Conversation began, at first cryptic but suddenly only preposterous. There was an argument about the supposed intelligence of porpoises, based on recent studies of their brain structure. Tony observed profoundly that without an opposable thumb intelligence could not lead to artefacts, and hence no culture and no great effective intelligence was possible. Jug denied the meaningfulness of brain structure as an indication of intellect. Intellect would be useless to a creature which could neither make nor use a tool. Doug argued hotly that the point was absurd. He pointed to spastic children once rated as morons but actually having high I.Q.'s. They had intellects, though they had been useless because of their inability to communicate. But Nick asserted that without tools they'd have nothing to talk about but food, danger, and who went where with whom for what. All of which, he observed, needed no brains. Davis listened amusedly. Deirdre threw in the suggestion that without hands or tools an intelligent creature could compose poetry, and Jug protested that that was nothing to use a brain for--and the talk turned into a violent argument about poetry. Doug insisted vehemently that the finest possible intellects were required for the composition and appreciation of true poetry. Then Davis said, "Tony's still at the wheel." The argument died down and the crew-cuts devoted themselves to eating, so one of them could get through and relieve him. Afterward, Davis settled down below to a delicate short-wave tuning process to get music from an improbable distance. Deirdre served Tony his meal and talked with him while he ate it. Terry went abovedecks and paced back and forth as the _Esperance_ sailed on through the night. He couldn't make out anything at all about the crew or the purpose behind the _Esperance's_ chosen task and purpose. He felt dubious about the whole business. Like most technically-minded men, he could become absorbed in a problem, especially if it was a device difficult to design or a design that somehow didn't work. Such things fascinated him. But the _Esperance's_ crew was not concerned with a problem like that. There was no pattern in their talk or behavior to match the way a technical mind would go about finding a solution. The problem was bafflingly vague, yet there _was_ one. _La Rubia_ was an element in it. Possibly Davis' wistful mention of a partial map of the bottom of the Luzon Deep fitted in somewhere. Davis had spoken of _orejas de ellos_ with some familiarity, but certainly no Navy ship would cooperate in the investigation of a fisherman's superstition in which even fishermen didn't believe any longer. The Philippine fishing fleet was modern and efficient. Fishermen used submarine ears without superstitious fears, and if they referred to imaginary _ellos_ it was as an American would say "knock on wood," with no actual belief that it meant anything.