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He was underwater!
Not just that, he could sense dozens of creatures swishing around him.
Had he fallen into a pool of piranhas?
Was he going to be gobbled alive?
Eric desperately swam to the surface and took a gasp of air.
GASP!
No. These were much bigger than piranhas. And far friendlier too.
They were PENGUINS!
The boy had plunged into the penguin pool!
It had just been built and was more like a waterpark, with slides and a fountain. Perfect, if you were a penguin. Not so good if you were a boy.
The slippery birds played around Eric, pecking at him. One even perched on his head.
“Get off!” he said affectionately, as he guided the penguin back into the water. Eric swam to the edge of the pool and began clambering up the slide. But it was slippery, and he plunged back in the pool again.
WHOOMPH!
SPLOSH!
“SQUAWK! SQUAWK! SQUAWK!”
This time Eric swam over to the edge, and then he heard a familiar sound.
CLINK! CLANK! CLUNK!
It was Sid.
“What are you doing in there?” the old man called down.
“Taking a swim!” called Eric, trying to make light of the situation.
Sid huffed and shook his head. “Wait there!”
CLINK! CLANK! CLUNK!
There was silence for a moment before the old man returned with a long-handled net. It was the one he used for fishing out penguin poop.
“Hold on to this!”
Eric did as he was told, and Sid hauled him out of the water.
“You’re soaking wet!” said the old man.
“That normally happens when you go for a swim,” replied Eric.
“What are you doing here at the zoo so late? It’s way after closing time!”
“I was worried about Gertrude. She looked so frightened today.”
“She was, but you should be tucked up in bed by now, young man!”
“So should you!” said Eric.
This stopped the old man in his tracks. “I know, but I was sure there was going to be another bombing raid. We’ve had them night after night for weeks. I wanted to be here for all the animals!”
“Me too!” exclaimed the boy.
Sid looked up at the sky. “It’s quiet up there in the clouds right now. You should go home!”
As if on cue, the air-raid siren wailed.
WOOOHOOOO!
“I spoke too soon,” hissed the old man. “Come with me.”
Sid grabbed Eric by the hand and led him through the zoo.
CLINK! CLANK! CLUNK!
The zoo might have been in darkness because of the nightly blackout but it was noisier than ever. The air-raid warning had woken all the animals up.
“Are we the only ones here?” asked Eric as he held his great-uncle’s hand tightly.
“No, there’ll be the nightwatchman, Batter. Or Corporal Batter as he demands to be known! We’ll have to keep an eye out for him. He’s the only one who’s meant to be in the zoo after dark.”
Eric could hear a distant humming sound. Next, a rumbling. Finally, there was a loud drone as the Nazi planes came right over their heads, flying in neat formation as they powered through the night sky.
Then the first bomb whistled through the air.
And the next.
And the next.
Then the explosions began.
Lightning was striking all over London.
Searchlights scoured the sky, before big guns fired at the Nazi planes from the ground.
Fire-engine bells rang.
DING! DING! DING!
Eric could just make out the sounds of people screaming and shouting.
“ARGH!”
“HELP!”
“RUN!”
The boy’s heart raced.
The noise.
The lights.
The debris.
Another bomb exploded, even nearer than the last.
And another!
And another.
The elephants raised their trunks and hooted.
“HOO!”
The camels reared up on their back legs and moaned.
“WUHU!”
The lions leaped from rock to rock and roared.
“ROAR!”
However, the saddest sound of all came from the gorilla’s cage.
Gertrude’s huge hands were covering her big ears as she tried to block out the booms of the bombs.
At every explosion she let out a shriek…
“EEEHHH!”
…and rocked from side to side.
Eric broke away from the old man and hurled himself at the cage.
“EEEHHH!”
“GERTRUDE!” cried the boy, but the gorilla wouldn’t even open her eyes.
“GERTRUDE!”
“RAISINS!” shouted Eric.
“You what?” spluttered Sid. It was clear that of all the things he was expecting the boy to shout at this point, “raisins” was a long way down the list.
“Raisins! They are her favourite! After bananas, of course, but you can’t get bananas these days. A handful of raisins might just calm her nerves.”
“You’re right!” agreed Sid. “Clever boy! We’ll make a zookeeper of you yet!”
The boy beamed. “Maybe one day! But where am I going to get raisins from at this time of night?”
