Margaret St. Clair Read Free

felt sick and dizzy. In a minute, he realized, he was going to vomit.
    With some foggy idea of not fouling up the sidewalk, Sven walked wobblingly over to the edge of t he dock. Much better, if one had to vomit, to do it in the water.
    There was a wooden railing, not quite waist-high, at the edge of the concrete. Sven leaned on it, waiting for the spasm to take him. He must have black ed out for a moment. The next thing he knew, he was struggling in the cold, filthy water of the slip.
    He got to the surface and gasped for air. He must have struck his head on a floating piece of wood; there was a sharp pain behind his ear, and he wen t under once more.
    He tried for the surface again, but couldn’t make it. A noise of roaring filled his ears. Impersonally, he decided that he was going to drown. The knowledge did not bother him. He felt objective and detached about the whole thing.
    Abruptly he was borne up from below. A broad smooth curving surface was between his legs. A voice —high-pitched, quick, and slightly gobbling —said, ‘Take it easy, now. You’re all right.”
    Dazed and half-drowned as he was, Sven felt a thrill run down his spin e. It must be the night watchman, attracted by the sound of his splashing. But the voice had seemed to come from below him.
    He drew in air pantingly. When he could talk, he said, “Who are you? Where are you speaking from?”
    “I’m in the water,” the voice answered. “My name is Djuna. I was following you.”
    “Following? But—”
    “Can you hold on now?” said the voice. “Lean forward and put your hands under my flukes. You’ll be better balanced that way.”
    Sven obeyed. The flukes must be those triangular flesh y flaps, and that meant —“Why, you’re a dolphin!” he said. He did not know why the realization should please him so much.
    “Yesss. We call ourselves the sea people, though.”
    “You can talk!”
    “Yes. The navy was training me. But I managed to get away.”
    The dolphin had turned around, noiselessly and effortlessly, and was swimming out through the slip into the bay. “Where are you taking me?” Sven asked.
    “Where do you want to go?” Djuna replied.
    “To Fisherman’s Wharf, I guess. I think I could climb up o n the pier there. Or —where are you going?”
    “To the Farallons, to meet some —” The animal was moving more slowly now. “I know quite a lot about you,” it said in what seemed to be a thoughtful tone. “When you were playing darts in the bar, I was helping you .”
    “You were? Well, I’m not surprised. I didn’t think I could throw that well by myself. But I don’t know how you did it.”
    “It’s called Udra,” Djuna answered. “We can do it with people sometimes, the right kind of people. You don’t like human beings very much, do you?”
    “No. Whatever we do, it always seems to end up in hurting somebody. With the best motives, of course. But I ‘m sick of it.”
    “If you only hurt other human beings, Splits, it wouldn’t matter.” Djuna was swimming even more slowly now.
    Abruptly the animal seemed to have made up its —her?—mind. “Look here, would you like to come with me?” it said. “We won’t hurt anybody if we can possibly help it But the sea people are in danger. We need allies.”
    For a moment Sven hesitated. He didn’t know what he might be letting himself in for, and —then his caution was washed out by an irresistible attraction. “Yes, I’d like t o go with you,” he said. “I’ll help you all I can. Yes.”
    They got to Noonday Rock about four, when the late-rising moon was filling the sky with light. Djuna had been unable to make her accustomed speed with Sven on her back, and she had had to make wide detours around shipping for fear he might be seen.
    “Here we are,” she said in her high, somewhat gobbling voice. “This is Noonday Rock. Nobody comes here, ordinarily.” Sven felt sand under his feet. He put his legs down, and Djuna slid out from under hi m.