Menagerie, a Child's Fable from biting fleas behind the counter when he heard the “Be patient!” he said.

“Be patient!” he said. “Believe me, he's comin' back!”

door slam. “Come off it,” said one of three snakes. “Monkey says
by Charles Johnson
But it seemed one night too early for closing time. His Tilford's dead. Question is, what're we gonna do about
Among watchdogs in Seattle, Berkeley was known
instincts on this had never been wrong before. He trotted it?”
generally as one of the best. Not the smartest, but steady.
back to the darkened storeroom; then his mouth snapped Berkeley looked, witheringly, toward the front door.
A pious German shepherd (Black Forest origins, prob-
shut. His feeding bowl was as empty as he'd last left it. His empty stomach gurgled like a sewer. It took a tre-
ably) with big shoulders, black gums, and weighing more
“Say, Berkeley,” said Monkey, whose cage was near the mendous effort to untangle his thoughts. “If we can just
than some men, he sat guard inside the glass door of
storeroom. “What's goin' on? Tilford didn't put out the hold on a —”
Tilford's Pet Shoppe, watching the pedestrians scurry
food.” “We're hungry!” shouted Frog. “We'll starve before old
along First Avenue, wondering at the derelicts who slept
Berkeley didn't care a whole lot for Monkey, and usu- Tilford comes back!”
ever so often inside the foyer at night, and sometimes he
ally he ignored him. He was downright wicked, a come- Throughout this turmoil, the shouting, beating of
nodded when things were quiet in the cages behind him,
dian always grabbing his groin to get a laugh, throwing wings, which blew feathers everywhere like confetti, and
lulled by the bubbling of the fish-tanks, dreaming of an
feces, or fooling with the other animals, a clown who'd do an angry slapping of fins that splashed water to the floor,
especially fine meal he'd once had, or the little female
I anything to crack up the iguana, Frog, Parrot, and the Monkey simply sat quietly, taking it all in, stroking his
poodle, a real flirt, owned by the aerobic dance teacher
Siamese, even if it meant aping Mr. Tilford, which he did chin as a scholar might. He waited for a space in the
(who was no saint herself ) a few doors down the street;
well, though Berkeley found this parody frightening, like shouting, then pushed his head through the cage again.
but Berkeley was, for all his woolgathering, never asleep
playing with fire, or literally biting the hand that fed you. His voice was calm, studied, like an old-time barrister
at the switch. He took his work seriously. Moreover, he
But he, too, was puzzled by Tilford's abrupt departure. before the bar. “Berkeley? Don't get mad now, but I think
knew exactly where he was at every moment, what he was
“I don't know,” said Berkeley. “He'll be back, I guess.” it's obvious that there's only one solution.”
doing, and why he was doing it, which was more than can
Monkey, his head through his cage, held onto the bars “What?”
be said for most people, like Mr. Tilford, a real gumboil,
like a movie inmate. “Wanna bet?” “Let us out,” said Monkey. “Open the cages.”
whose ways were mysterious to Berkeley. Sometimes he
“What're you talking about?” “No!”
treated the animals cruelly, or taunted them; he saw them
“Wake up,” said Monkey. “Tilford's sick. I seen better “We've got a crisis situation here.” Monkey sighed like
not as pets but profit. Nevertheless, no vandals, or thieves,
faces on dead guppies in the fishtank. You ever see a one of the elderly, tired lizards, as if his solution bothered
had ever brought trouble through the doors or windows
pulmonary embolus?” Monkey ballooned his cheeks, then even him. “It calls for courage, radical decisons. You're in
of Tilford's Pet Shoppe, and Berkeley, confident of his
started breathing hard enough to hyperventilate, rolled charge until Tilford gets back. That means you gotta feed
power but never flaunting it, faithful to his master though
up both red-webbed eyes, then crashed back into his cage, us, but you can't do that, can you? Only one here with
he didn't deserve it, was certain that none ever would.
