The Old Men at the Zoo Read online

  “Of course,” Leacock told us, “this does not mean that the intellectual workers with all that they have done and will do for humanity do not still have a central place in zoological studies.”

  And there we saw the anatomists, the biologists, the bacteriologists, the biochemists and a legion of others in their labs and their lecture rooms. We saw, we admired, but after the field workers we somewhat doubted.

  “I believe that they too will only find benefit from the Foundation of a National Zoological Reserve in Great Britain.”

  Then a laugh came into the voice that was reaching us through pictures of such an imaginary reserve.

  “What about the ordinary man in the street who wants to pay his half crown and see his hippo? I think that if we’re really to get this thing going, he’s going to have one of the most exciting experiences of his life. Not straining through bars but looking down on a whole animal kingdom through the magnifying glass floors of our hovering helicopters.”

  And so we saw him, the ordinary man; he looked a trifle uncomfortable because a line of vision below one is never entirely satisfactory, but still the magnified herds of reindeer and yak that were all that proved available from the Soviet Arctic Animals Park were a beautiful and impressive sight.

  “All the same,” said Leacock, “I should hope that as many young people as possible”—and young faces studious and gay were flung at us from every angle—”would try to profit by the naturalists’ way of life, to go in parties or singly, and come to know animal life as it should be known through the senses and the instincts. Not just those who are going to become professional zoologists, but young people destined for all walks of life. They will be the pioneers in our society carrying the developed instinctual way of life to balance the top heavy intellectual growth of today. After all because we do not want to live in chaos”—scenes of mobs looting, crowd panic, peccaries over-running yam plantations and elephants trampling rice fields—”there is no reason why in our fear we should die in captivity”—factories, canteens, crowded transport, deadened genteel homes once more and shots of the Decimus Burton Giraffe House and Raven’s Cage—”Liberty we can find if we accept some limitation in its definition, liberty thus limited we may feed on”—shots of the naturalists again in the great reserves—”Only so I believe can we restore the psychic balance, the soul’s health of a very sick civilization.” And now suddenly and for the only time the ridiculously ugly features came to us in close-up; the effect somehow was to command respect.

  “That,” said Dr Edwin Leacock, “is my dream. Good night.”

  One of the young Leacocks got up and switched off. I could feel Mrs Leacock’s nervous movements behind me. And now I caught a glimpse of her straggly grey hair and foolish, hearty, red face. She had just returned from a camping holiday with some of her grandchildren; her back and chest glowed scarlet against an unfortunately chosen applegreen evening dress.

  She said, “Well, did anyone think that Daddy was as good as I did?” And then as she saw the glowing, admiring faces of the family, she said, “That was something we’ll always remember, wasn’t it, children?”

  It was no doubt a measure of my great enthusiasm, that, despite the many reserves and embarrassments I had also felt, I answered now before any of the Leacock young.

  “It was very good indeed,” I said, “I’ve absolutely no doubt at all, Mrs Leacock, that its effect will be to push the Director’s ambitions out of the sphere of dreams into the sphere of active politics.”

  She was surprised at my answering her remark to her children.

  She said, “Ambition? Politics?” with a nervous laugh. But she had so long heard her husband’s complaint of me as ‘a jolly good man but horribly casual’ that any unexpected enthusiasm gave her real pleasure and she added, “Thank you, Mr Carter. I know how much Edwin counted on your appreciation.”

  And now all the Leacock sons and daughters-in-law, and daughters and sons-in-law, and even one or two of the teenage grandchildren gave their rousing applause to the programme. And by the time they had finished, under Mrs Leacock’s approving eye, there seemed nothing much left for us others to say. But since they were all rising young architects, and young stockbrokers doing extraordinarily well, and young advertising agents writing brilliant copy, and young doctors and dentists with futures, and since their wives reposed on status, their acclamations lacked one thing—knowledge. Mrs Leacock in her childish way seemed aware of this. She looked at Bobby for over a minute.

