Three Singles to Adventure

CHAPTER SIX Capybara and Cayman

Our fortnight in the Rupununi passed so quickly that we were surprised one night when we discovered, swinging in our hammocks and calculating on our fingers, that we had only four days left.

Owing to the efforts of McTurk and the local Amerindians our collection had increased considerably. A few days after catching the anteater, Francis arrived on horseback, carrying a sack that squeaked and twitched as though it was full of guinea-pigs, but I soon found this noise came from three young and very alarmed capybara. I have mentioned these creatures before, in describing the ferocity of piranhas, but their chief claim to fame is that they are the largest of living rodents. This means nothing unless you compare them with one of their smaller relations, and then you get some idea of their size. A full-grown capybara measures about four feet in length, stands two feet high, and can weigh nearly a hundredweight. Compare this bulk with, say, the English harvest mouse, which measures four and a half inches including the tail and weighs about one-sixth of an ounce.

This enormous rodent is a fat, elongated beast clad in harsh, shaggy fur of a brindled brown colour. Since its front legs are longer than its back ones, and it has an ample rump with no tall, the capybara always looks as though it is on the point of sitting down. It has large feet, with broad, webbed toes, and on the front ones the nails are short and blunt, looking curiously like miniature hooves.

Its face is very aristocratic: a broad, flat head and the blunt, almost square, muzzle giving it a benign and superior expression like a meditative lion. On land the capybara moves with a peculiar shuffling gait or a ponderous, rolling gallop; but once in the water it swims and dives with astonishing ease and skill. A slow, amiable vegetarian, it lacks the personality displayed by some of its relatives but makes up for it by a placid and friendly disposition.

The three youngsters that Francis had brought were, however, anything but friendly; they kicked and squeaked and regarded us with bulging eyes, as though we were a troop of jaguars.

They were only about two feet long and a foot high, but they were compact and muscular, and when they bucked and kicked they were quite a handful. I noticed that they never attempted to bite, although they were armed with large bright orange incisors, as sharp and about as large as a penknife blade. They could have inflicted very nasty wounds with these teeth if they had wanted to. After a considerable struggle we got them out of the sack, and then we stood around foolishly, our arms full of squeaking capybara, wondering what to do with them, for we had forgotten that we had no cage in which to put them. We solved this problem, after much debate, by making them tiny harnesses out of string, the same type of thing we had made for the anteater. Then we tied them up on long cords to three orange trees and stood back to admire our handiwork. The capybara, finding themselves free but still close to us, rushed towards one another for protection and got their cords entangled round themselves and the trees. A quarter of an hour later we had disentangled them from one another, from the trees and from our own legs and retted them to trees further apart. This time they ran round and round the trees, squeaking hideously, until the trunks were covered with string and the beasts nearly strangling. At last we solved the problem by tying the ends of their strings to branches high above them; this gave them a considerable area to run about in but prevented them from getting tied up and strangling.

"I bet that won't be the last bit of trouble we have with them," I said gloomily as we finished.

"Why?" asked Bob, "I thought you didn't seem very pleased to see them. Don't you like them?"

"I had a rather trying introduction to capybara in Georgetown ," I explained, "and it has put me off the family."

It had happened when Smith and I were staying in a boarding house in the back streets of Georgetown while we were looking round for a place in which to establish a base camp.

Our landlady had very kindly told us that we might use her front garden in which to keep any specimens we got in the meanwhile, and we took her at her word. I don't think the poor woman quite realized what her invitation would entail, but as her tiny garden began to get overcrowded with monkeys and other creatures, and we still had not found a base camp, she began to look a little worried. Even we were beginning to feel that the garden was getting a bit congested, for the other guests had to pick their way into the house with great care if they did not want to have their legs seized by an inquisitive monkey. With the arrival of the capybara things came to a head.

A man led the huge rodent in on a string late one evening.

It was half grown, very tame, and it sat there with an aloof and regal expression on its face while we bargained with its owner. The bargaining was protracted, for the owner had noticed the acquisitive gleam in our eyes when we first beheld the beast, but at last the capybara was ours. He was housed in a large, coffin-shaped crate with a wire mesh front that seemed strong enough to withstand any onslaughts he might make upon it. We showered him with choice fruits and grasses, which he accepted with royal condescension, and congratulated ourselves on having acquired such a lovely animal. We gazed at him spellbound while he ate, tenderly pressed a few more mangoes through the bars and went upstairs to sleep. We lay in the dark for a while, talking about our wonderful new specimen, and then eventually dozed off. At about midnight it began.

