The Scrivener: The Wrong Place
…Creatures have a way of finding themselves in the wrong place. During another African night, when the chirps and croaks of the bush were music to the waking ears. I heard another sound. It wasn't music. It was a quiet tap-tap-tap…
Brian Barratt tells of creatures which have flown, crawled or climbed themselves into a fix.
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Waking up in the grey half-light of an African morning, I glanced across the room and saw something black twitching on the floor. It didn't appear to have legs, so I put on my glasses for a closer look. Black, more or less triangular in shape, and twitching. What horrific creature had come to visit me during the night? I switched the light on.
A small bat had crept through the gap below the outside door. It must have stunned itself, dropped to the ground, and sought refuge. No horror for me but, oh dear, poor little bat. So I opened the door and carefully swept it outside, hoping it would not become breakfast for something higher in the food chain.
Creatures have a way of finding themselves in the wrong place. During another African night, when the chirps and croaks of the bush were music to the waking ears. I heard another sound. It wasn't music. It was a quiet tap-tap-tap. I got up and opened the door. Nobody there. Puzzled, I went back to bed.
Tap, tap, tap. There it was again. Inside the room. Something knocking on wood. Puzzlement became alarm. I carefully opened the rather flimsy wooden wardrobe door. Clinging to the inside was a tiny gecko. It was enjoying a midnight snack. The unfortunate meal was a locust, as big as the little lizard itself. Each time the gecko took a gulp, it knocked the locust's head on the wardrobe door. Tap, tap, tap. For the gecko, my wardrobe was probably home. For the unfortunate locust, it was a case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Cats have a habit of being in the wrong place but, as far as they're concerned, it's the right place. At a friend's house one evening, I watched a purry furry pussy sleeping somewhat precariously on the slippery seat of an old wooden chair. The seat wasn't exactly horizontal. It had a gentle slope. And the cat gently and very slowly slid toward the edge — ThroPLONK! It suddenly fell off and landed in a squalling heap on the floor. I have never seen such an indignant cat.
During my last visit to England, I admired the great elm trees in the picturesque village of South Collingham in Nottinghamshire. Two local pedigree Burmese cats evidently liked them, too. Now Burmese cats, beautiful though they are, are very adventurous bird-hunters. I was told how two of them had climbed very nearly to the top of one of those elms. At 25 to 30 metres from the ground, they were definitely in the wrong place. The fire brigade had to be called out, to rescue them.
And there is news of a fox which climbed to an even greater height. Yes, a fox. London workmen discovered it on the 72nd floor of the Shard, which when finished will be the tallest building in Europe. That's about 280 metres above ground level. They fed it with food scraps for a couple of weeks until experts were able to catch it, bring it down to Earth, check its health, tell it that if foxes were meant to be 72 storeys up they would have evolved wings by now, and set it free.
I'm not so sure about that. My poor little bat had wings and it finished up in the wrong place, on my floor.
© Copyright Brian Barratt 2011
