Henry Amalfi and Larry Bates stood outside the interrogation room. Bates pulled at a big calabash pipe, while Amalfi puffed on a black cigar. “You had better stay outside,” Amalfi said. “She’s not going to relax with you around.”
“Expect you’re right,” Bates said. “Can’t really say I’m sorry to be out of it. This is a weird one.”
“Maybe.” Amalfi stuffed the cigar into a sandfilled ash tray. “You weren’t on that interrogation of those cats from North Laos, were you?” When his partner shook his head, Amalfi continued, “Now that one was really weird. These monkeys speak English, anyway. That outfit spoke some brand of Gook that nobody else understood. Finally we found a Gook who could speak their gibber and could talk Chinese too, only then we had to get a Chink to translate that. Weird, I tell you. This is pretty straightforward.”
“I suppose. Only, Henry…”
“Yeah?”
“You really shouldn’t speak of them as Gooks and Chinks. It isn’t nice.”
“Yeah.” They both laughed, and Amalfi went back into the interrogation room.
“This will have about the same effect as ‘Grape Juice Plus’,” Lewis told her. “You’ll get sleepy…”
“And drunk,” she said.
“More or less. OK, count backwards from ten, please,” Lewis said.
“Sure. Ten—nine—eight—seven—seven—six…”
“That’s fine. Just keep it up.”
“Five—four—four…”
“What’s after four?”
“I don’t know—two? I’m very tired.”
Lewis looked up to Hasslein. “We’re ready.”
“Thank you, Dr. Dixon. You may go now.”
“No, sir,” Dixon said. “This chimpanzee is my patient, and I’m staying here.”
Hasslein said nothing. Lewis met his steady gaze. “Dr. Hasslein, I am both a member of the Presidential Commission, and the attending physician. If you have me put out of here I’ll make so much noise you’ll be hearing about it for the next ten years.” Lewis spoke very quietly so that he wouldn’t disturb Zira, but his voice was hard and determined. Hasslein nodded. “Very well. Mr. Amalfi, you may begin.”
“Zira,” Amalfi said. “You remember me? I’m your friend.”
“Friend…”
“Have you ever worked in a room like this one?” he asked.
“Yes. Mine was larger. But not so—pretty.”
“Pretty? I wouldn’t call this room pretty,” Amalfi said.
“The equipment is lovely,” she muttered. “Really beautiful equipment. We never had such good equipment.”
“I see. And you had assistants?”
“Three. Three assistants, all chimpanzees. And one orangutan worked with us, sometimes…”
“And what did you do in your laboratory?”
“Comparative studies.”
“Comparative studies of what?” Amalfi asked.
“Comparative ana—ana…”
“Comparative anatomy?”
“Yes,” the sleepy voice answered.
Hasslein looked at Lewis with both triumph and sadness in his eyes. “You knew?” he asked softly.
Lewis didn’t answer.
“Traitor,” Hasslein said coldly. “Continue, Amalfi.”
“What anatomies did you compare?”
The chimpanzee rocked gently on the table. There was no answer. Finally Amalfi said, “Human and ape anatomy? Is that it?”
“Mmm.”
“Do you mean yes? Say yes if you mean yes. Did you compare human and ape anatomies?”
“Yes.”
“So you dissected other apes? All species of apes?”
“Yes.”
“Where did you get them?”
“Dead apes. From hospitals, and morgues.”
“But to do comparative studies, you had to dissect humans as well, didn’t you?”
“Yes. As they were—as they were made available.”
“I see. How were they made available, Zira?”
“The gorillas hunted them. For sport. They used nets, and guns, and traps. Sometimes they caught them alive, and kept them in cages…”
“And what did they do with the humans they kept in cages, Zira?” Amalfi asked. His voice was carefully controlled, calm and friendly, but he looked away with hatred and disgust.
“The army used them for target practice, some of them. We had our pick of the others, for scientific experiments. Some were very good specimens.”