howling. hands is me. See, we all have different talents, unique
At closing time, Mr. Tilford, who lived alone, as most
Not thinking this funny at all, Berkeley padded over to gifts. If you let us out, we can pool our resources. I can
cruel men do, always checked the cages, left a beggarly
the front door, gave Monkey a grim look, then curled up open the feed bags!”
pinch of food for all the animals, and a single biscuit
against the bottom rail, waiting for Tilford's car to appear. “You can?” The watchdog swallowed.
for Berkeley. The watchdog always hoped for a pat on
Cars of many kinds, and cars of different sizes, came and “Uh-huh.” He wiggled his fingers dexterously, then the
his head, or for Tilford to play with him, some sign of
went, but that Saturday night the owner did not show. digits on his feet. “But somebody's gotta throw the switch
approval to let him know he was appreciated, but such
Nor the next morning, or the following night, and on the on this cage. I can't reach it. Dog, I'm asking you to be
as this never came. Mr. Tilford had thick glasses and a
second day it was not only Monkey but every beast, bird, democratic! Keeping us locked up is fascist!”
thin voice, was stubborn, hot-tempered, a drunkard and
and fowl in the Shoppe that shook its cage or tank and The animals clamored for release; they took up Mon-
a loner who, sliding toward senility, sometimes put his
howled at Berkeley for an explanation — an ear-shat- key's cry, “Self-determination!” But everything within
shoes in the refrigerator, and once — Berkeley winced
tering babble of tongues, squawks, trills, howls, mewling, Berkeley resisted this idea, the possibility of chaos it
at the memory — put a Persian he couldn't sell in the
bellows, hoots, blorting, and belly growls because Tilford promised, so many different, quarrelsome creatures
Mix Master during one of his binges. Mainly, the owner
had collected everything from baby alligators to zebra- uncaged, set loose in a low-ceilinged Shoppe where
drank and watched television, which was something
striped fish, an entire federation of cultures, with each even he had trouble finding room to turn around be-
else Berkeley couldn't understand. More than once he'd
animal having its own distinct, inviolable nature (so they tween the counters, pens, displays of paraphernalia, and
mistaken gunfire on screen for the real thing (a natural
said), the rows and rows of counters screaming with a heavy, bubbling fishtanks. The chances for mischief were
error, since no one told him violence was entertainment
plurality of so many backgrounds, needs, and viewpoints incalculable, no question of that, but slow starvation was
for some, howled loud enough to bring down the house,
that Berkeley, his head splitting, could hardly hear his certain if he didn't let them in the storeroom. Further-
and Tilford booted him outside. Soon enough, Berkeley
own voice above the din. more, he didn't want to be called a fascist. It didn't seem
stopped looking for approval; he didn't bother to get up
fair, Monkey saying that, making him look bad in front birds found the eating habits of the reptiles, who thought plaintive howl, his head tilted back like a mountaintop
of the others. It was the one charge you couldn't defend eggs were a delicacy, disgusting and drew away in horror; wolf silhouetted by the moon in a Warner Brothers car-
yourself against. Against his better judgment, the watch- the reptiles, who were proud of being cold-blooded, and toon — he did look like that — his insides hurting with
dog rose on his hindlegs and, praying this was the right had an elaborate theory of beauty based on the aesthetics the thought that if Tilford was dead, or indifferent to
thing, forced open the cage with his teeth. For a moment of scales, thought the body heat of the mammals cloying their problems, that if no one came to rescue them, then
Monkey did not move. He drew breath loudly and stared and nauseating, and refused to feed beside them, and this they were dead, too. True, there was a great deal of Tilford
at the open door. Cautiously, he stepped out, stood up to was fine for the mammals, who, led by Monkey, distrusted inside Berkeley, what he remembered from his training as
his full height, rubbed his bony hands together, then did a anyone odd enough to be born in an egg, and dismissed a pup, but this faint sense of procedure and fair play hard-
little dance and began throwing open the other cages one them as lowlifes on the evolutionary scale; they were ly seemed enough to keep order in the Shoppe, maintain
by one. shoveling down everything — bird food, dog biscuits, and the peace, and more important provide for them as the
Berkeley cringed. “The tarantula, too?” even the thin wafers reserved for the fish. old man had. He'd never looked upon himself as a leader,
