CHAPTER VII
THE FIGHT WITH THE OCTOPUS
A few moments later Rawlins appeared with Smernoff close behind him.
"Gone!" Rawlins announced before a question could be asked. "Clearedout bag and baggage. We went over every inch of the Cay and there'snot a living soul on it. Just too late."
"Jove, that's too bad!" exclaimed Mr. Henderson. "Looks as if they'rebound to be a jump ahead of us. Lord alone knows where they've gone."
"You're dead wrong there!" declared Rawlins. "The Lord's not the onlyone knows. We know."
The others leaped to their feet. "Are you serious?" cried Mr. Pauling,hardly able to believe Rawlins' statements. "What do you mean by that,Rawlins?"
"Where are they?" demanded Mr. Henderson. "_How_ do you know?"
"You bet I'm serious," declared Rawlins. "Heard 'em talking. Last of'em was just leaving and I had one devil of a time stopping oldSmernoff from running amuck and doing up the bunch single-handed.They've gone over to Santo Domingo where the Grand Panjandrum stops."
"Well, for Heaven's sake, begin at the beginning and tell us whathappened," cried Mr. Pauling. "First you announce they've all gone andthen you talk about hearing them and knowing their plans. Make asensible consecutive story of it, Rawlins."
"All right," grinned the diver, seating himself. "We got ashore allright and I called the boys and heard them--say you must have beenshouting, Tom--and then we took off the suits, tucked 'em out of sightamong the brush and started overland, Smernoff leading. Found a nicespot overlooking the beach and there was a bunch of men standing by apile of dunnage and jabbering away to beat the band. Old Smernoffwanted to butt right in and clean up the crowd, but I managed to stophim. Thought he'd spoil the game by yelling or something. Well, afterI'd got him quieted down we sneaked in close--they were so blamed busygassing away they wouldn't have seen us if we'd walked in and said'how-de-do.' Got close enough so Smernoff could understand them andtold him not to try to translate, but just to take it all in and tellme later. I thought at first of coming back and reporting, but I couldsee they were just ready to clear out and knew they'd be gone beforewe could get over here and back and decided the talk was moreimportant so hung on. Pretty soon up bobs their sub--I could tell herby that smashed conning tower--and a boat comes ashore and takes offthe bunch. Then the sub clears out and we are alone."
"Well, what did Smernoff tell you?" demanded Mr. Henderson as Rawlinsconcluded.
"I was coming to that," went on the diver. "There were so many talkingat once he didn't get it all, but he got enough. He says they had wordthis morning or this afternoon--he isn't sure which--that their subhad been attacked and was being followed by a destroyer, and a sub,but that the sub--meaning us--had been done for. And they were talkinga lot about him--I expect he was so busy listening to that part hecouldn't get all the rest--swearing vengeance on him for betrayingthem. They knew about his getting away and doing up a few 'reds' inNew York--though how the dickens they got the news beats me, and oneof the men from the sub--he'd come ashore in a diving suit to see ifthe coast was clear--was telling them how Smernoff and his mate hadbetrayed the sub in the East River and the narrow escape they'd had.Funny how they got the idea old Smernoff did that when really theydeserted him. Anyhow they were mad as hornets when their nest's beenpoked by a kid and at the same time they didn't dare wait for thedestroyer to come up, so all hands decided to pack up and go over toSanto Domingo. It seems they've a place all ready over there close tothe big chief's and had been planning to move for some time. Now, justwhere that is I don't know, but Smernoff says they talked about a caveand I heard one of 'em say something about Cana Honda. Over Cana Hondaway there are lots of caves so I've got a hunch the whole shootingmatch are beating it for over that way."
"You've done a good night's work, Rawlins!" cried Mr. Pauling. "Youdid quite right in listening rather than notifying us. All we wantedof this crowd was information--it's the head of the gang we'reafter--and we've got what we want, or nearly what we want--withoutcapturing or alarming them, which is a big point. Always keep theother fellow guessing in this game is a good thing to remember--lethim think he's safe and he'll be less careful. I imagine you are rightabout the locality, your hunches have proved very accurate so far, solet us get under way for Cana Honda."
