Chapter 17

The Museum was a mad house on Monday. Apparently Education and Public Relations had taken the notion of getting visitors interested ("involved" appeared to be the appropriate catch word) and had run with it.

"Can I help you?" a woman in a suit asked me.

"I think I work here," I responded. "At least I did last Thursday."

"Oh. Jeremy! Jeremy!"

"Yes?" he was wearing a coat with nearly a dozen buttons up the front.

"I think this is the young man who had an idea. Can you cope with him, like a dear?"

"I'm Jeremy," he said.

"So I gathered," I responded. "Gordy." He didn't offer a hand.

"Can you tell me your idea?"

"Sure. It seemed to me that having thousands of specimens in glass cases wasn't exactly the best attraction for museum visitors and that we might be able to get more people – especially kids – interested."

"And... ?"

"No 'and', I suggested a few things. Look. I'm not an expert in PR or in museum exhibits. I'm a part-time worker here and a student at UNSW."

"I was told you said something about 'creepy crawlies' and a spider web." He had a tiny notebook and a gilt ballpoint.

"Oh, yes. I thought we could decorate the main entry over there so that it appeared you were entering a spiderweb or an ant colony. And, rather than 'Entomology', the signs might read 'This way to the creepy crawlies' or 'Come into my parlour'."

"Great. Great. And your name's Gordy?"

"Gordy Hollister."

"Great. Lots to work with. Thanks ever so..." and he was gone. I spotted my boss waving his hands at the woman. I sidled over, caught his eye, and said: "There's a problem with the pheidole."

He caught on right away. "There is? Oh dear. You'll have to pardon us." He took me by the elbow and steered us into his room, closing the door."

"Thank you. Very quick. How long before they go away?"

"Not long, sir. They have no idea what they're doing, so they'll look about and go off to pool their ignorance."

"You're right. Well, take a seat. We can talk about your work and our trip. How did you think of pheidole?"

"It's an invasive species and I saw you with an alien queen."

He started to laugh and soon had tears in his eyes. "Yes. I picked up on invasive. I never thought of her as a queen."

"Well the young man, Jeremy, was certainly a minor worker."

The laughter increased and he wiped his eyes. "Enough. Did you get your course work straightened out?"

"They won't even talk to me, yet."

"Go in tomorrow morning. Tell them its imperative. That I told you to get things in order. Throw my name around. Now, go out and see if they're still occupying space."

The woman and her entourage were gone, but Jeremy was in Room III, busy with a measuring tape.

"Is everything okay?" I asked.

"I suppose so," he mumbled. "They've gone off and left me with the work, as usual."

"Oh. Well. Sorry."

I went back. "All gone but the twit in the jacket," I reported.

"What's he doing?"

"Measuring the rooms, it seems."

"Aha. Maybe something will come of it all. We'll see. Now, our trip." He rummaged a bit and came up with a scrap of paper. "Hmmm. Are you into vertebrates at all?"

"No sir."

"Hmmm. Do you know any herpetologists? Herpetology students?"

"I know one. He's into lizards."

"Hmmm. Could he do a bit on Spencer's burrowing frog?"

"I don't know. I could ask."

"They want some data on range limits. Might be a bit into NSW. Join me for lunch?"

"Of course."

We were sitting when he said: "It's the damn CSIRO bureaucrats! I told them my intentions, so they found an additional chore. Range of Limnodynastes spenceri! You'll talk to this friend of yours?"