The monster rose till he was almost three feet clear of the surface, then turned so as to strike the water absolutely flat, and just before the crash and splash of the fall, Murren hurled the harpoon into the fish, and sprang back to clear the line. Although drenched and gasping from the torrent of water thrown over the boat by the devil ray,
Colin took a bight of the line from the second coil and passed it around the foremost thwart. He was just in time, for a few seconds later the rope tautened. There was just one jerk and the boat started flying through the water, sending up a green wall on either side that threatened to swamp it every instant.
With the fight really begun, Colin became at once quite calm. Paul, who was an absolutely fearless youngster, was laughing in glee.
"Which way are we going, Pete?" asked the capitalist.
"Lordy, Lordy, don' as' me; gwine to de bottom, boss. Ah knows we'he gwine to de bottom."
The negro crouched down in the bottom of the boat, and the sponge buyer roared at him:
"Sit up and watch where we're going, you coward! You know these reefs."
"It don' matteh, boss, de vampa tuhn roun' in a minute an' jump on de boat an' smoddeh we all."
It was not a pleasant suggestion. The ray was undoubtedly big enough to do that very thing, and everybody in the boat had seen its power to leap. But even the little study that Colin had given to fishes came to his aid.