  Then she said, “I was so sorry Lady Falcon couldn’t come.”

  Bobby bowed his head slightly.

  “She too,” he said, “but a new play she’s interested in took her to quite another theatre.”

  Martha said, “I was really angry with Dr Leacock for working Simon so hard in these last weeks. But now I know it’s been well worth while.” She took my hand, “I see now exactly what you mean by the Zoo job, darling.”

  She really meant it for me, but in the circumstances, she offered a part of it to Mrs Leacock.

  “Edwin’s appreciated it so much, my dear,” Mrs Leacock said. She gave Martha a look that almost included her in the family. “I wonder what I can offer you to eat, Sir Robert?”

  Bobby looked at the food laid out on the table.

  “A chicken sandwich would be delicious,” he said, “But let me help in handing round.”

  The young Leacock males wouldn’t hear of this. Public school manners towards older men were a hallmark of their status. I was angry enough with Bobby to point the situation.

  “Sit down,” I said, “and let us young ones do the running about.”

  Mrs Leacock looked at him twice in hope and then turned away in anger.

  “I think I’ll ring Daddy at the studios. He’ll be tremendously bucked by all you’ve said.”

  I had hoped to escape early, but when she returned, she said, “Daddy thanks everybody. The viewer response so far is jolly encouraging, he says. And you’ve all got to stay. He’s having a quick whisky at the studios and they’re sending him back in a Rolls. I suppose that’s what they call V.I.P. treatment.”

  She gave a little laugh. We seemed to wait hours for Lea-cock’s return. In the first half hour we had telephone calls of congratulation to discuss—from friends of the family, other zoologists, important Fellows of the Society, even, to my surprise, from Godmanchester’s secretary. Sanderson had telephoned his intention of coming over from Wimbledon to Finchley Road in person to congratulate his chief. Mrs Leacock had tried to dissuade him, but he was intent on the act.

  She said, “Funny little chap! We must save him a bone for his trouble.”

  Under the strain of waiting I could feel my enthusiasm ebbing, and it seemed unlikely that anyone else’s would be more enduring. Martha found a daughter-in-law whose children went to Reggie’s kindergarten. They talked child psychology, trying to avoid any serious engagement on the subject since their views were clearly divergent. Bobby made flirtatious chat with the teenage granddaughter.

  Once Mrs Leacock said, “Well, what shall we do children, while we’re waiting for Daddy?”

  I felt, looking at her family, that it would not be long before we were involved in paper games or even a sing-song round the piano.

  I said quickly, “How was the Garden Party this year?”

  I had chosen the right topic.

  She said, “Oh, the Queen looked so pretty and she had a word for Daddy. A lot of people,” she went on, “find official social life an awful fag, but I seem to thrive like the wicked on it. Of course I was a bit shy at first, but I soon found that other people are shyer than I am, so now I just barge in and talk. Mind you, a wife can make or break a man’s career, so I always make a point of doing my homework first.”

  It was only when in fact she began ‘to just barge in’, when she talked about Zoo policy, international Zoo matters and the characters of eminent zoologists, that I realized that like her husband she was incapable of doing any homework at
all.

  My lukewarmness at last got through to her, for she said, “But, of course, you’re terrifically off shop talk, aren’t you? Though I don’t mind telling you, you’ve confounded all the critics by properly putting your back into this business.”

  Then she talked interminably of her grandchildren, their prowess at games, the public schools for which they’d been entered, and the extraordinary powers of improvisation they had shown during the recent family camping holidays when ‘poor old Grandad had had to stay in mouldy old London’.

  At last I heard the sounds of a latchkey, but as it was immediately followed by the padding of animal’s feet on the hall parquet, I conceived the notion that the Director had followed up his plea for intuitive living by bringing home a leopard or a puma. I smiled at the thought. Mrs Leacock looked at me angrily.

