Death in Deep Water

by Paul Kemprecos

  Atwood took an angry pull on his butt and ground it out under his shoe. “Why the hell should I help Oceanus?”

  “You wouldn’t be helping them, necessarily. I’m simply pulling together information on the Oceanus operation so people who are smarter than I am can figure out what went wrong. If you’ve got criticisms, I’m not going to whitewash the facts; what you say will go in my report. Maybe knowing more about Mr. Byron’s death can prevent another trainer from being killed or injured at Oceanus or anyplace else.”

  He blew smoke through his nostrils like a dragon. His features hardened.

  “You knew I got the ax,” he said.

  “I heard you were let go after the whale got sick.”

  Atwood rose from his chair and paced back and forth a couple of times before he came over and stuck his finger in my face.

  “Okay, Mr. Consultant,” he growled, “I’ll tell you what really happened. Sure, Rocky was sick. Hell, I saw it first. I was working with him one day and noticed the sound he made through his blowhole. He was having a tough time breathing. He was swimming in tight little circles and had trouble keeping his balance. I caught it right away. I’d been working closely with Rocky for months. We got Doc Livingston to take a look at him. Turned out to be respiratory problems.”

  “Is that serious?”

  “It can be.” Atwood settled into his chair again and sat back, crossing his arms. “We don’t know a lot about orcas. There just hasn’t been enough research. But a killer whale is basically a big dolphin, and pneumonia kills more dolphins in captivity than anything else. It’s more complicated, though.”

  “Complicated in what way?”

  “Say a dolphin dies in an aquarium. They perform a necropsy and the cause of death is put down to pneumonia. They don’t say if the animal probably died from something else.”

  “Why not, Mr. Atwood?”

  “Nobody wants to admit they’re only telling part of the truth. Sure the animal got pneumonia, but that was only a secondary infection resulting from an ulcer or some other stomach ailment that was produced by the real cause of death, plain old stress. It’s pretty much an open secret in the marine-park industry.”

  “Why would anyone be afraid to admit a dolphin died of stress?”

  “Because they don’t want to get the federal regulators or the animal-rights people down on their neck. Saying an animal died from stress is like admitting you’ve been leaning too hard on it.”

  “How’s that, Mr. Atwood?”

  “You’ve got to start at the beginning. First the animal is yanked away from its family and companions. Then he’s stuck in an artificial environment that limits his movements and he’s fed dead fish instead of the live ones he’s used to. Just when he starts getting acclimated to swimming around in a tank that bounces his signal back every time he tries to echolocate, we humans come along and start demanding that he jump through hoops to get his supper. It puts a lot of pressure on him, like your bosses, calling you up and saying you’ve got to get your report here done this afternoon or you won’t get paid.”

  “Was Rocky under stress?”

  “Every marine mammal in captivity is under some kind of stress. Depends on the management of the park. How tough they are with the training, or how much pressure they put on the animals to perform.”

  “What about the management at Oceanus?”

  “Oceanus is no different from anyone else. They all say they’re out to educate the public, but that’s crap. They’re after the bucks. Oceanus was planning a major expansion program built around the killer-whale show. They wanted Rocky to perform as often as he could. I was always being pushed to teach him new tricks.

  “What happened after you told Austin that Rocky was sick?”

  “Livingston pumped antibiotics into him.”

  “How did he respond?”

  “I never got a chance to find out. Austin told me to take a few days off. I guess the treatment worked. Rocky is still alive. But that wasn’t the end of it. Austin blamed me for Rocky getting sick. He said I could have prevented it, or that I should have told him sooner. That’s a bunch of bullshit. Austin was just covering his ass. So he fired me.”

  “Do you think Rocky’s sickness had any bearing on Eddy Byron’s death?”

  “Directly, no. Rocky is a real gentle animal. Even now, even with Eddy dead, I find it hard to believe he’d ever hurt anyone. The most he’d do is nudge me once in a while or sulk if I was working him too hard, and I’d lay off.”

