Kodjo realized the problem. “If we climb to the very top,” he said, “we can look down into the jungle. We may be able to see the camp from above where we cannot see it through the trees.”
By noon, with the sun vertically above them (for they were almost on the Equator), they had reached their objective. The view from the summit of Mount Lwungi was breathtaking. North, south, east and west — the hills and forests rolled away. From the vantage-point which they enjoyed, they could — virtually — see the whole of Burundi. For a moment Stephanie wondered whether, after all, Lwungi was not the site of some ancient burial ground. If I were the King of Burundi, she thought, I wouldn’t mind being buried here with my whole kingdom in view.
After she had let the field-glasses range for a while over the horizon, she turned to the scene nearer at hand. It was extraordinary how the forest canopy, which from a distance seemed to be a solid wall of green beneath them, was transformed by the magnification of the glasses into a shimmering variegated expanse where individual trees could be distinguished, and branches on those trees and even the animals moving on the branches.
Suddenly she clasped Kodjo’s arm. “Look, down there!” she cried. “Monkeys! I think they’re green monkeys too. In that clump of trees by the outcrop of rock. Here,” she handed him the glasses.
It took Kodjo a few seconds to find the target. “Yes,” he said at last. “You are right. Those are the monkeys. The old woman will not be far away.”
They spotted the clearing almost immediately.
“Good God!” Stephanie exclaimed, having retrieved the glasses from her companion. “There’s a whole complex hidden in the trees down there.”
This time Kodjo needed no mechanical assistance. Once Stephanie had pointed it out, he could distinguish with his naked eye a series of huts which had been built around the perimeter of a clearing in the forest. Nor did he need any help in distinguishing the old woman as she came out of one of the huts. The crablike shuffle which Stephanie had noted in the course of their one brief encounter at the village market had disappeared. The old woman strode purposefully across the open circle.
“There she is, Kodjo! There’s the old woman. Do you see her?”
“I see her, miss. And I see the other men too.”
“What do you mean?”
But before Kodjo had time to answer, Stephanie saw for herself what he meant.
For two people had followed Frau Matthofer out into the clearing. One was a white man, about forty years old. Stephanie had a clear view of his face through the glasses and she knew she had never seen him before. The other was black, tall and handsome. She gave a start of surprise as she recognized Victor Mtaza.
“Look, Kodjo! That’s Victor Mtaza. What’s he doing here?”
Kodjo just had time to observe them through the field-glasses before the old woman and her two visitors disappeared into a hut at the other side of the clearing.
“Yes.” He lowered the glasses. “You are right. That’s Victor Mtaza. I don’t know what he is doing here, miss, but I’m sure he’s up to no good. Victor Mtaza is bad music, miss. Very bad music.”
“We can find out, Kodjo.”
“You want me to go down?”
“No. I’ll go myself. You wait for me here.”
“Are you sure? It will be dangerous.”
“Yes, I’m sure.” As she spoke, Stephanie realized that she had never felt surer of anything in her whole life.
Seen from near at hand, the huts formed a distinct pattern around the circle of the clearing. As Stephanie crept closer, she realized that the one on the far side was clearly the place where Frau Matthofer lived. A line of washing was hung out alongside and the assorted garments, most of them very much the worse for wear, flapped limply in the breeze. There was a porch of sorts, and a faded deck-chair had been placed so as to catch the late afternoon sun. The hut had a chimney and Stephanie could visualize the old woman lighting a fire against the chill of the evening.
She crawled past the hut and round the edge of the clearing, taking care to stay under the cover of the trees.
The second hut was placed opposite the first. Its windows were barred with tough bamboo and there was a block of wood on the door which could be dropped down into position from the outside. Panting from the exertion, Stephanie raised herself on tiptoe to peer through the window of the second hut.
As she poked her head above the sill she was greeted by a sudden quick chattering. She had time to glimpse a line of monkeys in cages set around the wall before ducking out of sight once again. She crouched where she was, as she heard voices. Frau Matthofer and her visitors had obviously heard the disturbance and had come out to see what it was.