I was awakened by a most curious noise coming from the garden beneath our window; it sounded like someone playing on a Jew's harp accompanied rather erratically by someone else beating on a tin can. I was lying there listening to it, and wondering what it could be, when I suddenly remembered the capybara. With a cry of 'the capybara's escaping!' I leapt out of bed and fled downstairs to the garden, barefoot and in my pyjamas, closely followed by my drowsy companion. When we reached the garden all was quiet; the capybara was sitting on its haunches, looking down its nose in a superior manner. We had a long argument as to whether or not it was the capybara that had been making the noise; I said it was and Smith said it was not. He insisted that the creature looked too calm and innocent, and I maintained that that was exactly why I thought it was the culprit. The capybara just sat in its moonlit cage and stared through us. There was no repetition of the sound, so we went back to bed, arguing in fierce whispers. No sooner had we settled down than the noise started again, and, if possible, it sounded louder than ever. I got out of bed and peered out of the window. The capybara cage was vibrating gently in the moonlight.

"It is that blasted animal," I said triumphantly.

"What's he doing?" inquired Smith.

"God knows, but we'd better go and stop him or he'll have the whole place awake."

We crept downstairs and from the shelter of a convenient cluster of bushes we surveyed the cage. The capybara was sitting by the wire looking very noble. He would lean forward and place his enormous curved teeth round a strand of wire, pull hard and then release it so that the whole cage front vibrated like a harp. He listened until the noise had died away, and then he raised his large bottom and thumped his hind feet on the tin tray, making a noise like stage thunder. I suppose he was applauding.

"Do you think he's trying to escape?" asked Smith.

"No, he's just doing it because he likes it."

The capybara played another little tune.

"Let's stop him, or he'll wake everyone."

"What can we do?"

"Remove the tin tray," said Smith practically.

"He'll still get that harpsichord effect with the wire."

"Let's cover the front of the cage up," said Smith.

So we removed the tray and covered the front of the cage with sacks, in case it was the moonlight that was making the animal feel musical. He waited until we were in bed before he started twanging again.

"What can we do?" said Smith, distraught.

"Let's go to sleep and pretend we can't hear him," I suggested.

We lay down. The twanging continued. Somewhere a door slammed, feet pattered along the passage and there was a knock at our door.

"Yes?" I inquired.

"Meester Durrell," came a voice from outside, "I think some animal of yours it is escaping. It is making a large row in the garden.

"Is it really?" I asked in surprised tones, raising my voice above the twanging.

"Thanks so much for telling us. We must go and see."

"Yes. It is making row, you know."

"Yes, I can hear it. So sorry you've been troubled," I said sweetly.

The steps pattered off down the passage, and Smith and I looked at one another. I got out of bed and went to the window.

"Shut up," I hissed.

The capybara continued his solo.

"I've got it," said Smith suddenly, "let's take him down to the Museum; the night-watchman can look after him until tomorrow."

This seemed to be the most sensible thing to do, so we got dressed. As we did so two other members of the household came to tell us that one of our animals was escaping. We were obviously not going to be the only ones who would be glad to see the back of the capybara. We went down into the garden, covered the cage with more sacks and then staggered off down the road with it. The capybara was annoyed at being disturbed and showed it by running backwards and forwards along the cage, making it tilt up and down like a see-saw.

It was only half a mile to the Museum grounds, but we had to rest three times on the way, and while we rested the capybara played soothing tunes to us. We had rounded the last corner, and the Museum gates were in sight when we bumped into the policeman.

We all stopped and looked at each other with suspicion. To the policeman it must have looked as though these two dishevelled gentlemen were carrying a coffin through the streets at a time of night when they should have been in bed. He noted that bits of our pyjamas were sticking out from under our clothes, he noted our hunted expressions, and, above all, he noted the coffin we were carrying. Just as he was noticing this the capybara gave a strangled grunt, and the policeman's eyes widened: apparently these ghouls were on their way to bury some unfortunate alive. He had obviously arrived just in the nick of time. He cleared his throat.

