Dr. Tyler set to work with amazing, uncanny speed. He had never been more skilful in closing sutures of the flesh in any of his myriad of operations. He was a man inspired as he labored on the task of changing Lee Bentley from a normal human being to a Colombian ape.
While the surgeon worked his son telephoned to the Colombian explorer whose return from Latin-America had been mentioned in the day’s news. He couldn’t explain anything over the telephone, he said, but would Doctor Jackson come at once to the private offices of James Tyler, surgeon?
Doctor Jackson grumbled, but the urgency in the voice of Tyler convinced him that the thing was important. He promised to be on hand within an hour. It then lacked a few minutes of three o’clock in the morning.
Next at Bentley’s suggestion––and he talked quickly and eagerly to keep his mind off the ordeal he knew he was facing––Tyler got the curator of the Bronx Zoo out of bed and asked him to wait upon Doctor Tyler immediately.
At four o’clock Doctor Jackson and the curator entered the room where Surgeon Tyler had performed a miracle. 245
Doctor Jackson stepped back in amazement when he noted the manlike ape which leaned with arms folded against one wall of the operating room. His eyes were big with amazement.
He studied Bentley for several minutes, while no one spoke a word.
It was the curator who broke the strained silence.
“So this is your Colombian ape,” he said. “I read the news story, but I understood that the ape you had found had been killed in the attempt to capture it.”