"No hurry," declared Rawlins. "Those chaps won't be over there untilmorning and I don't want to take any chances of bumping into them or areef at night. We can get started and loaf along a little later, butwe want to be dead careful or they'll hear us. They think we're at thebottom of the Caribbean so we'll let 'em keep on thinking so. If theyare at Cana Honda we won't have much trouble finding them. We caneither pick them up by radio or spot them by smoke. They can't cookwithout fire and where there's fire there's smoke. My plan would be towait until nearly daylight and then start and take it easy andsubmerge before we get in sight of Cana Honda. Then slip in, find agood hiding place and do our hunting in small boats or afoot afterdark. A sub's a mighty poor sort of thing to go moseying around with.If we locate them we can slip off, notify Disbrow and corral the wholebunch."
For a few moments Mr. Pauling was silent, thinking deeply.
"Yes," he assented at last. "That will be the best plan. No use inrushing matters to such an extent that we overdo it. And I quite agreewith you in regard to tracing them. As you say, a submarine is tooclumsy and large a craft for scouting--it's too easily seen or heard."
Everything being thus arranged, the submarine was raised to thesurface, anchored securely and the occupants retired. The boys,however, got little sleep, for they were nervous and excited andfilled with expectation of thrilling adventures to come.
As soon as the first faint streaks of dawn showed upon the horizon,the anchor was hauled in and, swinging her bow towards the dim, blackbulk that marked the mountains of Santo Domingo to the westward, thesubmarine slipped silently from Trade Wind Cay.
Hour after hour they moved steadily across the calm blue sea and asthey drew ever nearer to the big island the boys gazed upon it withwonder. They had never dreamed that an island could be so large. Theyhad imagined, from the tiny dot that represented Santo Domingo intheir geographies, that it would be a low, flat spot somewhat like theBahamas, but a little larger, and now before them, they saw whatappeared to be a continent. As far as eye could see on either hand theforest-covered hills stretched away. Inland and up from the shoresrose tier after tier of mountains, the farthest nearly two miles inheight and half-hidden in clouds, and between them were immensevalleys, deep ravines and wide plateaus. And everywhere, from sea totopmost mountain peaks, the vivid green of forest and jungle, brokenonly by a few isolated patches of light-green sugar cane upon thelower hill slopes or in the valleys.
"Jiminy!" exclaimed Tom. "That _is_ an island!"
"I'll say 'tis!" agreed Rawlins. "Mighty fine one too."
"It's beautiful--but awfully wild-looking," declared Frank. "Is itfull of Indians and wild animals?"
Rawlins laughed heartily. "Wildest animals are the natives," heassured them, "and the old Spaniards killed off the last poor Indianover two hundred years ago." Then, a moment later, he continued: "Bythe way, speaking of Spaniards, that old galleon I told you about isright over yonder. See that line of reefs? Well, she's just on theouter edge of those in about 20 to 25 fathoms."
"Oh, Gosh! why won't Dad let us stop and go down to it?" cried Tom.
"Say, perhaps he will!" exclaimed Frank jubilantly. "He wouldn'tbefore, but now he's in no hurry--they can't go in shore untildark--and I'll bet he'd just as lief wait out here as anywhere else.Let's ask him."
At first Mr. Pauling refused to listen to the boys' pleading, but whenRawlins pointed out that they had time to kill and added that hepersonally would like to have a look at the old wreck, Tom's fatheryielded.
"Very well then," he agreed, "but don't waste any time. We'll expectyou to bring up a fortune, Rawlins. Let us know when you go down so wecan see the fun."
"And for heaven's sake take care
of yourself," added Mr. Henderson."If anything happens to you where will we be?"
"Oh, I'll be safe enough," laughed Rawlins. "I'm safer under waterthan on top any day."
"Come on then!" cried Tom, "let's get our suits ready."
"No, boys, you're not going down here," declared Rawlins. "Too deep."
