+-----------------------------------------------+
| _Homo sapiens_ |
| MAN ♂ |
| This specimen, born in Scotland, was presented|
| to the Society by John Cromartie, Esq. |
| Visitors are requested not to irritate the |
| Man by personal remarks. |
+-----------------------------------------------+
When Cromartie had had breakfast there was very little to do; he made
his bed and began reading “The Golden Bough.”
Nobody came into the Ape-house until twelve o’clock, when two little
girls came in; they looked into his cage, and the younger of them said
to her sister:
“What monkey’s that? Where is it?”
“I don’t know,” said the elder girl. Then she said: “I believe the man
is there to be looked at.”
“Why he’s just like Uncle Bernard,” said the little girl.
They looked at Cromartie with an offended stare, and then went on at
once to the Orang-outang, who was an old friend. The grown-up people who
came in during the afternoon read the notice in a puzzled way, sometimes
aloud, and more than once after a hurried glance they went out of the
house. They were all embarrassed except a jaunty little man who came in
just before closing time. He laughed, and laughed again, and finally he
had to sit down on a seat, where he sat choking for three or four
minutes, after which he took off his hat to Cromartie and went out of
the house saying aloud: “Splendid! Wonderful! Bravo!”
The next day there were rather more people, but not a great crowd. One
or two men came and took photographs, but Mr. Cromartie had already
learnt a trick that was to serve him well in his new situation--that of
not looking through the bars, so that often he would not know whether
there were people watching him or not. Everything was made very
comfortable for him, and on that score he was glad enough that he had
come.
Yet he could not help asking himself what did his surroundings matter to
him? He was in love with Josephine, and now he had parted from her for
ever. Would the pain he felt on that account ever die away? And if it
did, as he supposed it would, how long would it take to do so?
In the evening he was let out, and walked round the Gardens alone. He
tried to make friends with one or two of the creatures, but they would
not take notice of him. The evening was cool and fresh, and he was glad
to be out of the stuffy Ape-house. He felt it very strange to be alone
in the Zoo at that hour, and strange to have to go back to his cage. The
next day, just after breakfast, a crowd began pushing into the house,
which was soon packed full. The crowd was noisy, some persons in it
calling out to him very persistently.
It was easy enough for Cromartie to ignore them, and never let his eyes
wander through the wire-netting, but he could not prevent himself from
knowing that they were there. By eleven o’clock his keeper had to fetch
four policemen, two standing at each door to keep the crowd back. The
people were made to stand in a queue, and to keep moving all the time.
This went on all day, and in fact there were thousands waiting to see
“The Man” who had to be turned away before they could get a sight of
him. Collins said it was worse than any bank-holiday.
[Illustration]
Cromartie did not betray any uneasiness; he ate his lunch, smoked a
cigar, and played several games of Patience, but by tea-time he was
exhausted, and would have liked to go and lie down in his bedroom, but
it seemed to him that to do so would be to confess weakness. What made
it worse, because more ridiculous, was that the Chimpanzee and the
Orang-outang next door, each came to the partition walls and spent the
whole day staring at him too. No doubt they were only imitating the
public in doing so, but they added a great deal to poor Mr. Cromartie’s
unhappiness. At last the long day was over, the crowds departed, the
Gardens were closed, and then came another surprise--for his two
neighbours did not go away. No, they clung to the wire partitions and
began to chatter and show their teeth at him. Cromartie was too tired to
stay in the cage, and went and lay down in his bedroom. When he came
back after an hour the Chimpanzee and the Orang were still there, and
greeted him with angry snarls. There was no doubt about it--they were
threatening him.
Cromartie did not understand why this should be until Collins, who had
come past, explained it to him.
“They are wild with jealousy,” he said, “that you should have drawn such
a large crowd.” And he warned Mr. Cromartie to be very careful not to go
within reach of their fingers. They would tear his hair out and kill him
if they could get at him.
At first Mr. Cromartie found this very hard to credit, but afterwards,
when he got to know the characters of his fellow captives better, it
became the most ordinary commonplace. He learnt that all the monkeys,
the elephants, and the bears felt jealous in this way. It was natural
enough that the creatures that were fed by the public should feel
resentment if they were passed over, for they are all insatiably greedy,
and the worse they digest the food given them the more anxious they are
to glut themselves with it. The wolves felt a different jealousy, for
they were constantly forming attachments to particular persons among the
crowd, and if the chosen person neglected them for a neighbour they
became jealous. Only the larger cats, lions, and panthers seemed free
from this degrading passion.
During his stay Mr. Cromartie gradually came to know all the beasts in
the Gardens pretty well, since he was allowed out every evening after
closing-time, and very often was allowed to go into other cages. Nothing
struck him more forcibly than the distinction which most of the
different creatures very soon drew between him and the keepers. When a
keeper came past every animal would pay some attention, whereas few of
them would even look round for Mr. Cromartie. He was treated by the vast
majority with indifference. As time went on he saw that they treated him
as they treated each other, and it struck him that they had somehow
learnt that he was being exhibited as they were themselves. This
impression was so forcible that Mr. Cromartie believed it without
question, though it is not easy to prove that it was so, and still more
difficult to explain how such a piece of knowledge could have spread
among so heterogeneous a collection of creatures. Yet the attitude of
the animals to each other was so marked, that Mr. Cromartie not only
observed it in them, but very soon came to feel it in himself for them.
He could not describe it better than by calling it firstly “cynical
indifference,” and then adding that it was perfectly good-natured. It
was expressed usually by total indifference, but sometimes by something
between a yawn of contempt and a grin of cynical appreciation. It was
just in these slight shades of manner that Mr. Cromartie found the
animals interesting. Naturally they had nothing to say to him, and in
such artificial surroundings their natural habits were difficult to
ascertain, only those living in families or colonies ever seeming
perfectly at their ease, but they all did seem to reveal something of
themselves in their attitude to each other. To man they showed quite
different behaviour, but in their eyes Mr. Cromartie was not a man. He
might smell like one, but they saw at once that he had come out of a
cage.
There is in this a possible explanation of the often recorded fact that
it is particularly easy for convicts to make friends with mice and rats
in prison.
For the rest of that week crowds collected round the new Ape-house every
day, and the queue for admittance was longer than that at the pit of
Drury Lane Theatre on a first night.
