Zamba

by Ralph Helfer

  I grabbed the clip to release the pressure from around Zamba’s neck, but the tension was too strong. Toni and I tried to lift him over the wire to release the pressure of the chain around his neck, but his weight was too much for us.

  I was frantic. We had to do something, now! But what?

  I ran around the other side and, reaching over, grabbed his mane, one leg, and the bulk of his body and pulled for all I was worth—an impossible task.

  “Come on, big fella!” I gasped.

  Toni got underneath, and we gave it all we had. The enormous body moved, slid, swayed. I felt numbing pain as something tore in my arm. I pulled. Toni pushed. The balance shifted. Zamba’s lifeless body teetered and then fell on me, knocking me flat.

  I scrambled out from underneath him and, digging my hand into his mane, found the chain that was tight around his throat, choking off his windpipe. I squeezed the clip to release the pressure, and the whole chain popped off.

  We pried Zamba’s mouth open. His tongue and gums were white. Then I tapped his eye…no response.

  “He’s dead, Toni. Zamba’s dead.” The emotion was too much for me, and I burst into tears. “My Zamba! My baby—he couldn’t! He can’t. Please, dear God!!” He had been my mentor, my guide into the world of nature, my companion.

  “We shouldn’t have left him!” Toni sobbed.

  We, like everybody else, had always tied our animals out at the ranch. There had never been a problem. This was some kind of freak accident.

  Toni wrapped her arms around Zamba and hugged him as if her heart would break. Her weight pressed air from his lungs. When I heard it, I flung my full weight on his body, and again another small volume of air burst forth.

  “Toni, honey, press together with me.”

  He was so huge that it took the full pressure of both our bodies to force the release of air from his lungs.

  “Oh, Ralph, can it really help?”

  “I don’t know—but we have to try something!”

  We were exhausted, but we wouldn’t give up. For twenty minutes we pushed and released. I kept Zamba’s mouth open, his tongue out, to free the passageway, but the only result of all our pushing was total exhaustion on our part. We lay there, Toni with her head in Zamba’s mane, whimpering softly. I had my head buried in his chest, too grief-stricken to move.

  “It’s no use,” I said.

  Then I heard it! I pressed my ear tightly to his chest and listened.

  “What’s wrong, Ralph?”

  “Sshh!” I whispered.

  Then I heard it again! A far-off, slow, nearly inaudible beat. A heartbeat!

  “Oh my God, it’s beating!”

  I heard it down there, in that mess of hair. Inside that great body, I heard it. I started to rub Zamba all over to help his circulation. Toni joined in. Our fatigue fell away as we grabbed all four of his feet, rolled him over onto his other side, and continued rubbing. A quick look in his mouth told me that his color was coming back.

  I had Toni bring blankets from the house. I wrapped them all around his body for heat while she went to call the vet.

  “He’s on the way!” she yelled, running back. We hugged and kissed Zamba and each other. I slowly reached up toward Zamba’s eye and, taking a deep breath, touched it. It blinked! Dear God! He was alive! Both Toni and I began to cry again, shedding tears of joy and of deep, heartfelt gratitude.

  When the vet arrived, he immediately administered intravenous injections and stimulants and started glucose and a saline drip. Artificial heat was applied to keep Zamba’s temperature up.

  “What happened, Ralph?” the vet asked as he worked.

  I told him what I thought had happened.

  “How long were you away?”

  “Just a matter of minutes!”

  “Has this ever happened to you before?”

  “Never, and I’ve never heard of it happening to anyone else. That’s what these cable runs are for—to allow the animals freedom to run and play.”

  “Well, it’s a miracle he’s still alive. He must have done it moments before you walked out.”

  After a couple of hours, the vet left, giving us instructions that would keep us busy for the rest of the night. We set up camp outside around Zamba, since the doctor thought it best not to move him. Sundown brought hot Santa Ana breezes, drifting in from the high desert. The stars were brilliant, the night balmy.