“I see.” Amalfi’s voice came alive, matching Zira’s enthusiasm. “And you could make so many scientific discoveries that way. You dissected and removed and compared—”
“Bones, muscles, tendons, veins, arteries, kidneys, livers, hearts, stomachs, reproductive organs. Everything. We did very careful work. We mapped the nervous systems, and reflexes—”
“Reflexes,” Hasslein hissed. He looked at Dixon, then at Amalfi. “What does she mean, reflexes?”
“Reflexes?” Amalfi said. “But dead humans don’t have reflexes.”
“Of course not,” Zira protested. “I told you we did good work. We used living specimens. You can’t make a dead man’s knee jump, or test a corpse’s reactions to a prefrontal lobotomy.”
“Then you were very advanced,” Amalfi said. “So much so that you were able to do experimental brain surgery on living humans?”
“Yes.”
“How many survived?”
“Quite a few. Of course we lost a lot of them, too, but that was only to be expected,” Zira said. “But my main project is to stimulate the atrophied speech centers of the humans.”
“Have you had any success?”
“Not yet,” Zira said. “I mean, not now—not anymore? Where am I?”
“She’s coming around,” Hasslein said. “Another injection, Dr. Dixon.”
“I think not,” Lewis said. When Hasslein started to protest, Lewis said, “If you kill this intelligent, speaking chimpanzee, you’ll answer for it to the president. I won’t take the responsibility, and I doubt you’ll find another doctor who will.”
“What about Colonel Taylor?” Amalfi asked. “Did you stimulate his speech centers?”
“Of course not,” Zira snapped. “He could talk already.” There was a sharp sound from Hasslein as he drew in a deep breath. He nodded to Amalfi, then looked at Lewis again, the same look of sadness and triumph mingled.
“There were three men in Colonel Taylor’s ship,” Amalfi said.
“Yes,” Zira answered. “There was one who—somehow—died.”
“Died?”
“Yes. Before we found that he could talk. The gorillas killed him. He had a unique skin, something we’d never seen before, until we came here. We had him stuffed and put in the museum—like the gorilla I saw in your museum.”
“What do you mean, this human had a unique skin?”
“It was black,” Zira said. “Coal black. He dominated the room in the Museum of Natural History.”
“Lieutenant Dodge,” Hasslein whispered. “What happened to Taylor?”
“Did you dissect Colonel Taylor?” Amalfi asked.
“No! We loved Colonel Taylor.”
“All of you? All apes?”
“Many of us,” she said. “We did everything we could to help him. Cornelius and I—”
She struggled against the restraining straps on the table. Dixon quickly stepped over and looked at her. “That’s all,” he said. “And no, Dr. Hasslein, I won’t give her another injection.”
“Cornelius!” Zira called. She opened her eyes and looked wildly around, but she could see only Lewis Dixon.
“It’s all right,” Lewis said. “Go to sleep now.” He turned to Hasslein. “She’ll need a nap.”
“Very well.” Hasslein opened the door to admit a white-coated young Marine. “Orderly, take this chimpanzee to its quarters, and see that Dr. Dixon gets anything he needs for treating it.”
“Yes, sir.” Tommy Billings, age nineteen, went over to the operating table. “Hey, she’s really out, isn’t she? Come on, girl, it’s all right now. Let’s get you back to your room.” He looked up at Hasslein and Dixon. “You didn’t hurt her, did you? You got no cause to hurt her. She never did anything—”
“Just return that chimpanzee to its room, Orderly,” said Hasslein.
“Yes, sir.” As he wheeled the rolling table out, he spoke gently to the sleeping form. “Come on, nobody’s going to hurt you now. Tommy’ll take care of you. I like monkeys. We had three pet monkeys and a chimp in the little zoo next to my high school. I took care of ’em sometimes. You just come on…” They left the room.
“I think we have heard enough,” Hasslein said.
“Heard enough for what?” Lewis Dixon demanded.
“Come now, Dr. Dixon. Even you see the danger from these apes. But if you don’t, yet, I’m sure you will when I’ve finished my presentation to the Commission. You’ll understand then.”