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Grand-mama produced a small card from her pocket. ‘We are here at the personal invitation of Lord Vetinari.’ The keeper stood to attention, saluted, and a large smile broke the crust between the moustache and beard.

    ‘Good morning, ma’am. My name is Pontoon, with an emphasis on the “oon”, and I have the privilege of being his lordship’s head keeper. Please do come in, we have been expecting you. What would you like to see first, young man? The largest animal we have here is the Hermit Elephant from Howondaland, and the smallest is the Llamedos Swimming Shrew. We’ve got Acrobatic Meerkats, Counting Camels, a Ring-maned Lion, a Reciprocating Ocelot – be very careful there – and Dancing Bears, to name but a few.’
    ‘I would very much like to see the elephants first, please,’ said Geoffrey.
    The old man tapped a finger to his nose and, in the tone of a connoisseur, said, ‘Very wise choice, young man, everyone should see the elephants.’
    As they walked towards a large enclosure Geoffrey started to explain to the keeper about his poo museum. ‘I’d really like to collect some poo from all of your animals. I’ve even brought my own bucket,’ he added.
    Mister Pontoon scratched his beard, causing a number of unidentified objects to fall out. ‘Well, young man, that is a rare and unusual hobby, but his lordship did say that I was to help you in every way. Your Grand-mama must be a very influential lady. But it wouldn’t be safe for you to go in their cages with your bucket and spade. Besides, all of the poo would get a bit mixed up in just one bucket and you would end up with what we in the industry call miscellaneous poo, and you don’t want that.
    ‘I’ll ask young Gus – he’s the junior assistant keeper – to get the wheelbarrow out. It’ll be good experience for him.’
    He whistled sharply and a boy of about fourteen, with a shock of straw-coloured hair on which was perched, back to front, an old keeper’s hat, emerged from a shed pushing a very official-looking wheelbarrow. He seemed too big for his clothes, with the exception of his boots, which would have fitted a giant.
    ‘We’ve got some old feed bags,’ said Mister Pontoon, ‘and there’s some waxed-paper bags that my missus puts my sandwiches in. That should do us for now and we can gather your samples as we go, so to speak.’
    They followed the boy pushing his barrow to a large enclosure, with a very high fence made of strong iron bars. Inside were a number of tea-cosy-shaped haystacks, some of which seemed to have door-openings, showing a dark interior. Quite suddenly one of the haystacks rose up on four stumpy grey legs and began to wander away. When it stopped a huge pile of poo dropped to the floor with a wet splatty sound.
    ‘Gosh,’ said Geoffrey, ‘I don’t think I’ve ever seen a poo as big as that before. If Plain Old Humphrey were here he’d want that for his compost heap.’ 2
    Geoffrey and his Grand-mama continued past what they now knew to be elephants to a large cage holding a sulky-looking camel. Unusually, the bars of this cage were horizontal rather than vertical, with large spherical beads threaded at intervals, which the camel listlessly pushed to and fro.

    ‘That’s a Counting Camel from Djelibeybi,’ said Mister Pontoon. ‘He gets really bored if we don’t keep him occupied. Careful in there, young Gus, don’t spoil the arrangement. You know how bad it gets if you move the decimal point when he’s in the middle of something.’
    ‘He does look very bad tempered,’ said Geoffrey.
    ‘He’ll spit at you as soon as look at you and I don’t think you want to start collecting
that
,’ said Mister Pontoon. ‘He’s very particular about his floating-point integers. So we’ll move on now, if you don’t mind. Now, look over there: that’s the Coat-Hanger Elk from Nothingfjord. It’s called that because its antlers make wonderful coat-hangers. Shame really, there’s not many left in the