“The snack bar might have some!”
“But I don’t have any money!”
“You won’t need any money. It’s closed!”
“Well, if it’s closed, how am I going to get in?”
“You’ll have to break in!”
Eric gulped. He’d never broken in anywhere, ever, and he was rather hoping to get through his whole life without doing so.
“Climb through the window!” shouted Sid over the noise. “Grab some raisins and run!”
The Nazi bombs were landing nearer and nearer to the zoo all the time.
Eric had been to the zoo so many times that even in the dark he knew his way around. In no time at all, he’d found the snack bar, climbed up on to a dustbin and forced a side window open. Next, he slid down inside and fumbled in the darkness to find a jumbo bag of raisins. Tempted though he was to take some sweets for himself, he resisted. Then, using a chair as a stepladder, he climbed up and out through the window, and leaped down on to the dustbin.
CLANG!
Eric glanced at the bag of raisins. There was a tear in it. He must have caught it on the little hook on the window frame. The boy did his best to stop the raisins falling out as he ran back to the gorilla’s cage, bombs dropping all around.
“I got the raisins, Uncle Sid!” he called out, breathless from the running.
The gorilla was still rocking, covering her ears, letting out a sad cry.
“EEEHHH!”
“Have you been eating them?” asked Sid, feeling that the bag was light.
“No, the bag got ripped and I dropped some on the way.”
“A likely story!”
“It’s true!”
The old man turned his attention to the gorilla. “Now, now, Gertrude! Come on, old girl! Your friend has a nice juicy raisin for you!”
Eric took one of the little treats out of the bag and pushed it through the metal bars.
This was the nearest explosion yet. Louder than all the others. They could feel the force of the blast. This bomb must have landed in Regent’s Park. Soil sprayed everywhere, pelting the gorilla.
Poor Gertrude was scared out of her wits. She shrieked and shrieked and shrieked…
“EEEHHH! EEEHHH! EEEHHH!”
…as she leaped about her cage wildly.
“NOOO!” screamed the boy, terrified at what he saw.
Instead of taking the raisin as he’d hoped, the gorilla had bashed her head so hard against the cage that the wire had buckled.
BASH! BASH! BASH!
“Make her stop!” pleaded Eric.
Sid looked as worried as the boy. It was clear the old man had never seen the gorilla acting like this before.
“It’s just a bad storm, Gertrude!” lied the zookeeper.
BASH! BASH! BASH!
“EEEHHH!”
This time Gertrude leaped to the middle of her cage and grabbed on to the rope tied to the metal bars at the top of her enclosure, and yanked with all her might.
“What’s she doing?” cried Eric.
“She’s trying to get out!” replied Sid.
The gorilla wrenched the rope so hard that the roof of her cage tore off from three sides.
TWONK!
Then it toppled into her cage.
KLUNCH!
It landed at an angle, providing a ramp for Gertrude to run up, her huge feet thudding on the metal.
Eric and Sid looked on in a mixture of wonder and horror at the gorilla standing at the top of her cage. She was perfectly silhouetted by the full moon as she beat her chest and let out an almighty howl.
Eric and Sid could feel the heat from the bomb. It must have landed inside the zoo itself. A tall tree in the picnic area exploded into flames.
WHOOF!
The heat was enough to sweep you off your feet.
Eric thought he was going to be burned alive.
The zoo lit up red and orange and yellow as black smoke darkened the sky.
Gertrude leaped down from the top of the cage and landed on the ground with a terrific THUD.
THOMP!
Eric stood frozen in fear as the huge creature lolloped over to him. She stared him right in the face, and he saw a look of terrible sadness in her eyes.
“Don’t scream!” hissed Sid. “And don’t make any sudden movements!”
The boy nodded slowly.
“If we keep still and quiet, then all should be fine…”
Gorillas were so strong they’d been known to tear a man’s arm clean off.
Eric knew that.
But Gertrude was his friend. There had always been this special connection between the pair, even though the bars of the cage had kept them apart.
Until now.
They were now standing nose to nose. He could even feel her warm breath on his face.
Eric felt a strange mixture of joy and fear all at once. But the joy was stronger than the fear, and the boy smiled.
Gertrude loved to copy Eric, so she smiled back, flashing her teeth and those long fangs on each side of her mouth.
