But Tim was too much engaged to answer, he had seen some large mullet endeavouring to escape out of a channel in the rocks, and was wading about amongst the green weed, piling stones across the outlet of this creek, previous to pursuing the fish, when suddenly under water, in a cleft of the rocks, he felt his foot seized, and held in a vice-like grasp. The shock nearly threw him down, but recovering himself, he shouted,—
“Mat! here, quick!”
The latter rushed up at once, crying,—
“Got a rock on your foot?”
“No,” gasped Tim, “it’s more like a dozen rat-traps, and it’s pinching fearful.”
Mat by this time had cleared away the weed, and at length, through the dark water could be seen the outlines of a gigantic double shell, with his brother’s leg imprisoned in its jaws.
“Look, how awful!” cried Tim; “I can never get loose from that big brute of a cockle.”
Mat tugged and tore at the shell, and, being a powerful lad, he expected to be able to rip one side off by the hinge, but he could no more move it than he could the rocks to which it was attached.
“It’s no good, old man, it’s too far for me to reach it yet, but, thank God, the water’s falling; if ’twere rising we’d be done. Do you feel you can last out an hour or so?”
“I don’t know, Mat, I feel awful queer and sick, but I can find the pain is out of my foot, for I can’t feel the limb at all.”