10 Gorilla Adventure

by Willard Price

  Hal drew out his fingers. They were covered with green pus. ‘Poor devil,’ Hal said. ‘Worse than I thought.’

  ‘Can you treat it?’ Roger asked.

  ‘I’m afraid it’s beyond me. The bullet is lodged in the shoulder joint. I might have gotten it out if we could have nabbed him just after he was shot. But by this time it has set up a very bad infection. I’ve never seen a worse abscess. And the bullet must be wedged in between the humerus and the scapula where it must grind every time the arm is moved. I’d hate to think how painful it must be. No wonder he’s turned rogue. I won’t tinker with it - this is another job for Dr Burton.’

  Chapter 25

  The inquisitive ostrich

  When Gog was laid on a hospital bed, it promptly collapsed under the seven-hundred pound patient.

  ‘No matter,’ the doctor said. ‘If he won’t stay up, hell just have to stay down. We haven’t anything strong enough to hold him. First of all I think I’d better give him an anaesthetic to keep him asleep while I’m digging for that bullet.’

  Roger was shaking his head. ‘If he’s asleep, he won’t know.’

  ‘Won’t know what?’ Hal said.

  ‘Won’t know we’re trying to help him.’

  The doctor looked surprised. ‘Why is that so important?’

  Roger explained. ‘He thinks we killed his family. And the man who was with us put that bullet into him. It’s made a rogue out of him. He just has no use for the human race. He’s one great big hate.’

  The doctor looked at Hal. Hal said, ‘I think perhaps my brother has something there. The way this gorilla feels now he’s too dangerous to be put on exhibit in any animal collection. He’s quite likely to murder somebody. In fact he tried to murder us last night. Stuffed a mamba in through the window. And twice he’s tried to burn us out. And thanks to him I had to fight a leopard in an elephant pit. Those things were a mystery to us, but now we know he was the guilty one.’

  ‘You two are pretty amazing,’ the doctor remarked. ‘I think if I were in your shoes I would just put another bullet into this rascal and finish him off for good and all.’

  Hal smiled. ‘Killing animals doesn’t happen to be our business. We take them alive, tame them, and send them home for other people to enjoy. And there’s nothing that tames an animal so quickly as the knowledge that you’re trying to do it a good turn.’

  ‘But do you think this animal is intelligent enough to realize that I’m trying to do him a good turn when he wakes and finds me digging into his shoulder?’

  Hal nodded. ‘I think any animal that’s intelligent enough to plan murder the way he planned it is bright enough to know when he’s being helped. But perhaps you’d rather not risk it.’

  ‘I’ll risk it.’ said Dr Burton. ‘But first I’ll get these three other patients out of here.’

  The three men were transferred to another room. Then the door was locked and the doctor went to work.

  The probing in the wound woke the gorilla. Gog slowly opened his eyes. He growled when he saw his two mortal enemies. He was still too sleepy to do more. Hal was bending over him and Roger was sitting on the floor holding the ape’s hands as if he were a baby to be comforted instead of a giant who could kill the boy with one slap. And someone was easing that painful thing out of his shoulder.

  It came away at last in the grip of the forceps and the doctor held it before the eyes of the ape. Gog looked searchingly into the faces of the three men. There was no growling now. He winced a little when the doctor proceeded to clean out the abscess but he bore the treatment patiently.

  Then came the dressing - it soothed the inflamed nerves. What a blessed relief!

  When Gog closed his eyes Roger began to remove his hand, but the ape held on to it. Only after he was sound asleep was Roger able to withdraw his hand and join Hal and the doctor in the corridor.

  ‘Well,’ the doctor said, ‘I’ve just seen a miracle. You certainly seem to know what makes an animal tick.’

  The same thing that makes a human animal tick,’ Hal said. ‘Gorillas respond quickly to good treatment. But don’t take it for granted that Gog has suddenly turned from a devil into an angel. That would be expecting a little too much.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ Burton said. ‘I won’t take any unnecessary chances. No other patients will be put back in that room. Your Mr Gog shall have the distinction of being the only patient in the hospital to have a private room.’