  Neighbors and friends had come from miles around to help in any way they could. These were people who had known Zamba since he was a baby. They came with blankets, fruit, all kinds of food. They had automatically planned on staying for the night, or even for a week, if necessary. There were a lot of tears shed that night.

  We all took turns keeping the fire going, and the men assisted me in turning Zamba every half hour to prevent the buildup of fluid in his peritoneal cavity. I checked constantly to see that the intravenous needle hadn’t slipped out of the vein.

  As the evening wore on, a circle of people formed around the fire. Some of the kids got sleepy and gently cuddled up to Zamba for warmth. We watched closely so they wouldn’t disturb him, but we thought it might be a good idea for them to have contact with him. Zamba loved kids.

  Zamba slept peacefully most of the night, but I kept waking him up to see if he was okay. I’ve never been as happy to hear anything as I was to hear him moan. What rapture to my ears! I petted him and stroked his head and kept talking to him, reassuring him of all the good things to come.

  It was only at that moment that I thought about the movie and our trip to Africa. I had just agreed to make the trip of my life with my Zamba, but at that very moment we had almost lost him. I was humbled by the experience and said a few thankful prayers that night.

  Morning found him staggering, trying to get up. A couple of the men and I supported his weight, and we were finally able to get his legs underneath him. Then, like a drunken sailor, he started to walk. He was headed for the oak tree, and we turned him just in time to keep him from hitting his head.

  For the rest of that day, he stood up periodically, walked in a tight circle for a bit, then collapsed and slept for a while. By the day’s end, we had him in the kitchen, one of his favorite spots. He loved to lie on the cold stone floor and smell the cooking. It looked as though he was out of danger and well on the way to recovery.

  Early in the morning of the third day, I got up to see how Zamba was doing. He lay sprawled in a deep sleep against the wall in the kitchen, and I crept along quietly so as not to wake him. But I knocked over a cup when I was making the coffee, and the noise woke him up.

  “Morning, Zam. Did you have a nice rest?” I asked.

  He responded by yawning and stretching, and then proceeded to come to me. But he walked right into the cabinet next to me, banging his head on the door.

  Strange, I thought. I stepped around behind him and called again.

  “Come on, boy, over here.” He turned a quarter-turn and headed toward me, but off by about forty-five degrees. Missing me by six feet, he walked right into the wall.

  “Oh no! Toni!” I yelled. “Toni!”

  She appeared in the hall. “What’s wrong?” she asked.

  “I think Zamba’s blind!!”

  The vet confirmed my fears: Zamba was totally blind. He explained that when the chain had closed off Zamba’s air passage, the optic nerves had also been squeezed. He said that this was not uncommon in this type of accident.

  “Will he ever see again?” I asked, brushing my hand over Zamba’s eyes.

  “He could—one never knows. It depends on the severity of the injury.”

  “Well, it was pretty severe, wouldn’t you say?” I asked him.

  “Yes, but that massive mane helped offset some of the damage. Only time will tell.”

  “How much time? I need to tell the studio something. I can’t let them continue to think the production will go on, when…” I couldn’t find the words.

  “How soon will you have to leave?” the vet
asked.

  “In about six weeks.”

  The vet put his hand on my shoulder, “Ralph, we’ll know something in three. Can you wait before you talk to the studio?”

  I looked at Toni, then at Zamba. Would it be fair? Here they were basing an entire film on my lion, hiring locals and setting up travel arrangements for a huge production company. But I knew Zamba. He was strong, and his whole history was one of survival. He’d survived in the wild as a cub, he’d survived the freak blizzard at the ranch; I wasn’t going to doubt his strength now.

  “Yeah, we can wait,” I said, stroking Zamba’s mane. “No problem.”

  Toni and I massaged Zamba’s throat every few hours, day after day, and administered his medicine religiously. Although he seemed to be getting stronger, we noticed no improvement in his vision. Most mornings we would lead him out into the field alongside the house, where he would “look” off into the distance. I thought, over and over during those days, how wonderful he was. What an extraordinary capacity animals have to accept their problems! No moaning, no self-pity—just acceptance and quiet dignity.