Monkey gave him a cold glance over one shoulder. “Don't touch that!” said Berkeley. “The fish have to eat, preferring to attribute his distaste for decision to a rare
“You should get to know him, Berkeley. Don't be a bigot.” too! They can't leave the tanks!” ability to see all sides. He was no hero like Old Yeller, or
Berkeley shrank back as Tarantula, an item ordered by Monkey, startled by the watchdog, looked at the wafers the legendary Gellert, and testing his ribs with his teeth,
a Hell's Angel who never claimed him, shambled out — in his fist thoughtfully for a second, then crammed them he wondered how much weight he'd lost from worry. Ten
not so much an insect, it seemed to Berkeley, as Pestilence into his mouth. “That's their problem.” pounds? Twenty pounds? He covered both eyes with his
on legs. (“Be fair!” he scolded himself. “He's okay, I'm Deep inside, Berkeley began a rumbling bark, let black paws, whimpered a little, feeling a failure of nerve, a
okay, we're all okay.”) He watched helplessly as Monkey it build slowly, and by the time it hit the air it was a soft white core of fear like a slug in his stomach. Then he
smashed the ant farm, freed the birds, and then the entire full-throated growl so frightening that Monkey jumped drew breath and, with it, hew determination. The owner
troupe, united by the spirit of a bright, common future, four, maybe five feet into the air. He threw the wafers at couldn't be dead. Monkey would never convince him of
slithered, hopped, crawled, bounded, flew, and clawed its Berkeley. “Okay — okay, give it to 'em! But remember that. He simply had business elsewhere. And when he
way into the storeroom to feed. All except crankled, old one thing, dog: You're a mammal, too. It's unnatural to returned, he would expect to find the Shoppe as he left
Tortoise, whom Monkey hadn't freed, who, in fact, didn't take sides against your own kind.” it. Maybe even running more smoothly, like an old Swiss
want to be released and snapped at Monkey's fingers Scornfully, the watchdog turned away, trembling with watch that he had wound and left ticking. When the
when he tried to open his cage. No one questioned it. fury. He snuffled up the wafers in his mouth, carried watchdog tightened his jaws, they creaked at the hinges,
Tortoise had escaped the year before, remaining at large them to the huge, man-sized tanks, and dropped them in but he tightened them all the same. His eyes narrowed.
for a week, and then he returned mysteriously on his own, amongst the sea horses, guppies, and jellyfish throbbing No evil had visited the Shoppe from outside. He'd seen to
his eyes strangely unfocused, as if he'd seen the end of like hearts. Goldfish floated toward him, his voice flutter- that. None, he vowed, would destroy it from within.
the world, or a vision of the world to come. He hadn't ing. He kept a slightly startled expression. “What the hell But he could not be everywhere at once. The corrosion
spoken in a year. Hunched inside his shell, hardly eating is going on? Where's Mr. Tilford?” grew day by day. Cracks, then fissures began to appear, it
at all, Tortoise lived in the Shoppe, but you could hardly Berkeley strained to keep his voice steady. “Gone.” seemed to Berkeley, everywhere, and in places where he
say he was part of it, and even the watchdog was a little “For good?” asked Goldfish. “Berkeley, we heard what least expected them. Puddles and pyramidal plops were
leery of him. Berkeley, for his part, had lost his hunger. the others said. They'll let us starve —” scattered underfoot like traps. Bacterial flies were every-
He dragged himself, wearily, to the front door, barked “No,” he said. “I'll protect you.” where. Then came maggots. Hamsters gnawed at electri-
frantically when a woman walked by, hoping she would Goldfish bubbled relief, then looked panicky again. cal cords in the storeroom. Frog fell sick with a genital
stop, but after seeing the window sign, which read-- “What if Tilford doesn't come back ever?” infection. The fish, though the gentlest of creatures,
CLOSED--from his side, she stepped briskly on. His tail The watchdog let his head hang. The thought seemed caused undertow by demanding day-and-night protec-
between his legs, he went slowly back to the storeroom, too terrible to consider. He said, more to console himself tion, claiming they were handicapped in the competition
hoping for the best, but what he found there was no sight than Goldfish, “It's his Shoppe. He has to come back.” for food, confined to their tanks, and besides, they were
for a peace-loving watchdog. “But suppose he is dead, like Monkey says.” Goldfish's from the most ancient tree; all life came from the sea,
True to his word, Monkey had broken open the feed unblinking, lidless eyes grabbed at Berkeley and refused they argued, the others owed them.