  ‘How long will he need to be here?’

  ‘Just until tomorrow. Then you can continue the treatment at home.’

  Joro came running down the hall. ‘Bwana. Come quick. Ostrich.’

  Sure enough, and a very handsome one it was, strutting across the hospital grounds.

  Hal had wanted to add an ostrich to his collection. But perhaps this one was a pet.

  Ts it yours?’ he asked Dr Burton.

  ‘No, no. Just a wild bird. But we see it often. It wanders around here and in the nearby villages picking up whatever it can find.’

  ‘You mean scraps of food.’

  ‘Not only food, but hard objects, stones, rings that it pulls off the ears of women, anything bright and shiny. It will steal anything from anybody. But it belongs to nobody. You are free to take it if you want it.’

  Hal went into action. Luckily he had most of his crew with him, since they had come along to carry Gog into the hospital. He instructed them to make a circle round the ostrich. Then they could gradually close in on it and capture it.

  He and Roger came close to the bird to study its plumage and decide whether it would make a good specimen.

  The ostrich made no attempt to run off. Instead, it examined the boys curiously, then began to pluck at their clothing. Roger put up his hand to fend off the inquisitive beak.

  Quick as a flash, the ostrich plucked the watch from his wrist and swallowed it.

  ‘My watch,’ cried Roger. ‘How am I going to get that back? What does it want with these hard things anyhow?’

  ‘The ostrich has no teeth,’ Hal said. ‘So it can’t chew its food. The gravel and other hard objects it swallows do the chewing. They churn around in the stomach and grind up the food.’

  ‘Look,’ Roger said. ‘Now it’s eating stones. See it making for that flashy one. What kind of a stone is that?’

  Hal had only an instant to study the stone before it was swallowed. Reflecting the sun, it shone like a jewel. It was as if there were a light inside it. He suddenly remembered that the geologist Ryan had described a diamond just that way. He searched the ground but didn’t find another like it. But wasn’t it important to learn whether it really was a diamond?

  ‘We’ve got to get inside that bird,’ he said. ‘Toto, bring the dart gun.’

  The tranquillizer worked fast. As soon as the bird closed its eyes and sank to the ground, Hal directed the men to take it up and tote it into the hospital.

  When Dr Burton saw his new patient he protested. ‘You must think I’m running a Noah’s Ark,’ he laughed.

  ‘If I’m not mistaken,’ Hal said, ‘there’s something in this bird more valuable than all the contents of the Ark put together.’ He told of what he had seen. ‘Do you think you can get at it?’

  ‘A fairly simple operation,’ the doctor said. ‘Just a slit to open the stomach, take out what’s inside, and sew it up again.’

  Skilfully, he proceeded to do just that. One of the first things to emerge was Roger’s watch, still ticking away merrily. Out came half-digested lucerne, lettuce, grass, and wild celery, mixed with an odd assortment of grinders, gravel, buttons, keys, spoons, and even a set of false teeth lost a few days before by a village headman.

  And the bright stone.

  Dr Burton examined it with interest. Tm no expert on diamonds. We could send this to town to be assayed.’

  ‘We can do better than that,’ Hal said. He told the doctor about the visit of the Williamson geologists. ‘They said they’d be in Rutshuru today. We can go over right n
ow and try to locate them.’

  The ostrich, relieved of twelve pounds of gravel and trinkets, was placed in the cage that had housed Gog and taken home to join the mountain menagerie. Most of the men went along, while Hal and Roger drove to Rutshuru. They found the geologists in the town’s one small hotel. They examined the luminous bit of rock and pronounced it a diamond.

  ‘It’s the real thing,’ Ryan exclaimed. ‘Can you take us where you found this ?’

  Within half an hour they were poking around with shovels in the plot of ground where the diamond had been discovered. A few feet under the wind-blown dust, they found what they were looking for - the surface of a diamond lode that might extend downwards, funnel-shaped, for hundreds or even thousands of feet.

  ‘You have struck it rich,’ they told the boys. ‘We’ll ask you to sign preliminary papers. Then well bring in some of our men and do some actual digging. When we get a better idea of the extent of the lode our firm will make an advance payment to you and a royalty arrangement.’