Thousands of people paid for admission to the Gardens and waited
patiently for hours in order to catch a glimpse of the new creature
which the Society had acquired, and none were really disappointed when
they had seen him, although many professed to be so. For everyone went
away with what people are most grateful for having--that is, a new
subject for conversation, something that everyone could discuss and have
an opinion about, viz., the propriety of exhibiting a man. Not that this
discussion was confined to those who had actually been successful in
catching a glimpse of him. On the contrary it raged in every train, in
every drawing-room, and in the columns of every newspaper in England.
Jokes on the subject were made at public dinners, and at music-halls,
and Mr. Cromartie was referred to continually in _Punch_, sometimes in a
facetious manner. Sermons were preached about him, and a Labour member
in the House of Commons said that when the working classes came into
power the rich would be put “alongside the Man in the Zoo, where they
properly belonged.”
What was the strangest thing was that everyone held the view either that
a man ought to be exhibited, or that he ought not to be exhibited, and
that after a week’s time there were not half a dozen men in England who
believed no moral principle to be involved in the matter.
Mr. Cromartie cared less than nothing for all these discussions of which
he was the subject; it was no more to him indeed what men said about him
than if he had been the ape in the cage beside his own. Indeed it was
really less, for had the ape been able to understand that thousands of
people were talking about it, the creature would have been as much
puffed up with pride as now it was mortified with jealousy that its
neighbour should draw so vast a crowd.
Mr. Cromartie told himself he cared nothing for the world of men now. As
he looked through the meshes of his cage at the excited faces watching
him, it cost him an effort to listen to what was being said of him, and
after a while his attention wandered even against his will, for he cared
nothing for mankind and cared nothing for what they said.
Yet while he told himself that with some complacency, something came
into his mind which threw him into such disorder that he looked about
him for a minute as if he were distracted, and then ran as if in terror
into his hiding-place, his place of refuge, his bedroom, which he had
not sheltered in before, at least not in that way.
“What if I should see Josephine among them?” he asked himself aloud, and
the thought of her coming was so actual to him that it seemed as if she
were at that moment entering the house, and then were there at the bars
already.
“What can I do?” he asked himself. “I can do nothing. What can I say? I
can say nothing. No, I must not speak to her, I will not look at her.
When I see her I will sit down in my armchair and look on the floor
until she is gone, that is, if I have the strength. What will become of
me if she should come? And perhaps she will come every day and will be
always there watching me through the bars, and will call out and insult
me as some do already. How could I bear that?”
Then he asked himself why should she come at all, and began to persuade
himself that there was no reason why she should visit him, and that it
was the most irrational fear that could seize hold of him--but it would
not do.
“No,” said he at length, shaking his head, “I see she is bound to come.
She is free to go where she likes, and one day when I look up I shall
see her there, staring into my cage at me. Sooner or later it is bound
to happen.” Then he asked himself what errand would send her there to
look at him? Why would she come? Would it be to mock at him and torment
him, or would it be because now that it was too late she repented of
sending him there?
“No,” he told himself, “no, Josephine will never repent, or if she
should, she would not own to it. When she does come here it will be to
hurt me more than she has done already; she will come to torture me
because it amuses her and I am at her mercy. Oh, God, she has no mercy
in her.”
At this Mr. Cromartie who was so proud only a half-hour ago, saying he
cared nothing for mankind now and nothing for what they said, began to
cry and whimper like a baby, staying hidden all the while in his little
bedroom. He sat there on the edge of his bed with his face buried in his
hands for a quarter of an hour, and the tears running through his
fingers. And all the while he was busy with this new fear of his, and
saying to himself first that his life was no longer safe, that Josephine
would bring a pistol and shoot him through the bars; and then his
thoughts fetching about, that she cared nothing for him, and would not
come to hurt him, but from mere love of notoriety and to get herself
talked about by her friends or in the newspapers. At last he pulled
himself somewhat together, washed his face and bathed his eyes, and then
went back into his cage, where you may be sure the crowd was pretty
impatient to see him after being kept waiting so long.
Once again you could see how this Mr. Cromartie “cared nothing for
mankind and what they said.” For the moment that he stepped into his
cage in full view of the public, from being an abject creature with his
face comically twisted up to keep back his tears, he became at once
quite calm and self-possessed and showed no trace of any feeling. Yet
did this assumed calm show that he cared nothing for mankind? Was it
because he cared nothing for mankind that he made these efforts,
swallowing down the lump that was risen in his throat, holding back the
tear that would have started to his eye, and strolling in with a serene
smile, then knitting his brows with an affectation of thought; and was
all this because he cared nothing for mankind?
The strange thing was that Mr. Cromartie should have taken three weeks
to think that Josephine would certainly come and pay him a visit. For
three weeks he had been thinking at every moment of the day of this girl
Josephine, and, indeed, dreaming of her almost every night, but it had
never come into his head that he would ever see her again. He had told
himself a thousand times, “We are parted for ever,” and had never asked
himself, “Why do I say this?” He had, one evening, even retraced their
steps as they had wandered from one cage to another on the day that they
had had their final rupture. But now all these sentimental ideas were a
thousand miles away from him, who, though he lay back, yawned, and
negligently cut the pages of a book from Mudie’s, was all the same
terrified at the question he kept asking himself:
“When will she come? Will she come now, to-day, or perhaps to-morrow?
Will she not come till next week, or not for a month?”
And his heart shrank within him as he understood that he would never
know when she was coming and he would never be prepared for her.
But with all this flutter Mr. Cromartie was like a countryman coming
into town a day late for the fair, for Josephine had already paid him a
visit that day two hours before he had ever thought that she might do
so.
When she had come Josephine did not know at all certainly why she found
herself there. Every day since she had heard of the “loathsome thing”
John had done she had vowed that she would never see him again, and
would never think of him again. Every day she spent in thinking of him,
and every day her anger drove her to walk in the direction of Regent’s
Park, and all her time was occupied in thinking how she could best
punish him for what he had done.
At first it had been insupportable for her. She had heard the news from
her father at breakfast while he was reading _The Times_, and had learnt
it in fragments as he chanced to read it out to her while she sat silent
with the coffee machine and the egg machine in front of her, for her
father stickled for his eggs being boiled very exactly. When breakfast
was over she found _The Times_ and read the account of the “Startling
Acquisition by the Zoo Authorities.” She told herself then that she
could never forgive or forget the insult to which she had been
subjected, and that while she sat at breakfast she had grown an old
woman.
