Stranded / Liao Hung-chi | 廖鴻基
Translated by Jacqueline Li
Originally published in 2012 in the collection “The Story from Deep Sea” (來看深海)
Detail from an illustration in On Risso's Dolphin, Grampus griseus (Cuv.) by William Henry Flower. Courtesy of Biodiversity Heritage Library.
1
Gray clouds thicken and sink, the cloudlines neatly stacked as though a trowel plastered them across the belly of the dark blue mountains. Small leaves rustle on treetops, and as the north wind rises, a piston of clouds from the cold front is oppressing the luminous sky of the last two days, all at once turning its boundless space hazy and claustrophobic, in the mood of leaden gloom gasping for thin air.
Out there white horses trot on the sea, whipping the surface into a primal mist. At the edge of the shore the waves roll higher and higher, like a sequence of gradually closing doors. The mass of cold air is moving in, and soon raging breakers will be churning up the sea.
The telephone rings continuously and in this stifling atmosphere sounds almost like an insistent alarm. Under a changing sky the disquieting rings make one feel that something unfortunate is about to happen, or worse, a disaster has already taken place.
‘Hello hello! Stranded . . . on the reef! Come quick!’ It’s a call from a fisherman friend who lives by the sea; he blurts out a barely intelligible message before hastily hanging up.
Two summers ago, two fisherman friends and I went round on our fishing boat to observe and record cetacean life in neighbouring waters. Ever since then local fishermen have phoned us whenever they encounter strandings, whether at sea or on shore.
I hurry to the reef platform. A group of men and women, old and young, have already gathered there, and in their midst lies a dolphin on its side. It doesn’t move an inch, seemingly dead. Its torpedo body, smiling upturned mouth and white linear scars easily distinguish it as a Grampus dolphin.
Among the crowd is a middle-aged man in a fishing vest. His antislip-rubber-clad foot is planted on the body of the dolphin, a wide-brimmed angler’s cap with a chinstrap angled on his head, and a fishing rod lying on the ground as if he had just caught the trophy himself. Fishing Man speaks to the crowd of onlookers with the exaggerated gestures and tone of an orator.
‘Not just one . . . there’re two of them . . . this one really small, and the other, wow, so big . . . almost stranded too.’
Also among the crowd is a grizzled oujisang, an old boy, who raises his eyebrow mockingly and says, ‘Re-a-l-ly? How big? Bigger than Hai-ang, our old monster of the sea? You’re all hot air, you are!’
‘Curse me if it ain’t true . . .’ says Fishing Man, throwing his arms wide twice in a row to show the size of the other dolphin; then he pauses, as if contemplating if he should scale up his assessment.
‘Oh wow!’ The children in the crowd join in excitedly. Only then does Fishing Man smugly drop his outstretched arms.
People often ask why whales and dolphins get themselves stranded and killed. In reference books on cetacean ecology, there have been many hypotheses about the reasons for stranding: old age, disease, failure of the echolocation organ, navigation mistakes, geomagnetic confusion, current turbulence combined with complex coastal terrain, carelessness in prey hunting, or even the subliminal desire to return to a long-forgotten ancestral home. However, these suggestions, all teasing as riddles, have never been proven.
It has always puzzled me that most people seem more intrigued by cetacean death on beaches than by their life at sea. Here at the seaside the wind is fierce, and the temperature is gradually dropping; many in the crowd turn up their collars, but still they look on at the stranded dolphin, with unchanging curiosity.
Drip, tick, drip . . . intermittent sounds issue from the dolphin’s mouth, as though it were responding to the speech of Fishing Man. A wave of stench and blood gushes out with the noise. The crowd quickly steps back, and Fishing Man, similarly spooked, removes his foot from the body of the creature, and blurts out, ‘Ha! It still speaks.’
