Deirdre introduced Terry.
"Ha!" said the man. "They got you enlisted, eh? They were talking about it a month ago. You've solved the problem by now, I daresay. Including how these very queer fish happen to be in our lagoon instead of miles down in the Luzon Deep. When you find time, tell me!"
"I'll try," said Terry reservedly.
The man went down into the after-cabin and Davis followed him. Deirdre said amusedly:
"Dr. Morton's a dear! Don't take him seriously, Terry! He loves to tease. He'll hound you to tell him how deep-sea fish got up here and into a shallow lagoon. Please don't mind!"
"I won't," said Terry. "I'll tell him tomorrow, I think. I believe now I know how it happened, but I want to check it first."
Five
When Terry awoke, next morning, the reflections of sunlight on water came in through the porthole of his cabin. He watched the shimmering contortions of the light spots on the wall. His thoughts went instantly back to the subject they'd dwelt on before he went to sleep. The man with the spectacles—Dr. Morton, but his doctorate was in astronomy instead of medicine—had said that Deirdre and his father had discussed enlisting him in the Esperance's company a month ago. Deirdre'd come into the shop of Jimenez y Cía. only four days before. Some of the delay could have been caused by time spent in simple sailing from one place to another, mostly on wholly futile errands. They'd gotten a fish-driving paddle at Alua. That'd take some days of sailing each way. Apparently, they'd been fumbling at some vague idea of trying to find out what would produce the facts they'd noted. 'Very queer fish,' Davis had said of some of the catches La Rubia had made. The abyssal fish mentioned last night would be very queer fish to catch in a lagoon. Yes....
He lay still, surveying other aspects of the situation. Davis had called on an aircraft carrier for electronic items, and the Esperance was in constant touch with somebody by short-wave radio. It might be the same carrier. The Manila police department was on very cordial terms with Davis, and the staff of a satellite-tracking installation saved odd specimens of fish for him.