As time went on Josephine’s fury did not slacken; no, it became
greater; and it passed through a dozen or more phases every day. Thus at
one moment she would laugh with pity for such a poor fool as John, in
the next marvel that such a creature should have the sense to know where
he belonged, then turn all her rage on the Zoological Society for
causing such an outrage to decency to occur in their grounds, and
reflect bitterly on the folly of mankind who were ready to divert
themselves at such a sorry spectacle as the degraded John--reducing
themselves indeed to his level. Again, she would exclaim at the vanity
which led him to such a course; anything would do so long as he got
himself talked about. No doubt he would see that she, Josephine, was
talked about too. Indeed, John, she declared, had done it solely to
affront her. But he had gone the wrong way to work if he thought he
would impress her. She would indeed go to see him and show him how
little she cared for him; no, what was better, she would go visit the
other ape next door to him. That was the way by which she could best
show him her indifference to him, and her superiority to the vulgar mob
of sightseers. Nothing would induce her to look at such a base creature
as John. She could not regard his action with indifference. It was a
calculated insult, but fortunately he would alone suffer for it, for as
for herself she had never cared in the least for him, and her complete
indifference was not likely to be ruffled by his latest escapade. Indeed
it meant no more to her than any other creature being exhibited.
Thus Miss Lackett drove round and round in circles, vowing vengeance at
one time and the next moment swearing that it was all one to her what he
did, she had never cared for him and never would. But do what she might
she could think of nothing else. At night she lay awake saying to
herself first one thing and then another, and changing her mind ten
times for every time she turned her head on the pillow, and thus she
spent the first three or four days and nights in misery.
Yet in all this there was something that wounded Miss Lackett more even
than the fact itself, and that was the consciousness of her own
worthlessness and vulgarity. Everything she felt, everything she said,
was vulgar. Her preoccupation with Mr. Cromartie was vulgar, and every
emotion connected with him which she now felt was degrading. In fact,
after the first few days this weighed on her so heavily that she was
almost ready to forgive him, but she could never forgive herself. All
her self-respect was gone for ever, she told herself; henceforward she
knew that she was never disinterested. She had offended herself more
than any number of Cromarties would ever do. She was, she said, deeply
disappointed in herself, and wondered how it had come about that this
side of her nature should have been so long unsuspected by her.
It was this turning off of her rage and indignation against herself that
finally allowed of her going to see him, or rather of her going to see
the Chimpanzee next him, for she repeated to herself that she would not
look at him, that she could not endure to see him, and so on, though at
moments this decision was modified by the reflection that she only hoped
he would feel properly punished when he saw her give him one glance of
cool contempt.
Miss Lackett found the event different from her expectations. In front
of the Ape-house a crowd was collected, and directly she had joined it
she found herself caught up in a queue of people waiting to see “The
Man.” On all sides she heard jokes about him, and those of the women
(who were in the majority) struck her as being barely decent. Progress
was extremely slow and very exhausting.
At last, when she found herself in the building itself, it was
impossible for her to carry out her intention of looking only at the
apes, for she suddenly became overcome at the thought of seeing them and
closed her eyes lest she should see an ape and be overcome by nausea. In
a few minutes she found herself in front of Cromartie’s cage, and gazed
at him helplessly. At that moment he was engaged in walking up and down
(which occupation, by the way, took up far more of his time than he ever
suspected). But she could not speak to him, indeed she dreaded that he
should see her.
Back and forth he walked by the wire division, with his hands behind his
back and his head bent slightly, until he reached the corner, when up
went his head and he turned on his heel. His face was expressionless.
Before she got out Miss Lackett was to have another shock, for, leaving
Mr. Cromartie’s cage, she let her eyes wander and suddenly was looking
straight into the mug of the Orang. This creature sat disconsolately on
the floor with her long red hair matted and entangled with straws. Her
close-set brown eyes were staring in front of her and nothing about her
moved but her black nostrils, that were the shape of an inverted heart
and set in a mask of black and dusty rubber. This, then, was the
creature that her lover resembled! It was to this melancholy Caliban
that everyone compared him! Such a hideous monster as this ape was
thought a suitable companion for the man with whom she had imagined
herself in love! For the man whom she had considered marrying!
Miss Lackett slipped silently out of the house, sick with disgust and
weighed down with shame. She was ashamed of everything, of her own
feelings, of her weakness in caring what happened to John. She was
ashamed of the spectators, of herself, and of the dirty world where such
men, and beasts like them, existed. Mixed with her shame was fear which
grew greater with every step she took. She was alarmed lest she would be
recognised, and looked at everyone she passed with nervous apprehension;
even after she had got out of the Gardens she did not feel safe, so that
she got herself a taxi and climbed in almost breathlessly, and even then
looked behind her through the pane of glass in the back. Nothing
followed her.
“Thank God, it is all right. There is no danger,” she said to herself,
though what the danger was of which she spoke she could not have said.
Perhaps she was afraid that she might be shut up in a cage herself.
The next day Miss Lackett had somewhat shaken off the painful
impressions caused by her visit, and her chief emotion was a sensible
relief that it had turned out no worse.
“Never again,” she said to herself, “shall I be guilty of such folly.
Never again,” she repeated, “need I run such an awful risk. Never again
shall I think of that poor fellow, for I shall never need to. Out of
justice to him I had to see him, even though at a distance, and without
his seeing me. It would have been cowardly not to have gone, it would
not have been in keeping with my character. But it would be cowardice in
me to go again. It would be weak. After all I had to indulge my
curiosity, it would have been fatal to have suppressed it. Now I know
the worst and the affair is closed for ever. If I were to go again it
would be painful to me and unjust to him, for I might be recognised; if
he heard that I had been twice it would fill him with false hopes. He
might conclude that I wished to speak with him. Nothing, nothing could
be farther from the truth. I think he is mad. I feel sure he is mad.
Talking to him would be like those interviews that people have to have
once a year with their insane relatives. But fortunately for me my duty
coincides with my inclinations--I ought not to see him and I abhor the
thought of doing so. There is no more to be said.”
It was not often that Miss Lackett was so consistent in her thoughts,
neither, we may add, was she often quite so prim. She managed to repeat
such phrases over and over again to herself throughout the week, but
somehow she did not succeed in forgetting all about Mr. Cromartie, or
even in putting him out of her thoughts for more than an hour or two at
a time.
