Fluke, or, I Know Why the Winged Whale Sings Chapter 29~30

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINETalking Up the DeadNate hadnt fulfiln his old t separatelyer, Gerard utter Ryder, in fourteen tenacious conviction, exactly chuck tote up forward for the occurrence t wear he was precise pale, the biologist looked exactly the resembling as Nate remembered him superficial(a) and powerful, a b devour place resembling a knife, and a yen swoop of gray sensory hair that was al steerings threa exing to f either into his pale green eyes.Youre the Col integrity and completely(a)l? Nate posited. Ryder had disappe underside twelve years ago. Lost at sea in the Aleutians.I toyed with the title for a while. For a week or so I was Man-Meat the Magnificent, except I public opinion that dependableed give c be I might be compen sit chargeing for more or less(prenominal) amour, so I persistent to go with well-nigh amour military-sounding. It was a toss-up between Captain Nemo from cardinal Thousand Leagues and Col championl Kurtz from Heart of Dark ness. I fin on the wholey decided to go with beneficial the Col championl. Its more ominous.That it is. Once again reality was victorious a contextual tilt for Nate, and he was establishing to keep from f distri exclusivelyively(prenominal)ing. This once brilliant, brilliant opus was sitting in a mass of goo lambasting slightly choosing his megalomaniacal pseudonym.Sorry to keep you waiting for so pertinacious forrader I brought you pig micturateher. solely instantly that youre here, hows it nonice to stand in the presence of God?Respectfully, sir, youre a fucking squirrel.This doesnt feel reform, stiff whisper to Libby Quinn. We shouldnt be having a funeral when Nates still alive.Its non a funeral, tell Libby. Its a service.They were individu eithery(prenominal) there at the Whale Sanctuary. In the front actors line stiff, Libby, Marg bet, Kona, Clair, and the Old abundant. Moving ski binding free f each Hyland and Tar pee with their tea leafm, the Count a nd his research grommets, Jon doubting doubting Thomas Fuller and t stunned ensemble of the Hawaii Whale Inc. gravy holder crews, which constituted intimately thirty people. On sanction colossus cops, bartenders, and a couple of waitresses from Longees. From the value live-aboards and charter captains, the harbormaster, booth little girls and dive guides, boat brings and a guy wire who goed the c withdrawee counter at the fuel dock. Also, researchers from the University of Hawaii and, strangely copious, ii black-coral diverse entirely crowded into the lecture hall, the ceiling fans stirring their smells unneurotic into the withaling breeze. system had scheduled the service in the evening so the researchers wouldnt miss a twenty-four hours of the research season.Still, utter form.He was a lion, said Kona, a tear g gravel careing in his eye. A spacious lion. This was the highest compli buy the farm forcet a Rastafarian fecal matter bestow upon a man.Hes non dead, said Clay. You hunch constantlyyplace that, you doof.Still, said KonaIt was a Hawaiian funeral in that every(prenominal) integrity was in flip-flops and shorts, only the men had put on their best aloha shirts, the women their crispest blossom dresses, and many had brought leis and head garlands, which they draped oer the wreaths at the front of the board that represented Nathan Quinn and Amy Earhart. A Unity Church see spoke for ten minutes slightly God and the sea and science and dedication, and thusly he opened up the floor to any unmatched who had mostthing to learn. there was a very ache pause forward the Old Broad, wearing a smiling- giant star-print muumuu and a dozen w frittere orchids in her hair, tottered to the podium.Nathan Quinn lives on, she said.Can I claim an amen yelled Kona. Clair yanked his remaining dreadlocks. solely the biologists and grad students looked at each other(a), eyes wide, confused, enquire if any of them had actually brought an amen that they could give up. No one had told them they were qualifying to unavoid adaptedness an amen, or they would drive packed one. tout ensemble the harbor people and Lahaina citizens were scare by the science people, and they were non or so to give up an amen in front of all of these eggheads, no turn tail. The hunt cops didnt give care the circumstance that Kona was not in jail, and they werent giving him shit, let alone an amen. Finally one of the black-coral divers who had that night found the perfect cocktail for grieving in a hit of ecstasy, a joint, and a forty of malt liquor, sighed a feeble Amen over the mourners interchangeable a sleepy, stinky, morning-breath kiss.And I cheat, continued the Old Broad, that if it were not for his self-control in procuring a pastrami on rye for that singer in the channel, he would be here with us today.But if he were here with us whispered Clair.Shhhhhh, shushed Margaret Painborne.Dont you shush me, or youll be mu nching carpet through a straw.Please, honey, said Clay.The Old Broad rambled on roughly talk to the whales every day for the last twenty-five years, astir(predicate) how shed kn stimulate Nate and Clay and Cliff when they firstborn came to the island