She turned back to the pigeon. He had somehow managed to stand despite his injuries and was now flapping his good wing while jumping, evidently trying to fly away, but failing terribly.
“Your wing is injured,” Ming told him gently. “I think it might be broken. You shouldn’t try to fly.”
Tang nodded in agreement. “You’re not going anywhere,” he said.
“Maybe Jean will help?” Ming suggested. “She promised she’d come back as soon as she could.”
The pigeon abandoned his futile attempts to fly and sank to the ground. “Who is Jean?”
“Our keeper,” Ming said. “You’ll like her, she—”
“Oh no!” the pigeon squawked. “No humans! I can’t let any humans see my message. It’s very important and top secret and—” He quickly snapped his beak shut. “I didn’t tell you any of that—I must be delirious from my head injury. I am just an ordinary pigeon from the park.”
As if to prove his point, he started cooing and pecking randomly at the ground, wincing each time he moved. One of his legs was redder than the other and seemed swollen. Ming narrowed her eyes as she examined it. It looked like some kind of canister or container was attached.
“What’s that on your leg?” she asked.
The pigeon lifted his leg slightly, so that he looked like a balancing flamingo, covering it with his good wing. “Nothing,” he said. “Nothing. Just a… um…” He sighed. “It contains a note,” he admitted. “I am part of the NPS. That’s the National Pigeon Service, to you civilians. My commanding officer is Lieutenant General Worthington and I have a very important message to deliver. The entire country is depending on me!” he said. “Or at least it was until that blasted Messerschmitt knocked me off course.”
Ming frowned. “You won’t be able to deliver it with a broken wing.”
The pigeon looked at her desperately. “I must!” he said. “Something terrible will happen if I don’t. I was trusted with this mission and I cannot fail.”
He examined the enclosure as though looking for an escape route. The bars were wide enough for him to fit through if he wanted to, and most of the enclosure was open air with no ceiling, but the pigeon seemed barely able to stand for longer than a few moments, let alone fly.
There was a rattle behind the enclosure, and the jangle of keys.
“Jean!” Ming cried, relief flooding through her that the keeper was okay. Despite her anger at Tang, he was right—Jean was her only friend in the zoo. “She can fix your wing, and then maybe you can deliver your note?”
The pigeon shook his head. “No, no, no! She might see the message. Rule number one: Trust no one. You never know who could be a spy for the enemy.”
Tang snorted. “I can assure you that Jean is not a spy. Spies wouldn’t spend their days cleaning up panda dung, for a start. They’d be doing much more interesting things, I imagine, like…”
“Spying?” Ming supplied.
Tang scowled at her.
“Please!” the pigeon begged Ming. “You have to help me remove the capsule and hide it somewhere. I have to keep the message safe.”
Ming examined the red capsule. It was firmly attached to the pigeon’s leg with a thick plastic binding. “I don’t think it can be removed,” she said. “At least not without human help.”
The pigeon gazed beseechingly at Tang.
“I don’t know what you expect me to do,” Tang muttered, avoiding the pigeon’s desperate eyes.
There was a clang as the thick metal enclosure door was unlocked, and then a swoosh as the heavy door was slid open.
“Please!” the pigeon wailed.
Without thinking, Ming lunged at the pigeon as though she was about to attack, her teeth bared. The pigeon reared back with a squawk as she clamped her jaws down onto the capsule.
“Stay still!” she mumbled through her closed jaw.
The pigeon relaxed a little as Ming started to grind her teeth back and forth over the capsule’s binding as though it were a bamboo shoot, being careful not to injure the pigeon’s leg.
The pigeon caught her eye and gave her a nervous smile. “I’m Francis, by the way,” he said.
Finally, the capsule broke free. Ming quickly scooped it up and hid it beneath her paw as the keeper appeared.
Jean paused as she took in the sight of the bloodied, disheveled pigeon, her eyes filled with concern.
“Well,” she said. “What do we have here?”