The crowd laughs. Fishing Man watches for a moment, and when it appears that there is no more danger of being harmed, he puts his foot back where it was. The belly of the dolphin is swollen and rotting. I reckon it’s been dead for a while. I also notice that its white scars look vaguely familiar. With a tinge of sadness I squat down to take a closer look. The scar marks are minimal, and its body length and weight may just be half of an adult’s. It is obviously a very young dolphin. What dismays me most is that these physical features look much like those of a Grampus dolphin we met during our observation trips. Could this stranded and dead dolphin lying in front of us be the one we befriended at sea?
Grampus dolphins of such an age like to interact with boats. They like to tag along and perform all sorts of leaping acrobatics on the surface of the sea. To some onlookers, the sporting of these juvenile dolphins may seem a little ungainly, but they will jump nonstop, spouting generous jets of water one after another.
I remember being deeply impressed at the time. This stranded little dolphin here is likely the same Grampus, which time and again jumped and played at the gunwales of our observation boat at the start of the year. Now it is lying on its side on the rocky reef, its body trodden by a complete stranger, its mouth squeaking, and its head pillowed in a pool of bloody water.
‘Trust me, re-a-l big . . . two of them there – one large, one small – larger one with its tail broken . . . ’ Fishing Man continues to describe the scene when he first came across the dolphins.
Blood is once again gushing out of the young dolphin, and the squeaking comes and goes, as though it were tearfully narrating its own sorrows. I think of the tales of people drowned in the sea, who, when loved ones get close to them, bleed through the seven orifices of the head. I can now see the eyes of the dolphin half-open, its bloodstained eyeballs exposed. If it were still capable of shedding tears, I reckon they would be dark red in colour.
‘Poor thing,’ says a child sadly.
‘Not our dolphin, please. Not ours . . . ’ I murmur to myself, with the same disconsolate feeling one has on first hearing news of a dear friend killed in an accident. I can hardly bear seeing a friend of the sea meeting such a tragic end.
2
A policeman pushes through the crowd. He stares round for clues, and quickly raises his hands and announces, ‘Nobody moves. This is a protected animal, and according to the law it must be reported to higher levels: the conservation unit, the academic unit . . .’ He starts counting the departments on his fingers one by one.
Fishing Man quietly pulls back the foot planted on the dead dolphin. He doesn’t want any trouble now. Instead he turns round to pick up his fishing rod and grabs the first opportunity to slip out of the crowd.
‘Well, no worries . . . it stinks, ain’t nobody carving that meat.’ The white-haired oujisang is probably speaking with experience. In the past when meat was in short supply, when whales and dolphins were newly stranded they were seen as gifts from heaven. People fought each other to butcher them on the spot.
‘Just push it back to sea, simple as that . . . why bother to report?’
‘Don’t you move. I say do NOT move!’ As if reaching for a gun, the policeman pulls out a walkie-talkie from his belt, and begins mumbling a report to a higher authority.
3
The north wind is blowing ferociously, and the air cracks with a piercing whistle as if it were whipped open by the cold wind. The sea lettuces are quivering by the shore, and waves ram against the cliffs, throwing up curtains of frothing water. The ocean is now fully off limits, with an impassable border between sea and shore.
I walk along a coastal path towards the nearby small fishing port. The sky is getting dark, and the temperature has dropped sharply. The bleak light of misery is flickering from each mercury lamp on the street. The image of a friend lying on its side and spilling blood lingers in my mind. I think hard about it: if Fishing Man was telling the truth – about the two dolphins, and the one with a broken tail – I sense, hidden somewhere behind this stranding incident, a disheartening process not yet known to us.
A determination is gradually taking shape in my heart: I must get to the bottom of the death or deaths, to expose the process and reasons behind the stranding. Curiosity is definitely not the driving force; I am here simply to redress the injustice of a friend’s death.
4
I first find the friend who phoned me about the stranding. His answer is as incoherent as his phone message: ‘This weather . . . just have a drink . . . why bother too much?’ I pester him, and he goes on, ‘Heard that it was chucked out from one of those tuna set-nets . . .’ And later adds, ‘Smelt so bad . . . of course had to chuck it out . . . this weather . . . ’
After a pause, he mumbles, ‘That was this morning . . . come on . . . have another drink!’ He can’t even string his words together any more.
