It would be pointless to describe our open boat voyage in detail.
We were, in fact, far better off than many others who have been cast away in small boats. We possessed a means of rapid locomotion (or it possessed us) and we were sure of two nourishing but unpalatable meals a day — one at sunrise and one at sunset. Our discomforts were more or less standard — although we were unlucky inasmuch as we possessed no rag of canvas or other material to protect us from the blistering sun by day, the damp cold by night. And there was, of course, the acute embarrassment occasioned by the lack of privacy — but it is amazing how soon that wears off.
We talked, of course. (There was nothing else to do.)
Sally, like most of her trade, was widely informed, and she already had theories to account for what had befallen us — and, presumably, the other missing ships.
She said, “There must be quite a few tons of radioactive water in the Pacific now. Apart from the various bomb tests, there’s fall out.”
“So mucking what?” snarled Green.
“But it’s obvious, Curley. At least, I think it is. Most biologists agree that radiation is a cause of mutation. Suppose there have been a few mutations among the whales — and we must remember that whales, like the other cetacea, are already quite intelligent …”
“An’ our mucking friends out there,” asked the engineer, waving his arm in a sweeping gesture, “are they cetacea too?”
“They are. Well, we’ll get back to the whales. We have a few whales who’re now really intelligent. They realise that Man is their worst enemy, far more vicious and dangerous than either the killer whale or the giant squid. So they declare war on the human race.”
“Plausible,” I said. “But why don’t they attack the whalers?”
“Because,” she said, “the whalers have guns. Ships like Sue Darling don’t.” Her face brightened. “Now that we know, it will be easy to fit the island traders with armament …”
“Four inch guns,” I said. “And depth charges. Although I should imagine that if the average island trader used either, she’d fall to pieces.”
“But why should the whales be the only mucking bastards to … to mutate?” asked Curley Green. “Why shouldn’t the sharks, or the mucking squids?”
“I have an idea,” I said, dredging up something I’d once read from the depths of my memory. “I think that with the cetacea there’s a certain genetic instability …”
“An’ what’s that when it’s mucking up an’ dressed?”
“Well, as you know, the whales and dolphins and the like are mammals, not fishes. Their ancestors — believed to be bearlike creatures — lived on dry land. For some reason they returned to the sea. They must have adapted very quickly, by a series of mutations, to have survived. The seas were already teeming with highly efficient fishes. So, if anything in the sea is going to mutate, the odds are that it will be a creature that has already demonstrated its capabilities for just that.”
“So, just as I said some mucking time ago,” Green told us, “this is a mucking war. What if the bastards win?”
“They can’t,” I said. “They’re handicapped. Remember that the history of Man is the history of the fire-making, tool-using animal. And to make fire, to use tools, you have to have hands. In any case, you can’t make fires in the sea.”
“Just as mucking well. For a moment I was quite worried, Petey boy. But neither you nor Sally has explained these mucking porpoises. Why should they be helping us? You’d think they’d be sticking with their own mucking kind.”
“Perhaps,” said Sally, “they regard us as potential allies against the whales.”
“Per-mucking-haps,” said Green.
• • •
Yes, it was fantastic the way in which we took that fantastic situation in our stride. The initial shock, no doubt, was a contributory factor. In times of stress men are apt to believe anything, no matter how illogical — the Angels of Mons, the Phantom Bowmen and all the rest of it. Too, the cetacea have been rather widely publicised in the press of late, with various marine biologists making flattering remarks about their intelligence, capacity for learning and all the rest of it. Finally, there was the well-known arrogance of homo sapiens who still, in spite of evidence to the contrary, believes that every life form was created to serve him. Horses pull carts, dogs pull sleds — why shouldn’t dolphins pull (or push) boats?
And porpoises have already been pressed into the service of man. The Aborigines of Northern Queensland have trained them to herd shoals of mullet in to the beach. And there was Pelorus Jack, offering his services as a Cook Strait pilot, just out of good nature. And there are the intelligent, applause-hogging clowns of the marine circuses along the coast of Florida.
And, the more I thought of it, the more it made sense to me that mutated porpoises, with the equivalent of human intelligence, should seek to enlist Man as an ally. Man would be able to deal with the sperm whales — although, in this case, he would be looking after his own interests. And Man, too, would be able to make a concerted drive against the orca, the killer whale.
Such thoughts, had I been sitting in my cabin aboard a well found ship, would have been fantasy. But huddled in a small boat, a boat being driven west at all of ten knots by a squadron of friendly sea beasts, I found them easy to think.
Only one thing worried me — the killing of the Samoan fisherman and his wife. But that could be explained. The porpoises were trying to help, and the man had turned on them, killing at least one of their number. They had acted in self defence.
They couldn’t be blamed for that.