September 8, 1940
The zookeeper approached tentatively, kneeling down in front of Francis as she reached out to him.
“Poor thing,” she said. “Looks like you’ve been shot out of the sky like a bomber plane.”
Little does she know, Francis thought. She didn’t seem to present any immediate danger, so he remained calm while the keeper gently lifted him up and carried him toward the gate at the back of the enclosure.
Ming followed anxiously. The keeper turned, puzzled. “It’s all right,” she told Ming. “I’m just going to fix him up.”
“Keep the message safe for me until I get back,” Francis whispered.
The keeper took him into a room behind the enclosure. It was filled with crates full of bamboo. Charts hung along the walls, covered with scribbled notes about the giant pandas’ diet, exercise, and any other information the humans felt necessary to record. Francis thought it must be awful having your every move monitored, never really being free to do what you wanted, go where you pleased. Although, he supposed, his life was much the same way. He belonged to the humans and did what they needed him to do, whenever they needed him to do it. His life was no more his own than Ming’s was.
The zookeeper, Jean, placed him on the table and rummaged through some cupboards, producing a case full of various medical instruments and bottles of potions and lotions, a wad of bandages, and a roll of gauze.
She filled a bowl with water at the small sink in the corner of the room, then gently wiped Francis’s feathers with cotton balls, being careful not to hurt him. Francis watched the water turn a murky pink color as Jean cleaned away the blood, and his stomach felt a little queasy.
“It looks worse than it is,” Jean said. “You were lucky, little guy. You’ve got a few scrapes and grazes, but most of the damage is contained to your left wing.”
She glanced at Francis. “This is going to hurt a little, I’m afraid.”
Francis took a deep breath and closed his eyes. There was a gentle tug on his shoulder, then nothing. Francis opened one eye, surprised that it hadn’t hurt as much as he’d thought it would, when Jean forcefully pushed his wing up and back into the socket, sending a fire burning through Francis worse than any explosion.
He shrieked in agony, but Jean held him close, stroking his head. “It’s all over now,” she told him. “You are a very brave pigeon.”
“Jean?” a loud voice boomed from the doorway. “What do you have there?”
Jean’s smile dropped from her face. “Sir… it’s a pigeon; he somehow found his way into the pandas’ enclosure. He’s injured,” she said quickly. “I was only—”
“You are not paid to look after pigeons,” the boss growled.
“I’m a volunteer,” Jean whispered under her breath. “I’m not paid at all.”
“What was that?” the boss barked.
He was a short, stout man, with a graying beard and mustache and tufts of black hair that protruded from his nose and ears. His dark eyes flashed at Francis as he continued. “They are little more than flying rats. Get it out of here before it infects our animals with some hideous disease.”
Jean lowered her head. “Yes, sir. I’ll just bind his wing, then I’ll take him away from the zoo.”
The man gave a curt nod, then left.
“You’re not vermin, are you?” she huffed, binding Francis’s wing with the bandage a bit tighter than necessary. “You seem clean and well fed. I wonder where you’ve come from.”
Francis avoided her gaze, trying to act like a normal, e
veryday pigeon. Maybe he wouldn’t make a very good spy after all, if humans suspected him this easily.
“There,” Jean said, tying off the ends of the bandage into a knot. “All done. You won’t be able to fly for at least two weeks, though, I’m afraid.”
She glanced at the door. “I can’t just leave you out in the open to fend for yourself,” she muttered. “The foxes will get you before you’ve had a chance to heal.”
She picked him up and checked that the coast was clear before returning to Ming’s enclosure. “Of course,” she said aloud as she put Francis on top of a pile of straw in a corner of the enclosure. “I have no control over where a pigeon might or might not wander.”
Ming bounded over and Jean ruffled the fur on her head playfully. “Look after him, Ming,” Jean said, adding with a whisper, “Don’t let the boss find him.”
Tang gave a small huff before continuing to lick himself beneath his armpit.
“I told you Jean would help,” Ming said, looking pleased with herself.