  He did need our help, though. We learned quickly that a “harrumph!” from Zamba meant that he had to visit his tree. I would put a canvas harness around his chest, similar to those used for seeing-eye dogs. Then, with Zamba pressing hard against my leg, he and I would walk outside. After a few days, I didn’t even need to use a harness. If he was touching my leg, that was sufficient for him to feel secure.

  We would take long walks up the slope. For the most part, Zamba’s gait was smooth and graceful; occasionally he would stumble, but then only for a moment. At the top, Zamba would first sit on his haunches and appear to gaze off into the distance, and then he’d lie down in the soft green of the field.

  I would comb his mane with my fingers. I must have said that I was sorry a thousand times, but each time hurt as much as the first. He was so forgiving, never questioning, and never hesitating in his love for me. To have his kind of peace of mind, to accept everything without complaint—I struggled to learn those things that came so naturally to him. He was born, like his fathers and forefathers, to turn the negatives into positives. We shared the same environment, the same world, he and I, and yet he felt a different wind blowing. The smell of the great outdoors was designed for his pleasure only. He saw everything with his great eyes, and the roar of his voice answered questions we would never have known to ask.

  Why is it that animals have attained such perfection in their existence, while man has never known anything even approaching such tranquillity? I have always believed that animals listen to one perfect voice—nature’s voice—and do as it bids them. We, on the other hand, listen only to ourselves, and we do as we please. Our ego, our pride, is our instructor, and that force is so powerful that it can make us ignore the reality presented to us by our intellects, and by common sense. It forces us to live superficially, driven by personality, not by character.

  Zamba and I spent a lot of quiet time together during those weeks on the slope. Zamba would lie with his toes touching mine, as he always did in bed. It was his way of knowing whether I was leaving—it was clear to us both that he didn’t want to be left alone. I lay on the grass opposite him, looking into those huge, unseeing eyes. I wanted so badly for him to see again, for the energy and forces of his nature to restore his sight. I thought that by connecting our powers we could, together, make that happen. I’ve always believed that the mind rules the physical body, and that if only we can penetrate to our subconscious, we can tell our bodies to heal.

  One evening I went to bring Zamba in from the field. As I went, I thought about a game we used to play. I would get down really low and make a clicking noise with my tongue. This was his signal to “act” like a lion. He would lie in wait for me, ears flat, chin on the ground, tail twitching, body tense. Then I would break into a run, and he would explode after me in an all-out race. Leaping high on those powerful hind legs, he would pounce on me, knocking me flat, licking my face like a giant, overgrown puppy. It had been good fun. I took a deep breath.

  “At least he’s still alive,” I murmured to myself.

  As I walked toward him, I noticed that his head was down, his tail was twitching, and his ears were flat. He was stalking me! I could hardly believe what I was seeing. I said a silent prayer, bent low, and made the clicking noise with my tongue. In an instant, Zamba was racing toward me full tilt. I raced away, leaping with joy. He could see again!

  He caught me in midair. We hit the ground together, rolling over and over in the soft field. I pulled his great head to me and kissed both his eyes.

  “I love you, Zam.”

  I never did make the call to the studio.

  19

  Preparing for a long journey always takes a certain amount of organization and planning, even when you’re not traveling with lions.

  First, we had learned a little bit more about our assignment. It would require three lions to depict all the big cat scenes. Zamba, of course, would play the lead. I chose to take the very best lions in my collection. Tammy, a fabulous four-hundred-pound lioness, was one of the most loving lions I’ve known. She was gorgeous, too—she had the most striking face I have ever seen, in all the lions I’ve known, in the wild or in captivity. It was as though her features were painted on by the Almighty Himself. The acting she had to perform would be difficult, but I knew she could do it.