"Oh, confound it all!" cried Frank. "Everything has to be spoiled.What's the use if we can't go down to the old wreck?"
"You can look through the underseas ports and watch me," Rawlinsreminded them. "Honest, I'm sorry you're disappointed, but this isreal diving. I'll have to use my regulation suit here too. Too deepfor those self-contained ones."
For a time the disappointed boys sulked, but presently, realizing thatthere were limits to what they could expect to do and also realizingthat they were more than fortunate to be able to watch Rawlins as heinvestigated the old galleon, their high spirits returned and theybecame as interested, excited and enthusiastic as ever.
The submarine was now close to the spot where Rawlins stated the wreckhad been before and he busied himself getting out his suit, oiling andtesting the air pump and making everything ready while the submarineslowed down and came to a stop.
"It's a heap easier now--with a submarine," said Rawlins, as he slidback the heavy metal cover to the thick glass port. "We can look abouta bit and locate the wreck before I go down. Last time it took usnearly a month to find it. You see, it's too deep to see bottom fromthe surface and--look here, boys--ever see anything prettier thanthat?"
The boys crowded to the small port and stared out It was like thesea-gardens at Nassau multiplied and glorified a thousandfold. Thesubmarine was now submerged and floating at a slight angle a fewfathoms above the bottom and her powerful electric lights, such asRawlins used in his sub-sea photography, were casting a brilliant beamof soft greenish light upon the ocean floor and the marvelous growthswhich covered it. The boys, dry and safe within the submarine, couldscarcely believe they actually were gazing at the bottom of the sea.It was more like some strange and marvelous painting or, as Tom said,like the models on exhibition in the American Museum. It was allunreal, weird, beautiful, unbelievable. On all sides was a dim, greenvoid, with half-revealed forms, shadowy outlines and indistinctobjects showing through it as through a heavy green curtain, while thebeam of light, stabbing through the water gave the effect of thecurtain being drawn aside to disclose the beauties and wonders behindit. Back and forth in this light clear space flitted gaudy fishes;fishes of grotesque form; fishes with long, trailing opalescent-huedfins; fishes large and fishes small; and once the boys cried out inmomentary alarm and drew quickly back from the glass as an uglyhammer-headed shark, six feet or more in length, bumped hisclumsy-looking head against the port.
"Gosh! Mr. Rawlins, aren't you afraid to go down among those fellows?"cried Tom.
"Not in the least," Rawlins assured him. "They won't touch a man in adiving suit--come up and rub their backs against him or stare at him,but never anything else. They're a blamed nuisance at times--get in aman's way, but we can drive 'em off by hitting them. Look, there's amoray!"
As he spoke, an immense greenish, snake-like eel wriggled past soclosely the boys could see his throbbing gills.
"They're worse than sharks," Rawlins told them. "Bite anything andsavage as tigers. Good to eat though."
But the boys found the other wonders and beauties even moreinteresting than the fishes. Gigantic cup-shaped sponges grew upwardsfor six or seven feet. Immense sea-fans and sea-plumes formed a forestthat might have been of futuristic palms. Huge orange, green andchocolate domes of brain corals were piled like titanic many-coloredfruits. There were great toadstool-like mushroom corals of lavender,pink and yellow and everywhere, above all, the wide-branching,tree-like madrepores or stag-horn corals of dull fawn-brown. Back andforth among this forest under the sea darted schools of tinyjewel-like fishes; great pink conchs crawled slowly about; a littleflock of butterfly squids shot past, gleaming like bits of burnishedmetal in the light; ugly long-legged giant spider crabs scuttled intotheir shelters among the corals and everywhere the ocean's floor wasdotted with huge starfishes, brilliant sponges, big black,sea-cucumbers and crabs and shells by hundreds.
"Jove, it's the most wonderful sight I've ever seen!" declared Mr.Henderson who, with Mr. Pauling, was also gazing at this wonderlandbeneath the sea.
"Yes, simply marvelous!" agreed the other. "Boys, I'm mighty glad Igave in. I wouldn't have missed this for anything. No wonder you'refascinated by a diver's life, Rawlins!"