  When the door opened a very large Alsatian dog walked in. If like me you find cats and pumas beautiful, you will probably agree that wolves and Alsatians have the wrong shape of face. But this was a very fine specimen of its tribe. The young woman who followed it was not a fine specimen of her tribe, if by that was meant a typical member of the Leacock family, nor in their eyes was there much fine about her, for she was Harriet, the eldest girl they’d had such a lot of trouble with. I knew her because, shortly after I arrived at the Zoo, she came to see her father, and, finding him absent, had borrowed five pounds off me and tried to get me to make a pass. All in a quarter of an hour. Dr Leacock had asked me never to lend her money again; he had even mentioned her other weaknesses: ‘I’m afraid she’s rather silly where men are concerned,’ was what he said. It had struck me at the time that he had come, over the years, too readily to advertise his daughter’s weaknesses. I felt sorry for her. Also she was rather fine to look at, tall, a little square-jawed perhaps, but with large blue eyes that had a pleasantly vulgar sexy glint and a large mouth to pattern, also her legs were promising. She seemed gentle, which was a praiseworthy characteristic in such a family.

  Mrs Leacock said, “Daddy’s had a great success, darling.”

  “Oh, good.” Harriet’s voice was soft and deep and her tone completely casual.

  One of her brothers said, “It seems a pity you couldn’t have stayed to see it, Harriet.”

  She didn’t answer him, but seeing me, she smiled and said, “Television gives me claustrophobia.”

  Then she turned to her mother. “I shan’t go to that man on Monday. You’d better cancel.”

  Mrs Leacock looked horrified, “But of course you must. Daddy’s fixed the appointment.”

  Harriet smiled, “Well, if he’s had such a success, he can take a little disappointment.”

  One of her younger sisters said sharply, “But Harriet, you promised him. You can’t.”

  “Oh, I think you’ll find I can.”

  There was a terrible family silence. I saw no way of breaking it, so I talked to Martha.

  Then at last once again I heard the latchkey.

  “Ah, that’s Daddy,” Mrs Leacock said.

  There was a general stir among the family.

  “Well, I’ll be off to bed,” Harriet announced. “Come on, Rickie,” she commanded the huge dog.

  Under the cover of the scratching and padding of its departure, I heard Martha say to Bobby, “I think you’ve behaved absolutely bloodily, Bobby.”

  But there was none of the warm teasing with which she had rebuked him at the funeral wake. He too reacted quite differently. He merely shrugged his shoulders and turned away.

  As Harriet opened the door, she said, “Oh, by the way, the French have sent a tremendous climbdown note or something. So we can all forget our fears.”

  “How did you know, darling?” Mrs Leacock asked.

  She spoke to Harriet in a less determinedly jolly voice than to other people, I noticed.

  “Oh, it was on the tele news in the pub I was in,” Harriet said, and was gone.

  A second later Dr Leacock appeared. He must have passed his daughter in the hall without speaking.

  I did my very best, as did Martha, to communicate our enthusiasm. But beside the eulogies of his family our remarks appeared a little pale. One of his daughters, a young athletic version of Mrs Leacock, went out into the kitchen and returned with a parsley crown to put round his head. And, before we knew where we were, Mrs Leacock had formed us into a circle holding hands and around his grotesque figure we moved singing, “For he’s a jolly good fellow.” Leacock seemed some hideous Easter Island god in a tribal rite. Bobby somehow avoided involvement. As soon as this embarrassment was over, Martha and I made attempts to take our leave and sweep Bobby off with us. But Edwin Leacock in his triumph was not in a mood for dissent.

  “Well, what did you think of it, Falcon? Has Saul been turned into Paul?” he asked.

  Bobby’s drawl was terrific, “I’m never frightfully good with pictures, you know, so I think a lot of it passed over my head. But your voice came over naturally. I used to be so infernally nervous. I don’t think your cameramen quite did justice to your material. Some of the shots of Regent’s Park were shockingly bad. But there you are, if you hand yourself over to the technicians and ad men of today you can never hope to convey the real thing.”

  Martha, in her nervousness said, “It would make a wonderful film, Dr Leacock.”

