Dick in the Everglades

by A. W. Dimock

"There's trouble ahead. That fish is just getting ready to fight."

Before they had passed out of sight of the girl, the sawfish turned around and for the first time headed for the skiff.

"Down, quick!" yelled the captain and both Dick and he crouched low in the skiff as a great broad sword, swung with all the power of the tremendous fish, swept over their heads. As the angry creature passed them, a second blow which fell upon the skiff and threatened to wreck it was echoed by a cry from the girl. The attack on the skiff was the last great effort of the fish, and though he still swam strongly he could be controlled. The captain ran the skiff on a shallow bank and helped Dick with the line until sixteen feet of fierceness lay stranded on the bank. As the sawfish is a species of shark, Dick had no hesitancy about killing it, but wanted Molly to first see his captive and have a look at her saw, before it left the place where it grew. The captain brought the girl, and then a rope was made fast to the saw of the fish and tied to a tree, after which the brute's brain was explored with an axe and the saw cut off as a trophy.

"Better wake up," shouted the captain the next morning, before the boys were stirring. "There's a shark outside waiting for you, and I've wired your harpoon line."

The boys omitted their ablutions that morning and must have hurried their devotions, for three minutes after they were called found them aboard the skiff which they drove toward a big fin and a swaying tail, which was cutting the water a hundred yards from the Irene. As they neared the shark, Dick took the harpoon pole and made ready with the harpoon, while Ned sculled quietly in the wake of the ugly fish. Twice the shark heard them and darted away, but on the third approach Dick drove the iron deep in the back of the brute. The shark lashed out with its tail, sending the water flying as the harpoon struck, and then made a straight-away dash for a hundred yards while the boys rode in triumph behind it. Then the maddened creature turned, and rolling up on the line, bit it savagely but vainly.

Again and again the brute dashed away and again and again it turned, biting at the line and attacking the boat with its teeth. Dick held the skiff close to the shark, which lifted its head and seized the gunwale in its huge mouth, when Ned struck the furious creature a powerful blow on its nose with the axe. For a moment the brute seemed paralyzed, but soon returned to the attack, when the boy drove the point of the big gaff through the tough hide of the tiger of the sea.

Ned held on to the handle of the gaff, although almost dragged overboard during the first wild struggles of his captive, and then hauled the head of the brute over the gunwale, where a few blows with the axe ended the trouble.

When the boys got back to the Irene, Ned was happily surprised to find ready a dainty breakfast which his assistant had graciously prepared for all hands and which drew from him the unusual praise: