by Tom Michell
“There you are,” I said, handing over the plastic ice cube tray. “But it won’t make any difference, none at all. You’ll see.”
Just at that moment the dining room bell rang out across the campus.
“Right, there we are, off you go! Stop messing about here! Just leave him alone and I expect he’ll discover the bath for himself,” I said. “You can come back later.”
“Momentito, momentito!” they implored, and threw the handful of ice into the water, where it was going to melt in a few seconds and make no discernible difference to the temperature of the bath at all.
But at that instant Juan Salvado stopped his preening and looked up. Just as though the ice was precisely what he had been waiting for, he hopped up the steps like a veteran who had done it a hundred times before, stepped into the water, and began to wash.
The peals of laughter that greeted this action were infectious, and I told the boys to get along to eat at once. Off they ran, laughing all the way. Voices mimicking “It won’t make a jot of difference!” drifted up to the terrace and were met with fresh gales of laughter every time it was repeated, until they reached the dining room, a hundred yards away.
I poured myself the promised gin and tonic and joined Juan Salvado on the terrace for a sundowner. Sitting comfortably in the warmth of the setting sun, I raised my eyes and my glass to the penguin.
“Good health, Juan Salvado. Salud!” I said, and sipped. And as I toyed with the ice in my glass it chinked against the sides. He returned the salutation with Bottoms up! by bending over and shaking his tail as he pecked at an ice cube. He submerged his wings in the water and splashed furiously.
“Juan Salvado did no such thing. He took no interest at all in his new tub; he simply continued preening.”
The college water supply was practically undrinkable because of its salinity, and the pipes furred up so rapidly that they had to be replaced every few years. We had been told that the work in School House would interrupt our supply and that the maintenance men would need access to our accommodation, so it came as no surprise to me when, one siesta time, three men arrived at my flat in order to measure the pipeline. They finished the job in less than ten minutes, thanks to the simplicity of my kitchen and bathroom, but next they asked if they could tackle the terrace.
One might have expected the mission to be accomplished in only a minute or two by the trio, one with a pencil and paper, one with a tape measure, and the third acting as foreman—there was only one short length of pipe out there, after all—but Juan Salvado had other ideas.
My flat had a window fitted with blinds that overlooked the terrace, and whenever Juan Salvado had visitors of his own, I couldn’t help but overhear the conversations that took place without anyone being aware. Now I watched as Juan Salvado insisted on checking the measurements for himself, and before any time at all, the three men were sitting on the parapet explaining to the bird the precise specifications of the job they had to do and how much more satisfactory he would find the water pressure once they’d worked their magic. I had been given a fraction of the same information!
I had become accustomed to this kind of anthropomorphism. I myself was guiltier than anyone when it came to attributing human characteristics to the penguin. I was relieved and amused to find that other people reacted in much the same way as I did, and I had to stifle more than a few laughs as the simple measurement took over half an hour with Juan Salvado’s help.
A day or so later I was a bit surprised when I answered a knock at my door to find a number of the groundsmen on the threshold to my apartment, their collective gaze aimed directly over my shoulder. All became clear when they explained they wanted to see Juan Salvado, not me. They were delighted when I asked if they’d like to give him his lunch, and the men trooped out onto the terrace to feed him some sprats. In no time at all they were discussing his walks around the college, assuring him that a new lawnmower was on its way to improve the quality of the grass. They hoped he would approve!
The cleaning ladies of the house didn’t require my fish or my permission to visit Juan Salvado. I had made it clear to all of them that they should visit him as frequently as they pleased, but no doubt they would have done so anyway—this had been their domain long before it was mine. Just as with his other guests, conversation moved swiftly past opening pleasantries and complimentary remarks and on to the issue of the day. Inflation and the inadequacy of their pay was possibly the subject most frequently aired by the laundry ladies, closely followed by gossip about the other members of staff.