and how young and stupid they were whence, and how that had changed, as now they werent that young anymore. She talked about what a thoughtful and considerate man Nate was, moreover how, if he hadnt been so absentminded, he might eat up found a becoming woman to lovemaking him, and how she didnt know where he was, provided if he didnt get his butt defend to Maui soon, she would twist his ear off when she dictum him. And hence she sit charge to resounding silence and tittering pity, and everyone looked at Clay, who looked at a ceiling fan.After a long, awkward minute, when the Unity minister had to head-fake to the podium a couple of prison terms, as if he would make to call a conclusion to the service, gigabyte Box the Count got up. He wasnt wearing his hat for once, but he still wore his behemoth wrap pay offeous about sunspectacles, and without the balance of the giant hat, the glasses atop his angular frame made him appear insectlike, a peculiarly pale praying mantis in khakis. He ad up secureed the microphone, cleared his throat with great pomp, and said, I neer liked Nathan Quinn And everyone waited for the but, but it never came. Gilbert Box nodded to the crowd and sat back down. Gilberts grommets applauded.Cliff Hyland spoke abutting, talking for ten minutes about what a great guy and beauteous researcher Nate was. hence Libby actually went forward and spoke at space about Nates Canadianness and how he had once defended the Great Seal of British capital of South Carolina as creationness superior to all the other provincial seals in that it depicted a moose and a ram smoking a hookah, portraying a spirit of cooperation and tolerance, while Ontarios seal depicted a moose and an elk trying to eat a bear, and Saskatchewans showed a moose and a lion stage setting drive out to a fondue crazyweed both of which clearly exploited the innate Canadian fear of moose and the seal of Quebec depicted a woman in a toga twinkle one of her boobs at a lion, which was barely fucking French. Hed named all the provinces and their seals, but those were the ones Libby could remember. because Libby sniffled and sat down.Thats what you could scratch up with? hissed Clay. What, five years of pairing?Libby whispered in his ear, I had to go with something that wouldnt threaten Margaret. I dont see you storming the podium.Im not going to talk about my dead friend when I dont hark back hes dead.And before they k juvenile it, Jon Thomas Fuller was at the podium being thankful for Nates support for his new vagabond, then going on about how much he appreciated how the whale-research community had gotten behind his new mahimahi interaction center, all of which was turgid news to the whale-research community who was listen. During the short speech, Clair had caught Clays discern in what appeared to be an embrace of consolation but was in fact a choke hold shed learned from notice cops on the news. Baby, if you try to go after him, Ill harbor you unconscious on the floor in three seconds. That would be disrespectful to Nates memory. But her effort left Kona unsupervised on the other side, and he managed to cough Bullshit as Jon Thomas took his seat.Next a grad student who worked for Cliff Hyland stood and talked about how Nates work had inspired her to go into the field. thusly someone from the Hawaiian De bulge outment of conservation and Resources talked about how Nate had al meanss been at the forefront of conservation and treasureion of the humpbacks. Then the harbormaster talked about Nates being a competent and conscientious boat pilot. All told, an hour had passed, and when it seemed obvious that no one else was going to stand u p, the minister moved toward the podium but was beaten to it by Kona, who had slipped from Clairs steely magnetize and high-stepped his way to the front.Like old Auntie say, Nathan is living on. But no one here today say a thing about the Snowy Biscuit, who Jahs mercy be on her is feeding fishes in the briny blue about now. (Sniff.) I know her only short time, but I think I can say for all of us, that I al shipway want to see her naked. Truth, mon. And when I think upon the round, theatre she ordain be missed, Clay said, finishing for the faux Hawaiian. He had clamped a consecrate over Konas mouth and was dragging him out the door. She was a knowing kid. With that, the minister jumped to the podium, thanked everyone for coming, and declared, with a prayer, all respects paid in full. Amen.Well, yes, amiable health can be a problem, said let out Ryder. creation Gods conscience is a tough job.Nate looked around, and, as if following his gaze, the liquid ecstasy rece ded around them until they were in a chamber about fifteen feet in diameter a bubble. It was like camping in someones bladder, Nate thought.That better? Ryder asked.Nate realized that the Colonel was the one controlling the shape of the chamber they were in.Someplace to sit would be good.The oozing behind Nate shaped itself into a chaise longue. Nate touched it tentatively, expecting to pull his hand back trailing strings of oozing, but although the scoop glistened as if it were wet, on the chair it matte up dry. Warm and icky, but dry. He sat down on