On the fourth day after her visit it so happened that General Lackett
gave a dinner-party at which his daughter acted as hostess. Several of
the guests were young, and one or two of them not very well to do. It
was natural in these circumstances, as the General had rather
thoughtlessly dismissed his chauffeur for the evening, that his daughter
should offer to drive some of her young friends home. One of them lived
in Frognal, two others in Circus Road, St. John’s Wood. On the outward
journey Miss Lackett took the ordinary route from Eaton Square, that is,
by Park Lane, Baker Street, Lord’s, and the Finchley Road as far as
Frognal, afterwards bringing her other companions back to Circus Road.
It was then, after saying good-bye, and good-bye again as she drove
away, that she gave way to a feeling of unrest. She drove slowly to
Baker Street station, but by that time she was thinking of Mr.
Cromartie. This caused her, almost mechanically, to swing her car round
to the left, and shortly afterwards to take the Outer Circle. As she
drove, her mind was almost blank; she was driving in that direction
merely to dissipate a mood. All she was conscious of was that Cromartie
was there--in the Zoo. She was tired, and driving distracted her. In a
few moments she was passing the Gardens. She pulled up just over the
tunnel, before reaching the main entrance. At this point she was as
close as she could get to the new Ape-house, which lay, as she knew,
under the shadow of the Mappin Terraces. She got out of the car and
walked up to the palings. They were too high for her to look over, and
when she pulled herself up by her hands there was nothing to be seen but
the black shadows of evergreens and, through one break in them, a corner
of the Mappin Terraces--a silhouette of black against the moonlight. As
she looked it came into her head that it was like something familiar to
her. Her wrists ached and she jumped down.
“John, John, why are you in there?” she said aloud. In a few moments she
saw a policeman approaching her, so she got back into her car and drove
on slowly.
As she passed the main entrance she turned again, and again she saw the
Mappin Terraces.
“The Tower of Babel, of course,” she said aloud, “in Chambers’s
Encyclopedia. It’s like Noah’s Ark, too, I suppose, as it’s a menagerie,
and--Oh, curse! Oh, damn!” There were tears in her eyes, and the street
lamps had become little circular rainbows. But what she said to herself
was that it was awkward driving.
That night she could not sleep, and could find none of the ordinary
defences against unhappiness. That is to say, she was unable to affect
any kind of superiority to her troubles, besides which she saw them
exactly as they were, in their naked horror, and was not able to put
them in conventional categories. For could Miss Lackett have said to
herself: “I have been in love with John, now I find he is mad. This is a
terrible tragedy, it is very painful to think of people being mad, for
me it is a disappointment in love. Such disappointments are the most
painful to which a girl in my position can be exposed,” and so on--if
she could have done this then Miss Lackett would have found a sure way
to reduce her suffering to a minimum. For by putting forward such
general ideas as madness and disappointment in love she could very soon
have come to feel only the general emotion suited to these ideas. But as
it was she could only think of John Cromartie, his face, voice, manners,
and way of moving; of the particular cage in which she had last seen
him, the smell of apes, the swarm of people staring at him and laughing,
and of her own loneliness and misery which John had deliberately caused.
That is to say she thought only of her pain, and did not cast about to
give it a name. And naming a sorrow is a first step to forgetting it.
About three o’clock in the morning she got out of bed and went down to
the dining room, where she found a decanter of port, another of whiskey,
and some Bath Olivers. She poured herself out a glass of port and
tasted it, but its sweetness disgusted her, so she put it down and
helped herself to the whiskey. After she had got down half a wineglass
of the spirit, taking it neat as it came from the bottle, she felt much
calmer. She drank another glass of it and then went up to her room,
threw herself on her bed, and at once fell into a heavy, drunken sleep.
During these days Mr. Cromartie had by no means got rid of his
apprehensions of seeing Josephine. The thought which tormented him most
was that he was at her mercy, that is to say, that she was at liberty to
visit him whenever she liked, and to stay away as long as she chose. The
material conditions of his life did not change in any degree, though
there was no longer a vast crowd anxious to see him at all times; and
from four policemen, two were soon thought to be enough to regulate his
visitors. After another week the two were reduced to one, but though the
crowd was scantier each day this policeman was left permanently, more as
a protection for Mr. Cromartie than anything else, for certain persons
had shown themselves very disobliging to him. Indeed, Mr. Cromartie had
had to complain on two occasions, and that not only of abusive language.
But during this time very little had changed in his material
surroundings; this is not saying there was no alteration in Mr.
Cromartie’s state of mind. In that respect there were two forces at
work. One was that he was now continually thinking of Josephine and
expecting a visit from her, and, that as his circle of ideas grew
smaller in solitude, he became more and more taken up by imagining how
she would come, what she would say, and so forth. Thus he was
continually rehearsing scenes with Josephine, and this habit interfered
with his daily reading and at times even alarmed him about his sanity.
In the second place, perhaps because thinking so much of Josephine made
him withdraw into himself, he became shy, was annoyed by the spectators,
and felt something approaching a repulsion for the animals in the
menagerie.
This feeling was naturally intensified in regard to his immediate
neighbours, the female Orang and the Chimpanzee. In their case he was
indeed only making a slight return for the ill will they bore him, which
seemed to increase with every day. Mr. Cromartie was really much to
blame for an aggravation of their natural and, one may say, reasonable
dislike of him. For not only did he draw a larger crowd than fell to
their share, but he persistently ignored them, and so neglected ordinary
civilities that he would have made himself exceedingly unpopular had his
neighbours been human beings like himself. This was due to a singular
defect of imagination in him rather than to natural want of manners, for
in ordinary life he always showed himself perfectly well bred. If an
excuse can be found for his conduct it is that he believed that the
proper thing for him to do was to ignore the very existence of his
neighbours, and also that Collins, his keeper, never set him right on
this point. The fact is that Collins was never perfectly easy with Mr.
Cromartie, and that he was the kind of man to take offence himself.
