“Think we could get them both alongside?” said the doctor.
“Not with tackle like this,” replied the mate; “we should want fine rope and a bit of chain. Mine must be six feet long. Look what a rate we’re going at.”
“Why, it’s like being fast to a whale,” cried the doctor.
“Not quite so bad as that,” said the mate, laughing. “There he goes,” he added, as the line suddenly hung loose in his hands.
“Gone?” cried Jack with a sigh of relief.
“Yes, and it’s a good proof of the quality of the lines. They are wonderfully strong to hold out so long. Cut into my hands pretty well.”
“Come and give me a hand, Jack,” cried the doctor.
The boy moved unwillingly, but he reached over and took hold, half expecting to see a head come out of the water, a pair of menacing jaws open close to his hands, and a pair of fierce eyes give him a questioning look as to what he was doing to a peaceable inhabitant of the deep. But he had hardly felt the throbbing drag at the end of a hundred yards of line when the shark dived, and he and the doctor sank back in the boat, whose steady progress through the water was checked.
“How do you like fishing?” said the doctor merrily.
“But I don’t quite understand,” said Jack. “Oh, it’s easy enough, boy,” cried the doctor, smiling; “we threw out little fish or imitations. Bigger ones took them. Then a pair of monsters seized the bigger ones and began to tow the boat; and if we had held on much longer we should have had a pair as big as the yacht take our monsters, and end by swallowing us, boat and all.”