“She is a kind human,” Francis admitted. He thought about George and wondered how he was. If he was on the front line or… He shook the thought away.
“You still have the capsule?” he asked.
Ming nodded.
Francis paused, wondering if he could trust Ming. He had only known her for a few hours. Real trust was something that took months to build up. Years even. But she had done more for him in a few short hours than anyone else he knew. She had all but saved his life. Besides, she was stuck in an enclosure. It wasn’t like she could run away, and he didn’t really have anyone else to rely on.
“Could you keep hold of it for me for a little longer? There is something I must do.”
Ming watched curiously as he eased himself between two of the metal bars, being careful not to knock his damaged wing.
“Where are you going?” Ming asked, alarmed. “It’s not safe to wander around the zoo in broad daylight!”
“Of course it’s safe,” Francis replied, gazing up at the hazy morning sunshine. “It’s a fine day to go for a stroll. If I cannot deliver this message, I need to find someone else in this zoo who can.”
“But—” Ming started.
“Let him go,” Tang called. “Pigeons do not belong in a zoo.”
Francis smiled at Ming reassuringly. “Don’t worry, I’ll be back.”
It certainly was a pleasant day for a stroll, Francis thought. Zookeepers bustled around, cleaning out enclosures and feeding the animals, preparing to open for the day. They paid him no mind as he strutted along. When the night drew in, though, it would be a different matter. They would huddle in their homes in the dark, afraid to set foot outside in case there was another air raid.
The giant pandas’ enclosure was at the end of a long path. Francis followed the path to the center of the zoo, where a large wooden pavilion stood in a vast grassy area peppered with wooden picnic tables. He gazed up at a wooden sign on which a map of the zoo was posted. Four other paths led off from his in different directions. In the distance, Francis could see the top of a large building, and along the path to his left was a café and a wide-arched tunnel that seemed to lead out of the zoo. Behind that, tall nets hung over another row of enclosures. Francis decided to go straight and see what animals the zoo contained.
As he walked, Francis wondered how long it would be until the bombers returned. He hoped there would at least be enough time to get his message to Bletchley. A horrible chill ran down Francis’s spine. What if he was Britain’s only hope? What if he was the only creature who could warn the Allies about Operation Sea Lion? He hurried on, his thoughts of the pleasant day forgotten. He had to find someone reliable to take the message for him. But he couldn’t entrust just any old creature with his mission. It had to be someone brave, determined, and, above all, loyal to their country.
He reached the penguin pool, where dark black-and-white shapes glided past an underwater window, swimming elegantly to and fro. Francis could never understand why the humans considered penguins to be birds. They were more fish than bird. What was the point of having wings when you couldn’t fly? He looked down at his injured wing and tried to move it. Nothing. He was as useless as a penguin.
He approached an enclosure similar to Ming’s and peered through the bars for a glimpse of what was inside.
“Ahem! Excuse me?” he called. “Is there anyone in there who thinks they might have it in them to become a hero?”
In reply, a massive lion launched itself at the bars with an almighty roar. Francis jerked his head back, narrowly avoiding the beast’s claws, which scraped across the bars with a screeching noise that set Francis’s beak on edge.
“I’ll help you,” the lion growled, prowling back and forth. “Come inside and tell me more.”
Francis backed away, shaking his head vigorously. “Th-that’s all right,” he stuttered. “I’m very sorry to have bothered you.”
Francis scurried away, cursing his own stupidity. He had to think more clearly. He couldn’t choose any animal. It had to be one that would be able to navigate its way through London unnoticed. Not a lion or elephant—they would only draw attention. Perhaps another bird? Either way, he had to make sure he didn’t go near any animal that would eat him before he’d even told them about the mission.
He paused. How was he going to convince the right animal to take on the mission when he wasn’t even able to talk about the mission?
He was lost in thought when something hit him on the back of the head. He turned but there was no one in sight. He continued on when something hit him again. It was an empty peanut shell. He caught the smallest of movements on the wall beside him.
