two metal handles that met in the middle. She took one in each hand and wrenched them downward. It took a minute, but then the seal broke, they too came open and she stood back.
It was a wolf, already mounted. A gray wolf, it looked like to her. It stood with its front paws close together, its head raised, as if listening. The mouth was shut; it did not look fierce at all, merely attentive, even faithful.
She turned to look at the right-hand door, where another white sticker read North America Mammals 1.1.7.01. Newfoundland wolf, Canis lupus beothucus. Canada native. Extermination. Wild specimen, @ 1911. It was a kind of wolf she hadn’t heard of, she thought. But she couldn’t leave it here: she would have it moved upstairs. The next cabinet took her by surprise: a huge penguin-like bird, black on its back and white on its stomach, standing on a fake rock. It was almost three feet tall, and had big, webbed feet and atrophied-looking wings. North America, Europe Birds. 1.2.1.02. Great auk, Pinguinus impennis. Iceland native. Collection. Zoo specimen, @ 1844.
The great auks were extinct—had been for a long time. She had read about it in one of the old man’s natural history books, a thick one in the library with lithographs or pen-and-ink drawings, she didn’t know which. She’d trailed her fingers over them for their minute details and the fineness of the lines. She found it while she was looking up another bird, looking up albatross. She’d wanted to know what kind of scenery an albatross would need, to order a fix on an albatross mount, and then she came to auk and read the auks’ story and it was impossible to forget. Auks mated for life; they did not know how to fly and walked very slowly, so they were easily taken. Around the middle of the nineteenth century the last known pair in existence was found incubating a single egg on a rock in Iceland. Both the adults were quickly dispatched by strangling and their only egg was crushed beneath a boot.
The auks had been known to be on their way out, down to that one last, isolated colony, and collectors had wanted them for the skins.
Had the wolf and the quagga also vanished?
She crossed the room and opened another cabinet at random—a small, square one at eye level. She saw what looked like a mouse. South America Mammals. 3.1.8.06. Darwin’s rice rat, Nesoryzomys darwini. Galápagos native. Competition by nonnatives. @ 1929.
Beside it, in another square compartment, was a brown frog with yellow spots sitting on a large plastic leaf, which looked, like most of the amphibian mounts in the old man’s collection, as though it had been shellacked. South America Amphibians. 3.3.7.14. Long-snouted jambato, Atelopus longirostris. Ecuador native. Uncertain; disease, weather warming. @ 1989.
She turned and went to another wall, opened another small locker and this time found a bird: Asia Birds. 5.2.2.08. Bonin Islands grosbeak, Chaunoproctus ferreorostris. Japan native. Habitat destruction by nonnatives. Zoo specimen, @ 1827.
She stopped and looked around her—the many closed doors beneath the fluorescent tubes, the few she’d left standing open with their mounts visible within. The bags of silica gel must be to keep them from molding, though it wouldn’t work forever. Maybe they were already gathering mildew, breeding the larvae of beetles and moths beneath their wings or claws . . . they should be moved, she should move them as soon as she could. She wondered what T. would say, with his interest in rare animal species. All of these were extinct, obviously; the dates would have to be when they disappeared.
In a dark back alcove off the main room, past what looked like a disused furnace, she saw a big glass case. There were no fluorescents on that section of ceiling and it was too dim to see; but maybe the case had its own light. She walked over and looked around on the wall for a switch, but couldn’t find one and impatiently turned on her flashlight instead.
Inside the case there was no backdrop—no diorama at all, only a bare plywood floor and an oversized bird skeleton. It was brown and ancient, not the usual clean white of bones, and its bill had a bulbous, rounded end. From head to foot the skeleton was easily the size of the great auk and looked like a dinosaur to her, maybe a kind of bird dinosaur, but the sticker on the side read Raphus