Theorists. They might even get their names latinized and made part of the new species’ name. Gorilla montani adrakianias-budgeon.
I couldn’t help myself; I had to speak up. “If we found good evidence of a yeti it would be our duty to get rid of it and forget about it,” I said, perhaps a bit too loudly.
They all stared at me. “Whatever for?” Valerie said.
“For the sake of the yeti, obviously,” I said. “As animal behaviorists you’re presumably concerned about the welfare of the animals you study, right? And the ecospheres they live in? But if the existence of the yeti were confirmed, it would be disastrous for both. There would be an invasion of expeditions, tourists, poachers—yetis in zoos, in primate center cages, in laboratories under the knife, stuffed in museums—” I was getting upset. “I mean what’s the real value of the yeti for us, anyway?” They only stared at me: value? “Their value is the fact that they’re unknown, they’re beyond science. They’re the part of the wilderness we can’t touch.”
“I can see Nathan’s point,” Sarah remarked in the ensuing silence, with a look at me that made me lose my train of thought. Her agreement meant an awful lot more than I would have expected…
The others were shaking their heads. “A nice sentiment,” Valerie said. “But really, hardly any of them would be affected by study. Think what they’d add to our knowledge of primate evolution!”
“Finding one would be a contribution to science,” Phil said, glaring at Sarah. And he really believed that, too, I have to give him that.
Armaat said slyly, “It wouldn’t do any harm to our chances for tenure, either.”
“There is that,” Phil admitted. “But the real point is, you have to abide by what’s true. If we found a yeti we’d be obliged to say so, because it was so—no matter how we felt about it. Otherwise you get into suppressing data, altering data, all that kind of thing.”
I shook my head. “There are values that are more important than scientific integrity.”
And the argument went on from there, mostly repeating points. “You’re an idealist,” Phil said to me at one point. “You can’t do zoology without disturbing some subject animals to a certain extent.”
“Maybe that’s why I got out,” I said. And I had to stop myself from going further. How could I say that he was corrupted by the tremendous job pressures in the field to the point where he’d do anything to make a reputation, without the argument getting ugly? Impossible. And Sarah would be upset with me. I only sighed. “What about the subject animal?”
Valerie said indignantly, “They’d trank it, study it, put it back in its environment. Maybe keep one in captivity, where it would live a lot more comfortably than in the wild.”
Total corruption. Even the botanists looked uncomfortable with that one.
“I don’t think we have to worry,” Armaat said with his sly smile. “The beast is supposed to be nocturnal.” —Because Phil had shown no enthusiasm for night blinds, you see.
“Exactly why I’m starting a high-valley night blind,” Phil snapped, tired of Armaat’s needling. “Nathan, I’ll need you to come along and help set it up.”
“And find the way,” I said. The others continued to argue, Sarah taking my position, or at least something sympathetic to it; I retired, worried about the figure in the shadows I had seen that day. Phil watched me suspiciously as I left.
So, Phil had his way, and we set up a tiny blind in the upper valley to the west of the one I had made the sighting in. We spent several nights up in an oak tree, and saw a lot of Himalayan spotted deer, and some monkeys at dawn. Phil should have been pleased, but he only got sullen. It occurred to me from some of his mutterings that he had hoped all along to find the yeti; he had come craving that big discovery.
And one night it happened. The moon was gibbous, and thin clouds let most of its light through. About two hours before dawn I was in a doze, and Adrakian elbowed me. Wordlessly he pointed at the far side of a small pool in the stream.
Shadows in shadows, shifting. A streak of moonlight on the water—then, silhouetted above it, an upright figure. For a moment I saw its head clearly, a tall, oddly shaped, furry skull. It looked almost human.
I wanted to shout a warning; instead I shifted my weight on the platform. It creaked very slightly, and instantly the figure was gone.
“Idiot!” Phil whispered. In the moonlight he looked murderous. “I’m going after him!” He jumped out of the tree and pulled what I assumed was a tranquilizer pistol from his down jacket.
“You can’t find anything out there at night!” I whispered, but he was gone. I climbed down and took off after him—with what purpose I wasn’t sure.
Well, you know the forest at night. Not a chance of seeing animals, or of getting around very easily, either. I have to give it to Adrakian—he was fast, and quiet. I lost him immediately, and after that only heard an occasional snapped branch in the distance. More than an hour passed, and I was only wandering through the trees. The moon had set and the sky was about halfway to dawn light when I returned to the stream.
I rounded a big boulder that stood on the bank and almost ran straight into a yeti coming the other way, as if we were on a busy sidewalk and had veered the same direction to avoid each other. He was a little shorter than me; dark fur covered his body and head, but left his face clear—a patch of pinkish skin that in the dim light looked quite human. His nose was as much human as primate—broad, but protruding from his face—like an extension of the occipital crest that ridged his skull fore-to-aft. His mouth was broad and his jaw, under its ruff of fur, very broad—but nothing that took him outside the parameters of human possibility. He had thick eyebrow crests bent high over his eyes, so that he had a look of permanent surprise, like a cat I once owned.
At this moment I’m sure he really was surprised. We both were as still as trees, swaying gently in the wind of our confrontation—but no other movement. I wasn’t even breathing. What to do? I noticed he was carrying a small smoothed stick, and there in the fur on his neck were some objects on a cord. His face—tools—ornamentation: a part of me, the part outside the shock of it all, was thinking (I suppose I am still a zoologist at heart), They aren’t just primates, they’re hominid .
As if to confirm this idea, he spoke to me. He hummed briefly; squeaked; sniffed the air hard a few times; lifted his lip (quite a canine was revealed) and whistled, very softly. In his eyes there was a question, so calmly, gently, and intelligently put forth that I could hardly believe I couldn’t understand and answer it.
I raised my hand, very slowly, and tried to say “Hello.” I know, stupid, but what do you say when you meet a yeti? Anyway, nothing came out but a strangled “Huhn.”
He tilted his head to the side inquisitively, and repeated the sound. “Huhn. Huhn. Huhn.”
Suddenly he jacked his head forward and stared past me, upstream. He opened his mouth wide and stood there listening. He stared at me, trying to judge me. (I swear I could tell these things!)
Upstream there was a crash of branches, and he took me by the arm and wham, we were atop the stream bank and in the forest. Hoppety-hop through the trees and we were down on our bellies behind a big fallen log, lying side-by-side in squishy wet moss. My arm hurt.
Phil Adrakian appeared down in the streambed, looking considerably the worse for wear. He’d scraped through some brush and torn the nylon of his down jacket in several places, so that fluffy white down wafted away from him as he walked. And he’d fallen in mud somewhere. The yeti squinted hard as he looked at him, clearly mystified by the escaping down.