  “Are you saying he couldn’t have done it?”

  “That’s what I’d like to say, but I can’t. I read about the rips in Eddy’s wet suit and I’ll be damned if I can explain those away. Then there’s the whole lousy setup. All at once I’m gone. Rocky’s got to deal with a new trainer using different training methods. You know how it is when you’re feeling awful and someone starts to bug you. You want to strangle them. Maybe Rocky was just confused from being sick and the changes at the park and he went over the edge.”

  “What did you mean about different training methods? I thought they were all pretty much the same.”

  “They are to a point. First you have to build trust between you and the whale. The whale has nothing to base that trust on, so the most positive thing you can do is feed it. The whales gets used to having a human around. It learns a human is interesting and non-threatening. It sees that play is fun. Then you try to maintain that bond. It’s amazing the things they will allow you to do, whether performing or not.”

  “It must take a lot of time and patience.”

  “You have to know how to react to the whale’s behavior. It takes a sixth sense. But that’s only half of it. The whale must be ready to accept you in or out of the water.”

  “Does that mean Eddy would have had to go through the bonding thing all over again with Rocky?”

  “Absolutely. You can’t take anything for granted. It’s no sure thing Eddy and the whale would have hit it off. A whale might not like the person he is working with. Or if a stranger tries to feed the whale a fish, he might not take it. A whale loves tactile things like being scratched or having its dorsal fin rubbed, but only with people he’s accepted.”

  “Theoretically then, once you’ve established this bond, you could pretty much get the whale to do anything, within its physical bounds and those of its own intelligence.”

  “That’s right. Of course, every animal has a different personality. If the animal hates what you’re trying to get it to do, drop it. You have to stay on your toes.”

  “Are you suggesting that Eddy didn’t stay on his?”

  “Not exactly. I just think the training method he was using was just plain dangerous.”

  “In what way?”

  “Eddy preferred a technique the guys in the industry called the ‘macho’ method. Some of the parks began using it a few years ago. That’s when the problems started with the whales, in my opinion.”

  “What was so macho about it?”

  “You spent a lot of time in the water with the whales. The idea was to get real close to the animal, give it lots of spontaneous play, petting and scratching, more variety in its routine so the whale will perform because it wants to please, not because it’s hungry.”

  “No more fish for a trick?”

  “That’s right. You feed the animal more regularly with less of its food coming as a reward for tricks. The rewards were the petting and the giving it attention. You punished it with boredom. If the animal did something you didn’t like, you stopped working with it and didn’t talk for a minute or two. Your silence tells the whale you’re not pleased.”

  “Sounds pretty civilized to me. What was so dangerous about it?”

  “The trainer becomes the focus of the whale’s attention rather than food. There is less control, and the whale could become unpredictable. Look, Mr. Socarides, t
hose animals weren’t designed to react to that kind of training. They operate by their own set of rules. Like one guy said, it’s not like training dogs, it’s more like working with grizzly bears. Top predators, in other words. At the same time, pressure was on to get the animals to perform newer and more complicated stunts. Some trainers in the industry were worried about safety. No one listened to them until trainers started getting attacked at a few parks around the country. Eddy still wasn’t convinced.”

  “I take it you didn’t approve of the macho technique.”

  “I thought it was a recipe for disaster. I used the old methods. Later, I found out that Byron had made a change in the training. I called Austin and warned him he was asking for trouble.”

  “What was his response?”

  “He told me to shove it. Said I wasn’t working for Oceanus and to mind my own business. Not long after that, a couple of trainers were injured at Oceanus. I heard the park went back to the old methods and ordered the trainers out of the water. That would have confused Rocky even more. Austin never gave a damn about the animal. He’s just interested in the bottom line.”

  “But they found Eddy in the water.”

  “I’m not surprised. Eddy had a reputation. Nobody ordered him around. He would have done exactly what he wanted to do. Then again, Rocky could have snatched him from the side of the pool.”

