Apeshit

  Soaking in the bath, I thought again about the circus goons and why they had chased me. One of the men had referred to Gertie keeping their secrets. They must have come after me because they thought I knew about those secrets. It sounded like Nick and I weren’t the only ones to think a gorilla’s cage was a good place to hide things.

  The plan was for Nick to retrieve the jewels from Gertie’s cage after the circus had moved to the next town on their tour the following day. As I towelled off after my bath, it occurred to me that Gertie might be able to do me another favour.

  ◊ ◊ ◊ ◊ ◊

  The police let the circus move on after a day’s delay. There was nothing on the news about the jewels being found. Given my thoughts about what else might be in Gertie’s cage, I wondered how the circus hands had managed to keep the police from finding anything. Maybe the police didn’t search that hard. Gertie certainly was a very effective gate keeper.

  I hadn’t told Nick about the men with guns or what else might be hidden in that cage. He was a great crime partner and an okay boyfriend, but I didn’t see why I should share everything with him. I needed to return to the cage and I had the perfect reason to insist that it should be me that pick up the jewellery.

  Blessed Gertie.

  Nick and I met in a coffee shop near the new circus site.

  “It’s not that I don’t trust you…” Nick said, protesting my suggestion that I retrieve the jewels.

  “It’s exactly that you don’t trust me,” I interrupted, but I knew trust wouldn’t win me this argument. I knew he wouldn’t be swayed by an emotional appeal so I focussed on the success of the job. “The noise Gertie will make if you even get close to her cage will bring the entire camp running. I’m the only one who can get in and out without being spotted.”

  Nick sat back and drank his coffee. Pushing him at this stage would just make him more suspicious so I stayed silent. A finishing school education may be useless on the ways of gorillas but when it comes to getting your own way it’s top notch.

  I noticed Nick hadn’t made any protestations about my safety. Whatever happened at the circus, I decided, Nick and I would go our separate ways after this. When he couldn’t even be bothered to pretend to care about my well-being, it was time to go.

  Nick put down his coffee mug and looked at me closely. “I’ll know if any of the jewellery is missing. I know exactly what I stole, remember.”

  “Of course.”

  Now to hope that Gertie would be in a good mood.

  ◊ ◊ ◊ ◊ ◊

  Gertie’s cage was once again parked right at the back of the field, with the open caged front facing out towards the open fields opposite. I suspected that this was as much to hide the coming and going of people in her cage as it was due to her less than sunny disposition.

  There was no-one around as I walked down the field trying to look like an innocent audience member who’d wandered off. Of course, if they caught me down by Gertie’s then they wouldn’t care who I was, they’d be after me just as they had been last time.

  Gertie was sat in her usual spot in the corner of the cage, watching a whole lot of nothing go on outside. I entered the cage through the same small door I had used last time.

  “Hey, Gertie, old dear,” I said softly, “Hope you still like me.”

  She didn’t react to my presence other than to watch me as I reached up to grab the bag of jewellery. It was still there, thank goodness. I stuffed it in my rucksack and looked around the cage trying to decide where I would find the goons’ hiding place. I was sure there must be something here. Why else would they have cared so much about someone getting close to this cage that they came after me with guns?

  The obvious place was the little gully around the top of the cage. Taking a deep breath and praying for a lack of spiders I reached up and ran my hand inside it.

  Bingo.

  I found nine untidy piles of used notes held together with elastic bands. I stuck them in my rucksack without attempting to count them. Cash was what I had hoped to find. When I’d tried to work out what the goons might be up to, drug dealing seemed the most likely. I figured they hid the cash in Gertie’s cage until they could launder it through the circus’s takings.

  I hadn’t been in the cage very long and Gertie hadn’t moved so I figured I was safe to sneak out again. As a sentry against the arrival of unwanted men, she was hugely useful.

  “Bye, Gertie.” I was sad to leave her. It was sentimental nonsense I knew, but she’d saved my life and she’d been the reason this job had been a success. I was sure that I had been nothing more than an interesting diversion for her, but nevertheless I had grown attached to the magnificent old lady.

