iraffes fastidiously
observed her from their melancholy eminence, and the pink-lined trunks
of elephants cautiously abstracted buns from her outstretched hands.
Then there were the hothouses. He saw her bending over pythons coiled
upon the sand, or considering the brown rock breaking the stagnant water
of the alligators' pool, or searching some minute section of tropical
forest for the golden eye of a lizard or the indrawn movement of the
green frogs' flanks. In particular, he saw her outlined against the deep
green waters, in which squadrons of silvery fish wheeled incessantly,
or ogled her for a moment, pressing their distorted mouths against the
glass, quivering their tails straight out behind them. Again, there was
the insect house, where she lifted the blinds of the little cages, and
marveled at the purple circles marked upon the rich tussore wings of
some lately emerged and semi-conscious butterfly, or at caterpillars
immobile like the knobbed twigs of a pale-skinned tree, or at slim green
snakes stabbing the glass wall again and again with their flickering
cleft tongues. The heat of the air, and the bloom of heavy flowers,
which swam in water or rose stiffly from great red jars, together
with the display of curious patterns and fantastic shapes, produced an
atmosphere in which human beings tended to look pale and to fall silent.

Opening the door of a house which rang with the mocking and profoundly
unhappy laughter of monkeys, they discovered William and Cassandra.
William appeared to be tempting some small reluctant animal to descend
from an upper perch to partake of half an apple. Cassandra was reading
out, in her high-pitched tones, an account of this creature's secluded
disposition and nocturnal habits. She saw Katharine and exclaimed:

"Here you are! Do prevent William from torturing this unfortunate
aye-aye."

"We thought we'd lost you," said William. He looked from one to the
other, and seemed to take stock of Denham's unfashionable appearance. He
seemed to wish to find some outlet for malevolence, but, failing one,
he remained silent. The glance, the slight quiver of the upper lip, were
not lost upon Katharine.

"William isn't kind to animals," she remarked. "He doesn't know what
they like and what they don't like."

"I take it you're well versed in these matters, Denham," said Rodney,
withdrawing his hand with the apple.

"It's mainly a question of knowing how to stroke them," Denham replied.

"