'You mean they denied it?'

'Until recently the navy always denied any link between sonar and the beachings, but they've had to admit that in some cases sonar was indeed to blame. The problem is, we still don't know enough. The only evidence we have of damage is from the dead whales. Everyone's got their own theory. Fenwick, for instance, thinks underwater noise causes outbreaks of collective madness.'

'Noise just disorients them', growled Anawak. 'It causes beachings, not attacks.'

'Well, I think the theory's worth considering,' said Delaware.

'Oh, really?'

'Well, why not? The creatures are going mad. It started with a few and then it spread, like a mass psychosis.'

'Licia, that's rubbish. Look what happened to the beaked whales that died in the Canaries after NATO held a pow-wow there. They're about as sensitive to noise as you can get. Of course they went crazy. They were so panicked that they beached themselves in their rush to get out of the water. Loud noise makes them want to flee.'

'Or maybe they want to attack the noise,' countered Delaware, stubbornly.

'Attack what? Zodiacs with outboard motors? Since when is that noise?'

'It must have been something else, then. An underwater explosion.'

'Not round here.'

'How would you know?'

'I just do.'

'You can't bear to be wrong, can you, Leon?'

'That's rich, coming from you.'

'Besides, there've been beachings here before. It's been going on for centuries. Ancient stories tell of-'

'I know that, Licia. I think we all do.'

'Fine. So do you think the Indians had sonar?'

'What's that got to do with it?'

'Everything. Beached whales are being used for ideological purposes without a second thought-'

'Uh-huh. So now you're suggesting I'm thoughtless.'

Delaware glared at him. 'I'm suggesting that mass strandings don't necessarily have anything to do with artificial noise, and that noise might cause something other than mass strandings.'

'OK, folks!' Palm tried to pacify them. 'You're arguing over nothing. Fenwick has decided that the noise theory has too many holes in it anyway. OK, so he's still into his collective madness thing, but- Are you even listening to me?' They turned.

'OK,' said Palm, when he was sure he had their attention. 'So Fenwick and Oliviera found the clots and decided they'd been caused by external factors. Superficially they resembled blood clots, so that's what they assumed they were. Then they removed the substance and ran some tests. It was the colour of whale blood, but the substance itself was transparent and disintegrated on contact with air. Most of it was too far gone to be useful.' Palm leaned across the table. 'But they took a look at some of it. The results matched some findings from a few weeks previously. They'd seen the substance once before. In Nanaimo.'

Anawak was silent for a second. 'What is it?' he asked hoarsely.

'The same substance you found in the mussels on the Barrier Queen.'

'So the substance in the brains and on the hull-'

'Identical. Organic matter.'

ANAWAK HAD ONLY been up for a few hours but already he felt drained. He took Delaware back to Tofino in the boat. His knee twinged painfully as he climbed the wooden ladder to the jetty. He felt helpless, depressed and at the mercy of whatever unpleasantness was on its way next.

Clenching his jaw, he hobbled into the deserted office of Davie's Whaling Station, fetched a bottle of orange juice from the fridge and flopped on to the armchair behind the desk. One thought after another raced through his mind, like a dog chasing its tail.

Delaware had followed him.

'Grab yourself something.' Anawak pointed to the fridge.

'The whale that brought the plane down…' she began.

Anawak opened the bottle and took a gulp.

'That whale must have hurt itself, Leon. It probably died.'

He thought for a moment. 'Yes,' he said. 'I expect you're right.'

She walked over to a shelf with plastic miniatures of whales for sale, in all different sizes. A group of humpbacks were resting peacefully on their flippers. She took one down and twisted it in her fingers. Anawak kept a watchful eye on her. 'Something's making them do it,' she said.

He leaned forward and switched on the portable TV next to the radio. Perhaps she'd take the hint and go. He didn't mind her company but his need to be alone was growing by the minute.

Delaware replaced the whale on the shelf 'Can I ask you something personal now?'

Oh, not again. Anawak was on the point of snapping at her, but shrugged instead. 'I guess so.'

'Do you come from the Makah?'

He nearly dropped the bottle. 'Whatever gave you that idea?' he bleated.

'It was something you said to Shoemaker when we were getting on the plane, about Greywolf falling out with the Makah if he kept going on about whaling. The Makah are Indians, right?'

'Right.'

'Your people?'

I'm not a Makah.'

'But aren't you-'

'Look, Licia, don't take this personally, but I'm not in the mood for family history.'

She pursed her lips. 'OK.'

'I'll call you when Ford gets in touch.' He smiled wryly. 'Or you call me – he'll probably not want to wake me or something.'

Delaware shook her red ponytail at him and walked slowly to the door. She paused. 'And another thing,' she said, without turning. 'It's time you thanked Greywolf for saving your life. I've been to see him already.'

'You've done what?'

'I mean it. You can despise him for everything else, but he still deserves thanks. If it wasn't for him, you'd be dead.'

She went.

Anawak slammed the bottle on to the table and took a deep breath.

HE WAS STILL sitting there, flicking through the channels, when an emergency broadcast came on. The TV stations were full of newsflashes with the latest on the situation in British Columbia, plus broadcasts from the US where shipping was at a standstill too. In the studio, a woman in naval dress was speaking. Her short black hair was combed sleekly off her face and there was an austere beauty about her features. She looked Oriental, perhaps Chinese. No, half-Chinese. One small detail didn't fit with the rest: her eyes were a deep un-Asiatic blue.

A text box popped up at the bottom of the screen: General Commander Judith Li, US Navy.

'Should we consider withdrawing from the coast of British Columbia?' the interviewer was asking. 'Giving it back to nature, so to speak?'

'I think you'll find that we haven't taken anything in the first place,' said Judith Li. 'We live in harmony with nature although, of course, there's room for improvement.'

'Yet in the present situation there seems little sign of harmony.'

'Well, that's something we're working on in close collaboration with leading scientists and scientific institutes on both sides of the border. Sure, it's alarming when animals collectively change their behaviour, but it would be wrong to over-dramatise the situation. It's certainly no cause for panic.'

'In other words, you don't believe we're dealing with a mass phenomenon?'

'Before speculating on the type of phenomenon, I'd want to know for certain that this is a phenomenon at all. In my opinion, we're looking at a cumulative series of broadly similar events-'

'Events that the public knows nothing about,' the interviewer interrupted. 'Why is that?'

'We're keeping the public informed.' Li smiled.

'Well, I'm surprised and delighted to have this chance to talk with you, but let's be frank: the provision of public information, both here and in the United States, has been patchy to say the least. And now we're finding ourselves in a position where we're unable to report the views of experts since all attempts at communication are being blocked by the authorities.'