the chaise. Everyone thinks youre dead, Nate said.You, too.Nate hadnt thought about it much, but, of course, the Colonel had to be right. They would hold back thought him long dead.Youve been here since you disappeared, what, twelve years ago?Yes, they took me with a modified right whale, ate my whole Zodiac, my equipment everything. They brought me here in a blue whale. I went mad during the trip. Couldnt handle the whole judgement of it. They kept me restrained most of the way here. Im sure that didnt armed service. Ryder shrugged. I got better, once I accepted the way things are down here. I beneathstood why they took me.And that would be?The homogeneous reason they took you. I was about to figure out their existence from what was surreptitious in the signal of different whale calls. They took both of us to nurture the whale sends and, ultimately, the scoop. We should be grateful they didnt just kill us.Nate had wondered about that before. why the trouble? Okay, why didnt they?Well, they took me alive because the Goo and the people here precious to know what I knew, and by what course of instruction I came to suspect the matter in the whale calls. They took you alive because I ordered it so.why?What do you mean, why? Because we were colleagues, because I taught you, because youre bright and intuitive and I liked you and Im a decent guy. Why? Fuck you, why? Growl, you live in a slime lair and maintain an identity as the mysterious overlord of an sub rangeace city, you command a fleet of meat dreadnaughts with crews of homooid whale people, and youre shortly reclining in a pulsating mass of gelatinous goo that looks like it fly from hells own Jell-O mold so excuse the fuck out of me if I question your motives.Okay, good point. Can I get you something to insobriety?Like many scientists Nate had known, Ryder had plodded on only to realize midcourse that hed forgotten accredited social smoothties practiced by other civilized humans, but in this case he was completely missing the point. No, I dont deprivation anything to make merry. I study to know how this happened. What is this overgorge? Youre a biologist, Growl, you have to have been amusing about this.Im still curious. But what I do know is that this stuff makes up everything in Gooville, everything youve seen here, the buildings, the corridors, most of the machinery although I guess youd call it bio machinery all of it is the Goo. One giant, all-encompassing organism. It can form itself into nearly any organism on macrocosm, and it can design new organisms as the need arises. The Goo made the whale ships and the whaley boys. And heres the kicker, Nate It didnt make them over thirty million years. The broad(a) species isnt more than three carbon years old.Thats not possible, Nate said. thither were certain(prenominal) things that you accepted if you were going to be a biologist, and one of them was that complex lifespan was a exercise of evolution by natural selection, that you got a new species because the genes that favored survival in a certain environment were replicated in that species, selected by being passed on, often a process that took millions of years. You didnt put in your order and pick up a new species at the window. There was no cosmic boor cook, there was no watchmaker, there was no designer. There was only process and time. How could you possibly know that anyway?I just know things by being in contact with the Goo, but Im not far off. It might be less time ii hundred years.Two hundred years? The whaley boys are definitely sensate by any definition, and I dont even know what the whale ships are, but theyre definitely alive, too. That kind of complexity doesnt happen in that short a time.No, Id say the Goo has believably been here as long as three and a half jillion years. The rocks around these caves are some of the oldest in the world. Im just saying the whaley boys and the ships are new. Theyre only a fewer hundred years old because thats how long ago the Goo infallible them.The Goo demand them, so it made them to serve it? Like it has will?It does have will. Its self-aware, and it knows a lot. In fact, Id venture to say that the Goo is a repository for every bit of biological knowledge on the planet. This, Nate, this Goo is as close to God as we are ever going to see. Its the perfect soup.As in primordial soup?Precis ely. Four billion years ago some sizeable organic molecules grouped up, probably around some deep-sea source of geothermal heat, and they learned how to divide, how to replicate. Since takings is the name of lifes game, it very quickly probably in the span of less than a hundred million years covered the entire planet. colossal organic molecules that couldnt exist now because there are millions of bacteria that would eat them, but back then there were no bacteria. At one time the entire marineic surface of the earth was populated by one single living thing that had learned to replicate itself. Sure, as the replicators were exposed to different conditions they mutated, they developed into new species, they fed on each other, some colonized each other and turned into complex savages, and then more complex animals, but part of that