CHAPTER XIV
IN STRANGE PERIL
"What is it, Tom? What is it?" cried Mr. Damon, not stopping in this moment of excitement to bless anything. "What is going to attack Ned and Koku?"
"I don't know," answered the young inventor. "It's some big fish evidently. I must get to the diving chamber!"
He gave a quick glance through the observation windows. Ned and the giant were moving as fast as they could toward the side of the craft where they could enter. The black, shadowy form was nearer now, but its nature could not be made out.
Calling to his force of assistants, Tom stood ready to let his chum and Koku out of the diving chamber as soon as the water should have been pumped from it.
A little later, as they all stood waiting in tense eagerness, there came a signal that the two divers had entered the side chamber. Quickly Tom turned the lever that closed the outer door.
"They're safe!" he exclaimed, as he started the pumps to working. But even as he spoke they felt a jar, and the submarine rolled partly over as if she had collided with some object. Yet this could not be, as she was stationary on the floor of the ocean.
"Bless my cake of soap, Tom!" cried Mr. Damon, "what in the world is that?"