In the bitterly cold wind, the fishing port is quite deserted. Most fishermen have gone home. Two spearfishing boats berth at a corner of the embankment, their sterns lit up in misty yellow. They are both boats registered with other ports but are sheltering in the harbour from the wind. Spearfishing is a technique that relies heavily on keen eyesight, and workers don’t have a fixed fishing ground. When they go out to sea, they follow the tide line to search to and fro for traces of big fish. If the two suffering Grampus dolphins ever drifted near the shore, these fishermen would have seen them.
On the deck of the two boats, evening meals have just been laid out. Seven or eight fishermen are having their supper. When asked about the dolphin incident, they respond quite enthusiastically and frankly.
‘Oh yeah, the Monk dolphins,* right? There were two. We saw them at noon. Dead already . . . one big, one small . . . seemed quite close . . . still clinging together, even dead.’
‘Yeah, bigger one’s tail was broken.’
I don’t even have to ask much; the fishermen cannot wait to describe the details of what they saw on the day at sea.
‘Well, Ruan saw these two yesterday morning, and still alive at the time.’ The captain of the other boat leans forward and says, ‘The one with the broken tail was dragging a long trail of red smoke. I didn’t think it would last much longer.’
‘Looked like old mother and her young calf. It sounds strange, the young’un pushing old ma with its head like that.’
I ponder for a moment. We have almost got to the bottom of what misfortune overtook the mother and child dolphins. I again knock on a few doors of fisherman friends, down a few drinks, and when I leave the harbour, it’s already midnight. In the howling north wind, the green light flashing from the lighthouse at the tip of the port blinks with a particular melancholy.
5
Returning home, I spread a piece of white paper on the desk, and list the threads in chronological order . . .
The timeline starts at early morning of yesterday. I see two Grampus dolphins, vaguely swimming out from the left side of the white paper. They are mother and child . . . the surface of the paper slowly ripples . . . then the small dolphin starts swimming towards me, towards the edge of the desk, and when it appears right in front of me, it speaks in a tiny voice, calling out to me.
My whole body tingles, and a trembling, a sudden chill, comes over me, as though I were totally submerged in the dark and icy ocean.
6
4am. Mama leads the family into deeper water. We surround a shoal of purpleback flying squid, and Mama turns to us, ‘Dawn will break soon; just eat as much as you can.’
The family disperses and each member goes to their own waiting position. I swim to and fro above the shoal, trying to stop them breaking through. Others take turns to dive into the besieged squad, and swallow as many squid as they can. After filling up, they return to position. When it’s my turn, two strong and bulky purplebacks sneak past my side, and dart towards the surface. I flip round and chase them. Too hot-headed and eager to win, I miss Mama’s anxious shout behind me.
The glowing spots on the side of the bodies of the squid suddenly stop moving and remain still not too far ahead. ‘Where d’you think you’re going!’ I open my mouth and charge at them. Just when the squid are caught inside my mouth, I feel a few pieces of string stuck to my teeth on the lower jaw. Startled, I instinctively turn over and flip. Oh no, my right pectoral fin gets tangled with the strings too. Alarmed, I flick my tail fin hard. Alas, worse still, the tail fin seems to be wedged and can hardly exert any force.
‘Don’t move dear! Do not move at all!’ It’s the panicked voice of Mama, who is catching up. Alerted by her cry, I realize what has happened to me, but it’s already too late for regret.
I remember Mama warning me a few times: gillnetting is, like the demon of the sea, everywhere in the surrounding waters of this island, spreading and snaking a network of traps. A gill net is also known as ‘the Wall of Death’; the netting flows gently and slyly with the tides, extending its claws to ensnare anything alive that come its way. Time and again Mama has urged me not to rush around in this water. If you’re caught, do not move. The more you struggle, the tighter the netting, and the more deadly.
It’s too late for words now. I am all wedged up in the mesh, my body like a suspended specimen hanging on the wall. Time seems to be frozen as well. Each second is ticking away slowly and torturing me increasingly. I am frightened and confused. What makes it worse is, as I cannot move, I am obliged to remain as still as a corpse.