Maria became a frequent visitor, too, tottering out onto the terrace every time her duties took her past the door (and after the arrival of Juan Salvado, she made sure her duties took her there almost daily). Sitting on his parapet, resting her weary legs, she would unburden herself of all the goings-on among the domestic staff, or she’d raise other problems that vexed her, such as shirts scorched during ironing or the inevitable dalliances between her “girls” and the boys. “¡Ay ay! Juan Salvador,” she would lament. “¡Madre de Dios! What are we going to do?”
I overheard many such conversations between visitors and bird both in English and in Spanish (interestingly, he was quite fluent in both languages) as people went out to pass the time of day. Of course, the reason he enchanted everybody, adults and youngsters alike, was that, as with any good pastor or patrician, Juan Salvado was such a good listener, patiently absorbing everything that was said to him, from observations about the weather to secrets of the heart, and he never once interrupted. He looked people straight in the eye and always paid such close attention to what was said that his guests were inclined to talk to him on equal terms—they thought him a wise old bird. He even looked the part; with his “dog collar” and long black cape he resembled nothing so much as an elderly, diminutive, genial Victorian country parson who was rather troubled by gout. In fact, with a cross round his neck, he could have been a bishop!
This impression, of giving his undivided consideration to whatever was said, came from the way Juan Salvado cocked his head, alternately focusing with one eye and ear at a time. His visitors could trust his discretion absolutely, and they could rely on his unconditional support. Inability to speak was no obstacle for Juan Salvado; his eyes gave him all the lucid eloquence of a great orator. Possibly, I mused, it was the fact that his diet was fish, said to be so good for the brain, that gave his intimates confidence in the thoughtful wisdom of his answers.
“¡Ay ay! ¡Madre de Dios! What are we going to do, Juan Salvado?” began Maria’s conversation one day as I was sitting in my rooms, marking students’ work. “I don’t know, Juan Salvado, these girls are so stupid! But then, so are the parents! Fancy letting that boy bring valuable cufflinks back to the college. Anyone could have stolen them! Or the stupid boy himself has simply forgotten where he put them, and that’s most likely! Those cufflinks are worth three months’ pay for my girls. I suppose one of them might have thought she could get away with stealing them. Now we’ll have the police in! That’s never happened before, Juan Salvado!”
I peered through the blinds. It transpired that one of the boys hadn’t removed the gold cufflinks from his shirt, and when he discovered his mistake he had gone to the laundry to ask for their return. Nobody had seen them. These cufflinks were valuable not just because they were gold but because they were a treasured family heirloom. The upshot was that the boy had accused the laundry ladies of theft and the boy’s parents were insisting that the police be called in.
Fortunately, most incidents within Maria’s jurisdiction were less serious and more predictable, and in the end all the issues were resolved, of course. Damaged shirts were invisibly mended (Maria’s skills with a needle were renowned), and even the cufflinks were discovered thanks to Santa Maria’s efforts and restored to their rightful owner. And so it was that Maria ran her domain. She brooked no interference. As a tigress protects her cubs, so she ruled with a rod of iron but a heart of gold. The boys could do no wrong, a
nd neither could her girls. If her girls did transgress, then she would sort it out, and woe betide anyone else who thought to interfere. She discharged her responsibilities in the way she saw fit, and she gained admiration and respect for her decisive determination. And through it all, Juan Salvador listened carefully and was a tower of strength.
But it was the boys themselves who were Juan Salvado’s most frequent visitors. Usually they arrived in groups to discuss the unfairness of some imposition, or the tactics for the next rugby game. Occasionally, though, a boy would wander out onto the terrace alone. One dialogue in particular sticks in my mind, from the day when Julio Molina, in a pensive mood, came to consult the oracle.
“¡Hola! ¿Qué tal? Hello, Juan Salvado, how are you today? What beautiful weather we have been enjoying of late! What a magnificent view you have from here. Oh! You can see all the way to the river.” Following the preliminary pleasantries, the tone became more conspiratorial. “Actually, I’m glad to find you alone, Juan Salvado, because I could do with your advice right now, and I…well, I don’t know who else I can ask. You see, I’ve met this girl….Where? Oh, at my cousin’s house. And I, er…well, um…well, I think she’s really pretty and, well, I find myself thinking about her all the time, and I have been wondering if I should ask her out, but…Eh? What? Sorry? Oh! ¡Magnífico! You think that I should invite her out? Wow! Really? You do? Oh, that’s wonderful! Muchísimas gracias, Juan Salvado, muchísimas gracias! I will! I’ll go and do it right now.”
