Margaret St. Clair by The Dolphins of Altair Page B

big metal drums?”
    “Yes.”
    “Metal drums? What was in them?” Sven asked.
    “Radioactive wastes from nuclear reactors,” Madelaine answered. “I expect the canyon seemed a safe place to dispose of them.”
    Sven drew in his breath. Madelaine went on, “Just before I called to the dolphins to swim as fast as th ey could, I saw a —a picture of the mine exploding against a big metal drum. I didn’t know what it was. It frightened me. Then the drum broke, and I saw a fountain of deadliness shooting up from it. I knew then what it was. That was when I cried out.
    “We’re safe now, I think. Only the fringe of it brushed us.”
    We were swimming quite slowly now. We sea people have great endurance —we can keep pace with a ship for days —but we were carrying passengers, and we had had to draw on our reserves of energy in a wa y that was unusual even for an emergency. Also, we were beginning to get hungry, and of course we couldn’t hunt fish while we were carrying Sven and Moonlight.
    Sven said, “I suppose the magnet in the mine attracted it to the drum. But if the force of the mine was expended against the drum, will there be an earthquake? We hadn’t calculated on the explosion happening that way.”
    “I don’t know. Amtor might.”
    “Makes no difference,” I answered. “Lateral force is the same. There will be a quake.”
    “When?” the young man asked.
    “I don’t know. Before we get back to the Rock.”
    “Will we know when it happens?” Madelaine asked.
    “I don’t think you will,” Djuna replied. “We’ll stay well out at sea. We Will. The water feels different to us.”
    Sven said, “Are you hungry, Madelaine? There’s lots more corned beef.”
    “Why—yes, I guess I am. Perhaps the dolphins would like some of it, too.”
    Sven broke a piece of meat from the slices he was carrying. He reached over and held it to Djuna’s nose. She sniffed at it.
    “We can’t eat it,” she said. “It is too salty for us to handle. But you Splits might as well eat.”
    “All right.” Sven and the girl ate the meat and washed it down with water from the canteen.
    Madelaine bent over Ivry’s back and dabbled her fingers in t he sea water to clean them. “I’m getting sleepy,” she said, straightening up. “Ivry, when do you sea people sleep?”
    “While we are going through the water,” he answered her. “I slept a little just now. That is how we can swim such distances.”
    “You mustn‘t go to sleep, Moonlight,” I said. “Talk to Sven. We can listen. Talking will help both of you to stay awake.”
    “All right,” Sven said. “When you were washing your hands just now, Maddy, I noticed you were feeling your feet. Are they cold?”
    “Cold!” She laughed. “They’re so cold they don’t seem to be my feet any more. They might belong to somebody else. They’re swollen, too, and I ache all over from sitting in one position for so long. And yet I’m happy. I’m always happy when I’m with the people of the s ea. Do you know what I mean, Sven?”
    “Of course. I feel it, too. The halves are made whole with them.”
    “That’s because you remember the covenant,” I said.
    “What do you mean by that?” Sven asked.
    “It’s a little difficult to explain. I —excuse me a moment, please.” I had perceived that a fish, large and meaty, was swimming along unconcernedly a few feet away from me.
    I was after it in a flash. It took alarm, but of course I was much faster than it, and I caught it with no difficulty at all.
    Where there is one fish there are apt to be others, so I gave half my catch to Djuna and the other half to Ivry, and went after another for myself. They were good fish, with plenty of firm fat meat, and we all felt better after the snack.
    “When you say you ‘saw a picture’, what do you mean?” Sven was saying when I began listening again. “Do you see a real picture of something happening?”
    “No. Not exactly. Sometimes it’s just words. When