As Sid looked on and whispered, “Now be a good girl, Gertrude,” the gorilla puckered up as if to give the boy a kiss. Eric had seen some films with lovey-dovey bits. He’d noticed how the grown-ups often closed their eyes when they kissed. So he did the same.
SPLURT!
But it wasn’t a kiss. It was a raspberry!
PFFFT!”
A big, wet raspberry. For the second time that day, Eric had gorilla spittle all over his face. But he didn’t mind one bit.
“HA! HA! HA!” laughed the boy, and the gorilla joined in too.
“HUH! HUH! HUH!”
“You two!” chuckled Sid. “Now come on, Gertrude, let’s get you back inside what’s left of your cage.”
With that, the man took the gorilla by the hand.
“Say goodnight, Eric,” he said.
“Goodnight, Eric,” repeated the boy. “WAIT! I am Eric!”
“I meant say goodnight to Gertrude, you great bozo!”
“Goodnight, Gertrude!”
“That’s better,” replied Sid, looking up at the sky. Once again, the Luftwaffe planes were nothing more than a distant hum. “Come on, old girl!”
“Let me help!” exclaimed the boy as he took Gertrude by her other hand.
Just then a gunshot rang out.
BANG!
A bullet whizzed just over their heads.
“EEEHHH!” screamed Gertrude.
The gorilla shook the pair from her hands, and they tumbled to the ground.
DOOF! DOOF!
“HUH!”
“EURGH!” they cried as Gertrude raced off into the darkness of the night.
KERTHUMP!
KERTHUMP!
KERTHUMP!
The bombs might have stopped for the night, but the sound of gunshots startled all the animals in the zoo all over again.
“What on earth do you think you are doing?” thundered Sid.
Eric had never seen the old man so angry.
He was shouting at a short, squat figure in the distance, who was now hurrying towards the pair.
“BATTER!” cried Sid.
“Corporal Batter to you!”
Corporal Batter was the nightwatchman for LONDON ZOO. He had been made a corporal in the First World War and had kept using the title. The rank was just above lance corporal, but below sergeant. An achievement, of course, but only a certain type of man would want to keep reminding people of it every single day, a hundred times a day, for the rest of his life.
A man like Batter.
The corporal’s job was to make sure the animals didn’t escape from their cages during the night. Since the Blitz had begun, there was every chance that one of the bombs could land in the zoo and destroy the cages and enclosures.
Then you might very well have:
…an escaped hippopotamus waddling down Oxford Street looking for a bargain…
“HOOT!”
…or a fugitive tiger leaping on the back of a double-decker bus…
“ROAR!”
…or a runaway rhinoceros charging towards 10 Downing Street to knock down the door of the prime minister himself!
THUMP!
When the Nazi bombing campaign began, LONDON ZOO’s resident vet, Miss Gnarl, had put down every single venomous snake or spider. There was a real chance these creatures could find their way into the homes of Londoners and kill them just like the bombs.
Imagine sitting on the toilet, and a huge, furry spider bites you on the bottom.
“URGH!”
Or lying in bed at night, and a snake slithers its way up your leg.
“AAAHHH!”
So Batter had been given the order that if a dangerous animal escaped from its cage during the night he could shoot it on sight. A gorilla more than fitted into this category. Sid and Eric were sure that Gertrude wouldn’t hurt a flea. Well, that wasn’t strictly true. If Gertrude found a flea in her fur, she would pluck it out and eat it. But this gorilla was more interested in blowing raspberries than harming anyone.
“I am… huh… huh…” huffed and puffed Corporal Batter as he finally reached the pair. The old soldier was out of breath.
“Well, out with it, man!” demanded Sid.
“I’ve… huh… got… huh… a huh…” spluttered Batter.
“What’s a ‘huh’?” asked Eric.
“I think he’s just trying to get his breath back!” said Sid.
“I’ve… huh… got a… huh… stitch!” he uttered, clutching his tummy.
“Oh, boo-hoo!” exclaimed Sid. “You could have killed us!”
“I was aiming for the monkey!”
“A gorilla isn’t a monkey – it’s an ape!” protested the boy.
“Same difference!” snapped Batter.
“No, it isn’t! And you can’t shoot Gertrude. She’s my friend!”
“I have my orders!” declared Batter.
With that, the old soldier cocked his rifle.