  ‘That’s fine,’ Hal said, ‘except that you’re making one mistake. This is on the hospital grounds. Your arrangements will be made with Dr Burton, not with us.’

  Ryan looked surprised. ‘But you located the deposit. You’re entitled to a share of the profits.’

  ‘Listen,’ Hal said. ‘This hospital is doing a grand job under terrible difficulties. The hospital is about to close down for lack of funds. The people need this hospital. They even come from a hundred miles away. Dr Burton is frightfully overworked. He’s doing it all alone. His doctors and nurses have been killed or have gone home. He needs money to recruit a new staff, buy supplies, instruments, new equipment - and here it all is, right in his own front yard.’

  ‘But your father - isn’t he the boss? Don’t you want to cable him for instructions?’

  ‘We know exactly what father would say. We’re animal collectors, not miners.’

  The geologists shook their heads over the stubbornness of the two young men, and went in to see Dr Burton.

  Chapter 26

  Shipload of rascals

  The freighter, African Star, had thirty-four passengers. But only twelve of them were human. The other twenty-two were listed on the ship’s manifest as follows:

  ‘One gorilla, male; 1 gorilla, female; 2 infant gorillas; 1 python, white; 1 elephant shrew; 1 colobus monkey; 1 kudu; 1 bush-baby; 1 chimpanzee; 1 sitatunga; 1 mamba; 1 spitting cobra; 1 boomslang; 1 black leopard; 3 vervet monkeys; 1 ostrich; 1 gaboon viper; 2 skunks.’

  The viper and the skunks had been added at the last moment. The captain had objected to the skunks, even though Hal assured him that they were a very rare variety. That didn’t improve their smell.

  The captain consented only after Hal sprayed them with perfume and promised to keep them sprayed during the voyage.

  This was the most important wildlife shipment to leave Mombasa in many a day. Hal and Roger had decided to go along to see that the animals were properly fed and cared for. They had another reason. They were a bit homesick.

  ‘And we ought to be on hand in case of accidents,’ Hal said.

  Roger asked, ‘What accidents?’

  ‘Accidents can happen,’ said Hal.

  At first everything went smoothly. For five days the ship sailed over tranquil seas down the coast past Dar-es-Salaam, Durban, and Capetown.

  Rounding the Cape, she ran into rough weather and began to roll. The animals in their boxes and cages on the deck amidships started to fret. They were not used to any such motion. Some became seasick. All began to use whatever voice Nature had given them. The muttering and moaning grew into a screaming chorus.

  This touched the heart of the chimp, Good Samaritan. Sam was such a close friend of man that he had not been caged. He had gone about with Hal and Roger daily as they opened each container just enough to put in food. For simplicity’s sake, all locks took the same key. It was kept handy in a box nailed to the kudu’s cage.

  Now Sam saw his opportunity to do a good deed. He began with the little colobus monkey he had befriended on the slope of the volcano. The poor little fellow was wailing pitifully, pulling at the bars, trying to escape from his teetering box.

  The angel of mercy came to his aid. Sam got the key and unlocked the door. Out tumbled ‘The Little Bishop’. His wailing stopped. Happily he dashed about the deck, his white robe floating behind him.

  Then he joyously clambered into the rigging and took a flying leap to the ladder that scaled the mast. It was as good as a tree. Here he did not mind the motion. Trees also sway in a storm.

  Quite pleased with the results of his charitable deed, Helpful Harry opened another box. Out slithered the mamba. At once it reared six feet high. Ungratefully, it lunged at die chimp, who dodged just in time.

  Sam was a bit disappointed. He considered this a poor way for the twisty creature to say thanks. Oh well, you couldn’t expect appreciation from everybody.

  The mamba slipped on the sloping deck and skidded down the companionway to the passenger deck. Irritated by being so tossed about, it looked for someone to punish. Anyone would do.

  Rounding a corner, the snake came face to face with a passenger, a lady from Pocatello, Idaho. Needless to say, this was a shock to the good lady, since snakes six feet tall are not commonly encountered on the streets of Pocatello.