And off he went happily on his way, glad to have had his previous intentions endorsed by such a reliable and trusted friend.
Ever since Juan Salvado had failed to swim off and look after himself on that first day in Punta del Este, it had been my intention to present him to the zoo in Buenos Aires. There, I reasoned, he would benefit from the company of other penguins and from the expert attention of the keepers. After some weeks living with the bird, I had become greatly attached to my new friend, as had so many of my colleagues, but I knew I needed to explore further options. The three months of the summer holidays offered an unparalleled opportunity for me to travel extensively, and I wanted to make the most of them. However, I had taken on the responsibility of looking after a penguin, and I had to make suitable provisions for his well-being before I could go off on any more adventures.
It had certainly not been my intention to keep a penguin as a pet, or indeed to have any kind of pet while I was in South America. I was young, adventurous, and living abroad. I wanted to do as much exploring of that vast, wild, and romantic continent as I possibly could. The college afforded me a base from which I could operate, an income (notwithstanding the inflation rate), and more than four months’ holiday every year. Living in the college, I found that everything I needed was provided: four meals a day in the refectory and a superb four-room flat with all my cleaning and laundry thrown in. That meant it was possible to save almost every peso of my salary. With the money I saved, I purchased a motorbike, an ideal mode of transport for penniless explorers like me who had a wish to emulate Che Guevara’s mode of travel, if not his politics. However, motorbikes are definitely not compatible with explorers who have penguins as traveling companions.
It had become my custom to use the motorbike to visit various landmarks on my days off. In a boarding school, residential members of staff have duties to perform throughout the term, and to compensate for having to work on Saturdays and Sundays, we had a day off during the week. It was on one of these days, in early spring, that I finally had the opportunity to head into Buenos Aires and visit the zoo.
Following the recent coup d’état that had ousted the administration of Isabel Perón and brought General Jorge Videla’s military government to power, everything started to work properly. Trains ran on time and the economy of Argentina stabilized. Holding foreign currency was no longer a criminal offense, but inflation remained high; consequently, come payday everybody made a beeline for the banks to exchange pesos for hard currency—which really meant buying U.S. dollars.
The motorbike was hors de combat yet again—it was proving to be highly unreliable—and so on this occasion I had taken the train from Quilmes into the city and completed my own currency transaction at the bank before I finally set off for the penguin enclosure at the zoo.
The usual attractions of a zoo held no interest for me at all, and on arrival I passed the lions, elephants, alligators, and hippos with hardly a second glance, as some very uncomfortable questions about keeping wild animals in such confinement were exercising my mind. I made straight for the penguin pool. I was looking forward to seeing penguins displaying their black and white coats properly, because Juan Salvado’s tummy feathers would not get their true color back until he molted.
I was in for a shock. Seven unhappy-looking birds flopped around a shallow pool, which didn’t look deep enough to reach the tops of the keepers’ Wellington boots, while the entire enclosure was no bigger than Juan Salvado’s terrace. There was some shade, and they had all found room within it, but they were not behaving like the penguins I had seen living free near the ocean. They were lying around listlessly at some distance from each other and with their heads drooping disconsolately. It was a very warm day in the city, and in the wild these birds would naturally spend their summer months in the far south of Argentina, where it is much cooler.
I felt disappointed. I had seen great rookeries of penguins in the wild, on the coasts of Patagonia and Chile. The individual birds behaved like Juan Salvado, constantly alert, curious, and interested, except when asleep, and even then they always looked content. These birds in the zoo did not appear content; indeed, they looked thoroughly miserable.
It was just at that moment that a keeper came by, and I asked if I could quiz him about penguins. He was a cheerful type, happy to oblige.
Yes, penguins were perfectly happy on a diet of fish alone and didn’t need anything to supplement their diet.