professional living animal pulled back into its original niche. By this time chemical information was being exchanged first by UNA, then by DN A and as each new species evolved, it carried on all the information for making the next species, and that information came back to the original animal. But it had its safe niche, pulling heartiness from the earths heat, render in the deep ocean and by rock. It took in all the information from the animals that it came in contact with, but it changed only enough to protect itself, replicate itself. While a million million species lived and died in the sea, this original animal evolved very slowly, learning, always learning. Think of it, Nate Within the cells of your body is not only the blueprint for every living thing on earth but everything that has ever lived. Ninety-eight percent of your DNA is just hitching a ride, just lucky little genes that were smart enough to align themselves to other successful genes, like marrying into notes, if you will. But the Goo, not only does it have all of those genes, it has the diagram to turn them on and off. That seat youre sitting on whi tethorn well be three billion years old.Nate suddenly felt something hed felt before only when waking up in a hotel with the bedspread pulled up around his face a deep and dear(p) hope, motivated by disgust, that in all the time it had been there, someone had cleaned the cat genetic material from it. He stood up, just for safety. How could you possibly know this, Growl? It goes against everything we know about evolution.No it doesnt. It completely fits. Yes, a complex process like life can develop, given enough time, but we overly know that an animal that fits perfectly into its niche isnt pressured to change. Sharks have remained basically the same for a hundred million years, the chambered nautilus for five hundred million. Well, youre just looking for at the animal that found its niche first. The first animal, the source.Nate shook his head at the magnitude of it. You might be able to explain the evolutionary path being preserved, but you cant explain consciousness, analytica l thought, processes that require a very complex mechanism to perform. You cant pull off that sort of complexity of function with big, fluffy organic molecules.The molecules have evolved, but they remembered. The Goo is a complex, if amorphous, life form there are no analogs for it. Everything is a model of it, and nothing is a model of it.Nate stepped back from the Colonel, and the Goo flexed to make room for him. The movement gave him a brief moment of vertigo, and he lost his balance. The Goo caught him, the surface moving forward against his shoulder blades just enough to steady him on his feet. Nate whipped around quickly and the Goo pulled back. God, thats creepy-crawlyThere you go, Nate. Aware. Youd be amazed at what the Goo knows at what it can tell us. You can have a life here, Nate. Youll see things here you would never see, youll do things you could never do. And in the process you can encourage me unravel the greatest biological riddle in the history of the world.I t hink youre supposed to laugh manically after saying something like that, Colonel.If you help me, Ill give you what youve always wanted.Despite what you think, what I want is to go home.Thats not going to happen, Nate. not ever. Youre a bright man, so I wont vex you by pretending the circumstances are any different than they are You are not ever going to leave these caverns alive, so now you have to make the decision of how you want to spend your life. You can have everything here that you could have on the surface much more, in fact but youre not leaving.Well, in that case, Colonel, see if you can get your giant booger to duplicate you so you can go fuck yourself.I know what the whale song means, Nate. I know what its for. Nate felt as if hed been sucker-punched by his own obsession, but he tried not to show the impact.Doesnt rattling matter now, does it?I understand. You condition a little time to work into the idea, Nate, but there is some urgency. This isnt just standing back and collecting data we need to do something. I want your help. Well talk soon.The Goo came down and seemed to envelop the Colonel. There was a sound like ripping paper, and a long, pink tunnel opened behind Nate, trail all the way to the iris door through which hed entered. He took one last look over his shoulder, but there was nothing except Goo, Ryder was gone.Nate was met in the hall by the ii big killer whaley boys, who took one look at his face, then looked at each other, then snickered, with big toothy grins. Emily 7 was nowhere to be seen.Hes a fucking squirrel, Nate said.The whaley boys went into reedy fits of laughter, doubling over as they led Nate down the corridor and back to the grotto. govern what you want, Nate thought. The Goo designed these guys to enjoy themselves.As soon as Nate entered the apartment, he knew he wasnt alone. There was a smell there, and not just the present ocean smell that permeated the whole grotto, but a sweeter, artificial smell. He quickly checked the main living rooms and the bathroom. When the portal to the sleeping accommodation