Animal control left with some snide comments. That left Earl Rivers, Janet Rivers, my fellow Marshals, and myself within the confines of the sanctuary. It also left Henri the Orangutan and a whole past I had pushed to the back corners of my memory, never intending them to see the light of day again.
“I don’t think this is a good idea,” John said as Janet led me around to the gate of the enclosure.
“Aislinn and Henri have history, they’ll be fine together,” Earl spit tobacco juice onto a thin layer of snow as if to emphasize his point.
“What kind of history?” Xavier asked.
“She and her dad are the reason Henri is still alive,” Earl answered. I frowned at him. “The bum ear and the scar on his back are his only physical scars. But he’s got emotional scars that run deep.” Obviously, Earl didn’t care that I was frowning at him.
Henri came close to the gate. He didn’t grab for me this time. He just stuck his hand through the bars, palm up, fingers slightly curved. I’d seen the gesture once before, he’d been dying at the time after going head to head with a mountain lion. Since he was here, he hadn’t died, but it had been nothing short of a miracle. I didn’t know where my father had taken him after those couple of days, but now I was preparing for a reunion with the ape that had once been a patient in my house.
“Go on,” Janet told me. “Remember, they are gentle giants, he’ll be interested in you. Might sniff around and touch you some, just don’t panic and you’ll be fine.”
I repeated the phrase “don’t panic” in my head. It reminded me of a book, Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. It had also said “don’t panic.” I wondered if that was possible at the moment as I felt my heart rate increase.
Henri shuffled towards me slowly. His movements seemed deliberately exaggerated and at half speed. I wondered if he could tell I was nervous.
A large, rough hand gently brushed my face as the orangutan reached for my hair. I held my breath. He was gentle, barely touching the strands as they ran through his fingers.
“Talk to him, girl,” Earl called to me.
“Hi, Henri,” I said quietly.
Henri made a face at me. He didn’t bare his teeth or make a kissy face, both were things I associated with ape aggression. This was more like a wrinkling of his nose and eyes. He took hold of my hand with his. The rough pads on his palms were cold.
“Are you cold? Do you need to go inside?” I pointed to the shelter. Henri cooed at me. This was why I wouldn’t be a good pet owner. I didn’t know what he wanted and he couldn’t tell me.
Henri suddenly stood. He was taller than me by several inches. His wide arms engulfed me and he picked me up off the ground. With my arms pinned to my side, there was little I could do. I didn’t fight, which was my first instinct. Henri held me firmly, but not so hard as to hurt.
“Calm down,” Earl said, probably not to me. “Henri’s been socialized with humans. They call it identity confusion. He’s giving her a hug.”
As if to confirm this, Henri set me on the ground, feet first. He let go and just stared at me for a moment. I didn’t frown or smile nor did I make eye contact. He blew a raspberry at me. This made me smile despite trying to be on my best behavior. He did it a second time and I giggled. Finally, I put my arms around Henri and hugged the orangutan from my past and let the memory come back to me.
My father had been off duty. I had been nine at the time. We’d been horseback riding at the farm of one of my cousins. Dad and I had both noticed a lot of cars at the neighbor’s house and he’d been curious. Our cousin informed us that there were illegal activities taking place, an animal fight. My dad had thought it was a dog fight.
He had taken me with him to go investigate. We’d snuck around to the barn. Inside wasn’t a dog fighting ring, but a large cage. Inside the cage was Henri and a mountain lion. My dad called for backup, but there wasn’t much time.
My father had fired a few shots into the air. People had scattered. I think he planned to shoot the mountain lion, but he didn’t need to. With the people running, he opened the cage and the mountain lion sprang to freedom. He’d landed a few feet away from me. We’d stared at each for a couple of seconds before he lost interest and ran off.
My dad was holding the hand of the dying orangutan. I rushed into the cage and found the ape was bleeding from his ear and most of his back had been exposed by a swipe of claws. Our cousin rushed over with a gun of his own because he’d heard the shots fired. Together, he and my dad had removed the orangutan from the cage.
Our cousin was a large animal vet. He wasn’t sure the ape would live, but I insisted we had to try. My dad made the decision that the only way the ape had a chance was to not be found by the local police. He’d be put down for being “aggressive.”
They had whisked the orangutan to the cousin’s house. The cousin and I worked on the orangutan while my father lied to the police and said he’d found two mountain lions in the cage. Both of whom were released by the property owner when my dad arrived. He’d fired at them in self-defense, but wasn’t sure he’d hit either of them.
I don’t know what happened to the owner or why no one ever found out my dad had rescued an orangutan. I just know that for a week, the orangutan stayed at our cousin’s house and we visited every day. When he got better, he came to stay with us for a while. However, it was hard to hide an orangutan in our neighborhood. I came home from school one day and the orangutan that I had named Henri, in honor of French physicist Henri Becquerel, was gone. Dad told me he had gone to live in a place that could house him better than our small family home.
We had both cried that night. It was the only time I had seen my father cry. Seeing him breakdown into tears as he explained why we couldn’t keep Henri had been torture. He appeared broken by the decision to remove the animal. I wasn’t sure if it was because he wanted to keep Henri or because I did.
Seeing the orangutan now made me sad. Not an emotion I experience very often. I was sad that one of the few connections I had made with my father had outlived him. Henri was alive and well and my father was dead.
I wasn’t a spiritual person and I didn’t imagine the ghost of my father was looking over the animal and myself. The best I could come up with was the knowledge that my father had cared about the animal and I had cared about the animal. It was a tenuous connection, but a connection was a connection.
We left the sanctuary. Xavier and Gabriel kept giving me looks. I knew they wanted to rehash my past, but I was not going to give up the ghost easily. Maybe one day, I would, but for now, conversations about my father were off limits unless it related to the case. It wasn’t just that my father had died when I was young, it was that the memories of him were sacred.
The trip had taken my mind off the dismembered feet and given me an idea. A great ape was capable of doing immense damage. To them, the human body was a fragile, frail thing and a sexually mature chimpanzee was capable of going into a rage without provocation.
It was this thought that I relayed to the guys. They looked at me like I was crazy for a few minutes. We had arrived at the Columbia Police Department before any of them said anything.
“So, you now think it could be a chimp?” Gabriel asked.
“I think it’s a possibility, just one of many,” I said.
“You were convinced it was a jaguar yesterday,” John pointed out.
“Yes, well, I have reconsidered my position. It could be a number of predators. Even the expert was not certain it was a cat, just mostly certain. It is possible that the fangs of a large cat could be similar to the canines of a chimp.”
“We found a head,” Detective Russell said as we entered the secure part of the station.