CHAPTER III
THE SHARK
Steve’s feet were on the plank before the meaning of the words stung into his consciousness. As he ran, his startled gaze swept over the glinting water and for an instant his blood froze. Beyond the struggling Cavanaugh, but much nearer to him than the latter was to shore, something thrust up above the water—something thin, triangular, erect, dull gray in color, that cut through the little waves with swift, smooth, gliding ease.
To Haddon it seemed as if the plank slid backward under his feet. His dive was purely instinctive but it was a fine one, wide and shallow, that carried him well out. As he shot to the surface he almost collided with Ted Hinckley, but he was quite unconscious of the other’s nearness. Out of that numbed daze of horror and dismay but one thought, one motive, rose to dominate him. He must reach Cavanaugh before the shark.
What he could do then he did not know. But as he tore through the water with that powerful overhand stroke which had won him many a race, his sturdy self-control began slowly to return. Little by little scraps of things came back to him, things he had read and heard, some of them part of that very discussion on the beach so short a time ago. Noise! That was the thing. Sharks were afraid of noises. If he could only reach Cavvy in time there might be a chance—
His hands struck the water with an even, rythmical slap-slap. Though he had not slackened his stroke, it seemed as if he were merely crawling. The temptation to increase his speed was almost irresistible, but he conquered it by deliberate effort. Already he was breathing hard, and he knew that unless he kept back some of his strength he would be helpless at the crucial moment.
At almost every third stroke his dripping face flashed up out of the water and his desperate gaze searched the wide expanse for a sight of that ominous fin. Twice he found it; once circling off to the left of where Cavanaugh was swimming, whereat he was thrilled with hope that the creature had abandoned the pursuit. But the next time it was cutting through the ripples straight toward Cavvy, and the sight made Haddon throw caution to the winds.
With every remaining ounce of strength he lunged forward. His muscles ached, his lungs were bursting. But still he managed to send his weary body sizzling through the water at a racing speed. Then Cavanaugh’s face flashed up before him, strained, white, panic-stricken, and he slowed down.
“Keep on, old man,” he gasped. “Go straight ahead. I’ll stay—”
He did not finish. Already Cavvy had passed him and was laboring shoreward. Steve gulped in the precious air, took a few long strokes forward and stopped with a sudden gasp. The fin had disappeared!
The moments that followed were like nothing that he had ever known. Cold horror gripped him by the throat and choked him—that horror of the unknown which is so potent and so paralyzing. The shark had dived and was swimming under water. At any moment he might feel—