Free Through a Window by Jane Goodall

between herself and her mother was very close indeed—even
closer, in some ways, than that between Fifi and Flo. Passion would always back up her daughter during squabbles with other community females and Pom had become assertive and aggressive in her dealings with them. When Passion was not close by, the others would often retaliate, picking a fight with Pom. But if Passion was close enough to hear her daughter's screaming she would race to her defence and mother and daughter together would then punish the female concerned. And Pom typically tried to help and support her mother in the same way.
    One such incident is clear in my mind. I had followed Pom all morning and was watching as she and another female, Nope, fished for termites. Presently we heard pant-hoots, then some screams, about half a mile to the west, further down the valley. Both females stared towards the sounds but while Nope at once returned to her feeding, Pom continued to gaze westward. After a few moments there was another outburst of calling. Nope paid no attention, but Pom gave a little grin of fear, reached to touch Nope, and continued to look towards the distant group. A minute later came the frenzied screaming of a chimpanzee being attacked. Instantly, with a squeak of fear, Pom was off, racing towards the sounds. There was, fortunately for me, a rough trail and I was not left too far behind. We ran for about five hundred yards and then, as I burst through a tangle of vines, I saw that Pom had joined her mother and was grooming her. Both Passion and Prof, who was up in a tree above, were bleeding from fresh wounds, received, without doubt, during the attacks we had just heard. An adult male charged towards us, hit out at Passion and her daughter, then charged away, leaving the family alone.
    Even during the periods when Pom was pink and went off in search of sexual gratification, Passion often went with her. And if Pom did travel with the males on her own, she usually returned quite soon to the reassuring company of her mother and little Prof. Not until her sixth pinkness was Pom observed to sleep with a group of males far away from her family.
    Unlike Fifi, Pom was seldom taken on consortships—and at least part of the reason lay in her unusually close relationship with Passion. I well remember one hot September afternoon in 1976, when at midday I found Pom accompanied, as usual, by her mother and brother. With them was Satan—and he was trying most desperately to lead Pom away to the north. Pom, however, had no desire to go with him. Again and again, hair bristling, eyes glaring, Satan swayed vegetation at the young female, then moved off in his chosen direction, looking back to see if she was following. Again and again Pom ignored these summonses. Several times, exasperated, Satan swaggered around Pom, threatening her. And when this happened Pom, screaming loudly, rushed to Passion for comfort. Then Passion, tough old bird that she was, glared at the big male and uttered a string of angry—and surely abusive—waa-barks. Once Satan attacked Pom, and immediately Passion, with furious barks, hurled herself at her daughter's assailant, hitting him with her fists. Satan was probably as surprised as I was! He left the daughter and turned on the mother—but he only attacked her mildly. Passion and Pom then groomed each other for a long time while Satan sat, glowering, nearby. After this he made only two more swaggering attempts to impose his will—and then, nearly four hours after I had first encountered them, he gave up and went off on his own. Pom had been well chaperoned!
    The birth of a first baby, is, for the mother, an event of epic significance. And in Fifi's case the birth was of great significance for me also. Indeed, during the eight months of Fifi's pregnancy I was almost (but not quite!) as impatient as I had been during my own pregnancy four years earlier. Would she, as I predicted, be the same kind of mother as