She heard the door of the hut open and the old woman talking to the animals.
“Was passiert, meine Liebchen? What is the matter, my pets?” she crooned in German. “What’s got into you? Did something frighten you?”
Stephanie sensed rather than saw the old woman come over to the window and look out into the forest. She kept low to the ground, held her breath and hoped for the best.
Inside the hut, the old woman was joined by first one, then both her visitors.
“Qu’est-ce qu’il y a? What is it, Irma?”
The old woman replied this time in French: “I don’t know, Louis. Something seems to have frightened them.”
“Perhaps it was a chimpanzee. Monkeys are always frightened of chimpanzees.”
“Perhaps.”
Stephanie could hear only fragments of the conversation which took place within the hut. What she could understand of it alarmed her deeply.
She recognized at one point the deep booming voice of Victor Mtaza.
“Two weeks from now, Irma, and it’s all finished anyway. Your job will be over. Louis here will organize the last shipments — the normal route.”
“Brussels?”
“Yes, through Brussels.”
When she heard Brussels mentioned, bells rang in Stephanie’s mind. She remembered that Kaplan had spoken of a man called Louis — Louis Vincennes — the son of Count Philippe Vincennes. He had said that Louis had been away in Africa at the time of his visit to Belgium. Could it be the same man?
Before she had time to pursue this line of thought, she heard the old woman intervene.
“And after Brussels? Will there be any further transshipments? My monkeys hate long journeys, you know.”
Stephanie heard the reassuring tones of the man called Louis.
“Don’t worry. After Brussels, they’ll fly straight to Moscow. Plenty of food and water for all of them, I promise you.”
“Ah!” Frau Matthofer sounded deeply relieved.
Before Stephanie had time to digest what she had just heard, the old woman spoke again.
“What will happen to the monkeys who are left behind? I don’t want them to be harmed. They are my children, you know. I love them.” There was a beseeching, almost terrified, note in her voice.
“Don’t worry, Irma,” Stephanie heard Victor reply. “No harm will come to the animals that are left. They will live in the forest just as they have always done.”
Stephanie could tell from the intonation in Victor Mtaza’s voice that the man was lying but somehow Frau Matthofer missed it.
“Good,” the old woman’s gratitude was unmistakable. “I could not bear it if they were harmed. Gentlemen,” suddenly she became brisk and businesslike, “can I offer you some lunch? It is modest fare I am afraid, but I was able to visit the village the other day — at my age I find the climb tough going — and I have acquired some fresh fruit. Here I am surrounded by so much greenery,” Stephanie could imagine the old woman spreading her hands, “and yet fresh fruit is a luxury. Oh yes, and I got some new batteries for my radio so I will be able to hear the signal about the next shipment. Stay here, gentlemen. I’ll call you when lunch is ready.”
The old woman left the hut and the two men followed her out. But instead of crossing the clearing after her
, they stayed where they were — talking.
“Poor Irma,” Victor Mtaza said. “She doesn’t know yet. She mustn’t know.”
“Know what?”
There was a hint of impatience in Mtaza’s reply.
“About the monkeys of course, Louis. They’re doomed. All of them are doomed. Once you have got your last plane-load out of Bujumbura, those that are left have to be destroyed. Utterly and completely. Down to the last one.”
For five minutes Stephanie lay there in the undergrowth digesting what she had heard. What did the reference to Moscow mean? Why were the green monkeys being shipped out from Burundi to Russia? Why did Victor Mtaza say that in two weeks the operation would be finished? What operation? The only thing Stephanie realized with absolute clarity was that she could no longer handle this one on her own. There were forces at play far beyond her poor power to comprehend. But the problem was: whom to ask to help? Who were friends? Who were enemies? Or were the enemies, like Lowell Kaplan, really friends? Deep down, she wished she could be friends with Kaplan. Whatever their differences, she found herself missing him.