"But I want to see that wreck!" cried Tom. "Do you suppose it's gone?"
"Ought to be pretty close to it by now," said Rawlins. "Yes, there'tis! See it, boys? Look, over beyond that big bunch of sea-fans!"
The boys strained their eyes in the direction Rawlins pointed, butcould see nothing that even remotely resembled a wreck.
"No, I can't see it," admitted Tom, at last.
"Neither can I," said Frank.
"Why it's plain as can be," declared Rawlins. "Can't miss it." Then,an idea occurring to him, he burst into a hearty laugh. "Why, Isuppose you're looking for a ship!" he cried. "Masts and stern andrails and all! Nothing like that, boys. This old hooker's been downhere a couple of hundred years and more. She's just a mass of coralnow. See that sort of mound there--that one with that lop-sidedstag-horn coral growing out of one side?"
"Oh, yes, I see that," declared Tom. "Is that the wreck?"
"I'll say 'tis," Rawlins assured him. "Well, we're near enough. Toobad we can't let the old sub down to the bottom, but it's too rough. Iguess she'll be pretty steady here though--isn't any current or thosesea-rods would be waving."
"But I don't understand how you can go down with life-lines and thingswhen the submarine is under water," said Frank. "I thought we'd haveto be on the surface."
"And I don't see why it makes any difference about the suits, nomatter how deep it is," added Tom.
"I don't use life-lines and 'things' when I'm diving from a sub,"explained Rawlins. "In the first place they're no use. When a fellowgoes down from the surface he can't be seen and so he has to have asignal line and a rope for hauling him up. But down here I can comeback to the sub whenever I please and just climb into the air-lock onthe ladder, and if I want to signal I can do it without any line--justwave my hands--as you can see me all the time. The airhose runs from aconnection in the air-lock and I carry a light line along just as asafeguard and have a man in the air-lock holding it. Of course I_could_ go down in one of the self-contained suits, but thepressure's pretty big down here and it's no fun working in one of themwhen the pressure outside is just about the limit of what I can getwith the oxygen generators. It's different with the air--I don't haveto bother with that--the pump looks after it."
"Oh, I understand," declared Frank, "but who's going to tend the linefor you?"
"Sam," replied Rawlins. "He's worked with me before and he's awonderful diver and swimmer. You see the pressure in the air-lock isthe same or even a little more than outside and it takes a chap who'sused to deep-sea diving to stand that. Sam could go down here withouta suit--but not for long of course--pressure's too great. Well, solong. Keep your eyes on the wreck and you'll see me out there amongthe fishes in a minute."
Rawlins entered the air-lock with Sam and presently the boys sawhim--a grotesque, clumsy figure in the baggy diving suit and big roundhelmet--laboriously making his way along the bottom almost below them.Turning, he waved his hand reassuringly and then resumed his waytowards the coral-encrusted wreck.
"Doesn't he look funny!" cried Tom, "leaning way forwards and halfswimming along, and aren't those bubbles coming up from hisescape-valve pretty? Say, it must be fun to be way down there. Gosh, Iwish we could have gone!"
"It takes years of practice to enable a man to stand that pressure,"his father informed him, "and even expert professional divers cannotkeep it up long. If you boys should go down here you'd probably beterribly injured--your ear drums burst and perhaps your eyes r
uptured.A diver begins in shoal water and gradually goes deeper and deeper andRawlins has been at it since he was a youngster."
"Yes," commented Mr. Henderson, "and some men never can dive. Diversare born not made."
"Well it's the next best thing to be able to watch him," said Frankphilosophically. "Oh, look, Tom, he's nearly at the wreck!"
Rawlins was, as Frank said, close to the mound of coral and sea-growththat he had told the boys was the wreck of the old galleon and amoment later they saw him stoop and begin working with the heavycrowbar he carried.