Indeed, he was more jealous of the feelings of his old favourites, the
two apes, than he was quite aware of. Besides this he had lost the
Gibbon, which had been given to another keeper when Mr. Cromartie had
come, and there is no hiding the fact that Collins would have liked to
have the Gibbon back in Mr. Cromartie’s place. For one thing the ape had
given him less work, and for another, it had never been at any time in
its life his social superior. Besides that, Collins had, for we should
do him justice, a very positive affection for the animal. One evening,
after a day passed in a most desultory way, Mr. Cromartie was sitting in
his cage sucking his pipe, when suddenly he saw Miss Lackett come into
the empty house.
This was the evening of the day after her troubled night. In the morning
she had resolved to settle the question whether Cromartie were mad or
not, to make a judgment on the subject that would be impartial and
definitive, for she felt convinced that if she could not settle the
question of his sanity one way or the other, there would be no doubt of
her losing hers.
But when she had got into the Gardens she found it impossible to see Mr.
Cromartie alone. A crowd, though not as large as formerly, was still
clustered round the Ape-house the whole of the morning. Between one and
two there were always some persons before his cage whose presence
rendered it impossible for her to speak with him. She saw then that the
only thing was for her to wait till last thing at night and to hurry in
just at closing time. All this delay upset the arrangements of her day.
The knowledge that she had promised to call for her old schoolfellow,
Lady Rebecca Joel, and to go on and take tea at Admiral Goshawk’s, and
to go out afterwards with them, worried her excessively. At the last
minute she sent messages pleading headache and indisposition, and then
found nothing to do until closing time at the Zoo. To stay in the
Gardens for so long was intolerable. To add to her discomfort the sky
clouded over and a sharp storm came on, the air soon being filled with
sleet, snowflakes and hailstones. She ran out of the Gardens, getting
wet as she did so, and it was some moments before she could find a taxi.
When once inside there was the absolute necessity of telling the man
where to take her.
“Baker Street,” said she. For Baker Street is a central point from which
she could easily go wherever she wished. This was the reason, it will be
remembered, that made the great detective Holmes choose to have his
rooms in Baker Street, and to-day it is still more central. All
Metro-Land is at one’s feet.
But the time taken between the Zoo and Baker Street Tube station is
short, and Miss Lackett arrived with no clearer idea of where to go or
what to do than she had when she first ran out of the Gardens. To be
sure the rain had stopped for the time being, and she walked briskly
along the Marylebone Road. For she belonged to the order of society
which cannot loiter in the street. She marched away without any purpose,
wondering what she would do with herself, when on came the storm again
with a sudden gush of rain. Josephine looked about her and found a
refuge offered by the gates of a large red-brick building, which she
entered. It was Madame Tussaud’s.
She had never as a child visited the celebrated collection of wax-work
effigies, and she was at once interested in what she saw there. Some
internal voice bade her make the most of this casual opportunity, to
throw aside her temporary unhappiness, and enjoy herself.
She fell into a peaceful state of mind, and for several hours in
succession gave herself up to the pleasure of gazing at the formal
figures of the most celebrated persons of this and former ages. For the
most part they were the great Victorians and dated from last century.
There were but few other visitors, but the great saloons are always
crowded, and everywhere that she looked she found familiar faces.
Josephine had been presented at Court, but had not been impressed by the
experience. Madame Tussaud’s seemed to her like a more august
presentation at an Eternal Levee.
At one end of the room there were indeed the royal families of Europe in
their coronation robes. There was an air of formality, a stiffness, and
a constraint in all present which seemed to her natural in guests
waiting for their host to come in. And perhaps in another moment a
curtain would be brushed aside, and the Host of Hosts would appear.
Josephine did not wait any longer, but ran downstairs to the Chamber of
Horrors.
Before it seemed possible it was time to go back to the Gardens, if she
were to see Cromartie before closing time. She walked quickly into the
house, and found Cromartie sitting near the front of his cage as if he
were expecting to see her. As she came up to the cage he put down the
pipe he had been holding in his mouth and stood up, seeming then to
overshadow her, the floor of his cage being higher than the corridor in
which she stood.
“Please sit down,” she said, and then was silent, finding nothing of all
the things she had come to tell him ready to her tongue.
He obeyed her.
They looked then at each other for some little while in silence. At last
Josephine summoned up her resolution and said to him, speaking in a low
voice:
“I think that you are mad.”
Cromartie nodded his head; he had huddled himself up in his chair and
apparently was unable to speak.
Josephine waited and said: “I was very worried about you, because I
thought at first that something I had said to you might have made you
behave in this idiotic way, but it is now quite clear to me that even if
what I said did have any influence, you are quite mad, and that I need
not think about you any more.”
Cromartie nodded his head again. She noticed with some surprise that he
was weeping, and that his face was wet with tears which were falling on
to the floor of his cage. The sight of his tears and his determined
silence made her harden her heart. She felt suddenly angry.
The bell began ringing for closing time, and she heard someone, probably
the policeman, with his hand on the door talking to another man outside.
Josephine turned away, but a moment afterwards came back to the cage.
Cromartie was walking away from her blowing his nose.
“You must be mad,” she called after him; then the door opened and the
policeman came in.
“Hurry up, Miss, or you’ll have to stay here all night, and you know
that would never do,” she heard him say as she hurried away.
Though Josephine’s visit had been painful, it did not succeed in
distressing Cromartie for very long. Indeed, after a short time he
recovered himself completely, and reasoning upon what she had said, and
the reasons of her coming at all, he found much with which to comfort
himself. In the first place, all the secret doubts he had had in the
last week of his own sanity were now dissipated. He was not going to
believe that he was mad, he said to himself, simply because Josephine
Lackett told him so. Besides which, he felt sure that she only affirmed
that he was mad because it suited her to believe it. If he were actually
insane it would relieve her of any necessity of thinking of him, and
that she had felt any such necessity to exist was in itself extremely
gratifying. Furthermore, he felt certain that if Josephine had really
been convinced of his insanity she would not have paid him a visit in
order to tell him of it. Even Josephine would not find any satisfaction
in such useless inhumanity. If she felt bound to take any steps in the
matter she would have gone to the officers of the Society and insisted
that he should be examined by a mental doctor, and if necessary
certified as a lunatic. And with these very satisfactory reasons Mr.
Cromartie assured himself that he was not really mad, or even in any
danger of becoming so, though he did not doubt that Josephine would
readily persuade herself to the contrary.
Happiness and misery are purely relative, and Mr. Cromartie was now
raised into a state of the highest spirits by considerations which would
not ordinarily produce such a result. But after the condition of
complete despair in which he had been plunged for several weeks, he
could hardly imagine any greater bliss than knowing that Josephine was
having to persuade herself that he was mad in order to be able to
dismiss him from her thoughts.