bags and boxes of food, but the animals, who had always to release his gaze. “Then it's our Shoppe, right?” Old blood feuds between beasts erupted, too, grudges
been kept apart by Tilford, discovered as they crowded “Eat your dinner.” so tired you'd have thought them long buried, but not
into the tiny storeroom and fell to eating that sitting Goldfish called, “Berkeley, wait —” so. The Siamese began to give Berkeley funny looks, and
down to table with creatures so different in their gastro- But the watchdog was deeply worried now. He left the room whenever he entered. Berkeley let him be,
nomic inclinations took the edge off their appetites. The returned miserably to the front door. He let fly a long, thinking he'd come to his senses. Instead, he jumped
Rabbit when Berkeley wasn't looking, the product of this woofed in his sleep, seeing himself schtupping the little struck by thieves who specialized in stealing exotic birds.
assault promising a new creature — a cabbit — with jack- French poodle down the street, and it was good, like Monkey had it now. Berkeley's water ran down his legs.
rabbit legs and long feline whiskers never seen in the Pet making love to lightning, she moved so well with him; He'd propped the pistol between the cash register and
Shoppe before. Rabbit took this badly. In the beginning and then of his puppyhood, when his worst problems a display of plastic dog collars, and his wide, yellow grin
she sniffed a great deal, and with good reason — rape was were remembering where he'd buried food from Tilford's was frighteningly like that of a general Congress has just
a vicious thing — but her grief and pain got out of hand, table, or figuring out how to sneak away from his mother, given the go-ahead to on a scorched-earth policy.
and soon she was lost in it with no way out, like a child in who told him all dogs had cold noses because they were “Get it!” said Parrot. “You promised to protect us,
a dark forest, and began organizing the females of every late coming to the Ark and had to ride next to the rail. Berkeley!”
species to stop cohabiting with the males. Berkeley stood His dream cycled on, ans all dreams do, with greater and For a few fibrous seconds he stood trembling paw-
back, afraid to butt in because Rabbit said that it was greater clarity from one chamber of vision to the next un- deep in dung, the odor of decay burning his lungs, but he
none of his damned business and he was as bad as all the til he saw, just before waking, the final drawer of dream- couldn't come full awake, and still he felt himself to be
rest. He pleaded reason, his eyes burnt-out from sleepless- work spill open on the owner's return. Splendidly dressed; on the fringe of a dream, his hair moist because dream-
ness, with puffy bags beneath them, and when that did no wearing a bowler hat and carrying a walking stick, sober, ing of the French poodle had made him sweat. But the
good, he pleaded restraint. with a gentle smile for Berkeley (Berkeley was sure), pistol . . . There was no power balance now. He'd been
“The storeroom's half-empty,” he told Monkey on Tilford threw open the Pet Shoppe door in a blast of outplayed. No hope unless he took it away. Circling the
the fifth day. “If we don't start rationing the food, we'll wind and burst of preternatural brilliance that rayed the counter, head low and growling, or trying to work up a
starve.” whole room, evaporated every shadow, and brought the decent growl, Berkeley crept to the cash register, his chest
“There's always food.” squabbling, the conflict of interpretations, mutations, and pounding, bunched his legs to leap, then sprang, pre-
Berkeley didn't like the sound of that. “Where?” internecine battles to a halt. No one dared move. They tending the black explosion of flame and smoke was like
Smiling, Monkey swung his eyes to the fishtanks. stood frozen like a fish in ice, or a bird caught in the television gunfire, though it ripped skin right off his ribs,
