Fluke: Or, I Know Why the Winged Whale Sings

were intimidated by the science people, and they were not about to give up an amen in front of all of these eggheads, no way. The whale cops didn't like the fact that Kona was not in jail, and they weren't giving him shit, let alone an amen. Finally one of the black-coral divers who had that night found the perfect cocktail for grieving in a hit of ecstasy, a joint, and a forty of malt liquor, sighed a feeble "Amen" over the mourners like a sleepy, stinky, morning-breath kiss.
    "And I know," continued the Old Broad, "that if it were not for his stubbornness in procuring a pastrami on rye for that singer in the channel, he would be here with us today."
    "But if he were here with us -" whispered Clair.
    "Shhhhhh," shushed Margaret Painborne.
    "Don't you shush me, or you'll be munching carpet through a straw."
    "Please, honey," said Clay.
    The Old Broad rambled on about talking to the whales every day for the last twenty-five years, about how she'd known Nate and Clay and Cliff when they first came to the island and how young and stupid they were then, and how that had changed, as now they weren't that young anymore. She talked about what a thoughtful and considerate man Nate was, but how, if he hadn't been so absentminded, he might have found a decent woman to love him, and how she didn't know where he was, but if he didn't get his bottom back to Maui soon, she would twist his ear off when she saw him. And then she sat down to resounding silence and tittering pity, and everyone looked at Clay, who looked at a ceiling fan.
    After a long, awkward minute, when the Unity minister had to head-fake to the podium a couple of times, as if he would have to call a conclusion to the service, Gilbert Box – the Count – got up. He wasn't wearing his hat for once, but he still wore his giant wraparound sunglasses, and without the balance of the giant hat, the glasses atop his angular frame made him appear insectlike, a particularly pale praying mantis in khakis. He adjusted the microphone, cleared his throat with great pomp, and said, "I never liked Nathan Quinn…" And everyone waited for the "but," but it never came. Gilbert Box nodded to the crowd and sat back down. Gilbert's grommets applauded.
    Cliff Hyland spoke next, talking for ten minutes about what a great guy and fine researcher Nate was. Then Libby actually went forward and spoke at length about Nate's Canadianness and how he had once defended the Great Seal of British Columbia as being superior to all the other provincial seals in that it depicted a moose and a ram smoking a hookah, showing a spirit of cooperation and tolerance, while Ontario's seal depicted a moose and an elk trying to eat a bear, and Saskatchewan's showed a moose and a lion setting fire to a fondue pot – both of which clearly exploited the innate Canadian fear of moose – and the seal of Quebec depicted a woman in a toga flashing one of her boobs at a lion, which was just fucking French. He'd named all the provinces and their seals, but those were the ones Libby could remember. Then Libby sniffled and sat down.
    "That's what you could come up with?" hissed Clay. "What, five years of marriage?"
    Libby whispered in his ear, "I had to go with something that wouldn't threaten Margaret. I don't see you storming the podium."
    "I'm not going to talk about my dead friend when I don't think he's dead."
    And before they knew it, Jon Thomas Fuller was at the podium being thankful for Nate's support for his new project, then going on about how much he appreciated how the whale-research community had gotten behind his new "dolphin interaction center," all of which was big news to the whale-research community who was listening. During the short speech, Clair had caught Clay's neck in what appeared to be an embrace of consolation but was in fact a choke hold she'd learned from watching cops on the news. "Baby, if you try to go after him, I'll have you unconscious on the floor in three seconds. That would be disrespectful to Nate's memory." But her effort left Kona unattended on the other side, and he managed to cough "Bullshit" as Jon Thomas took his seat.
    Next a grad student who worked for Cliff Hyland stood and talked about how Nate's work had inspired her to go into the field. Then someone from the Hawaiian Department of Conservation and Resources talked about how Nate had always been at the forefront of conservation and protection of the humpbacks. Then the harbormaster talked about Nate's being a