But it must not be concluded from this that Mr. Cromartie indulged in
any sort of hope. He did not even consider the possibility of escaping
from the Zoo or of winning Josephine’s love, because he had never had
any ambition to do either. Such thoughts would have seemed to him not
only ridiculous but also dishonourable. He had taken his course with his
eyes open, and the question whether he should abide by it or not was not
even open to consideration. In this respect the Zoological Society were
indeed fortunate in their selection of a man. For though there is little
doubt that Mr. Cromartie would have been given his liberty whenever he
asked for it, without his having recourse to extreme measures such as
refusing food or imploring the aid of visitors in rescuing him, yet
letting him go would have been a cause of vexation to the Society. It is
not to be supposed that there would have been any difficulty in
replacing him by another specimen of his species. No, the reason why
they would have felt his loss such a severe blow is because the public
readily attaches itself to the individual animals in the Zoo, and is not
to be consoled when such a favourite dies, or disappears, even if it is
instantly replaced by an even finer specimen of the same species. Many
persons habitually resort to the Gardens in order to visit their
particular friends, Sam, Sadie and Rollo, and not merely to look at any
polar bear, orang, or king penguin. And this applies quite as forcibly
to the Fellows of the Society as to the outside public. It was natural,
therefore, that they should entertain hopes that the new acquisition to
the Gardens should remain in it for the rest of his natural life, and
though he could not vie with the other creatures in general popularity
when once the vulgar curiosity about him had worn off, yet it was to be
hoped that in time he would develop as much personality as if he were a
bear or an ape.
While Sir James Agate-Agar was being shown over the house by the
curator, he referred to Cromartie as “your local Diogenes.” The name was
immediately on the lips of everyone who moved in Zoological circles.
There was opportunity here for Mr. Cromartie had he been disposed to
take it. When once the vulgar publicity which had attended his
installation had passed, there were many persons in the upper ranks of
London society who were anxious to make Mr. Cromartie’s acquaintance,
and had he known enough to take up the part marked out for him, there is
no doubt but that he could have had as much society as he cared for, and
that of persons of the very front rank, all of whom were animated by the
most genuine interest in him and friendliness towards him, though
naturally not without the expectation that they would in exchange be
entertained by his remarks, for such a man as the Diogenes of the Zoo
must surely be a great oddity.
But though Mr. Cromartie had every intention of remaining for the rest
of his life in the cage provided for him, he had no idea of the social
opportunities which doing so would afford him, and he appreciated them
so little that he most steadily repulsed all overtures of the kind, and
betrayed an obvious reluctance to enter into conversation with anyone,
even the curator himself. At the time in question, however, this was set
down to a not unnatural self-consciousness in the new situation in which
he found himself, and also to the disturbing effect of being exhibited
daily to a large crowd, among whom there were persons whose offensive
behaviour excited the greatest indignation.
It was several days after this first interview before he was to see Miss
Lackett again. During this period he had much to think of, but his
spirits remained high; for the first time for ten days he took a walk
round the Gardens from pleasure, and not from a feeling that he must
have some fresh air if he were to keep well. For several evenings he sat
motionless for half an hour or more near the beavers’ and the otters’
pools, and was frequently rewarded by a glimpse of the former, though
only on one occasion by the latter. Whatever creatures in the Gardens
had most retained their native wildness were sure to attract him. They
seemed to him, in his rather warped state of mind, to have preserved
their self-respect. It was to accomplish this in his own particular case
which was his chief concern, though of course he was perfectly well
aware that it did not consist in behaving with any shyness. On the
contrary, Mr. Cromartie’s self-respect depended upon his maintaining an
appearance of unruffled calm, together with the utmost civility in all
his relations with those with whom he had any business.
One evening as he was watching for the foxes, the keeper of the small
cats’ house came up to him and entered into conversation. After a few
trivial remarks which served their ordinary purpose--that is they let
Mr. Cromartie know that the keeper was a pleasant fellow and
well-disposed to him--he said:
“I think it would be a good plan if you were to make a pet of one of the
animals, that is, if you would like to. It seems a waste for you to be
here and not make one of the out-of-way kind of pets.”
Mr. Cromartie had been thinking that day that perhaps the greatest
disadvantage under which he lay in his situation, was that he could not
have any familiar friend. His former life had been utterly renounced and
was now closed to him, so that it was no use his looking backwards for
one. At the same time he was so utterly cut off from the ordinary run of
humanity that he would not care to risk having any intercourse with his
fellows lest he should be exposed to pity, or to an offensive curiosity.
The suggestion of this keeper could not have come at a better time, for
he saw that though he might not care for a _pet_ he might make a
_friend_. In any case, he reflected, equality of circumstances is an
excellent basis for any acquaintanceship, and he could nowhere share the
circumstances of an animal’s life so well as he could here in the Zoo.
Had he gone into a tropical jungle it would have been no closer, for
there, though the animals would have been at home, he would not.
He followed the keeper into the small cat house, and talked with him for
a little while longer.
It so happened that one of the beasts directly under the care of this
man had attracted Mr. Cromartie when he went into the house before. For
in the Caracal he saw an unhappiness to match his own, combined with
beauty. The Caracal, poor creature, never stopped moving, holding its
face to the bars of its little cage. It moved back and forth with
tireless rapidity, and a monotony which seemed inspired by unutterable
sorrow.
At his request the keeper now took out the Caracal for him to speak to
it.
For several days after this Mr. Cromartie never failed to pay the
Caracal a visit every evening, and while making very few overtures to
it, he showed the creature that he was more disposed to be friendly than
most of its fellow captives. This persistence was not thrown away, for
after five or six days the Caracal would stop his sad motions before his
bars when Cromartie came in, and would look after him with evident
regret when the time came for him to go away.
The keeper, on his side, was mightily pleased at his Caracal’s getting
such a companion, and perhaps the more so as it was not his own
favourite; in particular the man gave himself all the credit for
advising Mr. Cromartie to make a pet of some beast or other. It was not
long before he spread the news of it, telling the curator and others of
the staff who might be interested.
The upshot of all this was that one evening as Cromartie was sitting
reading, locked in for the night, suddenly he heard the door unlocked
and beheld the curator come to pay him a visit.
