Pets in Prospect - Malcolm D. Welshman [98]
The path continued round an open enclosure where two Thomson gazelles, with their distinctive black flank stripes were grazing, their tails constantly flick, flick, flicking while an ostrich paced up and down the perimeter fence behind them.
The camel’s pen was next door with an open-sided barn in which Cleo was bedded down in a deep pile of straw. She was chewing the cud, her lower lip swinging from side to side, her gaze directed away from us, across the muddy pen as if in a trance – perhaps dreaming of lost Arabian nights. She slowly swung her head in our direction as we approached the barn gate and gave us a haughty look, flicking her long eyelashes at us. I noticed she had a head collar on it. So at least she could be handled – or so I thought.
Once inside the pen, we picked our way over to her, stopping when Kevin put out a straining hand saying, ‘I shouldn’t get any closer if I were you. She’s liable to spit.’ Certainly enough froth had built up around Cleo’s lips to do a cappuccino proud; and by the way the muscles in her throat were contracting, I guessed she was working up another mouthful ready, it seemed, to send our way. All the time she remained crouched, her knees resting in the straw with her hind legs splayed out behind, soles uppermost. I knew camels had two toes on each foot – I hadn’t watched Lawrence of Arabia three times for nothing.
Kevin was pointing to one of them now. ‘I reckon it’s her right hind foot. She’s been favouring that leg these past couple of days.’
‘Can you hold her for us?’ asked Crystal, putting down her bag.
‘Depends on her mood. Some days she plays up and you can’t get near her.’ Kevin extracted a head rope from his dungarees. ‘But we can have a go.’ He began walking up to her, whistling through his teeth. ‘Hello, Cleo. You going to be a good girl for us today?’
Her neck arched and she swung round baring a set of broken, yellow teeth before a stream of semi-digested cud showered out and splattered down Kevin’s front. Clearly this was going to be one of her ‘Bugger off, you lot’ days.
‘And good morning to you, too, you old cow,’ said Kevin wiping his beard.
She lunged out again, this time emitting a deep guttural roar which tailed off into a bubbling rumble as another lump of cud was prepared for ejection. Kevin nimbly jumped back and whistled. ‘Not one of her better days, I’m afraid,’ he said.
That was all too obvious. Even though we weren’t climbing on that hump of hers, we were in for a bumpy ride. Clearly this Cleopatra was missing her Antony.
‘We could sedate her, I suppose,’ mused Crystal, ‘but I’d rather not unless we absolutely have to.’ She edged towards Cleo’s hindquarters. There was a twitch of a tail and a flurry of urine-stained straw flicked into the air. Cleo swung round with another determined lunge. ‘Nope. We’re going to have to restrain her somehow,’ muttered Crystal, stepping back.
‘I’ll call the two lads over and see if they can help us,’ said Kevin and put two fingers in his mouth. The piercing whistle that he emitted would have shocked even Liza. It certainly gave Cleo something to chew over. Her jaws suddenly ground to a halt and her bottom lip dropped, strings of saliva hanging from it.
Within minutes, the two lads had appeared. For some reason, I’d been expecting two strapping young keepers with enough muscle power to help wrestle Cleo into submission. What I saw clambering over the gate were two miniature Kevins, minus the glasses – youngsters of about 12, of slight build, each with an identical mop of Kevin’s shaggy, black hair.
‘Meet the twins,’ he said, ‘Ben and Barnaby.’ The three of them standing together looked like a set of chimney brushes. ‘Right, boys,’ continued Kevin, ‘Cleo’s having a strop.’
‘What’s new?’ piped up one of the lads.
‘Anyway, you know what to do. It’s worked before. So let’s give it a go now.’
The three of them spread out round Cleo’s head, sufficiently out of range of her teeth, though not from the spit that came flying out in all directions