  The mamba made a pass at her. Its fangs dug into empty air, for madam had already collapsed in a quivering faint on the deck.

  The snake contemptuously walked over her. Discovering a partly open door, it entered. It was disappointed to find no enemy.

  But there was a place for it to hide. The absent passenger, member of a fireman’s band, had left his tuba standing against the wall.

  It was a double bass, largest of all brass instruments, ideal retreat for a badly disturbed snake. Gratefully, it wound its way down into the dark interior.

  In the meantime Sam the chimp had opened a dozen more doors. The black leopard turned white. Biting everything it found, it crunched a tap and let out a cascade of water that fell into a pail of detergent. Suds frothed all over the deck and over the big cat. The slippery animal skidded from one bulwark to the other at every roll of the ship.

  The three vervet monkeys, wildly delighted to be free, scampered up the rigging, leaped from boom to boom, and got themselves liberally pasted by the fresh white paint the crew had been applying to the ship for arrival at her home port.

  Then the monkeys took a notion to explore below. They tumbled into the coal hole and came up black with coal dust which they liberally applied to the freshly painted funnels, rails, and bulkheads until the ship looked like a zebra in its coat of black stripes on white.

  Colliding with the supercargo, they gave his white tropicals a thorough dusting and his bare arms a few good bites as he tried in vain to capture them and restore them to their box.

  He gave up, and went to beat on the door of the cabin occupied by the animal collectors. These two carefree gentlemen were having a pleasant siesta after spending much of the night on watch over their uneasy charges.

  ‘Come alive,’ he yelled. ‘Your beasts are tearing up the ship. Wake up, you blokes.’

  Hal, recognizing the voice of the supercargo, replied sleepily, ‘Can’t you watch them while we get a bit of sleep? The animals are cargo, aren’t they? And aren’t you in charge of cargo?’

  The supercargo fairly screamed. ‘I tell you, they’re all over the ship.’

  More convincing than the excitement of the officer was what Hal saw when he opened his eyes. The spitting cobra was looking in the window. It seemed ready to spit, and Hal was directly in its line of fire.

  Hal’s immediate thought was of the passengers. This creature, on the loose, could blind and even kill. The best thing that could be done was to get it to spit, and spit now, so its venom would be exhausted before it endangered anyone else.

  But even he didn’t particularly care to be its victim. There was a mirror at the end of the c
abin facing the window. Thinking fast, he leaped out of his bunk into a corner by the door.

  Now the snake could not see him - but could see his reflection in the mirror. Hal grabbed a flashlight and played it on his face. The brightly lit image in the mirror was all the cobra needed.

  It let loose its load of venom, which travelled like a bullet over the ten feet between the window and the provocative eyes. The glass streamed with the white poison.

  Hal moved to catch the snake, but it had already gone. But now it was almost as harmless as a garter snake.

  The boys plunged out on deck and caught whatever they could lay their hands on. But they couldn’t be everywhere at once. The whole ship was in an uproar - passengers screaming, alarm bells ringing, animals squawking, chattering, whistling, shrieking.

  The tuba player, returning to his cabin, thought to add to the alarm by blowing a blast on his instrument. He gave it all his lung-power, but there was no sound. Instead, the blazing eyes and darting tongue of a disturbed mamba appeared over the tuba’s rim. The musician left the tuba to the snake and dived out on deck.

  The ostrich, with its peculiar ability to roar like a lion and kick like a mule, was engaging in battle with the supercargo. The man naturally considered himself able to conquer any bird, even the eight-foot giant. He would just jump on it and flatten it to the deck.

  But when he tried this manoeuvre it didn’t work. The three-hundred-pound bird just didn’t flatten. Instead, the hundred-and-sixty-pound supercargo found himself riding ostrich-back clutching feathers to keep from falling.

  Passing the canvas swimming pool, the bird veered sharply and over went the unlucky rider with his hands full of feathers. Into the pool he fell, and came up to see the ostrich dart its head in through a cabin window, pluck a safety razor from a passenger in mid-shave and swallow it - then dash on with its beak dripping great gobs of shaving cream.