“Oh, I just stepped in, Mr. Cromartie,” said the curator in the most
friendly way, “for a word or two. The keeper of the small cats’ house
tells me that you have made quite a pet of the Caracal.”
At these words Cromartie turned a little pale, and said to himself: “The
fat is in the fire now. He is going to forbid us continuing our
friendship; I ought to have expected it.”
The next words the curator said quite undeceived him, for he went on:
“Now how would you like, Mr. Cromartie, to have that fellow in your--in
with you here, I mean? You need not have him unless you like, of course,
and you need not keep him a day longer than you want to. I am not trying
to save space, I assure you.”
Mr. Cromartie accepted the suggestion thankfully, and it was agreed that
the Caracal should come and pay him a trial visit for a few days.
The next evening he went as usual to the small cat house, but this time
when the Caracal was let out he invited him to come back with him, and
with very little demur the creature followed him and then walked with
him by his side, and then, his confidence increasing, the cat ran before
him a few yards, stopping every now and then as if to ask him:
“Which way shall we go now, comrade?”
[Illustration]
Then as Cromartie came up with him he shook the tassels of his tufted
ears and again ran on before. You may be sure that the poor Caracal did
not suffer from nostalgia for his little cage. No, indeed, he ran into
his friend’s more commodious quarters as if he would be content to stay
in them for ever, and after he had trotted all round them four or five
times and leapt up on to the table and down off each of the chairs, he
settled down as if he were at home, and perhaps indeed he was so for the
first time since he was come to the Gardens.
This pretty kind of cat, for such he found the Caracal to be (not but
what it had some virtues for which cats are not usually famous), proved
a very great solace to him in his captivity. For the creature had a
thousand playful tricks and pretty ways which were a delight to him. For
so long he had not been able to see anything all day except his
neighbours the sordid apes, and the staring faces of a crowd which
seemed to share all the qualities of those apes (and with less excuse
for being there), that it was a rare kind of happiness for him to have a
graceful and charming creature beside him. Moreover it was his
companion, the friend of his choice, and the sharer of his misfortunes.
They were equals in everything, and there was in their love none of that
fawning servility on the one side and domineering ownership on the other
that makes nearly all the dealings of men and animals so degrading to
each of the parties. Though it may seem fanciful, there was actually a
strong resemblance in the characters of these two friends.
Both were in their nature gay and sportive, with pleasant manners which
admirably concealed the untamed wildness of their tawny hearts. But the
resemblance lay chiefly in their excessive and stubborn pride. In both
of them pride was the mainspring of all their actions, though
necessarily the quality must show itself very differently in a man and
in a rare and precious kind of a cat. In imprisonment, though in one
case it was voluntarily made, and in the other case forced, neither
would fawn or make utter and complete submission.
For though Mr. Cromartie always showed a complete resignation and
exemplary obedience, yet it was only a feigned submission after all.
The visit of his new friend was to the liking of both parties, and in
general they found none of the difficulties that sometimes attend
living at close quarters. It is true that the Caracal was no sleeper at
night, but spent all the early part of it prowling hither and thither;
still it was on very silent and padded feet, and by morning he would be
tired of roaming, so that on waking up Mr. Cromartie never failed to
find his friend curled up on the bed beside him.
In all their relations the man never attempted to exercise any authority
over the beast; if the Caracal wandered away he did not call him back,
nor did he try to tempt him with any tit-bits from his table, nor by
rewards of any sort train him to new tricks. Indeed, to look at them
both together it would seem as if they were unaware of each other’s
presence, or that nothing but a total indifference existed between them.
Only if the Caracal trespassed too far on his patience, either by eating
his food before he had finished, or by playing with his pen if he were
writing, would he swear at him or give him a little cuff to show his
displeasure. Once or twice on such occasions the Caracal bared his teeth
at him and stretched out his sharp and wicked claws, but yet he always
thought again before using them on his big, slowly moving friend. Once
or twice, of course, as might have been expected, Mr. Cromartie got
scratched, but this was done in play or was merely accidental; indeed,
it almost always was when the Caracal, leaping up from the ground upon
his shoulder, held on lest he should over-balance. Only once was this at
all serious, and then because the Caracal, trying a higher jump than
usual, landed on his head and the nape of his neck. Mr. Cromartie cried
out in surprise and pain, and the Caracal drew in his claws instantly,
and by purring and many affectionate rubbings of his body against his
friend, sought to make amends for his misdeed. Mr. Cromartie was
bleeding from ten dagger wounds on his scalp, but after the first moment
he spoke gently to the cat and forgave him fully. All this was, however,
nothing when weighed against the happiness he had in having a companion
to be with him in his captivity, and a companion who was so much the
happier for having him.
At Cromartie’s request the Caracal was now installed permanently with
him, and another board was attached to the front of the cage, beside his
own. It bore the inscription:
+-----------------------------------------+
| CARACAL |
| |
| _Felis Caracal._ ♂ Iraq. |
| |
| Presented by Squadron N, R.A.F., Basra. |
+-----------------------------------------+
There were no pictures attached of either Man or Caracal, as it was
taken for granted that visitors would be able to distinguish them. The
public showed a great appreciation of the Man’s sharing his cage with an
animal, and Mr. Cromartie suddenly became, what he had not been before,
extremely popular. The tide turned, and everybody found charming the
person who had so scandalised them. Instead of ill-natured remarks, or
even insults, Mr. Cromartie’s ears were assailed with cries of delight.
This change was certainly one for the better, though Mr. Cromartie
reflected that in time it might become as tedious as ill-natured remarks
had been formerly. His defence was the same against each, that is, he
shut his ears, never looked through the netting if he could help it, and
read his books as if he were indeed a scholar working in his own study.
He was sitting in this way reading “Wilhelm Meister,” with his companion
the Caracal at his feet, when he suddenly heard his name called and
looked up.
There was Josephine, standing before him, looking in at him, her face
pale, her mouth rigid, and her eyes staring.
Up jumped Mr. Cromartie, but as he was surprised his self-control was
gone for an instant.
“My God! What have you come for?” he asked her in agitated tones.
Josephine was taken aback for a moment by this greeting, and as he
strode to the front of his cage, stepped back away from him. For the
moment she was confused. Then she said:
“I have come to ask you about a book. The second volume of ‘Les Liaisons
Dangereuses.’ Aunt Eily is fussing about it. She says the plates make it
a very valuable edition. She suspects me of reading it too, and thinks
it unsuitable....”