From the hut across the clearing came the murmur of mealtime conversation. Stephanie judged it safe to proceed. But before she left, she wanted to visit the third hut, the hut to which Frau Matthofer had first taken her visitors.
Once more she crawled through the undergrowth at the edge of the clearing. Once more she poked her head above the sill. This time the windows were not barred. There was a plain sheet of glass and that was all.
Stephanie peered through the glass. It took some time for her eyes to become accustomed to the gloom. When at last she was able to see clearly, she gave a gasp of astonishment. For the walls of the hut were lined with shelves from floor to roof. And on every shelf vials of liquid stood six deep. She strained her eyes to see what was written on each vial. And then suddenly illumination dawned. For each tube was marked with the date of its completion, and below the date appeared the words, written in Frau Matthofer’s unmistakably Gothic handwriting: “MARBURG VIRUS — ANTISERUM FROM GREEN MONKEY”!
“Oh God!” Stephanie suddenly saw it all. How much time did she have? She shut her eyes and prayed that she would have enough time. Then she slipped back into the forest.
15
Harry Bolbeck had been at the Bronx Zoo for over six months. He was enjoying himself enormously. He sometimes felt that dropping out of school to take a job with the animals had been the best thing he had ever done. Animals weren’t like teachers. They didn’t pressure you and muck you around all the time. They didn’t mind if you showed up late, unless it was your turn on the feeding run in which case they minded a great deal — but that was understandable. Frankly, Harry Bolbeck preferred animals to human beings. He particularly liked the monkeys with whom he had been working for the last two weeks.
The monkey-house was next to the Sea Lions and opposite the Carnivores. Each morning he took the Lexington Avenue express to East Tremont Avenue and walked the few hundred yards north to the Boston Road entrance of the zoo. He would show his pass at the turnstile and then enjoy, for the next fifteen minutes, the magical walk through the woods, past the elephants and buffalos, then down the hill to Wolf Wood and up again to the monkey-house where he would check in with the Head Keeper before getting on with his work.
The monkeys fascinated him. The Bronx Zoo had all sorts. They had two six hundred pound gorillas — the equivalent of three football full-backs rolled into one; they had chimpanzees and orang-utans. They had gibbons, the most skilled brachiators among the apes (Bolbeck had learned that a brachiator was an animal which used its arms to swing through the trees). They had langurs from India and colobus monkeys from Africa. They had a proboscis monkey from the island of Borneo which was the only place in the whole wide world where the ‘nosiest of the simians’ as the proboscis monkey was sometimes called, still survived. Bolbeck’s job was to look after them all; to feed them and water them. And to love and cherish them as well. He had learned early on that monkeys and apes of whatever kind responded wonderfully to affection. The monkey-house at the Bronx Zoo was not a spectacularly sympathetic place. Those who had designed and built it had done their best to maintain the fiction that a small tropical sanctuary existed somewhere between the seals and the lions. But they had not wholly succeeded. The cages were large and airy; they were filled with trees and branches to swing on. There were rocks to scramble over and forest pools to drink from. But, in the last resort — whatever the pretence —the animals were in a prison. And they knew it.
That was why the instinctive sympathy which Bolbeck brought to his work was so important. He was, on the surface, an unattractive youth. He had long dark hair which was certainly not as clean as it should have been; a straggling unkempt beard and a tendency to acne. But the animals loved him notwithstanding. He seemed to be able to talk to them in a language which they could understand. Monkeys gibbered. And Harry Bolbeck had learned to gibber back.