"Good night," he said uncertainly, "can I help you?"

At that moment I discovered how difficult it is to explain satisfactorily to a policeman why you are carrying a capybara through the streets at one o'clock in the morning in what appears to be a coffin. I looked blankly at Smith, and he looked back equally blankly. Summoning up all my courage I smiled winningly at the arm of the law.

"Good night, constable. We're just taking a capybara to the Museum," I said, realizing as I did so how very peculiar it sounded. The policeman shared my opinion.

"Taking a what, sir?"

"A capybara."

"What is a capybara?" asked the policeman.

"A sort of rodent," said Smith, who always took it for granted that everyone had some sort of zoological knowledge.

"A kind of animal," I explained hastily.

"Ah," said the policeman with well-simulated interest, "an animal? May I see it, sir?"

We put the cage down and unwound yards of sacking. The policeman shone his torch inside.

"Ah!" he cried, meaning it this time, "a water haas"

"Yes," I said thankfully, "we're taking it to the Museum. It's making too much noise outside our hotel, and we can't sleep."

When it was all explained, and the capybara had twanged musically to add force to our story, the policeman was charming, even helping us carry the cage the last few yards to the Museum and shouting for the watchman. But a deep silence enveloped the Museum, and it soon became apparent that there was no watchman there. Standing round the cage, and raising our voices above the capybara's concerto, we discussed the matter. It was the policeman who found a way out.

"You could take the water haas to the abattoir," he suggested; "I know there is a night-watchman there."

We accepted his advice, and after he had shown us the way to the slaughterhouse we set off, our burden seesawing gently.

To get to our destination we had to pass the boarding house, so we paused for a rest.

"Let's leave him here and go to the slaughterhouse first," I said.

"We don't want to carry him all that way if they won't have him."

So we set off through the deserted streets, leaving the capybara in the garden. Eventually, after losing our way once or twice, we found the slaughterhouse, and to our joy there was a light in one of the upper windows.

"Ahoy!" I shouted, "night-watchman, ahoy!"

Silence.

I tried again, with the same result.

"He's probably asleep," said Smith sourly.

I found a small pebble which I threw at the window, shouting meanwhile. After a very long pause the window was pushed open and a very old negro poked his head out and peered down at us.

"Ah! night-watchman," I said cheerfully, "sorry to disturb you, but could you look after a capybara for us, just for the night?"

The old negro stared at us.

"What's dat?" he inquired.

"Could you look after a … a … a water haas for us?"

"A water haas asked the watchman, taking a firmer grip on the window in case we tried to climb up and bite him.

"Yes, a water haas

We all stood and looked at one another. I was getting a crick in my neck from staring up at the window.

"A water haas repeated the negro ruminatively, looking to see if we were frothing at the mouth, you all got a water haas?"

Smith groaned.

"Yes, that's the idea. We want you to keep him for us."

"A water haas?"

Trying to stifle hysterics I could only nod. The old man looked at us for a long time, repeating water haas vaguely.

Then he leant out of the window.

"I come down," he said, and disappeared.

Presently the massive front door opened and his head reappeared round the edge.

"Where dis water haas?" he asked.

"Well, we haven't got it with us," I said, feeling rather foolish, "but we can go and get it, if you'll take it for us, will you?"

"Waterhaas," said the old man, evidently fascinated by the word, "what kind of animal dat"

"A rodent," snapped Smith, before I could stop him.

"A rodent," said the old man reflectively.

"Can you keep it for the night?" I asked.

"Dis place is abattoir," said the watchman, "dis place for cowses. I don't tink rodents allowed here."

With a tremendous effort I conquered my laughter and explained to the old man that the capybara would not hurt the cowses; in fact, I went on, the creature was edible and so, gastronomically if not zoologically, it could be classified with cowses. After a long argument he reluctantly agreed to house it for the night, and we set off on the long road back to the boarding house. I laughed all the way back, but Smith, who was tired and irritable, refused to see anything funny about the whole affair. When we at last reached the boarding house, footsore and weary, we found the moonlit garden quiet and peaceful; in one corner of his cage lay the capybara, slumbering like the dead. He did not wake up again that night and looked much refreshed in the morning when we descended, baggy-eyed and yawning, to begin the day's work.

