Hal followed Omo, Crab, and the captain as they walked along the reef, peering over the edge. He saw a baby octopus in the shallows, then another, and another. Each was about as big as a plate. Omo picked up several of them, saying that he would cook them for lunch. In the islands, octopus tentacles were considered quite a choice titbit.
Roger was a powerful swimmer for his age. He was quite at home either on the surface or under water. Now he chose to swim straight down a couple of fathoms, keeping his eyes open and enjoying the marvellous coral formations.
A hole appeared in the reef wall and he swam through it into a cave. Sunlight striking a shelf of coral was reflected into the cave and filled it with a soft blue light. It was a place of bewildering beauty. Here the coral polyps had shown their skill as architects and the floor and walls were covered with fairy castles and palaces in blue, white, rose, and green coral.
But Roger was getting winded and could not stay to enjoy the scene. He was about to swim out and up when he noticed that the water did not extend to the top of the cave. He rose until his head emerged. There was just room for his head between the surface of the water and the cavern roof.
A mischievous idea crept into his mind. What a joke it would be if he stayed here just long enough to get the folks a little worried.
He knew they had seen him dive in. If he didn’t come up they would think he had drowned. They would have to dive in and hunt for him and it wasn’t likely that they would happen upon this cave.
Perhaps they’d appreciate him more if they thought for a little while that he was dead.
He turned on his back and floated. He could breathe easily. The coral reef above him was so porous that it admitted plenty of air.
He could vaguely hear shouts above him and the splashing of divers into the sea. He lay quietly, chuckling to himself.
At the end of about ten minutes he filled his lungs with air and swam down and out of the cave. He did not come straight up but swam under water some twenty yards along the shore to where he knew some palm trees grew close to the edge.
Then he rose softly, slipped out of the water without a splash, and hid behind a palm.
The first thing he heard was Hal’s agonized voice saying, ‘I don’t know how I’ll ever explain this to Father. I should have kept a closer eye on him.’
Then Captain Ike: ‘Poor kid! Such a nice kid too. I’m all broken up, that’s what I am,’ and he ended with what sounded very much like a snuffle.
Even crusty Crab had something nice to say. Omo, panting from his last dive into the sea, fell back upon something the missionary lady had taught him. He tried to comfort Hal by reminding him that he would meet his brother in Heaven.
Roger could not keep down a snort of glee. Then he stepped out from behind the palm tree, roaring with laughter.
He was still laughing and crying all at once when the captain, Crab, and Omo held him down while Hal administered a whale of a spanking.
‘That’ll hold you for a while, you crazy spalpeen,’ fumed his angry elder brother. He was left flat on the reef, sick with laughter, while his annoyed companions resumed their search for specimens.
‘That’ll teach you to hide behind trees,’ Hal flung back.
Roger stood up. ‘But you’ve got it all wrong,’ he chuckled. ‘I wasn’t behind the tree - most of the time. Look. I’ll prove it to you. Keep your eye on the tree.’
And he dived again.
But Hal had had enough of his brother’s pranks. Why should he keep his eye on the tree? Roger wouldn’t come up behind the same tree - it would be another this time.
The idea of a submarine retreat never occurred to him. He went on after the others down the beach.
As Roger swam into the cave he caught a glimpse of what looked like a huge snake stretched across the cave floor. One end of it disappeared into a black hole at the back of the cave.
When he had reached the surface and taken breath he looked down to study this strange creature more carefully. It was hard to see plainly because it took on the colour of its background. Where it lay on pink coral it was pink, and it was blue, white, or black, according to what lay behind it.
Presently Roger made out another like it, and then two more. The ends of them all went up to the black hole.
And what was that at the hole? It was half in and half out, something almost as black as the hole. It was a bulbous baggy mass of no definite shape. In it were two eyes. They were small slanting eyes with a frightfully evil expression and they were looking straight at him.
