The Dolphin
Copyright© 2017 by Colin Barrett
Chapter 27
“I talk to Maggie,” I tell Kitik. “I ask her will she let us leave this place.”
“That is what you say you may do?” he asks.
I tell him yes.
“Then we may leave only if Maggie and Jason allow?” he says. “This is not right. Why is it that they may say if we leave or do not leave? Why is it that we must ask them and not go as we choose for us?”
I say I do not know if this is right or not right, but I know that it is so. I cannot change what is so. The fence and the land are there and they will not go away only because we desire that they do. And unless they go away we cannot leave, and it is only Maggie and Jason that can make them go away.
Kitik does not like that I say this. But he admits that it is so.
“Always as mother,” he complains. “All things we must take from the humans, even to where we may go and when we may go there.”
“In the time I am here I learn much of the humans,” I say. “A thing I learn is that for humans the now is very different from us. They cannot be content only to live in the now, they must twist now to their own way. They do this many ways, with money and with countries and other things too. These things are all shadow, but for them shadow is a part of their now and it makes them to see the now in the way that they do.”
He asks what has this to do with our leaving.
“Humans wish to command the now,” I try to explain. “In some ways I think it is that they must command the now to live as they do. I think they are not strong on the land as we are in the sea. They must use shadow to build things that make them strong. They must use what their minds allow them to make for themselves to command the now. They fear the now if they do not command it.”
Perhaps I do not say this right, because Kitik still does not understand.
“We are part of the now for them, as are other things,” I say. “Because they must command the now they must also command all of those things, and they must command us. I do not know if they are right or not right that they think they must command all in the now, but perhaps that does not matter because it is so for them.”
“Why does one wish to command the now?” he asks. “What good is to command the now?”
“There is good,” I remind him. “I think perhaps you go to the land if the humans do not help when you are hurt.”
He tells me I am right.
“It is the same shadow that lets the humans make things to command the now that also lets them make you well,” I say. “We cannot do as they in this way. I cannot help you as they do, none can. In this way they command even going to the land, which is a thing none of us may command, not in that way. Is there not good in that?”
Kitik thinks long on what I say. When he speaks at last it is to ask me do I think he is right not to learn human talk and human way.
“You say it is shadow,” I tell him. “You are right. It is not for us. But all shadow is not bad. I think there is good in shadow as well as bad. There is good in these humans’ shadow. Not all is good, perhaps much is bad, I do not learn enough that I may say and I am not sure I can ever learn so much. But I will not say their way is a bad way, only that it is not our way. And I do not know why it is that you should learn a way that is not our way if you do not wish. I learn because I wish it. But I cannot say you are wrong not to wish it.”
He thinks on what I say before he speaks again. “It is right that we leave,” he says at last. “As you say, it is not our way. But none ever cares for me as Jason has, not even Mother in some ways. If he and Maggie allow us to leave I wish to say this to him. Will you help me to find the way of human speech that I may say it?”
We speak more and I tell him how it is that humans say such a thing.
Jason drove as Maggie sketched out her talk with Minacou. To her astonishment he seemed to take it in stride.
“I’ve been wondering,” was all he said.
“You expected this?” she demanded.
“Something like it,” he admitted. “I mean, she pretty much hit it on the nose, didn’t she? We do have them caged up. Wouldn’t you figure they’d notice that sooner or later?”
Back in her trailer she began to pour out her feelings. Yes, they were keeping the dolphins caged. Yes, that was pretty much exactly the way criminals were treated in the jails and prisons. And how could they possibly justify doing that to animals who’d done nothing wrong, committed no crime, and were as intelligent as humans, perhaps even more so?
“Well, that’s pretty much the way of it with zoos and all, too, isn’t it?” Jason asked reasonably. “Different animals, nothing like as intelligent, although the apes are up there, but basically the same idea. It isn’t entirely a one-way street.”
“What do you mean?”
He shrugged. “We give them an assured living, no worries about food or predators, pretty decent quarters in most places—and certainly here—medical care when they need it, all that. I mean, do you think Kitik would have survived that wound out there in the ocean?”
“That’s not fair!” she protested. “He wouldn’t have been shot in the ocean either.”
“Might have been. I told you about the skipper I worked for with a rifle on board. OK, OK,” he continued hastily as he saw her about to argue, “it’s not likely, I admit. But there are other things. Sharks, I think killer whales occasionally go after them. The long nets. It’s a dangerous world out there, even for them. And I’ll bet it can be a pretty hungry one if the fish aren’t schooling. So there are pluses as well as minuses.”
“You can say the same things about prison inmates!” she snapped. “The point is they’re not free, and they want to be. Jason, I’m surprised at you. I thought you loved Kitik, loved them both, how can you defend—”
He held up his hand to stop her. “OK, honey, I’m just doing devil’s advocate. You’ve got yourself so worked up I thought somebody better do it. And maybe I’m trying to con myself a little too, because the thing is I agree with you all the way down the line.”
Mollified, she leaned over for a kiss. But it was a brief one as another thought occurred to her. “You said you’d been expecting this, though, babe.”
“Well, what I meant was that’s how I’ve been seeing it. I was hoping they didn’t look at it quite the same.”
“But they do,” she said flatly. “Minacou made that pretty clear today.”
“Yeah,” he said in a defeated tone. “I guess they do. Mag, you know where all this is taking us.”
She nodded. “I think so.”
“What about Morris?”
“I know. God, he’s such a sweetie.”
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