  The walkie-talkie on Atwood’s belt crackled. Somebody at the dock needed gas. He got up and we walked back toward the marina.

  “Sorry I have to go,” he said. “I felt pretty good getting this stuff off my chest.”

  “I appreciate the time. I’ll make sure your comments get into my report. Do you plan to get back into marine-mammal training?”

  “Hell, yes. This job is just to get me through the summer while I look around. My wife’s got a pretty good spot with an insurance company and my daughter was planning to waitress at a restaurant, so it would be tough on them to just pull up stakes. We’ll probably end up in Florida, or the West Coast.”

  “Well, good luck in whatever you do.”

  “Thanks. I hope this whole mess gets cleared up soon. I don’t like seeing all this crap about Rocky in the papers, like he was some kind of man-eating monster. We were real buddies. I really miss him.”

  “You sound like somebody who likes his work.”

  “I’ve trained whales and dolphins for years. I love them. I’d put them higher on the evolutionary scale than a lot of human beings. It kills me to see them locked up in these tanks, and if I had my way, I’d let them all go. But as long as they’re in captivity, I’ll try to make their lives as comfortable as I can.”

  We shook hands. I went back to my truck and sat. What next? I could try to dig up more suspects, but I had the nagging feeling that it was Rocky, not Eddy Byron, who held the key to this case. I thought of Dr. Livingston. He was the scientific expert on killer whales. Maybe he knew something that could make all the pieces fall into place. I took his card out of my wallet and looked at the address. He lived in the town of Sandwich, about fifteen minutes away. What the hell, I reasoned. It was worth a try.

  Livingston lived off the Old Kings Highway at the end of a long driveway in a contemporary house shaped like a typewriter case. A silver Toyota four-by-four was parked in the drive. I went up the flagstone walk and rang the bell.

  A moment later, he came to the door. He had a straight stem pipe clenched between his teeth. His annoyed expression changed to one of mild astonishment when he saw me. He took the pipe out of his mouth.

  “Well,” he said. “This is a surprise.”

  “I happened to be in the neighborhood and I remembered your invitation to drop by and talk. If it’s not convenient—”

  “Oh no . . . .” he interrupted. “Come in. I was just thinking of taking a break. I’ve been running some statistics through my computer. It’s incredibly dry work and I’d love the excuse to stop for a bit.”

  He led the way to his living room, settled me in a long sofa with wooden ends, and asked if I wanted some iced coffee.

  “Sure, Dr. Livingston.”

  “Call me Hank,” he said. “Let’s see. And your name was . . . .”

  “Socarides. Most people call me Soc.”

  He nodded and went out to the kitchen. I enjoyed the view of the marsh from the window that ran the length of the room. He came back with two glasses and settled into an Eames chair.

  “I had an ulterior motive in dropping by,” I said.

  He raised his eyebrows.

  “I’ve heard rumors that the park might open soon, which means I could be working with Rocky.” I laughed nervously. “I’m not sure if that might be good for my health because of, well, you know, that business with the trainer. We talked about killer whales in general the other day, but not about Rocky in particular.”

  Livingston chuckled. “Well, I don’t blame you for being jittery. Rocky is a pretty formidable-looking character. But how can I help?”

  “I’d just like to know a little more before I decide if I want to get in the same tank with him.”

  Livingston tapped his pipe tobacco into an ashtray.

  “I could tell you that Rocky is nothing but a big oceangoing panda bear, but that would be unfair as well as inaccurate.”

  “Does that mean I should look for another job? Something less hazardous, like working in a bomb factory?”

  “No, not necessarily. But you should realize killer whales behave differently in captivity than they do in the wild. It’s been a problem, not just at Oceanus, but at other parks. And it hasn’t always involved humans. At one park, a female orca broke its jaw attacking another killer whale, and bled to death. The park people should have known better than to put two female whales, one with a newborn, in the same tank, where they’d play out a female-dominance ritual.”