A chill ran through him as he realized that here, lying doggo, waiting for a victim to come too close, concealing itself by taking on the colour of its surroundings like a chameleon, was a full-grown octopus!
He was horrified but not surprised. Where there were little fellows in the shallows it was only natural that there might be bigger ones in deeper water. But he hadn’t expected to share the same cave with one.
Taking a deep breath - for he knew that it might have to last him a long time if he tangled with this beast - he swam down towards the entrance with strong swift strokes. His head, arms, shoulders emerged into the blessed freedom of the ocean. Another stroke and he would be safe.
Something lightly slipped around his ankle. He was gently drawn back into the cave. He struggled to free himself. But the grip on his ankle was as firm as it was gentle. Roger’s hand went to his knife - or where his knife should be. But the knife and the belt to which it was attached were with the slacks he had stripped off and left on the reef above.
He seized the tentacle and tried to pull it away from his ankle. He could see that the tentacle was lined with two rows of suction cups. He got his ankle loose from the beast’s vacuum grip - only to feel another tentacle go around his other leg, and another slide softly over his shoulder.
Now he yelled for help. Hal and the rest must be on the reef just above his head waiting for him to come up. They would hear him and come. The yell used up most of his precious breath. If he did
not get air in the next half-minute he would pass out. He fought to reach the top of the cave. Seizing the lumps of coral that projected from the wall he tried to pull himself up.
The Old Man of the Sea kept a heavy arm over his shoulder. Roger could not dislodge it. With all his might he thrust his shoulder forward, jamming the tentacle against some sharp coral.
A sound exactly like a human groan came from the octopus. It relaxed its grip on his shoulder and he was able to slide free. His legs were still held. But he managed to break water and draw breath.
Then he yelled - and how! He had never yelled as loud at any ball game.
‘Hey, Hal! For the love o’Mike! Octopus! Hal! Hurry!’
He felt a sharp pang of remorse for the trick he had played upon his brother. Pretending he was in trouble, he had seriously worried his friends. Now that he was in real trouble - would they think he was just fooling again? The boy who had cried ‘Wolf’ once too often…
The octopus was tugging at his legs. He yelled again and put his heart into it.
‘Hal! Honest! An octopus’s got me!’
He just had time to gulp air before he was dragged again beneath the surface.
Now the great arms were closing in on him, around his shoulders, his chest, his stomach, his legs.
He remembered the boa-constrictor of his Amazon adventure. But these tentacles were like eight boa-constrictors all attacking at once. They began tightening upon him, cramping his stomach, crowding his lungs, retarding his heartbeat. A little more of this terrific pressure and his heart must stop.
The light was partly shut off as someone or something came into the entrance of the cave. It must be Hal. Roger twisted about so that he could see. What he saw was the great head of a tiger shark. The scavenger of the sea had smelled the blood running from Roger’s scratches made by the coral.
The unexpected visit had a remarkable effect upon the octopus. It at once loosened its grip on the boy’s body. It turned a
n angry purple.
Its sac of a body swelled as it drew in water. The sac suddenly contracted and the octopus shot like a torpedo towards its enemy. It went through the water so fast that the eye could hardly follow it.
It was very much like a jet plane or a rocket. The water suddenly expelled from the sac through a funnel propelled the beast forward at terrific speed, with the tentacles closed in and trailing behind. It was quite like a comet with a tail.
The eight mighty arms with their hundreds of suckers slapped around the impudent fish who had dared hope to steal the octopus’s dinner. Just outside the entrance to the cave was fought a battle royal. Roger could get only an occasional glimpse of thrashing fins and tightening tentacles. The visibility was made worse when the octopus emitted a great black cloud from its ink sac.
It would be suicide to venture out just now. Roger breathed and rested and hoped against hope that the two contenders might move far enough away so that he could escape.
He shouted again - but he no longer had confidence that his friends were near by.