This, then, had been my introduction to capybara, and this the reason why I greeted with gloom and foreboding the three babies Francis had brought. They settled down very well after the first day and proceeded to eat vast quantities of greens and fruit and to squeak at one another.

Another day Francis turned up with a wonderful haul, consisting of four armadillos and five big Brazilian tortoises. The armadillos were all babies, each measuring about a foot long, with blunt pig-like snouts and great pink ears like arum lilies. They were charming little animals and gave no trouble, feeding on the same substitute food as the anteater, guzzling it up eagerly with much squelching and snorting. The tortoises were a handsome species with an elongated shell, and the legs and heads decorated with red spots like blobs of sealing-wax. Shortly after this another Amerindian brought us seven river turtles, of the kind whose eggs we had so much enjoyed, and the largest of them took two of us to lift it. They were vicious creatures, always ready to snap, and the largest could quite easily have taken off a finger if it had had the chance.

McTurk's orchard was now beginning to look as though it was the haunt of a giant spider that had constructed an enormous web out of ropes and string. Entangled in it were the capybara, the anteater, the armadillos, the tortoises, and turtles. I was getting increasingly worried about our lack of cages, for when the plane arrived to take us back to Georgetown I felt that they would not be keen to offer space to a lot of animals rather insecurely tied with ropes and string. At McTurk's suggestion I put in a radio-telephone call to Smith and asked him to send some boxes by the plane which was to bring us back, and this he promised to do.

Having disposed of this question Smith then asked me if there were any large cayman in the Rupununi, as we had just had a letter from a zoo in England asking for a large specimen if we could get one. I replied airily that there were plenty of large cayman in the river below the house and that it should be an easy matter to catch one. On this optimistic note I rang off and went to discuss the matter with Me Turk. He suggested that we should try and lure a cayman within reach of a noose with the aid of a rotting fish, a delicacy which, he assured me, they found it difficult to resist.

So that afternoon we made a fishing trip up the creeks and returned laden with piranha, which we laid out in the sun to hasten the process of decomposition. By the next morning the fish were definitely making their presence felt, and even the anteater, who was tethered in a direct line with them, started to sneeze in an irritated manner. In the evening Bob and I went to examine them.

"Dear Heaven! Are you sure cayman have such depraved tastes?" asked Bob, holding a handkerchief over his nose.

"McTurk says they like their fish this way, and he ought to know. I must say they do seem a trifle high."

"D'you want me to sit up all night over one of these, in the hopes of catching a cayman?"

"That's the idea. They won't smell so much in the river."

"I trust you're right," said Bob, "and now, if you've finished, I'd like to get a breath of fresh air."

When it grew dark we gingerly carried the fish down to the river and prepared our trap. Three of the long boats had been tied stern to stern, and by leaping from one to another we found ourselves quite far out from the bank. The fish were hung over the side of the boat on a string, a thick rope attached to one of the seats, and a noose made at the other end. This was then dangled out over the water on the end of a forked stick. We seated ourselves and prepared to wait. We could not smoke, and, as the air was laden with the smell of rotting fish, the atmosphere became very oppressive after about twenty minutes. The moon glittered on the water, a group of sand flies discovered us with zinging cries of joy, and the smell of fish got stronger and stronger, until the whole landscape was sodden in it.

"Reminds me of a holiday I spent in Margate ," whispered Bob.

"It's not so bad now."

"Less vivid, perhaps, but much more subtle. I dread to think what sort of state my nasal membranes will be in tomorrow."

We sat and glared at the opposite bank until our eyes ached and we could see cayman in every ripple. Three hours later a real cayman did show itself, even swam to within thirty feet of us, but we must have moved, for it sheered off, and we saw it no more. We retired at dawn, bitten and tired and cursing all reptiles. When we told McTurk about our failure he looked very thoughtful, then, saying he would see what he could do, he wandered off in the direction of the river.

Later we followed him to see what he was doing, and we found he had constructed a trap of great simplicity and ingenuity.

My spirits rose on seeing it. He had dragged two of the long boats half out of the water, leaving a narrow gap between them. This channel was spanned by a noose, so that anything swimming up it would have to push its head through to get at the bait, a rotten fish on a stake. As soon as the fish was touched it released a cord which was holding a sapling bent like a bow, and as the sapling whipped up it pulled the noose tight. The end of the rope with the noose on was attached to a branch of a tree that stood on top of the small cliff above the bay.