Breathessly the boys watched, thrilled with the idea of thus seeing adeep-sea diver at work and speculating on whether he would findtreasure. Then they saw Rawlins suddenly start back, almost losing hisbalance and in recovering himself the crowbar dropped to the ocean'sfloor. The next instant Tom uttered a frightened, horrified cry. Fromamong the mass of corals a long, snake-like object had shot forth andhad whipped itself around Rawlins' body like a living rope. They sawRawlins grasp it, strain at it, and then, before the white-faced,terrified watchers in the submarine fully realized what was takingplace, another and another of the livid, serpent-like things werewrithing and coiling about the diver.
"It's an octopus!" cried Mr. Pauling.
"Oh, oh! He'll be killed!" screamed Frank. "Oh, isn't it terrible?"
But they were helpless, powerless to aid. All they could do was togaze fascinated and terror-stricken at the awful tragedy, the fearfulstruggle taking place there at the bottom of the sea before their veryeyes.
And now they could see the loathsome creature itself. Its great pulpybody, now pink, now blue, now green; its huge, lusterless, unwinkingeyes--an enormous creature whose sucker-clad tentacles encircledRawlins in a grip of steel, binding his signal line and making ituseless, reaching about as if to grasp the air-hose, swaying likeserpents about to strike before his helmet. Madly the diver wasfighting for his life, bracing himself against the corals, grapplingwith the slimy tentacles, wrenching his hands and arms free. Then theterrified, breathless watchers gazing at the nightmare-like scene sawRawlins lift his arm and through the water they saw the blade of hissheath knife flashing in the beam of light. Again and again he broughtit slashing down, hacking, stabbing at the clinging tentacles. Bits ofthe writhing flesh dropped off at the blows and a cloud of inky waterthat shot from the repulsive creature's syphon for a moment obscuredthe scene. But the savage blows, the slashing cuts, the lopped-offtentacles seemed not to affect the giant devil fish in the least andslowly, steadily, inexorably Rawlins was being drawn closer and closerto the cruel eyes, the soft toad like body and the wicked, parrot-likebeak.
The boys screamed aloud, the men muttered under their breath. Membersof the crew, attracted by the frightened cries, rushed to the port andpeered horrified at the terrible scene being enacted under the sea.
Rawlins' fate seemed sealed, he was now bound fast by the eighttentacles, even the hand with the knife was wrapped around by therelentless, sucker-armed things.
And then, from below the submarine, a strange shape darted through thewater--a dark form which, for an instant, the boys took for some hugefish.
Straight towards the struggling diver it sped and as the light fellupon it the boys shouted and yelled, the men cheered, for it was nofish but a man! A man, naked and black, swimming at utmost speed--Samthe negro hurrying to Rawlins' aid!
Hardly had those at the ports realized it was Sam before he was at thescene of battle. For a brief instant he poised motionless above thediver and his antagonist and then, quickly and gracefully as a seal,he plunged straight down at the octopus. There was a flash of steel inthe light, the water was blackened with the polyp's ink. Through thethick, murky, discolored water only confused, rapidly moving formswere visible and scarcely breathing, those within the submarine gazedand waited. Would Sam be able to kill the creature? Could he hold outlong enough to win the battle? Could he free Rawlins?
Then as the water cleared and the light once more penetrated thedepths, rousing cheers went up from the watchers, they laughedhysterically, tears rolled down their cheeks, for slowly, painfullybut surely, Sam was coming back, while behind him, half dragginghimself along, but apparently uninjured, was Rawlins. Upon the bottomwhere he had stood a shapeless squirming, pulpy mass was all thatremained of the octopus and about it, swarmed voracious fishessnapping at the dying, flaccid tentacles. The battle was over. Rawlinswas safe. Sam had won. Naked, armed only with a knife, he had attackedthe monster of the sea, had literally hacked it to bits and hadreturned unharmed.
"Gosh!" cried Tom. "Gosh!" and unable to say another word, utterlyovercome, he slumped down upon a cushioned seat faint from the strainhe had undergone.
Frank swayed unsteadily and sank down beside his chum while Mr.Pauling and the others wiped their wet brows, licked their dry lipsand grasped one another's hands in silent thanksgiving, too overcometo speak.