as some of their members had successfully interposed small craft between
the Russian whalers and the breeding minkes they were hunting in the
Californian Gulf In Galveston, they met the young Texans who would
picket the Orient Amex refinery as soon as they were certain the
ultra-tanker had entered the Gulf of Mexico.
However, none of their efforts were successful in provoking
confrontation with Orient Arnex. The big oil company simply ignored
invitations to debate the charges on radio or television, and
stone-walled questions from the media.
it's hard to stir up interest in a one-sided argument, Samantha found.
They managed one local Texas television show, but without controversy to
give it zip, the producer cut Samantha's time down to forty-five
seconds, and then tried to date her for dinner.
The energy crisis, oil tankers and oil pollution were joyless subjects.
Nobody had ever heard of cadmium pollution, the Cape of Good Hope was
half a world away, million tons was a meaningless figure, impossible to
visualize, and it was all rather a bore.
The media let it drop flat on its face.
We're just going to have to smoke those fat cats at Orient Amex out into
the open/ Tom Parker growled angrily, and kick their arses blue for
them. The only way we are going to do that is through Green-Peace. They
had landed back at Miami International, exhausted and disappointed, but
not yet despondent. Like the man said/ Samantha muttered grimly, as she
threaded her gaudy van back into the city traffic flow, we have only
just begun to fight. She had only a few hours to clean herself up and
stretch out on the patchwork quilt before she had to dress again and
race back to the airport. The Australian had already passed through
customs and was looking lost and dejected in the terminal lobby.
Hi, I'm Sam Silver. She pushed away fatigue, and hoisted that brilliant
golden smile like a flag.
His name was Mr. Dennis O'Connor and he was top man in his field, doing
fascinating and important work on the reef populations of Eastern
Australian waters, and he had come a long way to talk to her and see her
experiments.
I didn't expect you to be so young. She had signed her correspondence
Doctor Silver and he gave the standard reaction to her. Samantha was
just tired and angry enough not to take it.
And I'm a woman. You didn't expect that either/ she agreed.
It's a crying bastard, isn't it? But then, I bet some of your best
friends are young females. He was a dinky-die Aussie, and he loved it.
He burst into an appreciative grin, and as they shook hands, he said,
You are not going to believe this, but I like you just the way you are.
He was tall and lean, sunburned and just a little grizzled at the
temples, and within minutes they were friends, and the respect with
which he viewed her work confirmed that.
The Australian had brought with him, in an oxygenated container.
container, five thousand live specimens of E Digitalis the common
Australian water snail, for inclusion in Samantha's experimentation. He
had selected these animals for their abundance and their importance in