I can see the glowworms sparkling on the surface of the water like morning stars. In normal circumstances, if I am not very deep, I just need to lightly flick my tail to surface for some air; but now everything seems as vague and distant as the starry sky. I know that the air in my lungs will not last long and I urgently need a fresh breath.
‘Don’t move,’ Mama shouts at me again, as if she knew what was in my mind.
If I rush upwards, my tail fin will get caught up with more netting and I will get entangled more tightly. More to the point, I doubt if I have the strength to drag up the heavy leadline on the lower edge. I know Mama is going to help me, but I know also that she has to do it at great risk of being entangled herself. I don’t want that; I would rather die. But what else can I do? The gill net has not only caught my body, but has also completely seized hold of my whole being.
Slowly I can feel Mama pushing against my lower trunk. I can feel my body rising . . . the starry sky seemingly closer and closer . . . and if only I could move my flipper, I would almost be able to reach the stars . . .
With a splash I surface. I breathe out hard immediately, then breathe in, out and in . . . this moment feels so blissful yet so full of guilt. The net quickly pulls me down again. I am falling back into the bottomless abyss of death. Is Mama safe? Is Mama safe? In this moment of agony the only thing I can do to relieve my anxiety, strangely, is to worry about Mama.
5am. The family arrives, but Mama stops them and keeps them at a distance. By using her mouth, she has been untangling some netting from my tail fin. She swims towards my deeply enmeshed pectoral fin, each piece of string cutting into my skin like a sharp knife.
Mama’s action has become more urgent. Dawn is breaking, and the fishing boat will soon be hauling up the gill net. If I can’t get out by then, my destiny will be transferred from her hands into those of the fishermen on the boat.
After a while, Mama pushes against me one more time to help me float up for fresh air. When I surface, I glimpse a pale grey sky. In normal circumstances, dawn, the beginning of the day, is so full of hope. Now, to Mama and me, it becomes a life-threatening death knell.
Sinking back, I am again suspended, like a corpse drifting in water. When I don’t see Mama untying the netting on the fins, I am suddenly gripped by an intense fear and ominous premonition. The winch on the boat is turning, dragging in the gill net. My pectoral fin is being pulled apart, as if sawed by a knife. Has Mama given up on me?
‘Go away! Go far away!’ I heard Mama’s cruel, bitter cry.
I turn slightly sideways and can see Mama some distance from my belly. My aunt has brought the whole family along. They gather around Mama and are shouted away each time they try to get closer. Mama is floating on her side, her tail fin now tangled in the netting! My heart aches, much more so than when the netting is enmeshed in my chest. Trying to save me, Mama is now trapped as I am, waiting to be rescued and released from the same fate. But Mama, exercising her leader’s authority, still prevents my aunt and the family from swimming any closer to help.
I remember what happened once. A young cousin from another aunt’s family was trapped by a gill net. In the course of rescue, over twenty members of the family ended up hanging on the net, the whole family dead and gone.
Apart from deterring them from approaching, Mama speaks to my aunt in the solemn but beseeching tone of an elder: ‘Take the children far away from this island and its seas, and raise them well. Although there are plenty of purpleback squid here, this is not a place to raise our children, who will never be allowed to live freely.’ Mama is becoming desperate, but she continues firmly, ‘Go! Leave us, leave this island; the children will need a better environment to grow up in. Life is not just about food. Look, the sky is lighting up; take the children and go far away.’
It is already dawn. Filaments of light melt into the water, rippling and dancing on the surface. I finally see this cold-hearted Wall of Death that has torn apart my family and separated Mama and me. It dangles and squirms, like a demon’s finger that stirs up trouble in the sea. Not far behind us hangs a sea turtle, shriveled into a cocoon-like ball, long dead and gone. I begin to resent this sea, which we once regarded as home.
Mama comes over once more to hold me up. She hasn’t given up. This time she has to carry double the burden of netting, to help me bear the fate of dying entangled in a net.
‘Mama, Mama, let’s stop, we don’t have a chance . . .’
‘My child, keeping alive is most important, there’s a chance as long as you live.’