Now he could see nothing but the black cloud. The two mortal enemies might be whirling inside it, or they might be gone.
He must take a chance. He drew breath and went down. Halfway to the cave entrance he twisted and rose again to the roof - for he had seen the Old Man of the Sea peering into the cave from the ink cloud.
It was alone. Evidently it had triumphed over its rival.
Now it came in through the cave door, walking on its tentacles, pirouetting like a dancer or a gigantic spider.
It stepped along delicately, almost gracefully. It was like a cat stalking a mouse. Rainbow colours flitted over its body. Roger had learned in his talks with Captain Ike and Omo that this was a sign of great anger.
For the octopus was quite capable of emotions. It could be affectionate with its young and furious with enemies. It had a highly developed brain far finer than that of any fish, eyes that were similar to human eyes, and it was as cunning as a fox.
Roger could see the beast’s mantle swelling. He yelled again, for he knew that the final struggle was now only a matter of seconds.
Then the mantle squeezed tight like the bulb of a squirt-gun. The octopus catapulted up through the water and whipped its arms around its dinner.
A boy with less fighting spirit than Roger would have given up now. He kept battling and, at the same time, trying to remember. What was it Omo had told him? A way the islanders sometimes used to conquer the terror of the deep. Something about a nerve centre between the eyes. If you could get at it, the beast could be paralysed.
He would win yet. He would not only beat this devil, he would take it alive. They wanted an octopus for the collection. Perhaps they would forgive the scare he had given them if he made good now.
He stayed with his head above the water as long as possible, clinging to the coral. Then the octopus with a terrific jerk pulled him under. But his lungs were full of air and his heart full of fight. Only he did not struggle this time against the enveloping arms. He saved his strength.
He was drawn closer to the two evil eyes. They were exactly like the small slanting eyes of an angry rhino such as the one he had seen maim a foreman at this father’s animal farm.
The monster’s jaws, until now concealed under the mantle, opened to receive him. They were shaped like the beak of a parrot, but many times as large. They could smash a coconut or a robber crab at one crunch - so what chance would his head have? And yet he let himself be drawn closer. He pretended to be weaker than he was. The Old Man of the Sea would mink that he had given up. The octopus did not clutch him so tightly now - it did not need to. This was going to be an easy victim after all. The tentacles drew the morsel closer.
He felt as if his lungs would burst. But he must stick it out a little longer. Where was that thing? - Omo had said it was just between the eyes. All the nerves of the body met there in a little ganglia about the size of a pea.
Yes, there it was - a little bump, like a wart or a pimple. He nerved himself. He looked straight into the hating eyes and could not help dreading that they would read his mind. He tried to relax his muscles and hang limp so that his sudden move, when he made it, would be unexpected.
With a sharp twist he lunged at the pealike protuberance and caught it firmly between his teeth. Then he bit - hard. The monster groaned like a human being in great agony. ft struggled weakly and clouded the water with ink. The suckers lost their vacuum control and the tentacles fell away from the boy’s body.
The first thing Roger did was to come up to breathe -and just in time. He rested for a few moments. The octopus hung, inert, below him.
He hoped he had bitten just hard enough to paralyse the beast. Omo had said that an octopus could be killed this way. When the creature did not move he began to worry.
He submerged now, gripped one tentacle of the octopus, and drew the limp giant out of the cave. Although it had a tremendous spread it was not heavy, having no bone structure except its beak.
When his head came out into the sunlight he breathed a mighty sigh of thankfulness. The world had never looked so good. Perhaps Roger was several years older now than he had been half an hour before - older and wiser. He had a better perspective upon life and death.
He crawled out of the water. He saw the others far down the reef.
He shouted and they turned to look. When they saw what he lifted out of the water they came running back.
‘For heaven’s sake!’ exclaimed Hal. ‘What have you got there? The Old Man of the Sea himself! Is he dead?’
‘I hope not,’ Roger said. ‘How can we get him to the ship?’