He pretended to walk away, but then spun to face his attacker, getting hit directly in the face by another nut.
“Ouch!” Francis cried. “There was really no need for that.”
He pecked at the nut on the ground and found that it was actually quite tasty.
“Sorry!” A voice giggled.
“We were only playing,” said another.
Francis hopped onto the low wall so that he could see who he was talking to. Two small gray heads popped up, their wide eyes sparkling with mischief.
“Give me another one of those nuts,” Francis said, “then we’ll call it even.”
One of the monkeys threw another nut. This time Francis caught it in his beak, and the monkeys clapped their hands together in delight. He mumbled his thanks as he crunched it up, watching the monkeys leap across a wooden platform, swinging on ropes and ducking beneath branches.
In the middle of the enclosure was a hill built with blocks of concrete and stone, sculpted to look like a natural rock formation. A sign in front read: SQUIRREL MONKEYS.
A wall circled the enclosure, and just out of reach was an abandoned sandwich. A group of monkeys joined forces, hanging upside down in a chain until the lowest one was able to swing out enough to grab the sandwich. The monkeys chattered excitedly as they shared it between them.
“That was rather clever,” Francis called. And stealth-like, he thought.
Two of the monkeys bounded over, grinning. “We’re very resourceful when we want to be,” one said. “I’m Jacky. Nice to meet you.”
“Francis,” Francis replied, with a small bow.
“I’m Chiney,” the other added with a wink. “We’re only clever when the humans aren’t around. We can’t let them know how clever we really are, otherwise they’d never leave us alone.”
“We were at Whipsnade for a while,” said Jacky. “We had a nice island, surrounded by water, with a cave in the middle where we slept and a giant monkey puzzle tree to climb. The humans thought we couldn’t swim, so there was only a low wall on the other side of the moat.
“Except one day, one of us—Gerald—got a bit bored, so he decided to swim across to the other side and see what was over there. He jumped the wall and made off toward the giraffe house.”
“And was never seen again,” Chiney added wi
th a sigh. “We like to think that he made a new life for himself, somewhere out there.”
Francis laughed. “How did you end up here?”
“As soon as the humans found out that we could just up and leave whenever we liked, they moved us to London where they could keep us locked away.” Chiney gave Francis a wicked grin. “Of course, everyone knows that you can’t keep a monkey caged. If we wanted to leave, we could. Anytime we wanted.”
“Is that so?” Francis asked, a plan forming in his mind. “Then why don’t you?”
“There’s nothing out there for us,” Jacky said. “Besides, we like it here. We get all the food we can eat, and the humans love us. Of course, that’s not to say that we don’t have the odd adventure now and then.”
Francis smiled. “You might be just the animals I’ve been looking for,” he said. “I have a message to deliver. A rather important message, only I’m unable to deliver it myself because…” He held up his bandaged wing.
“Oh dear,” said Jacky. “That doesn’t look good.”
Francis shook his head. “It isn’t. But this message I have to deliver is very urgent, and I can’t wait until my wing is healed to deliver it.”
He glanced sideways at the monkeys. “I’ve been trying to think of a way to get the message to where it needs to go. Maybe even find someone who might be brave and smart enough to take on the challenge, but…” He sighed again, watching as Chiney whispered something into Jacky’s ear.
“We’ll do it!” Chiney said, but Jacky shook his head.
“What’s in it for us?” he asked. “It’s risky breaking out of the zoo. We might get caught, and then who knows what will happen to us.”
Chiney opened his mouth to interject, but Jacky held a paw up.
“Good question,” Francis said. “Of course, you need to know exactly what the mission… plan… involves. It’s quite simple. All we need to do is find a map so that I can show you where you need to go, and then give you the message to take to the humans.”
“Humans?” Jacky cried. “See?” He turned to Chiney. “I’m not getting into anything that involves humans.”
“Wait, wait!” Francis begged. He sighed. Jacky was right—the plan involved a lot of risk. Francis owed them the truth so that they knew what they were getting themselves into.
World War II Page 3