7
On my way up I saw the netting under my belly being pulled out and rolled up by Mama. Her own tail fin has snagged a large bundle of mesh, which is now, spun by her movement, twisting into a thick and tightly knotted cable, trailing along after her tail.
6am. We’re being dragged closer to the stern, both of us held floating together on the water. The morning sun warms the side of my face, and its rose-tinted glow reflected on Mama’s. In normal times we’d have been full with purplebacks, and leisurely resting on the surface of the sea. This’s the time I like best, seeing Mama’s beautiful face painted with a radiant blush. But now the same sunlight has lost its meaning for me.
As the net is being hauled in, I am dragged under the stern, trembling all over with fear. ‘My child, we’ve held up until now, but I shall say goodbye to you.’ Mama’s expression is incredibly tender, as though nothing had happened. ‘If you’re lucky and get free in the end, do not be afraid, do not look back, and do not fill yourself with hate; leave quietly, and promise me to go as far away as you can.’
I understand this is Mama’s way of teaching me to be brave in the face of death. Perhaps, she is also encouraging me not to give up the last chance.
‘Mama . . .’ Instead at this last moment, I am so deeply upset that I cannot utter a single word of regret, gratitude, or even love to her. I am simply left shaking to the core.
The fishermen on either side of the stern take hold of my pectoral fins, my body being hauled up by the winch onto the deck. The two men growl as if they’re cursing. The one on the right brutally jerks off the mesh deeply embedded in my pectorals. The fins are so badly ripped they could break off anytime. I howl loudly, crying with all the strength left in me. Death begins to seem the better way out.
Bang! I feel the surface of the water hitting my body violently. I am sinking, stiffening and hurting in the fall and staring blankly at the water surface receding from me. The mesh above my head is floating on the sea like wispy cloud. Sunbeams are flickering through the netting, and Mama’s tail fin is still hanging on the mesh. I see her bending to check on me. In the dazzling light, I carry on falling, as Mama appears no more than a black rod that hangs down from the water surface. She is getting further and further away, and smaller and smaller . . . finally as tiny as a needle, and then suddenly she’s pulled out of the water, disappearing in front of me.
I hurriedly swing my tail fin lightly and to my disbelief, find no more netting. Only then do I realize I have been completely released; I am free! I rush to the surface. I have to wait for Mama’s return. The boat has released me; they’ll do the same to her. Mama is right, there is a chance as long as you live.
Floating to the surface, I can see Mama being suspended upside down at the stern, her tail fin deeply wedged in the mesh. Two fishermen keep rotating her body. Mama quickly glances at me. I can see her expression of relief, although I am not sure whether this is due to my release or her own impending liberty.
7am. This is a moment of complicated emotion. Mama has been suspended and spun for quite a while. The thick twisted cable mesh on her tail fin shows no sign of untangling. I wait patiently, hoping to reunite with my Mama, free at sea at last.
At the same moment, a third man appears on the deck. He walks from the wheelhouse to the stern, his arms stout as the driftwood on the sea, his eyes bloodshot and a knife ready in his hand. He strides all the way to the stern, and grabs Mama’s tail with his hand, grunting as in a low roar of thunder at the end of spring. He swings the knife high, the blade flashing chilling and sinister light.
I thought he was cutting the netting off Mama’s tail; instead, the sharp blade strikes down violently and quickly lifts back up again. It is her tail fin being chopped off; the brittle sound is the breaking of bones. Mama weeps in excruciating pain. Blood jets out profusely, the colour of the rosy morning sky.
8
Boom! Mama crashes down with a huge splash. I immediately dive down to look for her. It’s not hard to locate Mama; a flurry of bloody mist leads me straight to her, and as blood keeps spewing out, I can’t help screaming at the top of my voice, lost in a crimson fog and completely soaked in Mama’s blood, yet unable to feel her.
Gone are the happy anticipation and longing, together with Mama’s chopped tail fin.