  There was nothing I could do for her right then. I snuck back out of the cage and pushed my way through the hedge at the back of the field and walked quickly away from the circus.

  As I walked along, I thought about what I was going to do next. I’d already decided to split with Nick. It was tempting to leave now and take the jewellery with me, but I didn’t fancy looking over my shoulder all the time worrying about him finding me. Plus he could come in handy again in the future. Foolish to burn bridges when you don’t have to.

  I surprised myself by considering going straight, but the more I thought about it the more I thought it was probably time. I hadn’t been caught so far, which couldn’t last. And what a way to finish, with a gorilla as a partner in crime! I’d never top that. Which reminded me, I had a call to make.

  “Hello, RSPCA?”

  ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤

  Caroline Cormack (The Great Gertie) lives in London, UK, a city she loves. She has been writing fiction since childhood, although these days her stories feature more dead bodies and fewer ponies than they did back then. Her work has also been published in Bete Noire magazine and in the anthology Ain’t No Sanity Clause. Caroline can be found on Twitter, usually procrastinating when she should be writing, as @bookclubdropout.

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  MONKEY BUSINESS

  by Cecelia Chapman

  My husband left me for another woman. He cleaned out our bank account, packed his belongings and left while I was out. So I took off traveling and bodysurfing the most eastern Caribbean islands.

  I found odd jobs doing office work, making flyers, painting fabric and t-shirts. Making my own prints and drawings for sale. Jean and her husband Neville rented me the shanty behind their home when I started doing their book work. They were busy as groundskeepers and guardians of the Primate Research Center sending tiny caskets of drugged spider monkeys to first world countries for laboratory purposes.

  One afternoon I fell asleep on Jean and Neville’s big house porch. I woke to the full moon pulling itself up from the sea. Female and children monkeys screamed in delight as loose males jumped up and down on their cages. Children darted bat-like in the dusk. Low tones drifted down the porch between Jean and Mr. Hewitt, a policeman from District F, her cousin from the other side of the island.

  “You haven’t seen her since? Did she mention any plans, a trip? What was she wearing?

  “No. She walk from the house in she gold bikini, big plastic rings…” Jean made big rings with her fingers, lips and eyes.

  “What house?”

  “The house they say she burn…Meurice, he call me, he say he look everywhere…”

  Hewitt studied his notebook, “You’re the last to see her…”

  Hewitt turned to Neville who just came in, “When did you last see your brother?”

  “He come by before yesterday to check the drain pipe spilling into his trees.”

  Judge Holder lived next door. He recommended Jean and Neville for the position of groundskeepers of the island heritage house. It included the monkey caretaker job that simultaneously cleared the animals from ripping up cane fields and farms.

  “Did he mention traveling plans? Was he carrying anything?”

  “No, no.”

  �
�What was he wearing?”

  “He judge suit, you know.”

  “He never arrived at court.”

  “You saw Desmond Brown cleaning trees here early yesterday?” Hewitt looked to Jean.

  “I asked Desmond to clean those coco trees and pick a few nuts, then I gone off to the shops. When I come back he gone.” Jean said, then added. “He eyes so red I afraid to send him up the tree.” Hewit studied his notes.

  “Well, that leaves Beverly Cole. Her manager called us. Her neighbours took in her children, her sister’s got her sick mother. Who saw her and when?”

  “Monday,” Neville pointed, “cleaning the road by the large cages over there.”

  Derek screamed upstairs. “There’s a monkey loose up here.” We all looked to see a large monkey jump from window to tree.

  “Close the screen and go to bed, Derek,” Neville yelled.

  Everyone looked to Hewitt.

  “That’s it?” Jean asked.

  “Yes.” Hewitt said.

  Loud waves woke me early. Surfers and small boats dotted the sapphire coast. Waves like little mountains rose up out of deep Atlantic waters, slow-moving crests rolling onto soft, sea-moss reef. I took the day off, bodysurfing at dawn, then again in late afternoon, all the while watching for Desmond, and the others.