opened, he could see a shape under the covers in his forficate bed. The biolighting hadnt come on in the bedroom as usual. Nate sighed. The shape under the covers nuzzled into the corner of the bed exactly the way she had on the whale ship.Emily 7, you are a lovely ah person, unfeignedly, but Im He was what? He had no idea what he was going to say. He was just trying to get to know himself better? He needed some space? But then he realized that whatever, whoever was under the sheets was too small to be the capture whaley boy. Nuez, he thought. This was going to be worse than Emily 7. Nuez was really his only human contact in Gooville, even if she was working for the cause. He didnt want to change her. He couldnt afford to. He moved into the room, trying to think of a way that this could possibly not make things worse.Look, I know that weve dog-tired a lot of time to gether, and I like you, I really do Good, said Amy, throwing back the covers. I like you, too. You coming in?CHAPTER THIRTYMotherflukerClay and Kona had spent the day cleaning the muck out of the raised-from-the-deep Always Confused. Now Clay stood on the break water supply at the Lahaina Harbor, watching the sun bubble red into the pacific and throw purple fire over the island. He was feeling that particular mix of melancholic and tempestuousness that usually comes with drinking coffee and Irish whiskey at the airstream of someone you never knew, and it usually ends in a fight. He felt as if he should do something, but he didnt know what. He needed to move, but he didnt know where. Libby had confirmed that the last communicate about Nate had been recorded more than a week after hed disappeared, and it seemed to be more evidence that Nate had survived his ordeal in the channel, but where was he? How do you rush in to save someone when you dont know where he is? All their anal ysis of the tapes since then had yielded nothing but whale calls. Clay was lost.What you doing? Kona, shoeless and smelling of bleach, came up behind him.Im waiting for the green flash. He wasnt, really, but sometimes, just as the sun dipped below the horizon, it happened. He needed something to happen.Yeah, I seen that. What cause that?Uh, well and that was another thing, he didnt have enough of a handle on the natural sciences to keep this whole project going I believe as the sun disappears under the horizon, the rest period spectrum bounces off the mucusphere, thus causing the green flash.Yah, mon. The mucusphere.Its science, said Clay, knowing that it wasnt science.When the boat clean, then we going out, record whales and like dat?Good question, Clay thought. He could collect the data, but he didnt have the knowledge inevitable to analyze it. He had hoped that Amy would do that.I dont know. If we let Nate, mayhap.You think he still living, then? Even after all this tim e?Yeah. I hope. I guess we should keep up the work until we can obtain him.Yeah. Nate say them Japanese going to kill our minkes if you dont work hard.Minke whales, yeah. Ive been on one of their ships. Norwegians, too.Thats some evil fuckery. maybe. The minke herd is large. Theyre not endangered. The Japanese and the Norwegians arent really taking enough of them to hurt the population, so why shouldnt we let them hunt them? I mean, whats the argument for demoteping them? Because whales are cute? The Chinese fry kitties we dont resist them.The Chinese fry kitties?Im not saying I agree with cleansing them, but we really dont have a good argument.The Chinese fry kitties? Konas phonate was acquire higher each time he spoke.Maybe some of the work we do here can prove that these animals have culture, that theyre closer to us than they perceive. Then well have an argument.Kitties? Like, little meow kitties? They just fry them? Clay was musing, watching the sunset and feeling sad and frustrated, and language came out of him like a long, rambling sigh Of course, when I was on the whaling ship, I saw how the Japanese whalers looked at the animals. They see them as fish. No more or less than a tuna. But I was photographing a sperm-whale mother and her calfskin, and the calf got separated from the pod. The mother came back to get the calf and pushed it away from our Zodiac. The whalers were visibly moved. They recognize that mother/child behavior. It wasnt fish behavior. So its not a lost cause.Kitties? Kona sighed, taking on the same nuance of resignation that Clay had used.Yeah, said Clay.So how we going to find Nate so we can do good work and save them humpies and minkes?Is that what were doing?No. Not now. Now we just watching for a green flash.I dont know any science, Kona. I made that up, about the green flash.Ah, I didnt know. knowledge you dont know just looks like magic.I dont believe in magic.Oh, brah, dont say dat. Magic come bite you in the ass for sure. You going to need my help for sure now.Clay felt some of the weight of his melancholy lift by sharing a moment with the surfer, but his need to act was worrying at him like a flea in the ear. Lets take a drive up-country, Kona.They really fry kitties in China? Kona said, his voice so high now that dogs living around the harbor winced.Amy, what, how what? The lights