MICHAEL CRICHTON

“Was there a written contract?”“No, I just called the zoo director.”Morton nodded. “Oral agreement. . .“ he said, writing. “And when the threeyears were up?”“That was the spring of 1976. 1 asked the zoo for an extension of six years,and they gave it to me.”“Again orally?”“Yes. I called on the phone.”“No correspondence?”“No. They didn’t seem very interested when I called. To tell you the truth, Ithink they had forgotten about Amy. The zoo has four gorillas, anyway.”Morton frowned. “Isn’t a gorilla a pretty expensive animal? I mean, if youwanted to buy one for a pet or for the circus.”“Gorillas are on the endangered list; you can’t buy them as pets. But yes,they’d be pretty expensive.”“How expensive?”“Well, there’s no established market value, but it would be twenty or thirtythousand dollars.”“And all during these years, you have been teaching her language?”“Yes,” Peter said. “American Sign Language. She has a vocabulary of sixhundred and twenty words now.”“Is that a lot?”“More than any known primate.”Morton nodded, making notes. “You work with her every day in ongoingresearch?”“Yes.”“Good,” Morton said. “That’s been very important in the animal custody casesso far.”For more than a hundred years, there had been organized movements inWestern countries to stop animal experimentation. They were led by the antivivisectionists,the RSPCA, the ASPCA. Originally these organizations were akind of lunatic fringe of animal lovers, intent on stopping all animal research.36