  “That’s whale on whale. How about whale versus human?”

  “We know about the high-profile cases where someone has been killed, but non-fatal attacks are far more common than most people realize. Dozens of trainers have been injured by killer whales. One whale pinned a trainer against a wall. Another took a trainer in his mouth. At one park, after a guy ended up with broken ribs, pelvis, and femur, the park owners banned divers from the water and fired the top management. This all happened before the business with Eddy Byron and the fatal attack on a trainer in British Columbia.”

  “Couldn’t they work the whales from the side of the pool?”

  “I hope you won’t be shocked if I tell you decisions in the marine-park business are often made on the basis of what’s healthy for the cash registers, not what is good for the trainer or the animal. Sure, you can put a whale through its paces from the edge of the pool. But it’s far more dramatic when the trainer rides on the whale’s back, or jets out of the water on the whale’s nose. That’s what people buy tickets to see.”

  “What happened at Oceanus?”

  “Once, during a performance, Rocky jumped out of the water and landed on the trainer. I didn’t see it happen, but the whale just miscued. Rocky bit another trainer on the hand. Nothing serious, which tells me the whale was only warning him. Then some of the trainers were knocked around a couple of times, pushed up against the side of the pool, but they could have been working Rocky too hard on bad days. Rocky was sending signals that shouldn’t have been ignored.”

  “What about the thing with the head trainer? Byron, I guess his name was.”

  He tamped some tobacco into his pipe and lit up. “It was during a training session. Eddy was trying to ride on Rocky’s back. It wasn’t a big deal. They used to do it all the time, but Rocky rolled over and knocked Eddy off a couple of times. I happened to be at the stadium. I told Eddy to give it a break. Rocky obviously wasn’t going to play piggyback. Eddy was one of the best in the business, but he was stubborn. He got on Rocky’s back again and held on to his
dorsal. Rocky rolled him off. This time he actually grabbed him in his mouth and dove with him to the bottom of the pool. The whole thing only took a few seconds. After Rocky showed Eddy who was boss, he let him go and swam away.”

  “What did Eddy do?”

  Livingston laughed. “You should have seen him. He popped back to the surface sputtering and gasping. It would have been damned funny if it hadn’t been so near tragic.”

  “How badly hurt was he?”

  “That was the incredible thing, Soc. Eddy didn’t have a mark on him, not even where the teeth had grabbed him. It was as if Rocky knew he had to be firm but gentle with a squishy thing like a human being. It scared the hell out of Eddy, as you might imagine. When he got some color back into his face, he got angry. Eddy Byron considered himself the best marine-mammal trainer in the universe. He’d been trying to build a relationship with Rocky, being a pal to him. He thought the whale would do anything he wanted. So when Rocky attacked him, it was a betrayal. Eddy took it personally. From that time on, I think he began to hate Rocky.”

  “You make it sound a little like Ahab and Moby Dick.”

  “You know, I had the same thought and I wondered if I were stretching the analogy. Moby was just reacting naturally when he bit off Ahab’s leg in self-defense. Yet it was Ahab, the human being who supposedly had the benefit of reason and intelligence, who was acting like an enraged animal to get his revenge. Hell, you would have thought Rocky had chewed off Eddy’s leg instead of just singeing his dignity. After I helped him out of the pool, Eddy glared at Rocky a few minutes, swearing under his breath. Then he stalked off.”

  “How did Austin find out about it?”

  “I told him and he talked to Eddy. To his credit, Dan moved quickly. He banned trainers from the whale tank until further notice. And he ordered Eddy to discontinue the training method he was using and go back to the old way.”

  “How did Eddy like that?”

  “Not well. He argued with Austin, but the orders stuck. Anybody else would have shrugged his shoulders and gone back to work, but not Eddy. He felt humiliated and blamed Rocky. He went along with the change, but he didn’t really go along. I think Eddy actually hated Rocky, and his attitude spilled over with the other animals at the park.”