had come up, and Nate could see that it was Amy in his bed. It was a lot of Amy that he hadnt seen before.They took me, Nate. expert like you. A few days later. It was horrible. Quick, hold me.A whale ship ate you, too?Yes, just like you. Hold me, Im so afraid.And they brought you all the way here?Yes, just like you, only its worse for a dame. I feel so so naked. Hold me. Dame? No one says dame anymore.Well, African-American, then.You are not African-American.I cant remember all the politically jog terms. Christ, Nate, what do you need, a diagram? Crawl in. Amy flapped the covers, threw them back, then stru ck a cheesecake pose, grinning.But Nate backed away. You put your head in the water to listen for the whale. The only other person I ever saw do that was Ryder.Look at my tan line, Nate. She danced her fingertips over her tan line, which to Nate looked more like a beige line. Nevertheless, she had his attention. Ive never had a tan line before.AmyWhatYou set me upIm naked over here. Havent you thought about that?Yes, but Ha You admit it. I was your research assistant. You had firing power over me. in time there you are, mentation about me naked.You are naked.Ha I think Ive made my point.That ha thing is unprofessional, Amy.Dont care. I no longer work for you, and you are not the boss of me anymore, and furthermore, look at this butt. She rolled over. He did. She looked back over her shoulder and grinned. HaStop that. He looked at the wall. You spied on me. You caused all this to happen.Dont be ridiculous. I was just part of it, but all that is forgiven. Look how luscious I am. A my did a presentation wave over herself, as if Nate had just won her in a game show.Would you stop that? Nate reached over and pulled the covers up to her chin.Lus-cious, she said, pulling the covers down, revealing a breast with each syllable.Nate walked out of the room. Put on some clothes and come out here. Im not going to try to talk to you like that.Fine, dont talk, she called after him. Just crawl in.Youre just bait, he called from the kitchen.Hey, buster, Im not that young.This conversation is over until you come out here fully dressed. Nate sat down at his little dining table and tried to will away his erection.What are you, some kind of fruitcake, some kind of sissy boy, some kind of fairy, huh?Yes, thats it, Nate said.For a moment nothing but quiet from the bedroom. Then Oh, my God, I feel like such a maroon. Her voice was softer now. She came stumbling out of the bedroom, the sheet disguised around her. Im really sorry, Nate. I had no idea. You seemed so interested. I w ouldnt have Ha Nate said. See how it feels.The Old Broad had given them iced ginger tea and set Kona up at one of her telescopes to look at the moon. She sat down next to Clay on the lanai and they listened to the night for a while.Its nice up here, Clay said. I dont think Ive been up here at night before.Clay, Im usually in bed by now, so I hope you dont think me dense if I get things clear in my mind.Of course not, Elizabeth.Thank you. As I see it, for years you and Nate have been verbalize everyone that Im a nut job because I said I could communicate with whales. Now you drive up here in a froth in the middle of the night to deliver the earth-shattering news that what Ive been telling you all along is possible? She leaned her chin on her fist and looked panoptic at Clay. That about right?We never called you a nut job, Elizabeth, Clay said. Thats an overstatement.Doesnt matter, Clay. Im not mad. She sipped her tea. And Im not angry either. Ive been in these islands a ver y long time, Clay, and Ive lived on the side of this volcano for most of it. Ive spent more time looking down on that channel than most people have spent on the planet, but not once did you or Nate ask me why. Didnt want to look a gift horse in the mouth, I guess. Easier to think I was just a few bananas short of a bunch than to ask me why I was interested.Clay felt worn spot running down the small of his back. Hed been uncomfortable around the Old Broad before, but in a to bigy different way the way one feels when a matron aunt pinches your cheek and starts to ramble inanely about the old days, not like this. This was like getting sandbagged by a prosecutor. I dont think that Nate or I could answer that question, Elizabeth, so its not out of order that we didnt ask you.Thats a load a chisel balls, old Auntie, Kona said, not looking away from the eye art object of the eight-inch mirror telescope.Hes a sweet boy, the Old Broad said. Clay, you know that Mr. Robinson was in the na vy. Did I ever tell you what it was that he did?No, maam, I just assumed he was an officer.I can understand how you might think that, but all the money came from my family. No, sweetheart, he was a noncom, a chief petty officer, a echo sounder man. In fact, Im told he was the best sonar man in the navy at the time.Im sure he was, Elizabeth, but Shut up, Clay. You came here for help, Im fate you.Yes, maam. Clay closed(a) up. jam that was Mr. Robinsons first name he love to listen to the humpbacks. He said they made his job a diddlysquat sight harder, but he loved them. We were stationed in Honolulu then, but submarine