‘Keep him in the water,’ warned Omo. ‘The sun will kill him. I’ll get the dinghy - it’s on the other side of the island.’ While Omo went to bring the boat around, Roger recounted his adventure. Hal’s face went pale and green by turns. Crab’s eyes looked as if they would pop out of his ugly face.
‘Well,’ remarked Captain Ike when Roger had finished, ‘you may have a bit o’ mischief in you, but you’ve got some guts too.’
Omo rowed up with the dinghy. ‘Just sit in the stern and tow him,’ he advised Roger. ‘Keep him under water.’
They rowed through the pass into the lagoon and to the ship’s side. A line was slipped around the pulpy mass and it was drawn up and plopped into a tank without delay.
h was far too big for the tank if it chose to extend its arms. Each of those boa-constrictor tentacles was twelve feet long. ‘But he doesn’t need to stretch his arms,’ Omo said. ‘He’s used to living hunched up like a ball.’
The monster was beginning to show signs of life. A light came into the eyes. Colours began to play across the body. The tentacles began to squirm.
The mantle swelled. Then the creature shot like a rocket across the tank, coming with a crash against the far wall. It shot in the other direction and encountered another wall.
Finding itself a prisoner it began to dash about wildly using its four methods of locomotion - for the octopus can walk on its tentacles, slide along on its mouth, swim by waving its arms, or project itself by jet propulsion. It began to chew at its own arms.
They do that,’ said Captain Ike. ‘Sometimes they eat their own arms off when they’re caught. They’re just so blamed mad they don’t care what they do. Your man won’t want an octopus with no arms.’
But Omo had already come, tugging the answer, an empty iron barrel. He lowered it into the tank. He laid it on its side, completely under water.
The octopus immediately rocketed into its dark interior and drew its tentacles in after it.
‘On the sea bottom,’ said Omo, ‘they always like a black hole like that. He’ll feel at home there.’
Chapter 8
Hurricane
Since dawn everyone on board had been irritable and nervy.
The Lively Lady had left Bikini and was once more sliding ‘downhill’ on her way to Ponape. The wind was fair, the sea was normal, and there
was no apparent reason for uneasiness.
But the air was hot, the breeze was no longer refreshing. It seemed to come out of a steam bath. Or it was like the close, thick air in the bilge of a ship.
It had no life in it. It nauseated you - it made you feel as if you would like to be rid of your breakfast.
And the sky, instead of being blue, was a sort of white-black.
Now, nothing can be white and black at the same time, yet that was the way of it. A sort of pallid darkness was filling the firmament and pressing down upon the ship and upon the spirits of those aboard her. The hour was twelve noon but you would have supposed it to be early dawn or late twilight.
Hal stood near the binnacle, sextant in hand, trying to get a noon reading. Then with the Nautical Almanac he could compute the ship’s position.
Hal had been studying navigation with a will. Not only was it a useful thing for anybody to know: it was especially important for him - if he was to carry out the secret instructions of Professor Richard Stuyvesant.
A dozen times a day the figures he had never written down drummed in his mind - North Latitude 11° 34’, East Longitude 158° 12’ - the position of Pearl Lagoon.
There was a puzzle he had not yet solved. How was he to reach the island without disclosing the secret of its position? If the captain and Crab and Omo went along, all
three would learn the location of the pearl atoll.
He thought he could trust Omo. He was not so sure of the captain and Crab. Could they be in with the gang that had threatened the professor and ransacked his files? Some remarks they had dropped made him suspicious.
Anyhow, he would feel safer if they did not accompany him and Roger to Pearl Lagoon. But he could never reach the island without the help of someone who understood navigation.
The answer was plain - he must understand it himself. He must learn to steer a vessel by sun, stars, and chronometer so he could bring it to that pinpoint in the sea, North Latitude 11° 34’, East Longitude 158° 12’.
02 South Sea Adventure Page 4
