He’d made another kill, a late one. A tube-man, this time, though not the same one he’d seen earlier. It had been fat and plump, a good meal.
Perhaps he would rest among the platforms of this light-eater tonight. It was a good spot.
He thought again on the Moving Mountains. Could he have been wrong? Mightn’t they be intelligent, after all? If only he could compare thoughts with another emperor! Or even an empress. But that was quite unthinkable—for now, at least.
He sighed and turned, working his way back toward the heart of the light-eater. Intelligent or no, T’ang did not feel sanguine about the possibilities of contact.
It pained him.
93
A Miracle of Small Fishes
Arguments between materialists and religionists occasionally get round to the question of “miracles.” Are they truly the products of divine dispensation, as the religionist would claim, or are they merely coincidental sequences of perfectly natural events, as the materialist might argue?
It’s a fine, fine line, and sometimes the obvious answer isn’t all that obvious. Sometimes both theologian and rational apologist find their certitude wavering ever so slightly.
Only one person doesn’t question the reasoning behind a miracle—the beneficiary. .
These days the old purse seiner had the long dock pretty much to itself. Few fishing boats were left in San Quintin; and only one went out with any regularity. But Grandfather Flores was fortunate. The dock was kept in good repair for the powerful cruisers and sailing yachts of the rich men from Mexico City and Acapulco, and for the wealthy Norteamericanos who made San Quintin a quaint overnight stop on their journeys.