crews were on and off on hundred-day duty shifts, so when he would have time in port, we would come over to Maui, rent a boat, and go out in the channel. He wanted me to be part of the world he lived in all the time the world of sound under the sea. You can understand that, cant you, Clay?Of course. But Clay was getting a not-so-good feeling about this tr ip down memory lane. He had things he needed to know, but he wasnt sure that this was part of them.Thats when I bought Papa Lani with some of my fathers money. We thought wed live there full-time eventually, maybe turn it into a hotel. Anyway, one day crowd and I decided to rent a little powerboat and camp on the ocean side of Lanai. It was a calm day and an easy trip. On our way over, a big humpback came up beside the boat. It even seemed to change course when we did. James slowed down so we could stay with our new friend. There were no rules then about getting close to the whales like there are now. We didnt even know we were supposed to save them back then, but James loved the humpbacks, and I had come to as well.There was no one but the pineapple-company workers on Lanai at that time, so we found a tatterdemalion beach where we thought wed build a fire, cook some dinner, drink highballs from tin cups, swim naked, and you know, make love on the beach. See there, Ive blow out o f the water you.No you havent, said Clay.Yes I have. Im sorry.No you havent. Really, Im fine, tell the story. Old ladies, he thought.When the trade winds came up that evening, we pitched the tent a little ways off the beach in a small canyon sheltered from the wind. Well, I gave James my best hummer, and he fell asleep right away.Clay choked on his iced tea.Oh, my dear, did an ice cube go down the wrong pipe? Kona, come here and Heimlich Clay, dear.No, Im fine. Clay waved the surfer away. Really, Im okay. crying streamed down his cheeks, and he wiped his nose on his shirttail. He was suddenly fantastically grateful he hadnt brought Clair. Just need to catch my breath.Kona sat down cross-legged at their feet, having suddenly found that he was interested in history. Go ahead, old Auntie.Well, I got a little bit of a headache. So I decided to go back to the boat to get an aspirin from the first-aid kit. Come to think of it, it must have been from the tension in my neck. I always got a crick in my neck when I did that, but James loved it so.Jesus, Elizabeth, would you get on with the story, Clay said.Im sorry, dear, Ive ball over you, havent I?No, Im fine. Im just curious to find out what happened.Well, as long as I didnt shock you. I suppose I should be more discreet in front of the boy, but it is part of the story.No, please. What happened on the beach?You know, we could fuck like mad monkeys, all night long, and it never gave me a headache, but one The beach, please.When I got to the beach, there were two men near the boat. It looked like they were doing something to the engine. I ducked behind a rock before they saw me. I watched them in the moonlight, a short one and the tallish one. The tall one seemed to be wearing some sort of helmet or diving suit. But then the short one said something, and the tall one started laughing snickering, really and I saw his face in the moonlight. It wasnt a helmet, Clay. It was a face a smooth, shiny face, with a underdress full of teeth. I could see the teeth even from where I was. It wasnt human, Clay.Well, I went back and woke James, told him he had to come see. I took him back to my privateness place. The two men, or the man and that thing were still there, but behind them, right there almost on the beach, was also a humpback, a big one. The water couldnt have been ten feet deep where he was, yet he was sitting there calm as could be.Well, all James saw was the two men messing with our boat. We had drunk quite a few cocktails, I guess, and James had his big, strong man act to do. He told me to stay where I was and not to move for anything. Then he went after them shouting at the top of his lungs for them to get away. The tall one, the nonhuman thing, dove under the water right away, but the man looked around like hed been trapped. He started wade out toward the whale, and James went right in after him. Then, at last, James saw the whale. He just stopped there in the surf and looked. Thats when the thing came up out of the water behind him. Suddenly it was just there, looming behind James. I wanted to yell, but I was so afraid. The thing, it hit James with something, maybe a rock, and he fell forward into the water. Then I screamed for all I was worth, but Im not sure they even heard me over the noise of the wind and the surf.The man took one of Jamess arms, the thing the other, and they swam to the whale with James in tow. Then, Clay, as crazy as this sounds, this is what happened That whale rolled over, and they stuffed James into it, back by the genital slit, I think. Then they both crawled into it as well. Then the whale kicked its tail until it was in deeper water and swam away. I never saw my husband again. The Old Broad took Clays hand and squeezed it. I swear to you, thats how it happened, Clay.Clay didnt know what to say. Over the years shed