Читать книгу Fear No Evil - John Davis Gordon - Страница 14

The zoo was in an uproar, policemen everywhere. Outside the locked gates were reporters and television crews. The professional staff had gathered in the conference room adjoining the director’s office.

‘I’ve met him once,’ Dr. Elizabeth Johnson muttered, massaging her brow. Just to sit still, while the director kept interrupting the meeting to accept telephone calls, took a supreme effort. She had not even combed her hair, and her damn panties were on back to front—she had slammed down the telephone, scrambled into the nearest clothes, flung herself into her car and driven furiously down to the zoo. ‘And I found nothing remarkable in him,’ she added. Which wasn’t true—but she was not about to admit anything in the bastard’s favor. A raving lunatic.

‘Remarkable, I assure you,’ the curator of mammals muttered distractedly while the director barked into the telephone next door. ‘Quite fearless. Used to get into the big cats’ cages with them.’

That wasn’t news; it was one of the first things she’d heard when she came to work here. ‘That shows he is crazy.’

‘But, he didn’t seem crazy. Just … I don’t know, I liked him—everybody did. And obviously very intelligent.’

‘And rude.’ Her accent was English.

‘Was he? I’m surprised. Very gentle man, I always thought. No-nonsense and quick, but … never rude. Gentle. And, somehow, absolutely trustworthy. Now? … look what he’s done

The director waved at them to shut up. He was a tall, horsey man of about fifty, eyes large behind his glasses. He was saying, ‘Really, Mr. Worthy … Please, Worthy, it is highly likely that your stolen trucks will be stopped on some highway with the animals safely inside them—but if this man Jordan manages to release them somewhere, I assure you that the recapture operation will be methodically mounted under my personal supervision, with the assistance of the US Wildlife Department and other experts. All other civilians will be excluded … Mr. Worthy, there are numerous tried and proven methods of capturing wild specimens, and as a zoologist I assure you I am familiar …’ He took an impatient breath and shoved his glasses onto the bridge of his nose. ‘Mr. Worthy—you will be consulted when necessary, but I am unaware that circus personnel are experts in the capture of wild animals—now … yes, I will keep you informed, now good day, my other phone is ringing!’

He banged down the telephone and snatched at the next. ‘Professor Ford,’ he snapped.

Dr. Elizabeth Johnson could sit still no longer. She muttered impulsively to the curator: ‘Buzz me at the surgery when this meeting gets going.’ She got up and Walked out of the room, heading grimly for the Animal Hospital.

Professor Jonas Ford had banned the press, but outside the gates a group of reporters was speaking to one of the keepers.

‘Of course we all love the animals, but Davey was somethin’ else again. Man, he could almos’ talk to animals.’

‘What do you mean, “talk”?’

‘I mean talk, sir,’ Ambrose Jones said earnestly. ‘I don’t mean just makin’ their kinds of noises, though Davey could make any kind of animal noise you name—canary, hippopotamus, monkey, elephant, you name it.’ He shook his old head. ‘But what I mean is, Davey knew what was goin’ on in an animal’s head. … He knew, an’ he could go up to that animal an’ if you was listenin’ real close all you could hear was a kind o’ mixture of noises, know what I mean, like breathin’ through his nose, snortin’ soft, and whistlin’ and some of the noises the animal makes, like purrin’ if it was a cat or squeakin’ if it was the hippo, and then some English, real soft and friendly. And so confident, man … and I ask him once, Davey, I said, How you do it, ’cos I wanna be able to do it too; and he says, animals got more senses than we got, that’s obvious because they can do things we can’t, and one of those extra senses is feelin’, he says … feelin’. I mean telepathy, kind of.’

Ambrose shook his graying head. ‘I ask him to explain plenty of times, but he just came over all complicated. And then he used scientific words too, ’cos, man, that Davey reads books; he’s studied more books about animals than Professor Ford, even.’

‘But what unusual things have you seen him do with animals?’

Ambrose said: ‘I mean, he used to spend hours just sittin’ with his animals in their cages, playin’ with ’em and just watchin’ ’em and talkin’ to ’em and … just bein’ with ’em. That’s the only way to know an animal, he said, by studyin’ it, everythin’ it does. And be its friend. … He did that in the wilderness too, plenty of times.’

‘Did Jordan ever get into the big cats’ cages?’

‘Particularly the big cats,’ Ambrose said. ‘And the elephants and the apes and the rhinos—and those rhinos, sir, they don’t take to nobody, but they like lambs with Davey. But the big cats?—they went mad for him.’

‘And other keepers can’t do that?’

‘No, sir,’ Ambrose said. ‘Certainly not. When the keeper has to go into the cage to clean it, first he chases the cat into the other section and seals her up in there. He don’t go stickin’ his hands into her cage. One time’—old Ambrose said, warming to his theme—‘one time the big tiger’s got to go to the doctor, see, but in the surgery she escapes. And she’s runnin’ all over the compound, snarlin’ and roarin’ and we’re all runnin’ round hollerin’ and gettin’ the tranquilizer gun—an’ Davey comes in; and he jus’ walks up to that tiger and says one word and puts his arms around her and leads her back into the cage like a little lamb.’ He added: ‘He loved that tiger. Mama. And Professor Ford was always tearin’ a strip off him for gettin’ in the cages, sayin’ they were dangerous.’

