Part 48 (2/2)

”Just a minute.” The downcast s.h.i.+p manager and his watchful attendant halted. ”If you could give us some insight, if you have any idea what is causing the baleens to act in this inexplicably belligerent fas.h.i.+on, that might be a contribution in your favor the courts would recognize.”

Hazaribagh's humorless laughter echoed across the deck. ”If I knew that and admitted it, that would make me at least partly guilty of what you've first accused me of, wouldn't it? A neat trick.” He coughed, said harshly, ”I've not the slightest idea. My fis.h.i.+ng experts have no idea. Ma.s.s insanity that comes and goes, manifests itself as rage against humanity?

Who knows? Perhaps they are at last sick of man- kind's presence in their ocean.”

Cora felt disappointed. She hadn't expected any revelations from Hazaribagh, but she had bad hopes.

The s.h.i.+p manager was led down a boarding ladder to the suprafoil below. Hwos.h.i.+en rejoined the others.

”Something else doesn't make sense,” Cora told him.

206 CACHALOT.

”I seek clarification, not additional confusion,” he

muttered.

”In the attack we witnessed,” she pressed on, ”we saw two kinds of baleens-blues and humpbacks.

Latehoht and Wenkoseemansa were chased by rights and worried about the presence of fins. Now, these are all plankton-eaters, but as far as I've read, they never school together. Joint schooling of, for example, , humpbacks and seis is unknown. I realize that studies of Cachalot cetacean society are limited, but in all the preparation I did before we came here I didn't come across a single example of joint schooling.”

”That's right,” Dawn said excitedly. ”Not only are they functioning as a group, the attacks involve mixed species.”

”We've tried for weeks to find a purely scientific explanation,” Merced said. They all turned to look at him. ”Maybe we're going about this the wrong way.”

”How do you mean?” Rachael asked respectfully, cuddling her neurophon. She had already been badger- ing the crew of the peaceforcer suprafoil for replace- ment modules for the instrument.

Merced appeared embarra.s.sed, as he always did when everyone else's attention was focused on him.

”We've been trying to find a biological explanation for the attacks. Now we intend to concentrate on the cetaceans. If we throw out the insanity explanation and a.s.sume there is some kind of intelligence at work behind all this, how would we go about determining the ultimate cause?”

”I'm not sure I follow you,” Cora said.

”That's because you're still thinking in terms of cetaceans. We all are. Let's use the more obvious a.n.a.logies rather than the less so. If a group of humans attacked a town but insisted they didn't know what they were doing, how would we begin to go about find- ing out the cause?”

”Capture one of them and question him or her.”

207.

Mataroreva looked at the little scientist approvingly.

Merced nodded.

”That's impossible,” Cora said immediately. ”You can't restrain a blue whale without using something more than words. Even the use of a temporarily de- bilitating narcotic drug could be interpreted by the Cetacea as the use of violence. That would shatter the human-cetacean peace you're always telling us about.

Anything milder than that, like a large net enclosure, would probably be torn apart.”

”There must be some way,” Dawn murmured.

Mataroreva looked at them thoughtfully. ”There may be. You can't compel seventy tons or more of whale, but you may be able to convince it.”

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