“Sure, it’s on our website. Do you want to join our group?”

“What do you mean?”

“There’s a committee of the volunteer group, FONZ? Friends of the National Zoo. You can join that, it’s called the Feral Observation Group.”

“The FOG?”

“Yes. We’re all in the FOG now, right?”

“Yes.”

She gave him the website address, and he checked it out. It turned out to be a good one. Some 1500 FONZies already. There was a page devoted to the Khembalis’ swimming tigers, and on the FOG page, a list of the animals that had been spotted, as well as a separate list for animals missing since the flood and not yet seen. There was a jaguar on this list. And gibbons had been seen, eight of them, white-cheeked gibbons, along with three siamangs. Almost always in Rock Creek Park.

“Hmmm.” Frank recalled the cry he had heard at dawn, pursued the creatures through the web pages. Gibbons and siamangs both hooted in a regular dawn chorus; siamangs were even louder than gibbons, being larger. Could be heard six miles rather than one.

It looked like being in FOG might confer permission to go into Rock Creek Park. You couldn’t observe animals in a park you were forbidden to enter. He called Nancy back. “Do FOG members get to go into Rock Creek Park?”

“Some do. We usually go in groups, but we have some individual permits you can check out.”

“Cool. Tell me how I do that.”

He left the building and walked down Wilson and up a side street, to the Optimodal Health Club. Diane had said it was within easy walking distance, and it was. That was good; and the place looked okay. Actually he had always preferred getting his “exercise” outdoors, by doing something challenging. Up until now he had felt that clubs like these were mostly just another way to corn-modify leisure time, in this case changing things people used to do outdoors, for free, into things they paid to do inside. Silly as such.