"That should do," said McTurk, examining his handiwork with justifiable pride.

"We'll see what we get tonight."

The sun was setting when we went down and baited the trap.

McTurk was of the opinion that if we caught a cayman at all we would not do so until late that night. So Bob and I decided to take a last walk across the savannah to get the smell of fish out of our lungs. The sky was barred with pale pink clouds on a jade green background, and a distant line of mountains stood out against it like the curved black backs of a line of leaping dolphins. In the long, crisp grass the crickets were making musical-box noises to one another, and in the distance, from the reeds by the river, we could hear the great frogs coughing their nightly chorus. A pair of burrowing owls flapped up from under our feet and flew thirty paces away on silent wings; they settled and watched us nervously, pacing a solemn circle and twisting their heads round and round. We lay on the red earth, warm as fire, and gazed up at the sky. It changed from green to dove-grey as the sun slid under the rim of the world, and then suddenly it was black and trembling with enormous stars seeming so close that, from where we lay, we could reach up and gather handfuls from the sky.

The moon was up when we made our way back to the house. We had decided to take our hammocks down to the river and sling them among the trees so that we should hear if we caught anything in the trap. We found suitable trees, slung our hammocks and then went back to the house for supper. After food and a smoke we strolled down towards the river in the moonlight, a dozen small bats drawing intricate geometrical patterns in the warm air above our heads. As we drew near the river I thought I heard a sound.

"What's that?" I asked Bob.

"What's what?" he replied.

"A sort of banging noise."

"I didn't hear anything." We walked on in silence.

"There it is again. Can't you hear it?"

"I can hear something." admitted Bob.

"I think we've caught something," I said, starting to run towards the river.

As I reached the bank I could see the trap rope stretched taut from the tree branch. I switched on the torch, and the rope started to vibrate and dip, and from the base of the small cliff there arose a fearsome noise, a combination of snorts, splashings and loud thuds. I ran to the edge of the cliff and looked down.

Ten feet below me the boats that had formed the sides of the trap had been pushed wide apart, and in the water between them lay one of the largest cayman I have ever seen, with the noose firmly tied round his neck. He was lying quietly after his last spasm, but as soon as the torch beam picked him out a shudder ran through his gigantic body and he curved himself up like a bow, his great blunt mouth opened aod then snapped shut like a door, his tail swept from side to side in a whirlpool of foam and water, and with each stroke it hit the boats with an echoing thud. In the swirling water between the rocking boats the huge reptile rolled and snapped and beat at the boats with his tail, while the rope twanged and thrummed and the branch to which it was attached creaked ominously. The tree was next to where I stood on the small cliff, and placing my hand on the trunk I could feel it vibrating with the cayman's struggles.

In my excitement I was obsessed with the idea that this magnificent reptile might, in his struggles, break the rope or the branch and escape, so I did something so futile and dangerous that even now I cannot realize how I came to act so stupidly; I leant forward over the cliff edge, seized the rope with both hands and pulled hard. The cayman, feeling the tug, rolled and lashed again, so that the rope was pulled taut. I was pulled forward, so that I found myself with only my toes on the edge of the cliff and my body hanging out into space at an angle of forty-five degrees, ten feet above the rocking boats and the snapping and infuriated reptile. I should have fallen, eventually, straight down into the water, to be bitten by the cayman or more probably lashed to death by its tail, if Bob had not arrived at that moment and laid hold of the rope. The cayman rolled and tugged, and we were both jerked backwards and forwards on the cliff edge, clinging madly to the rope as though our lives depended upon it. No drowning man ever clutched a straw with such a grip. Between jerks Bob turned his head.

"What are we hanging on for?"

"In case the rope breaks," I gasped. "He'll get away."

Bob pondered this for a bit.

"But if the rope does break we can't hold him," he pointed out at length. This idea had not occurred to me before, and I suddenly realized how silly we were being. We released our grip on the rope and lay on the grass to recover; below us the cayman fell quiet. We decided that the best thing to do was to get another rope round the beast, in case the first one broke, so we rushed back to the house and woke McTurk; then, armed with ropes, we returned to the river.