“Don't you go near those goldfish!” crosswinds, the colorless light behind the owner so blind- sent teeth flying down his throat, and blew him back like
Monkey stood at bay, his eyes tacked hatefully on ing it obliterated their outlines, blurred their precious an empty pelt against Tortoise's cage. He lay still. Now
Berkeley, who ground his teeth, possessed by the sud- differences, as if each were a rill of the same ancient light he felt nothing in his legs. Purple blood like that deepest
den, wild desire to bite him, but knowing, finally, that somehow imprisoned in form, with being-formed itself in the body cascaded to the floor from his side, rushing
he had the upper hand in the Pet Shoppe, the power. In the most preposterous of conditions, outrageous, when out with each heartbeat, and he lay twitching a little, only
other words, bigger teeth. As much as he hated to admit you thought it through, because it occasioned suffer- seeing now that he'd slept too long. Flames licked along
it, his only advantage, if he hoped to hold the line, his ing, meant separation from other forms, and the illusion the floor. Fish floated belly up in a dark, unplugged fish-
only trump, if he truly wanted to keep them afloat, was of-identity, but even this ended like a dream within the tank. The females had torn Siamese to pieces. Speckled
the fact that he outweighed them all. They were afraid watchdog's dream, and only he and the owner remained. lizards were busy sucking baby canaries from their eggs.
of him. Oddly enough, the real validity of his values and Reaching down, he stroked Berkeley's head. And at last And in the holy ruin of the Pet Shoppe the tarantula
viewpoint rested, he realized, on his having the biggest he said, like God whispering to Samuel: Well done. It was roamed free over the corpses of Frog and Iguana. Beneath
paw. The thought fretted him. For all his idealism, truth all Berkeley had ever wanted. He woofed again, snoring him, Berkeley heard the ancient Tortoise stir, clearing a
was decided in the end by those who could be bloodiest like a sow, and scratched in his sleep; he heard the owner rusty throat clogged from disuse. Only he would survive
in fang and claw. Yet and still, Monkey had an arrogance whisper begun, which was a pretty strange thing for him the spreading fire, given his armor. His eyes burning
that made Berkeley weak in the knees. to say, even for Tilford, even in a dream. His ears strained from the smoke, the watchdog tried to explain his dream
“Dog,” he said, scratching under one arm, “you got to forward; begun, Tilford said again. And for an instant before the blaze reached them. “We could have endured,
sleep sometime.” Berkeley thought he had the tense wrong, intending to we had enough in common — for Christ's sake, we're all
And so Berkeley did. After hours of standing guard in say, “Now we can begin,” or something prophetically ap- animals.”
the storeroom, or trying to console Rabbit, who was now propriate like that, but suddenly he was awake, and Parrot “Indeed,” said Tortoise grimly, his eyes like headlights
talking of aborting the cabbit, begging her to recon- was flapping his wings and shouting into Berkeley's ear. in a shell that echoed cavernously. “Indeed.” [1984]
sider, or reassuring the birds, who crowded together in “The gun,” said Parrot. “Monkey has it.”
one corner against, they said, threatening moves by the Berkeley's eyes, still phlegmed by sleep, blearily panned
reptiles, or splashing various medicines on Frog, whose the counter. The room was swimming, full of smoke from
sickness had now spread to the iguana — after all this, a fire in the storeroom. He was short of wind. And, worse,
Berkeley did drop fitfully to sleep by the front door. He he'd forgotten about the gun, a Smith and Wesson, that
slept greedily, dreaming of better days. He twitched and Tilford had bought after pet shop owners in Seattle were