  Desmond built the bamboo shanty I lived in when he was fishing and working with Neville. Later he moved home to care for his mother. He carried each floor-stone up the cliff. He cut each bamboo in the bush. The hut captured cool sea-breezes yet was sheltered. And private as a place can be where when you come home your collins is vanished. But the next morning it returns to your yard with a pile of sugar cane and coconuts.

  By sunset I was sipping green coco with rum while roasting a breadfruit. Steamed okra, peppers, onions, fresh tumeric and fresh thyme lay ready. Coconut meat was grated and soaking in an iron pot. The lid was placed over a banana leaf so flies wouldn’t dive in, covered with the broken half-lid I threw down the cliff and broke two days ago after receiving divorce papers claiming I abandoned the marriage.

  After eating I lay in my hammock in a drunken rum coma and watched the moon climb. Neville and a friend talked on the porch for a long time. Later I heard Jean and the children coming home from dinner at her mother’s. Pails clanging, doors slamming, glasses clinking, lights blinking.

  I fell to sleep again until the brilliant moon startled me awake. When I swung out of the hammock to go to bed I stumbled. Thoughts raced through my mind: I live too alone, too unloved, I need security, a home, a schedule, a good job, maybe children, a therapist, insurance, yes, a mortgage, debts, a cheating husband with horrible in-laws and I’m drinking too much rum. The life of an artist was harder than I could possibly have imagined. And I wanted to know things…like what happened to those people and more than anything, now what was going to happen to me?

  “Ssssssssssst…”

  “Here, Lady.” A monkey was at my shoulder, to steady me, whispering, “What you want?” His tail swept my cheek. “What you want, Lady?” The monkey repeated, looking me in the eyes.

  “I…I, I…”

  “Yes, you, Lady. What you want? I give you wish, anything you sweet heart desire. What you want? A man? You want a nice man? Good job? Some big jewelry? Money? Clothes? House? A trip? Fame, power? A nice lady like you deserve her heart wish. You want a Jaguar? What you want? You get it.” He rifled through my peanuts and grabbed sugarcane, ripping it clean with his teeth.

  “I…I, I…”

  “O.K., Lady, you get it. I see you a interested lady, a lady what wants knowledge. You wise. You gets you wish. Later, wise lady, I see you later.” The monkey melted into a tree.

  I sank into the hammock and closed my eyes. But on my eyelids I saw the shimmering blue and white beach, as if projected onto a billowing sheet or wind-filled sail. Angela walked on the sand with Meurice following behind her. She was toying with him. Her flirtations with men irritated him, then she ignored him. Or she took up political causes to annoy him. Meurice, assistant to the Prime Minister and married to his sister with eight children living on the other side of the island, entrepreneur, arms dealer, was devoted to Angela. He gave her anything she wanted. Usually money. And when he travelled abroad he took her with him. He built Angela a house that burned down when it was completed. Angela travelled to Cuba, then returned to rent a house on the beach. The sea faded and the wind-whipped canvas filled with figures. Angela tied on a bed in a hotel room, gagged, eyes bulging. Two men slashed at her suitcase. One man counted the money he found. The other pulled her gag, holding a knife to her throat.

  “I support your…cause…the money is for your people who suffer…you…” Angela’s hoarse voice cracked.

  “We suffer nothing,” the man laughed spitting on her. “I want to know now where is the rest?” Then he nodded at the other man. The hotel room faded from my vision.

  Dense, rolling smoke filled my eyes, throat, nostrils, I heard the monkey chuckle. Coconut-curry, damp wood, and hemp. A hut materialized from the smoke, with a turbaned man holding a large walking stick.

  “…enter dread…jah rastafari. Irie, brother, come forward.”

