As Cora got closer, Mother’s eye blinked. She startled back from Cora and focused, all of them shuddering awake.)

At noon, she lay on the dock, looking down through the slats. She could see that sleep was not what they were doing. Both their eyes were open and aware. However, they moved as little as possible, just coming to the surface to breathe. Through the slats, their exhales were slow and deep.

She lay on the dock just above them, staring down through the boards at the shaded dolphins. When they exhaled, she could smell their breath, an unflattering combination of brine, fish and rotting egg.

12 P.M.: All dolphins floating in the shade of the dock, eyes open. They do this at noon each day.

* * *

She sometimes sat at the top of the staircase to the veranda to observe the dolphins. From here she could look down through the metal railing to watch them in the water, moving about, interacting. From the stairs, she couldn’t hear all their sounds or catch the nuances of their play, but she could see more of the action and could take the notes continuously, her hands dry.

The men watched the dolphins and took notes also. They didn’t sit on the stairs even though it had the best view, but instead on cushioned chairs on the veranda, with a notebook. On the table beside them was a drink and snacks and an ashtray.

Since she was there taking notes now, they’d cut their hours down. Tibbet watched in the morning from ten to noon and Eh from two to four in the afternoon. If the animals did anything of interest outside of those hours, the men were not there to witness it. They also seemed to take different kinds of notes than she did, for they used their pen to make only small ticks on the paper every once in a while, pausing occasionally to take a long drink from their glass full of clinking ice.

TEN
June 17–26, 1965

One morning she waded out of the lagoon to find Tibbet sitting in a chair on the dock. He’d recovered from his sunburn, but now wore big hats and long-sleeved shirts and looked sweaty and hunched in the sun.

He had her notepad in his lap and was reading it. He didn’t put down the book once he saw her. Instead he looked at her, over her notes, like a teacher grading her quiz.—What’s Bernie?

The dolphin with the rope burn.—She ran her fingers across her collarbone to show the location of the burn.

He seemed a polite man struggling with his disappointment in the state of the world. At times when he watched her work or when Blum was talking, he’d pinch his lips between his teeth as though scared of all he wanted to say. He looked back down at the notebook. With his face turned partly away, it was harder to read his lips.—Blum asked you to take notes?