One Friday morning in the late summer, Harry Bolbeck realized as he walked through the woods of the Zoo on his way to work that he was in a particularly good mood. One reason for the good mood was the approach of the weekend. He and his friend, Steve Mulliner, took it in turns to have the weekend off and this time it was his turn. Another, perhaps more important, reason was the sheer enjoyment that Bolbeck was deriving from trying to communicate with a new batch of monkeys — guenons of various sorts — which had arrived at the zoo earlier in the week. Bolbeck probably liked the guenons more than any other kind of monkey. He liked the variety — they came with all kinds of colours, spots and stripes. He liked the clear markings, white bibs, white nose blobs, white tiaras. He liked the athleticism of the species, though of course the limits of the monkey cage acted as a severe restraint on the kind of aerial dynamics at which they were so adept. Above all he liked the guenons’ sense of humour. It was marvellous to see the little animals play tricks on each other and then roar with laughter, rocking back on their haunches, when the trick succeeded. The previous day he had seen one of the new arrivals, a guenon with an odd bright green fur, peel back the skin of a banana and eat the fruit. Then it had picked up a stick of approximately the same dimensions as the fruit it had just eaten and had pushed the banana skin around it so that it seemed, on casual inspection, as though the fruit remained untouched. Bolbeck had seen the little green monkey take up the fake banana and offer it to one of the others. Then, when the deceit had been discovered and the empty banana skin had been thrown angrily to the floor, he had witnessed an eruption of mirth such as he had never seen before.
Where on earth had the little green monkey learned that trick? he wondered, as he changed his clothes in the staff-room of the monkey-house. His colleague, Steve Mulliner, had arrived for work ahead of him and was already changing.
“Hey, Steve, do you know what I saw in the guenon cage yesterday?”
“No, what?”
Steve Mulliner, like Bolbeck himself, worked with the animals of the Bronx Zoo for love not for money and he had been fascinated by the tale of the bananas.
“Man, isn’t that something!” he had exclaimed. “I’d love to see that. Do you think he would do that again?”
“We can try.”
Later that morning, at a time when there were very few visitors to the monkey-house, Bolbeck and Mulliner went into the guenon cage with a bunch of bananas.
“That’s the one.” Bolbeck pointed to the green monkey as it sat in the crotch of a tree-trunk some distance from its fellows. “Here.” He held up a banana.
The rest of the new arrivals fled chattering and suspicious as he raised his arm. It would take them some time to get used to the rewards as well as the drawbacks of captivity. But the little green monkey showed an exactly contrary reaction. With a single continuous movement he leapt off his perch, seized the banana and returned to the tree where he sat and eagerly stripped away the peel to get at the fruit inside.
“Look!” Bolbeck drew Mulliner’
s attention to the process of consumption. “See how carefully he’s folding back the skin.”
They watched fascinated as the monkey finished off the banana; laid the skin in the fork of the tree; then skittered off in search of a piece of wood of the right size and consistency. When he had found what he was looking for, the animal retrieved the skin and repeated on an unsuspecting colleague the trick he had already played the previous day.
“He chose a different fall-guy today,” Bolbeck commented. “Yesterday, he tried it on a Diana monkey. Today, he’s going after the Patas.”
“Shit!” Mulliner shook his head in disbelief as the small charade unfolded.
This time when the Patas monkey discovered the trick, it did not merely content itself with hurling the empty skin to the floor. It launched a full scale attack on the perpetrator of the deception and the green monkey was forced to retire to the very top of the cage and swing from the roof with its long prehensile tail.
“See. He’s laughing! He’s really laughing!”
Steve Mulliner, regarding the scene for himself, could not disagree with his friend’s observation.
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” he said. “What kind of monkey is it anyway? Where did it come from?”
“It came in on the last African consignment. They’ve put it down as a grass monkey of some kind, but they haven’t got around yet to the precise classification. Our labelling people are running a bit behind.”
Steve Mulliner regarded the little animal with interest. The fun and games finished, it had once more regained its customary perch in the fork of the tree.
“That animal has been in contact with human beings before, Harry,” Mulliner said. “I don’t think he invented that trick himself. I think he learned it somewhere.”
“Could be.” Bolbeck sounded unconvinced. “But I don’t see why he couldn’t have worked it out for himself.”
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