8am. Mama must be hurting awfully. Her eyes look vacant, the usual radiance gone. Without the tail fin she can no longer swim. In a panic I push her belly up; I must not let her sink to the bottom of the sea. Excessive bleeding renders Mama very fragile. When I pushed her a while ago I could still feel the strength of her resistance, but now she doesn’t have much left to shoo me away.
‘There is a chance as long as you live, Mama. This is how you have taught me, and also the reason I’ve persisted till now. How come you don’t do the same to give yourself a chance?’ I know she has no energy left for words, but the truth is ever since I hit the net by mistake and struggled, haven’t I also wondered if there’s any point in keeping this chance?
The sea is vast; I don’t know where I can push Mama. In the end I am only carrying her on my back and going round in circles. What Mama really needs is a place to breathe and rest. In the boundless ocean, heaven has given us a chance to live, but has forgotten to show us how to survive.
9
9am. ‘Thrum, thrum, thrum . . .’ The engine noise of a fishing boat is faintly audible in the distance. The approaching clattering gives me the illusion that they are coming for us. Will this boat save us? I have mixed feelings. Is the boat coming to get rid of us? Mindful of what has happened to Mama, my suspicion is aroused: will they kill us?
Over the past year or so, there had been one fishing boat that befriended us. On that boat were three men. They had a different expression in their eyes, the way they looked at us. Every time we encountered the boat, Mama would say, ‘Go on . . . go and play with them.’
Whenever I leaped out of the water next to the boat, these fishermen would always clap and cheer enthusiastically; when I finished and swam close to their boat, they always had this gentle expression on their faces. It wasn’t the same when we encountered other boats. Mama would always warn us to keep a distance, or she’d lead the family to dive to avoid them.
The fishing boat is coming after us like a shark attracted by the scent of Mama’s blood. I should have avoided it. We cannot afford to be injured again. We are in no position to take more risks either. Still, I don’t want to lose any chance of being saved.
I once asked Mama, ‘What kind of animal are humans, precisely? How come we can get close to some but have to dodge others?’ I remember her saying, ‘My child, the human being is a very complicated animal, not easy to understand. Maybe we can wait for change, but we mustn’t expect anything from them.’
This time we do not dive under to avoid them; in fact we are not capable of doing any such thing. When the fishing boat is close to us, it pauses. Four men come to the gunwale and look at us curiously. After the treacherous injury inflicted on her by their fellow humans, will Mama agree with me to take this risk? I doubt that these fishermen can help us, but maybe as long as they don’t kill us, they are already encouraging us to live on. Indeed, they haven’t done anything: they haven’t lifted a finger to help, neither have they harmed us. They simply keep shaking their heads as their boat moves away.
Noon. Mama has stopped bleeding. I support her for a long while so that she can rest and she seems to recover a little. The sun shines brightly, shedding dazzling spots of light on the sea. The pale turquoise mountain ranges on the island have turned into a lush blue. We have finally drifted with the flood tide into the shore.
‘My child . . .’ Mama speaks, although her voice is as soft as a spring breeze, but at last she speaks. It’s such a pleasant thing to hear her voice again; maybe my efforts to save her have not been wasted.
‘Child . . . push me onto the shore . . . where I can rest up a bit.’
I hesitate on hearing what she says. I heard from my aunts that many who went ashore didn’t meet a good end: some were said to be slaughtered on the spot for food; some carved up and skinned for bone specimens; and some dragged along the beach and tortured to death. This island has not been very kind to us.
‘Child . . . if we’re lucky . . . if when we’re close to the shore no one sees us . . .’
‘Is luck really on our side? Can we still rely on any “if”?’ I think to myself.
‘My child . . . if luck allows me to rest a little on the shore, tomorrow after dawn . . . I ought to have the energy . . . the strength to leave with you.’
I consider this, and in the current situation, going ashore to rest for a while is perhaps Mama’s last and only chance, if and only if people don’t discover us before that.
‘Good, Mama. There is a chance as long as you live. Let’s push you ashore.’
Afternoon. Is it good or bad luck? The tide ebbs later in the afternoon, and we, me carrying Mama, are moving away from the shore. We drift north with the current, not knowing where our lucky shore will be. And if it does appear, will we have a saving tide to carry us ashore? Mother and I will need a huge amount of good luck in order to have another chance to live.
