Margaret St. Clair - The Dolphins of Altair

She says she thinks she murmured something, but she didn’t really wake. He turned out the light.

I am not quite sure what he did next. I think he stood looking down at Moonlight for an instant. He may have gone back to the table, where the finished ahln devices were lying. It is almost certain he went back to the bedroom he and Sven shared.

Madelaine, on the couch in the darkened workroom, slept more quietly now. The trip to the tropic island gave place to a brief interval of dreamlessness. Then, as if the new darkness had suggested to her sleeping mind the obscurity which ought to hide the ahln devices, Madelaine began to concern herself with her problem again.

They—Splits generally—mustn’t find the floating mechanisms until the polar caps were gone. The rising waters would certainly be noticed, but the cause of the rising must remain unknown. Years must pass, and the ahln devices must go on quietly melting the ice.

Within her eyelids, the girl saw an enormous scheme of camouflage. The ice fields were dappled with faded yellows, dull browns, dead green. The brown-flecked polar bear hunted a spattered prey, and the blobbed waves broke in yellow dots on a green-striped shore. No one would suspect…

The dappled ice gave place to a speckled hen, soft-feathered, covering her nestlings with dark, secure wings, and the darkness of the nest became a huge vase that poured out darkness over the melting ice.

In vain, in vain. Light glittered from the polar world in ten thousand heartless sparkles. Steam rose to the sky in three towering columns. It was sure to be seen.

Madelaine began to search through a toppling pile of documents for the single sheet of paper that held the answer. The pile leaned, and then broke over her in a cascade of slipping sheets.

It rose around her like a flood, to her waist, her armpits, her chin. But before it could close over her head, she rescued from it the unique sheet of paper that held the solution, the solution at which we had already arrived in our actual discussions when the ahln devices were being built: that Udra could be used to keep the navies of the world from finding and destroying what was melting the ice.

(I suppose Madelaine would never have been so concerned with this problem, in sleep, if her waking mind had been quite satisfied with the waking solution to it; we knew that Udra, by itself and at a distance, would not be enough to ensure the safety of the thermal devices. We had had to accept the unwelcome corollary that some of us sea people would have to live permanently with Splits in the role of pets.

(Close to them, accepted by them as amiable, hyperintelligent domesticated animals, we might be able to influence them subtly but constantly to make the decisions we wished. We did not think it would be too difficult to start a fashion, among wealthy and influential Splits, of keeping dolphins as pets. But we knew this meant a lifetime of semi-slavery for some of us.)

In Madelaine’s dream, the very word “Udra” was imbued with vast powers. The magical syllables alone could keep the ahln devices undiscovered for a hundred years. She was still dreaming that she had solved all our problems when Dr. Lawrence came into the room once more.

He must have come in very softly. Certainly he did not want to disturb or waken her. But his entrance started the girl to dreaming of a huge dim figure, veiled in gray sheets of water, from whose mountainous head torrents plunged to the ground. She could not see its features. It seemed the embodiment of raging water.

She heard a roaring. The figure was speaking to her, in a voice as large as a continent. “Flood control?” it said. “Flood control? Of the Mississippi?”

The words rang in her ears portentously. They filled her with mysterious dread. She must wake up, some irrevocable event was happening, she must wake up.

She struggled toward consciousness, but succeeded only in dreaming that she was awake. Half a dozen times she rose from the couch and stood beside the worktable, only to realize, a moment later, that she was still asleep. She made heroic efforts; sleep held her leadenly. She was still struggling to waken when Sven came in.

He turned on the light. Madelaine was tossing on the couch, moaning and grinding her teeth. He went over to her and touched her gently on the forehead. “What’s the matter, Maddy? Poor girl, are you having a bad dream?”

She sat up after a moment. Her face was dewed with sweat. “No—yes, I guess so. I was dreaming something about water. I’m still confused. Where’s Dr. Lawrence, Sven?”

“In the bathroom or the kitchen, I suppose.”

“Is he? Let’s go look for him.”

They went through the little cottage together. Lawrence was in none of the rooms. They came back to the living room, and their eyes, by a common impulse, went to the worktable. It was empty. The ahln devices were gone.

A moment later Sosa came running out on the beach, calling us dolphins. It took only a few words to make us understand what had happened: Dr. Lawrence had betrayed us again.

“He must have taken the ahln devices in his medical bag,” Sven said. He was speaking partly to us and partly to Madelaine, who was standing beside him on the beach. “The drawing Kendry had Madelaine make is gone too. I noticed that Maddy, how long ago do you think he left?”

“I’m not sure. It seems to me that I spent four or five hours dreaming that I was awake, and then realizing I was still asleep on the couch. What time is it now?”

“A little after eight. I was gone a lot longer than I meant to be. The clerk at the grocery store and I got into a conversation about North Americans.”

“Then—I think he left about six-thirty. It may have been earlier.”

“Um. I don’t think there’s much use trying to catch up with him if he has an hour and a half head start. He’s probably well on his way to his rendezvous with the navy by now. But we might be able to contact his mind and use Udra in the new way to make him come back. We can try it, anyhow.”

“All right. Amtor, you and Djuna will help us, won’t you?”

“Of course.”

Sven and Madelaine sat down on the beach, and after a moment Madelaine put her head in Sven’s lap. Djuna was used to working with Sven, and I with Madelaine; in no time at all we had reached a close enough psychic union with each other to start our search for Dr. Lawrence’s mind.

We couldn’t pick him up at all. The four of us working together should have had considerable “resolving power,” but, as far as finding him went, he might never have existed.

I may say here that Dr. Lawrence had as little psychic endowment as any Split I have ever encountered. He was subnormal. Perhaps this lack in his makeup accounts for the fascination psychic phenomena had for him.

At any rate, we failed. About nine-thirty it became plain there was no use in trying any more. Sven got up, dusting sand from his trouser legs. “That’s that,” he said. “About all we can do now is wait for the navy to attack us.” He put his hands under Madelaine’s armpits and swung her to her feet.

“You think they will attack?” the girl said.

“Yes. Probably within the next few hours. It was odd they let us alone before. Of course, we can separate. You and I can go on down the Mexican coast, or inland, and the dolphins can head for deep water. We don’t have to stay here in Descanso, waiting, like targets in a shooting gallery.”

“I’d rather stay here with the dolphins,” she answered slowly. “I’m tired of running and trying to save myself. Amtor, what do you and the others say?”

I consulted with them briefly, in our high-pitched speech. “We feel the way you do, Sosa,” I said. “We’d rather stay with our Split friends. So many of the sea people have already been killed that it doesn’t seem worthwhile for us to try to save our own lives.”