominably cold, but I believe Mrs Leacock has some coffee ready for us all at the farm, haven’t you, Madge?”

  And Madge Leacock said, “Yes, Daddy.” She turned to me, “So jolly to see you down here, Mr Carter.”

  Most of the crowd had packed into their brakes or had mounted their cycles and were gone before invitations could reach them; some refused in a numbed manner that could have been due to the cold; others again seemed too numbed to refuse. I felt completely sick. I could see Strawson coming back from the caves. I wanted to say something to comfort him, but I was frightened that he might reveal himself as aggrieved rather than sickened. Then from between two snow covered rhododendron bushes at the side of the roadway Harriet appeared followed by Rickie. She went straight up to Strawson.

  “I believe you’re the man who tried to save that wretched beast. Will you shake hands?”

  Mrs Leacock’ began to talk loudly to cover her daughter’s voice. Dr Leacock’s eyes blazed with anger.

  Harriet saw me. “Well, look who’s here,” she said, “on this big day for limited liberty.”

  Leacock tried to come to my rescue. “You hop into the rover, Carter. You’re frozen.”

  But I turned my back on both father and daughter, and walked away.

  With no daytime exploration of the Reserve tolerable and no evening watching likely to be productive, I did not see how to avoid entanglement with the personal feuds of Stretton. Yet I was determined to have no more to do with them all until their insane angers had died away. I decided to take the evening train back to London. Meanwhile, with no books provided, I sat in the parlour turning over bound copies of Punch. I was lost in the jokes about servants having cars that marked our triumphant victory of 1918, when a lot of clatter, banging of car doors and stamping of snowy shoes announced a new arrival.