said a lot of crazy-sounding stuff, but this was the mother of all crazy stuff. besides she was more serious th an hed ever seen her. It didnt matter what he believed there was only one thing to say to her. I believe you, Elizabeth.Thats why, Clay. Thats why Ive helped pay you over the years, its why Ive watched the channel all these years, its why I own two acres right near the water, yet Ive lived up-country for all these years.I dont understand, Elizabeth.They came back, Clay. That night the whale came back, and the thing came back to the beach, but I hid. They came back for me. The next day I didnt even go back to the boat. I hiked my way to the pineapple plantation and got help there. They brought me back to Lahaina on one of their big freighters. I havent been on the water since. The closest I ever go near the water is when theres an event at the sanctuary, and then there are a lot of people around.Clay thought about the Japanese soldier theyd found on a Pacific island whod been hiding from the Americans for twenty years after the war was over. Elizabeth Robinson had obviously been hiding from something that wasnt looking for her. Didnt you tell anyone? Surely the navy would have wanted to find out what happened to one of their best sonar men.They asked. I told them. They dismissed it. They said James went swimming at night, he drowned, and I was drunk. They sent some men over there, and so did the Maui police. They found the boat, still on the beach, with everything in working order. They found our camp, and they found an empty bottle of rum. That was the end of it.Why didnt you ever tell me? Or Nate?I wanted you to keep doing the work that you do. Meanwhile, I kept watching. I read all the scientific journals, too, you know. I look for anything that might make sense of it. Come with me.She got up and went into her house, Clay and Kona following without a word. In the bedroom she opened a cedar tree chest and took out a large scrapbook. She laid it on the bed and flipped it open to the last page. It was Nates obituary.Nathan was one of the best in the field, and that little girl said that a whale ate him. Then she disappeared at sea. She flipped a page. Twelve years ago this Dr. Gerard Ryder disappeared at sea, also studying whale calls at the time, although blue whales. She flipped another page. This fellow, a Russian sonar expert who defected to England, disappeared off Cornwall in 1973. They said it was probably KGB.Well, it probably was KGB. Im sorry, Elizabeth, but each of these incidents seems to have a perfectly normal explanation, and they happen over such a long period of time in different places. I dont see what the connection is.Its underwater sound, Clay. And theyre not normal. All these men, including my James, were experts at listening to the ocean.Even so, are you saying that someone has trained whales? That creatures have been abducting sonar guys and shoving them up whales bums?Dont be crude, Clay. You came to me because you wanted help, Im trying to give it to you. I dont know who they are, but what youve told me about there being language private in the whale song it just confirms in my mind that they took Nate, and James, and all these other people. Thats all I know. Im telling you that Im sure that Nate is alive, too. Its another piece to the puzzle.Clay sat down on the bed next to the scrapbook. There were articles from scientific journals on cetacean biology, on underwater acoustics, news items about whale strandings, some that didnt seem connected at all. It was the search path of someone who didnt know what she was looking for. Hed gone so long thinking of her as crazy that hed never given her credit for how knowledgeable she really was. He was realizing only now what had been driving her. He felt like a shit.Elizabeth, what about the call about the sandwich? What about the crystals and the whales talking to you all of that? I dont understand.I did get the call, Clay. And as for the other, I have dreams of the whales talking to me, and I pay attention to them. Fifty years of searchi ng, I take clues where I can get them. Given what I was looking for, I thought magic and divination as valid a method as any tool in the search.See, Kona said, I told you. intelligence you dont know? Magic.I guess I was casting my faith around carelessly, I just hope I didnt do something awful.Nah, old Auntie, Jahs love on ye anyway, even if youre trampin around your faith like a ho.Kona, shut up, Clay said. What do you mean, you might have done something awful, Elizabeth?She picked up the scrapbook, closed it, then sat down on the bed next to Clay and hung her head. A tear dripped down onto the black pasteboard cover of the book.When the call came, and the whale said that he wanted a pastrami on rye, I recognized the voice, Clay. I recognized the voice, and I insisted Nathan go out there and take the sandwich with him.It was probably a prank, Elizabeth, someone youve met. Nate was going out that day anyway. You didnt cause this.No, you dont understand, Clay. Pastrami on rye was my Jamess favorite. I always had one waiting for him when he came in from submarine duty. The voice on the phone was my James.