  Bobby said, “Oh, yes, yes. I think it would do that all right.”

  We were saved by the bell.

  “That must be Mr Sanderson. He’s come all the way from Wimbledon to congratulate you, dear.” Mrs Leacock almost skipped out to open the front door.

  Sanderson immediately shook Leacock by the hand.

  “My dear friend,” he said, “you gave us a wonderful glimpse of your splendid spirit.”

  I had never seen the Director completely nonplussed before. He simply shook Sanderson’s hand again and said, “You must have a whisky after coming so far.”

  Sanderson was not in the mood to be content with whiskies, although he took the one that was offered.

  “I must see it again, you know. I missed a good deal, telling poor old Miss Delaney what was happening. Mrs Blessington does that as a rule but she couldn’t keep up with it. She’s got quite a bone to pick with you. She says you must think of the old people’s slow wits next time. Of course, that’s only her joke. She’s very far from slow-witted. But there you are, the great thing is that you gave us that glimpse of your splendid, almost childlike spirit.”

  I propelled Martha by the elbow to the front door, leaving Mrs Leacock to find a bone for Fido.

  May came to an end in glorious sunshine, and in Zoo crowds large and congested enough to delight even Bobby Falcon’s heart. The Innsbruck Meeting was held in hot June weather that must have been trying to the nerves in that somewhat shut-in town. However the tempers of the European heads of government were equal to it. Accord was complete; the war clouds were banished from the bright blue sky. It was almost as though there were a friend for little children above it. At any rate Martha and a million other mothers felt so. Everyone breathed again; a good number only in order to say that this merely showed how impertinent the Americans, and the Russians had been to interfere in affairs that could perfectly well be settled without them. Lord Godmanchester’s papers warned against optimism for ten days and then banished Europe from the scene in favour of an all out attack on the National Trust, the lazy porters of the People’s country houses. Silly season was upon us. At first Edwin Leacock shared in the general carefree mood. Letters came pouring in from viewers of his programme, and, if there were some that did not make him feel loved, all of them made him feel interesting. The clearing of international tension augured well for governmental attention to his scheme. The Press had been friendly towards the programme; two of Lord Godmanchester’s papers had run features on it. Eminent English zoologists, like his colleagues at Regent’s Park, were enthusiastic about the programme as a model for the use of television. Pattie Henderson, who had watched in company with Newton and Nutti
ng, told me that they had thought the old boy definitely had something as a speaker. Couldn’t he, she suggested, barge off and become one of those quizmasters. They all seemed more concerned with the presentation than with the scheme itself. However, Leacock was a happy man. I did not like to intrude a discordant note into this deserved happiness, especially as all his energies had been brought to life by success and now, if ever, he seemed likely to have the determination for the hard slow work needed to drive home his gain. I decided to defer my confrontation of him with his possible part in the Filson tragedy.

  But as the days went by, it became clear to me that the Director’s picture of what he had achieved differed very much from mine. It is true that he was active day after day, to the detriment of the regular Zoo routine affairs, with seeing this and that Fellow of the Society, with wining zoologists from the Universities, dining chaps from the Natural History Museum, lunching so and so of the Treasury or so and so from the Ministry of Education, getting people on the grants committees of various scientific Foundations along for drinks. Mrs Leacock, he told me, was being absolutely splendid, doing her part in these social chores. This was disquieting, but it did not really matter, for I soon discovered that his part was in any case not what it should have been. The truth was that he had set complete store by the success of his programme. If it had not been successful, he might well have started work all over again to get his National Reserve in some other way. But it had been successful and he seemed to think that his work was done. People were either for the programme or against it; this seemed to be all that his round of contact making was concerned to discover, and if they were for it, they would no doubt set about giving their instant aid to the plan. It was childish, of course, and bit by bit, as this childishness showed, the important people he lobbied treated him as a child. He had done very well with his little play, but he mustn’t expect them to talk about it for ever—they were busy people with work to do, and if he hadn’t got any he should find some.