When either of the wives was around, the men acted differently. They were careful not to look at Cora in her bathing suit. If they needed to address her, they talked with their faces flat and bland.

Cora wore a black bathing suit, one that covered her from the collar bone down to the top of the thighs. She kept her hair drawn back in a ponytail, wore no makeup and worked to be ignored. She wanted to stay here, watching the dolphins. She wanted no trouble.

Cora watched while the men and Terry/Carrie ate lunch on the veranda. At one point Blum leaned in and touched Terry/Carrie’s shoulder, saying something. A few seconds later, Tibbet put his hand on his wife’s hand, leaving it there for Blum to see.

For a moment, Cora considered taking out her notebook to tally these touches.

* * *

About 9 A.M., Tibbet and Eh came out of the tool shed carrying a large fishing net. They unrolled it, 50 feet long, and dropped it into the water across the far end of the lagoon. The net had weights along the bottom. With Tibbet on one side and Eh on the other, they began to drag the net through the water toward the shallow end.

As soon as the dolphins saw the net, they began to panic, darting around the lagoon, looking for escape. Clearly, they’d experienced this before. They jumped, vocalizing, high squeals of fear. Blum stood on the veranda, watching and drinking his coffee.

Bernie tried to protect the other dolphins, keeping his body between the approaching net and them. He stuck his head out of the water and clapped his mouth open and shut, a warning to the humans. The claps were loud, and his sharp teeth shimmered in the sunlight. Then he charged the net, stopped just short of it and slammed his tail down against the water with all his power. The sound boomed, loud as a gunshot.

He did this over and over again, but the men paid no attention, chatting across the lagoon, continuing to drag the net toward the shallows. The fleeing dolphins had less and less room.

Cora was surprised the animals didn’t jump over the net. They could easily escape to the other side; they jumped that high all the time. However, with the net, they didn’t do so. They looked like they wanted to, for they repeatedly charged toward it, but then would turn away at the last second before jumping. Perhaps the netting confused their senses, leaving them unsure water remained on the other side for them to land in.

Using the net, the men herded the dolphins into the shallow end, then continued to heave in the net, dragging the dolphins bit by bit up the slope until they lay in an inch of water. The animals gasped there, pressed down by their own weight. Built for water, all of them (perhaps especially powerful Bernie) were transformed into fleshy paraplegics.