Yes, penguins needed to swim for exercise and to maintain health, but it didn’t have to be seawater.
The bigger the pool, the more satisfactory it would be. The zoo couldn’t keep a greater number of penguins because they didn’t have enough space.
Yes, Buenos Aires was a bit too hot for penguins to live in all year round.
Yes, he was on his way to feed the penguins now.
Yes, they were fed several times a day. They would eat, on average, about 200 grams of fish a day.
I was greatly reassured by the keeper’s confirmation that the regime for looking after Juan Salvado at the college was apparently satisfactory, but if he was to stay much longer I needed somewhere for him to swim. The pool at the zoo was hardly big enough for the penguins to swim properly, but I wanted Juan Salvado to have as natural an experience as possible.
The keeper took his leave, unlocked the gate to the enclosure, and went into the small building disguised as part of the rocky landscape. He reappeared a few minutes later with a bucket of what looked like chopped-up mackerel. In a dispirited and disinterested sort of way, the penguins watched him as he approached.
I, too, watched with anticipation. Lethargically the penguins took the fish he offered, then slumped down again. Their behavior was so very different from Juan Salvado’s that I was shocked. He would rush up and down as soon as he heard anyone approaching and would greet them with a vigorous bobbing head, which brought his eyes to focus in turn on the face of his visitor and also on what that person was carrying for him. When offering fish, Juan Salvado’s patron was always very careful to hold the sprats by the tail to keep his fingers well away from the penguin’s powerful, unerring, and razor-sharp beak.
It was clear to me by now that the behavior of these penguins wasn’t what I had seen in the wild. Possibly the heat in the enclosure in the Buenos Aires zoo didn’t suit them—and it wasn’t yet the height of summer. By comparison, Juan Salvado was living on a terrace at St. George’s, at the southern edge of the city. The comparatively rural location and the breeze th
at blew constantly from the river kept the temperature there a good deal cooler than at the zoo. In fact, Juan Salvado seemed to enjoy the sunshine at the college, and could often be seen, when no visitors were present, standing stock still facing the setting sun, as though extracting the last of the warmth before bedtime.
So there it was. I had gathered the information I had come to collect, seen the conditions in the zoo, and now needed time to consider my options.
—
I left the zoo, made my way back to the center of town, and on a whim went to Harrods, the overseas branch of the London store, to have a cup of tea. I needed to think about the best course of action for Juan Salvado—and, of course, to look at things I couldn’t possibly afford.
The waitress brought my tea, and I declined the cucumber sandwiches she pressed me to take. Rather than admit I couldn’t afford them, I insisted I really wasn’t hungry. I started eating the sugar lumps as soon as she left.
I poured some tea from the pot into my cup and, stirring my unsweetened tea for the sake of the illusion, I began to consider the ramifications of my visit to the zoo. Juan Salvado gave all the appearance of being considerably more content with his lot at St. George’s than the birds I had just seen. He ate much more than his counterparts and had many more “friends.” He was always alert, active, and so pleased to see company. I had checked my facts with the keepers and had the evidence of my own eyes. Reluctantly I was coming to the conclusion that handing him over to the Buenos Aires zoo wasn’t what I wanted for him, unless no other options presented themselves.
If I kept Juan Salvado at home, at St. George’s, rather than send him to the boarding school for penguins in Buenos Aires, was I really acting in his best interests? It was all very well to decide against the zoo, but it was clear from the keeper’s advice that I would have to find somewhere for Juan Salvado to swim. A solution to that problem wasn’t immediately obvious. What would I do if he became seriously distressed as the heat of the summer drew on? What was the alternative? I had to consider the possibility of releasing him back into the wild, but that would not be so easy. Could I take him back to Punta del Este, in Uruguay? Back through customs? Really? What other options were there? The nearest sea I could take him to, in Argentina, would involve a six-hour train journey to Mar del Plata, some 250 miles to the south. I had done most of the journey once before, by mistake; I had fallen asleep after a particularly good night out in Buenos Aires. I awoke at an unfamiliar station in the small hours, luckily, and was able to catch the early train back to Quilmes.