In the evening when the tide turns, I am so exhausted that I can’t wait to go ashore and rest too. I reckon that maybe after dark when the current changes into flood tide again, we can surf it onshore.
The sun has set on the mountain range, its glow pouring down the mountain top. Rose-tinted clouds are reflected in the water with patches of lustrous vermilion floating on the sea. Tomorrow after a night of rest, when the sun rises again, will we be given the same chance as the morning clouds? Yes, if we’re lucky.
The sky is darkening fast as though it were caving in. And the tide is beginning to turn again. Let’s go, Mama! This night is going to decide our future.
The sky is now completely dark. On the shore lights come up one after another. Let’s go riding the tide towards the lights. The flood tide is light and easy, gently carrying us onto the surface of the sea.
How odd? When I feel Mama’s body securely lodged, the sound of the waves hitting the shore seems still some distance away. Then, a familiar sensation creeps up my tail fin just when I am taking a rest, like the tremor of being stroked by tiny snakes, lots of them, or of being clawed by the ferocious fingers of the demons of the sea. I struggle hard to roll and flip. Who would choose to relive this morning’s nightmare? What sort of life can endure such repeated manipulation and torture?
‘Mama! Tell me what kind of home, what kind of sea this is! Out there are gill nets to sweep you away, and near the shore fixed nets to trap you, Mama dear! What sort of friends are they? Why can’t they leave us some room to live? Not even a tiny path for us to rest . . .’ I can’t stop myself: ‘And what now! Even the last gleam of hope they will cruelly destroy!’
‘My child . . . with your help, we have lived one more day.’ Mother loosens herself from the thick ropes of the fixed net, on which she was resting. As she slowly sinks, she leans close to me, her eyes overflowing with tears. ‘Separation, alive or dead, is the most wretched, my child . . . we’re at least dying together . . . we have some luck, don’t we?’
Mama’s pectoral fins embrace me, her head pressed against mine; we no longer have the possibility or the reason to live on. Mama is humming softly in my ear, the way she used to sing a lullaby: ‘We’re going to sleep soon, working from early morning to evening, we’re so exhausted, we’d like some sleep; the ocean is our home, seawater our bed, so close your eyes in peace and let us sleep on like babies, sleep on deeply . . .’
I close my eyes peacefully. And in my last look at the world, I see my Mama.
10
Outside, the north wind is howling sharply, and rattling the window frame. The misty morning light washes across the white paper on the desk. Dawn is here, the Grampus mother and child sleep peacefully on the right-hand side of the white. They live together, suffer together and here die together head to head. A damp crinkly patch appears on the paper, the tears of the mother and child perhaps.
The morning before, they were thrown into the sea from the set gill net, drifting with the tide, their spirit locked together, and floating for a whole day without being separated by any current. That evening, as the weather changed, they were very close to the coastal reef above the water level, the child washed up and stranded while the mother drifted on, forever separated.
11
I can’t tell why I go back to the reef platform again, maybe just to see the young dolphin one last time.
It’s still busy there, and because of the media attention, there are more people here than yesterday: officials from conservation units, or academic units, experts, researchers, media reporters and the same crowd of onlookers. After being measured, the dolphin’s body is bloodily cut open on the spot, skin flayed, flesh carved, head and body in two pieces, finally a badly mutilated carcass exposed to the north wind.
Later, the media will report a stranding event and the conservation officials will appraise the incident, spouting something about the importance of protection policy; experts will recite, as usual, an inconclusive riddle for the cause of this stranding. Undoubtedly no one will mention anything about gill nets or fixed nets. Thus the life of a young Grampus dolphin has simply evaporated. Some academic units may keep its skeleton as a specimen of an immature dolphin, but its life and its mother’s will vanish forever together with their miseries.
Bitter is the north wind, with gray clouds turning and roiling in the low sky. The wailing of the waves hitting the rocks reaches an ear-shattering pitch, while the sky drizzles incessantly.