‘But was he a troublemaker?’ the reporter asked.

‘No sir! No. Davey was a real quiet man, and he did his job better’n all of us.’

‘And the other man, Charles Buffalohorn, did you know him?’

‘Big Charlie?’ Ambrose said, ‘Sure. He and Davey been pardners a long time. But he didn’t work here. But he came to the zoo plenty, to see the animals.’

‘What’s he like?’

‘Nice guy,’ Ambrose said. ‘Real nice. And real gentle. And big. He makes Davey look so small. But Davey’s … smart,I guess. And he’s so … sweet. Maybe that’s the word … but tough too.’

‘You mean sweet-looking?’

‘No. Well, yes, that too, but I mean … sweet-natured ... sweet-thinking, like … he’s got beautiful thoughts …’

‘And Big Charlie?’

Old Ambrose smiled. ‘He don’t talk much. But he ain’t stupid. You know what those two do? Go up to trappers’ country, up to Canada and right here in the States. And,’ Ambrose said proudly, ‘they’d steal the traps! And throw them in the rivers.’

‘How do you know that?’

‘It’s no secret. Davey’s very hot against trappers, those animals takin’ days to die, and chewin’ their own legs off to get free, and the thirst and all that, it’s terrible, ain’ it? Why can’t an animal at least get a decent death in a civilized country?’ he says. And the whaling—and the seals, that’s another thing. Every year,’ Ambrose said, ‘Davey goes up to Canada, to the Saint Lawrence when they’re butcherin’ the seal pups, right? And he joins them Greenpeace guys and the Friends of the Earth on the ice. He been in plenty of fights up there with those Norwegian sealers—the Greenpeace guys don’t fight, you know, they just obstruct by standin’ in front of the little pup lyin’ there helpless, and Davey don’t like fightin’ either, but he says there’s a time when a man’s just got to stand up and fight when he sees somethin’ terrible happenin’—he’s got the duty, he says. Like when you see a mugger beatin’ up a little old lady. Well, it’s the same with the seals. And one time,’ Ambrose smiled, ‘he gets so mad he goes running out onto the ice with a big whip! And he cracks it over the heads of those butchers, like this, and he chases ’em back to their ship.’

‘Didn’t they retaliate?’ the reporter smiled.

‘Sure, and some come at him with their clubs, but Davey has ’em dancin’ all over the place with his whip, and he drives ’em off. Then,’ he said, ‘they reported him to the Mounties.’

‘What happened?’

‘It was in the papers,’ Ambrose said proudly. ‘The Mounties took him in front of the judge. And Davey says, “It’s amazin’ what a fuss big brave men make about a little bit of whip cracking when they busy butcherin’ defenseless little seals with clubs, an’ skinnin’ ’em alive …” It was all in the papers. And there’s such a fuss that the judge just warns Davey, and binds him over to keep the peace, ’cos he didn’t actually hit nobody with his whip, he just frightened ’em off. And you know what Davey says to the judge?’

‘What?’

‘“But I am keepin’ the peace, your Honor—God’s peace!”’

Suddenly, as he came over a long hilltop, there was the big flashing sign: POLICE CHECK—ALL TRUCKS PULL INTO EMERGENCY LANE.

Half a mile ahead of them was a wooden barrier across the highway, several police cars parked on the verges. A row of trucks was being inspected by policemen before being allowed to proceed under an elevating boom. Davey Jordan’s heart pounded, and he jerked his foot off the accelerator.

He looked desperately into his wing mirror for Big Charlie’s truck, and flashed his taillights in warning. His mind was racing. He was slowing to forty miles an hour, and the row of trucks was only five hundred yards away—now four hundred yards away, now three hundred … Now the last truck was only two hundred yards ahead, and the barrier one hundred yards ahead of that. And Davey trod on the accelerator and slammed his hand on the horn.

The blast of it split the morning like an express train, and his truck leaped forward, roaring down the highway again, blasting straight at the barrier.

Shocked policemen were scattering and waving and shouting, and Davey kept his foot down flat and his hand on the horn—roaring and blasting straight at the barrier, his headlights blazing, and Big Charlie roaring along behind him. Davey gripped his wheel, white-knuckled, his face ashen, his eyes wide and his teeth clenched. All he could see was that red and white barrier hurtling nearer and nearer, forty yards, then thirty, then twenty, filling his vision—and then he hit it.

With a crack like a cannon above the blasting of the horn, the barrier burst and flew like grapeshot, big shattered timbers flying high and wide into the Tennessee morning; Big Charlie’s truck hurtled through after him, leaving shocked policemen scrambling for their cars.

A quarter mile ahead was a turnoff to the town of Erwin and the Appalachian Mountains. Desperately Davey Jordan swung his truckload of elephants onto it.