CLICK!
“Put that gun away, you fool!” exclaimed Sid, pushing its nose down.
“I will use my rifle whenever I want! It is me who is the war hero! Remember that, Private Sidney Pratt? Not you! You didn’t last one day on the battlefields!”
Sid hung his head in shame. The man was right. His tin legs told that story.
Next, Batter turned his attention to the boy.
“And as for you! You are not even supposed to be here. A child at the zoo in the middle of the night! It is forbidden!”
“It’s my fault, Batter,” said Sid. “He’s family!”
“Corporal Batter! Just wait until Sir Frederick Frown hears about this! Now stand aside! I have an escaped monkey to hunt!”
With that, he pushed the pair out of the way and marched off in the direction in which the ape had run.
Eric looked at Sid, tears welling in his eyes. “He’s not really going to kill her, is he?”
“He’s going to try!” said Sid.
“Then we need to stop him!”
cried Eric.
Finding an escaped gorilla in the dead of night is hard. The bombing raid had woken up every single animal in the zoo. Even though the Nazi planes were now heading back to Germany, the animals could not be calmed.
The parrots were squawking.
The lions were roaring.
And the elephants were hooting.
So it was hard to know where in the zoo Gertrude might be, just from listening.
But Eric had an idea!
PING!
As soon as Batter had disappeared into the distance, Eric grabbed Sid by the hand.
“THIS WAY!” he hissed.
“HOLD UP!” said Sid, clanking along.
“Sorry, I forgot,” said the boy.
“So do I sometimes, until they get rusty!”
CLINK! CLANK! CLUNK!
Moments ago, Eric had broken into the zoo’s snack bar to fetch some raisins for Gertrude. As he’d climbed out of the snack-bar window, the bag of raisins had been ripped. The gunshot had spooked the gorilla, but if she’d followed her nose she may very well have found her way to the trail of the fruity treats on the ground. Eric and Sid retraced the boy’s steps, but even using Sid’s torch they couldn’t see any. Perhaps the pigeons had got them?
Or maybe, just maybe, a much bigger creature?
The pair hurried past the flamingos, round the meerkats and along the warthogs to the snack bar. The snack-bar window that Eric had forced open was now flapping in the wind.
THWACK! THWACK! THWACK!
“You don’t think she’s in there, do you…?” asked Sid.
“Shush!” shushed the boy, before nodding his head.
The pair tiptoed over to the window. Sure enough, there was the gorilla, slumped on the floor amid a massive mess of food. There were bags and wrappers everywhere. Gertrude was alternating between swigging from a bottle of fizzy pop and munching on some jelly babies that had been scattered all over the floor.
“BURP!” burped the gorilla. It was as loud as thunder. It even shocked Gertrude. The gorilla had clearly never had fizzy pop before.
“HA! HA!” The pair at the window couldn’t help but burst out laughing.
Gertrude looked up, startled.
“HURGH?” she gurgled.
“Shush, Gertrude! It’s just us!” whispered Eric.
He dashed to the door.
“Locked!” he said.
“And I don’t have the key!” replied Sid. “How are we going to get her safely back in her cage before Batter sees her?”
“We’ll have to climb through the window!”
“At my age?” spluttered Sid.
“I’ll help. Here, let me give you a leg up.”
The old man sighed and muttered to himself. The boy couldn’t work out what he’d said, but it sounded like one of those rude words grown-ups sometimes say that children aren’t allowed to.
Eric put his hands together to form a little cradle and gestured for Sid to step on it. The boy had seen cowboys do this when mounting a horse in Westerns, and it looked like a doddle! However, Eric was not a strapping cowboy, and neither was Sid. The man certainly was not helped by having battered old tin legs. So, after a wobbly start, poor Sid ended up falling through the open window, the back of his trousers getting caught on the hook.
WHOOSH!
Like a magic trick, a RUDE magic trick, the old man’s trousers and undercrackers* were yanked back as he slid downwards.
“ARGH! ME BOTTY!” he exclaimed, and he landed in a crumpled heap on the floor. Eric should really have had his serious face on at this moment, all kind and concerned, but he just couldn’t. Instead he burst out laughing.
“HA! HA! HA!”
Now, laughter is infectious. Either that or gorillas find wrinkly old bottoms funny, because Gertrude burst out laughing too.