  Desmond carried an empty burlap sack inside the hut. The man sat on the bed pointing his stick at the heap of plants on the floor. He offered Desmond a splif and a coco, and stirred a bubbling stew while Desmond filled his bag with herb. Smoke billowed and stung my eyes…then slowly thinned to reveal a gully of hacked plants behind the shanty. I smelled wet dirt, gasoline and blood. Armed men packed plants in a helicopter walking around Desmond’s body.

  Howling with laughter, clutching his sides, the monkey fell off his branch.

  Black acrid cane smoke poured into my nose and still-watering eyes. When my vision cleared I saw Beverly on her road job. She was hacking at overhanging bush, hooking it with the tip of her collins, and tossing it into her trash bag with great grace. I saw her moving up and down the byways picking up litter, waving at tourists in their rented mini-jeeps, helping people off the bus with their loads, holding traffic for children, chasing goats from the streets. She took care tying Mrs. Holder’s rose bush back from the crosswalk and moved broken crate parts from the road.

  Cane-smoke rolled in and rolled out. When it cleared, I stared. Beverly? She was styled, polished, finished. Like the model that rented Mrs. Bannister’s plantation each year. Reflected in a large mirror I saw faces behind her. A hairdresser grabbed her hair, a stylist unzipped her, an assistant handed her papers, a pen, a driver appeared with a messenger, a make-up artist approached her with a huge brush, a waiter handed her tea, a writer stood to the side nodding at everything the manager was saying to her. They all talked at once. One of her cell phones rang, then the other. A microphone was placed in her face, a camera.

  “She lovely lady, she get what she want,” The monkey sighed.

  Wind filled the sail, then flapped and unrolled to reveal Judge Holder sitting in his courtroom. Bewigged, heavily robed, he looked tired, uncomfortable, miserable, hot. The scene faded into heavy mist, the roar of smashing waves, followed by a long silence. Slowly the quiet was filled with the ticking of the antique clock being re-set by Mrs. Holder in their dining room. Judge Holder’s vexatious wife watched his every move with her tiny eyes as he ate. The mist returned hiding the room. Sea-foam splashed me and when my stinging eyes re-focused I saw Judge Holder crouched low in a banana boat. I recognized the boat. It was Rocky’s, a friend of Neville’s from another island. Rocky cleared the harbor watching Holder as he steered, and I could tell he loved him. Quickly the boat was lost on the horizon.

  ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤

  Cecelia Chapman (Monkey Business) is an artist working in film, writing and mixed-media. Visit her online at ceceliachapman.com.

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  ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤

  STRANGE COMPANIONS AT LONDON ZOO

  by Carrie Ryman

  The gray cement floor at London Zoo was agleam with a fairy dust
ing of rainbows. Boris Freeman cringed. He thought it looked more like something you’d see in a glitzy nightclub or beneath a little girl’s dressing table. He gritted his teeth, bending lower over the wide broom and pushing it past the wall of the gorilla exhibit. Ever since the gift shop started selling those wretched pink and blue elephants, the place was always covered in that ghastly glitter. Boris took comfort in the fact that he’d be back to his beloved night shift the following day. Only one more hour. One more. It was the mantra that carried him through until closing time. His nerves were raw from the constant cacophony of squealing children who littered the building that day.

  “A bloody field trip,” said Boris to himself. Day shift was deplorable. First, there were the infinite sites of vomitus to which he was emergency-paged. Boris thought the snake exhibit would be the more deserving location of such voluminous retching. And he would happily say goodbye to the trash cans in the ladies room, which incessantly reeked of wet nappies.

  His sweeping came to a halt when his eye caught a movement behind the glass exhibit. The young mountain gorilla, who had arrived a week ago, was one of the most celebrated acquisitions of London zoo. Some balda in management decided that all new primates would be given names that began with the first letter of their species, thus making it easier to catalog them. So the head veterinarian made a game of it and named her simply “G.” That eventually became “Gee.” This new naming business was rubbish and set Boris’ teeth on edge. He didn’t know why it upset him so much. The only thing that usually got him riled up was when his neighbor, Mrs. Beastly, fell asleep with the telly on.