As she spoke Cromartie began laughing, screwing up his eyes and showing
his teeth.
“So my forgetfulness has got you into a scrape, has it?” he asked. Then:
“I’m most awfully sorry. I’ve actually got it here. I’ll post it to you
to-night. I can’t slip it through the wire netting, unfortunately.
That’s one of the drawbacks of living in a cage.”
Josephine had not seen Cromartie looking so charming for a long time.
Her own expression changed also, but she still remained shy and awkward,
and was obviously afraid of someone coming into the Ape-house and
finding them together, talking.
For a moment or two they were silent. She looked at the Caracal and
said:
“I read in the paper about your having a companion. I expect it is a
very good plan. You are looking better. I’ve been having bronchitis, and
have been laid up for a fortnight since you saw me last.”
But as Josephine spoke Cromartie’s face clouded over again. He noticed
her awkwardness and was annoyed by it. He remembered also her last
visit, and how she had behaved then. Recollecting all this he frowned,
drew himself up, rubbed his nose rather crossly, and said:
“You must realise, Josephine, that seeing you is excessively painful to
me. In fact I am not sure I can endure being exposed to the danger of it
any longer. Last time you came to see me for the purpose of informing
me that you think I am mad. I don’t think you are right, but if I cannot
guard myself from seeing you I daresay I shall go mad. I must therefore
ask you in the interests of my own health, if for nothing else, never to
come near me again. If you have anything to say of an urgent nature--if
there should be another book of yours, or any reason of that sort, you
can always write to me. Nothing you can say or do can be anything but
extremely painful and exhausting, even if you felt kindly disposed
towards me; but from your behaviour I can only conclude you want to give
me pain and come here to amuse yourself by hurting me. I warn you I am
not going to submit to being tortured.”
“I’ve never heard such nonsense, John. I hoped you were better, but now
I am sure you really are mad,” said Josephine. “I’ve never been spoken
to in such a way. And you imagine that I of all people want to see you!”
“Well, I forbid your coming to see me in the future,” said Mr.
Cromartie.
“Forbid! You forbid!” cried Josephine, who was now furious with him.
“You forbid me to come! Don’t you realise that you are being exhibited?
I, or anyone else who pays a shilling, can come and stare at you all
day. Your feelings need not worry us; you should have thought of that
before. You wanted to make an exhibition of yourself, now you must take
the consequences. Forbid me to come and look at you! Good heavens! The
impertinence of the animal! You are one of the apes now, didn’t you know
that? You put yourself on a level with a monkey and you are a monkey,
and I for one am going to treat you like a monkey.”
This was said in a cold, sneering sort of way that was altogether too
much for Mr. Cromartie. The blood flew to his head, and with a face
distorted with almost insane rage he shook his fist at her through the
bars. When at last he was able to speak it was only to tell her in an
unnatural voice:
“I shall kill you for that. Confound these bars!”
“They have some advantages,” said Josephine coolly. She was frightened,
but as she spoke Mr. Cromartie lay down on the floor of his cage and she
saw him stuff his handkerchief into his mouth and bite it; there were
tears in his eyes, and sometimes he fetched a deep groan as if he were
near his end.
All this frightened Josephine more even than his threatening that he
would murder her. And seeing him rolling there as if he were in a fit
made her repent of what she had said to him, and then she came right up
to the netting of his cage and began to beg him to forgive her, and to
forget what she had said.
“I did not mean one word of it, dearest John,” said she in a new and
altered voice, which scarce reached to him, it was so soft. “How can you
think I want to hurt you when I come to this wretched prison of yours to
see you because I love you, and cannot forget you in spite of all that
you have done only on purpose to hurt me?”
“Oh, go away, go away, if you have any pity left in you,” said John. His
own voice was now come back to him, but he sobbed once or twice between
his words.
Meanwhile the Caracal, who had watched all this scene and listened to it
with a great deal of wonder, now came up to him and began to comfort him
in his distress, first sniffing at his face and hands and then licking
them.
And before anything more could be said between Josephine and John, the
door opened and a whole party of people were come in to see the apes. At
that Josephine went out of the house and out of the Gardens, and getting
into a cab went straight home, all as if she were in a nightmare. As for
Mr. Cromartie, he struggled quickly on to his feet and hurried out of
his cage into his hiding-place to wash his face, comb his hair, and
compose himself a little before facing the public; but when he went back
the party were gone away and there was only his Caracal staring at him
and asking him as plain as words:
“What is the matter, my dear friend? Are you all right now? Is it over?
I am sorry for you, although I am a Caracal and you are a man. Indeed, I
do love you very tenderly.”
There was only the Caracal when he went back into his cage, only the
Caracal and “Wilhelm Meister” lying on the floor.
That night Miss Lackett suffered every torment which love can give, for
her pride seemed to have deserted her now when she most wanted it to
support her, and without it her pity for poor Mr. Cromartie and her
shame at her own words were free to reduce and humble her utterly.
“How can I ever speak to him again?” she asked herself. “How can I ever
hope to be forgiven when I have gone twice to him in his miserable
captivity, and each time I have insulted him and said the things which
it would hurt him most to hear?”
“From the very beginning,” she told herself, “it has all been my fault.
It is I who made him go into the Zoo. I called him mad, and mocked at
him and made him suffer, when everything has been due to my ungovernable
temper, my pride and my heartlessness. But all the time I have suffered,
and now it is too late to do anything. He will never forgive me now. He
will never bear to see me again and I must suffer always. If I had
behaved differently perhaps I could have saved him and myself too. Now I
have killed his love for me, and because of my folly he must suffer
imprisonment and loneliness for ever, and I myself shall live miserably
and never again dare hold up my head.”
Providence has not framed mankind for emotions such as these; they may
be felt acutely, but in a healthy and high-spirited girl they are not of
a very lasting nature.
It was only natural, then, that after giving up the greater part of the
night to the bitterest self-reproach and to the completest humiliation
of spirit, and after shedding enough tears to make her pillow
uncomfortably damp, Miss Lackett should wake next morning in a very
hopeful state of mind. She determined to visit Mr. Cromartie that
afternoon, and despatched a note acquainting him with her intention in
these terms:
Eaton Square.