The cayman was still lying quietly between the boats; it seemed as though his last struggle had exhausted him. McTurk went into one of the boats alongside him to attract his attention, while I scrambled down the cliff and, with infinite caution, dropped a noose over his jaws and pulled it tight. With his jaws thus out of commission we felt safer, for now we only had his tail to reckon with. We got another noose round his chest and a third one round the thick base of his tail. He rolled about once or twice while we were doing this, but it was a half-hearted effort.

Feeling that he was now more secure with all these additional ropes round him we retired to our hammocks on the banks and slept fitfully until dawn.

The plane was due in at midday, but we had a lot to do before it arrived. The collection, with the exception of the anteater, had to be transported out across the savannah in the jeep and left near the landing strip with an Amerindian in charge. Then we started on the job of getting the cayman well roped up and hauled out on to the bank, where he could be picked up by the jeep when the plane arrived.

The first thing we had to do was to tie his fat and stumpy legs close to his body, and this was easily accomplished; then we had the more difficult job of sliding a long plank underneath him and tying him to it. This took us some time, for he was in shallow water, and most of his body and tail was resting on the mud; in the end we had to float him out to slightly deeper water so that we could get the plank under him. When he was trussed up to the plank we had to haul him out of the water and up the steep bank, and this was a long and laborious process. It took McTurk, Bob, myself, and eight Amerindians an hour to do so. The bank was wet and muddy, and we kept slipping and falling. Each time we fell the cayman's enormous weight would slide him back the few precious inches we had gained. At last, covered with mud and wet with water and sweat, we eased him over the top and slid him to rest on the green grass.

He was about fourteen feet long, his head as broad and as thick as my body, his shining scaly tail like a tree trunk and packed tight with iron-hard muscles. His back and neck were covered with great nodules and bumps, and his tail boasted a tall, serrated crest along it, each triangular scale the width of my palm. His top parts were ash-grey, patched in places with green, where the river slime still clung to him; his belly was bright yellow. His unblinking eyes were as large as walnuts, jet black, and patterned with an intricate and fierce filigree of gold. He was a magnificent creature.

We left him lying in the shade while we went to take the anteater down to the landing strip, for we could hear the distant drone of the plane. The anteater, of course, caused as much trouble as he could, hissing and snorting and lashing out at us as we manhandled him into the jeep and held him quiet while we bumped across the savannah. His uncooperativeness had delayed us, and the plane was landing as we arrived at the strip. I ran forward and found, to my relief, that Smith had sent a large pile of boxes; there was no time to lose, for we had to get the animals boxed up and go back for the cayman.

"You hold the capybara, and I'll get the anteater crated," I said to Bob. The anteater, never having been in a box before, strongly objected to the whole process, and he galloped round and round the crate while I made ineffectual efforts to slow him up and push him inside. After a few minutes of this both he and I needed a rest, so we paused for breath, and I looked round desperately for help. Bob, however, was fully occupied with the capybara. They had been thoroughly alarmed by the plane and had proceeded to run round and round him in ever diminishing circles, while Bob, rapidly enveloped in yards of string, was reeling about like an animated maypole.

He was obviously too engrossed to be able to help me; but fortunately McTurk came to my rescue, and the anteater was bundled into his crate. Then we unwound Bob, boxed up the capybara and loaded them on the plane with the rest of the collection. When we had finished, McTurk approached me gloomily.

"You can't take your cayman," he said.

"Why not?" I asked, horror-stricken at the very idea.

"Pilot says there's not enough room. They're picking up a load of meat at the next stop."

I pleaded, cajoled, argued, all in vain. In desperation I tried to persuade the pilot that the vast reptile would hardly be noticeable inside the plane; I even offered to sit on it to make room for the meat, but the pilot was a singularly obstinate man.

"I'll try and get him on the next plane for you," said McTurk; "make arrangements in Georgetown and let me know."

So, very reluctantly, I had to leave my gargantuan reptile, and boarded the plane casting dirty looks at the pilot.

McTurk waved as the plane roared over the golden grass, gathering speed. As we rose in the air we saw the great grassland stretched below us, McTurk's tiny figure walking towards the jeep, the ragged rim of trees along the glistening river where the cayman lay; and then the plane banked sharply and we were flying away. Ahead we could see the distant dim blur where the great forest began, split by the deep rivers that flowed down to the coast; behind us lay the savannah, vast and unmoving, golden, green, and silver in the sunlight.