Of course, in the current job market, a lot of Ph.D.'s ended up driving cabs and flipping burgers. I Googled his father's name and came across an obituary from seven years ago. Okay, that fit. The old man dies; Patrick gets his hands on the family fortune, and two years later, the Caerphilly Zoo is born. Allowing for the time needed to probate the will and hunt down a suitable tract of land, that sounded perfect.
And five years to run through his inheritance and find himself and his charges at the brink of bankruptcy.
I printed out a couple of pages from the site, just in case, but I had a feeling I’d exhausted the information to be found online about Lanahan.
Unlike the Caerphilly Zoo, the Clay County Zoo didn’t have a Web site. I did find an address, though, and checked one of the mapping sites to make sure I knew how to get there if need be. It wasn’t hard—there were only three roads in Clay County large enough to have state route numbers, and luckily the zoo was on one of them. Not far from the courthouse, by the look of it, and I knew how to get there, thanks to Michael's and my sneak visit to get the marriage license.
I sighed, and tried to wiggle into a more comfortable position. But the library's computer chairs weren’t designed for long-term comfort. Perhaps that was deliberate. The computers were supposed to benefit as many patrons as possible, and the chairs helped ensure that no one monopolized them. Already I could see an elderly man sitting at a nearby table, glancing up from his magazine from time to time to frown at me and look pointedly at his watch.
I returned to Google's main search page and typed in “Montgomery Blake.”
The first entry was Blake's own Web site. I decided to check it out.
It was much as I’d expected. Reports on what the Montgomery Blake Foundation was doing to preserve the environment on six or seven continents. Pictures of Blake with birds, animals, and reptiles of all kinds—presumably grateful members of species that were considerably less endangered as a result of his efforts. Though most of them didn’t look particularly grateful. The snow leopard cub was trying to sink his tiny, sharp fangs into Blake's hand. The monkey's bare teeth suggested that he was planning a similar attempt. The ten-foot snake draped like a stole around Blake's shoulders had lifted its head and turned it toward Blake, and was gazing at his face with calm,
reptilian interest, as if trying to determine if he was edible. Or perhaps he was recognizing a soul mate.
A sudden wave of nostalgia hit me. Many of my fondest childhood memories were of Dad strolling into the kitchen or the living room holding a wild creature, dead or alive, to give us an impromptu biology lesson. Mice, voles, shrews, snakes, snapping turtles, rabbits, and bats from the backyard or the nearby woods, and an apparently endless supply of slightly flattened possums plucked from the highway. Most of the live animals would be trying to escape or to bite Dad—sometimes both at once—and invariably, if Mother was home, Dad's lectures would be punctuated by shrieks of “Get it out! Get that thing out of my house! Now!”
Once Dad had rounded up the largest possible audience— preferably all three kids plus any stray cousins or neighbors visiting that day—he’d adjourn to the backyard to continue his lesson, which invariably ended with someone taking a picture of Dad with his catch, followed by a trek to the woods to bury the dead animals or release the wild animals at a safe distance from any busy roads.
Apparently Montgomery Blake enjoyed similar amusements with the far more varied and exotic creatures he found in his travels, with the added advantage of a full-time professional camera crew.
But as I clicked and moused my way through Blake's Web site, I couldn’t see any indication that he’d previously taken an interest in any small-town zoos.
Perhaps Patrick Lanahan had acquired an unusual specimen— some rare exotic or endangered animal hiding in plain sight among the more ordinary llamas and penguins. Once I finally got an inventory of the zoo's animals, I’d try to find out.
I was about to leave the site when, near the bottom of one page, I noticed a link to the Anthony Blake Memorial Fellowship. His father, perhaps? At any rate, it seemed like the first bit of personal information on the site, so I clicked the link.
“Checking up on our distinguished visitor?”
Chapter 30
I started, and turned to find Ellie Draper, the librarian, looking over my shoulder. As usual, her ensemble combined formality and practicality. She wore a conservative gray suit with a long, pleated skirt. A purple silk scarf tied around her neck added a note of color, as did her purple running shoes.
“Trying to see if he's really a suitable associate for Dad,” I said. “Am I the only one who finds it a little strange for a world-famous naturalist to show up here in Caerphilly, worrying about the problems of a dinky little private zoo?”