“I can’t! She won’t rise!” cried Jack despairingly.
“Then we are lost. Look there!”
Coming toward them at the speed of an express train was the huge whale. On she drove, making straight for the stranded motor ship.
“She’s going to attack us! She thinks that we killed her young one!” cried Mr. Chadwick.
The motor ship lay straight in the path of the maddened whale. As they regarded the fury of the oncoming creature with apprehensive eyes, they could almost feel the terrible impact and the struggle for life that must ensue when the leviathan struck their frail craft.
[CHAPTER XIII.]
ATTACKED BY A WHALE.
On came the whale. She was a huge, humpbacked monster, with a gigantic square head that looked as solid as the prow of a battleship. Every instant appeared to increase the speed at which she traveled. Fascinated by terror they could not take their eyes off the onrushing peril,—with the exception, that is, of Jack.
The boy was struggling with an auxiliary valve for gas supply which had been installed with the idea of quick-filling the bag. But the ordinary valve had worked so well alone that the auxiliary had not been used, and it was jammed and corroded.
“Hurry! hurry!” shouted Tom. “She’ll ram us in another second!”