  We would also be taking Zamba Jr. He was fifty pounds lighter than Zamba, but he could double for the star in certain shots, and he could also play another lion. He was a talented actor, skilled enough to show all the savagery a lion can muster one minute, and then turn into a mild pussycat the next. I felt confident that I was going to Africa with the best animals for the roles.

  There was a lot to be done to prepare for the trip. A month before we left, we had put the lions’ travel cages into their compound so they would get accustomed to them. I instructed my trainers to feed the lions inside the cages and to use them as sleeping quarters. By the time we were ready to go, the lions felt completely at home in them.

  The lions were ready for the trip—was I? The studio had told us to plan on being gone for at least six months, and although we didn’t know it then, we would end up being there for more than a year. I felt confident that the business would run well in my absence—the people I had put in charge knew what to do. It was harder to leave Toni, even though we had known each other only a few months. It didn’t seem realistic to ask her to wait for me—we just didn’t know each other well enough. So, with tears, we parted ways.

  The morning of the departure we fed the lions a light breakfast. They were going to be caged for about fourteen hours, and I didn’t want them to carry full stomachs when they couldn’t move around much. We were going to have to remain in England overnight, filling out documentation and loading equipment, so I had made arrangements with the London Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) to provide an area where the lions could exercise and have a proper meal.

  After they’d eaten breakfast, we loaded all three of them and headed for LAX. We were greeted there by an American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals officer, who weighed the cats: Zamba came in at 528 pounds, Junior at 480, and Tammy at 350 pounds.

  “I need the health certificate on each lion, and their tranquilizer report,” said the health official at the animal control office. I looked questioningly at him as I handed over the health papers. “You did tranquilize them for the journey, didn’t you?” he asked.

  “No, I never do. It’s too dangerous,” I said.

  The official looked at me with a disbelieving expression. “Well, we’ll have to do it here. They have to be tranquilized for travel,” he insisted. “They could panic and break out of their crates.”

  He gestured to his assistant to bring the tranquilizers.

  He was right in one respect: many zoo-raised, wild, or even highly excitable domestic animals (like racehorses) di
d need to be tranquilized for travel, lest they injure themselves or others trying to escape unfamiliar surroundings. But he needed to understand that my lions were different.

  “With all due respect, sir, lions can hallucinate under a drug and be uncontrollable—just like a person. It’s better that they know what’s going on. I’m afraid the drug could cause a reaction that would make them unmanageable, or even kill them,” I said. “These lions were brought up in a human environment, and have been subjected to all of the noises, smells, and activities that they’re likely to encounter on this trip. They understand what’s going on. The tranquilizer you use is for hyperactive, zoo-raised, or wild animals. These lions are different. They’re not seeing the world for the first time; they live in it.”

  The officer was getting upset. He didn’t like me challenging his authority.

  “Look, I don’t care what you say. A lion is a lion. Either we tranquilize them, or they don’t fly.” We spent hours trying to convince him and the other animal control people that our lions were safer without any drugs. Finally the studio had to step in and convince them to let us go, once we had signed a waiver of responsibility.

  I couldn’t ride with them in the hold on the first leg of the journey, but when we got to London I was allowed to help unload them and to take them to the RSPCA. As promised, we were given a special holding area so they could get some exercise. We opened the cage doors, and the lions filed out into their temporary home, greeting us with rubs and moans, and then casually peeing on the nearest tree. They had a good meal and full night’s sleep before we loaded them into the plane the next morning. We had no trouble with the RSPCA regarding tranquilization. After the difficulty in Los Angeles, the studio had called ahead and made arrangements.

  The studio had hired a private DC-6, a huge plane that could carry up to eighty passengers. It was enormous inside, especially because practically all of the plane’s infrastructure had been removed. All the seats had been removed except two: one for my assistant, Kellen, and one for me. The toilet remained; otherwise the whole plane was practically empty. The studio’s equipment—props, cameras, film, etc.—took up a small amount of space in the back of the plane, and we had the freedom to wander the wide open space that was left. I never figured out why they had hired such an enormous plane for three measly lions, but so be it.