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 pa.s.sed 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.

"All rays live on sh.e.l.lfish," he said, "and they have small mouths with plates instead of teeth to crush the sh.e.l.ls with. So that it really couldn't do us any harm, any way."

"It's de smoddehin', boss, de smoddehin'. Oh, why did Ah try an' make trouble ober dem durn sponge beds? Ef Ah eber gets on sho' again Ah'll be a betteh man. Lordy, Lordy, what am Ah gwine to do?"

His voice rose in a shriek.

"He's a-comin' now!"

The pointed fin jerked suddenly and a third of the gigantic shape heaved itself into the air as the devil ray whirled. There was an instant of suspense, but the giant went past, one huge fin beating the air like the waving of some uncanny monstrous moth born in the terrors of a nightmare, and the boat was wrenched around sharply, half filling it and almost throwing Colin out.

Over almost exactly the same course that he had taken, the ray raced back, the weight of the boat seeming to make no difference to its speed; and then a second time the creature turned. It seemed impossible that with a speed of not less than twenty miles an hour so huge a creature--the size of one side of a tennis court--could twist about in its own length. How the rope and the frame of the boat stood the strain no one ever knew.

Once more the vampire turned; the boat nearly went over, but she was a staunch little craft, and the fish started down the lagoon between the reefs at its top speed. Often the creature put its two horn-like tentacles down for a dive, but the water was everywhere shallow and there was no chance to drag the boat under.

"It doesn't seem to be tiring much," the capitalist remarked, "but I don't see what more we can do."

"No," Colin answered, "I don't think the ray feels our weight at all. I believe it's going faster."

"We's all gwine to de bottom," wailed the negro. "Lordy, Ah been a bad man, but ef Ah ebeh gets mah two feet asho' Ah'll nebeh do nuffin again!"

There was no doubt of it, the vampire was going faster and faster every minute. The line hissed as it cut through the water, and Pete, despite his moaning, was baling for dear life. Darkness was closing in and the ray sped on. On either side were reefs, and many times the boat grazed sharp coral which would have ripped the bottom out of her if she had struck. Mr. Murren stood by the bow with knife in hand ready to cut, waiting to the last minute.

Presently a line of breakers, between two islets, appeared directly ahead. It was only a matter of seconds till they would be reached, but remembering how the ray had turned before, Colin clutched the gunwale of the boat to prevent being flung out of it like a stone from a catapult when the creature swerved.

"It's a-comin', now!" shrieked Pete. "We's a-gwine to be smoddehed. Oh, Lordy, Lordy, Ah's a dead niggeh."

"Hold on tight, all, look out for yourself, Paul," Mr. Murren cried; "he's turning!"

But he was wrong.

Instead of the black fin edging its way up, the whole great bulk of the uncanny creature heaved itself above the water like a great cloud and fell into the surf on the rocks, flapped upon them, although half stranded, and with a heave that seemed to make the reef tremble, plunged into the sea beyond.

"Better cut!" cried Colin.

But before the word was fairly out of his lips, the bright steel gleamed in the dark, and with a grinding crash that seemed like the end of the world to Colin, the boat crumpled into splinters on the reef and the three men were thrown in a heap among the breakers.

The negro gave a yell that was enough to scare any one out of a year's growth and lay spread out upon a rock as though he was some ungainly kind of black crab, arms and legs in every direction, while he fairly gibbered with fright.

"Lordy, Lordy, don' let de debbil come an' take me now! Lordy, Ah ain'

fit to die! Don' let him come back an' smoddeh us on de rocks! Ah ain'

never goin' to get in a boat agen! On'y let me get home dis once!"

Paul, though the youngest of the party, had escaped the most easily. He had pitched clear against Pete and thus had broken his fall, while at the same time the impact of his weight had knocked nearly all the breath out of the negro's body. He had enough left, however, with which to make a powerful complaint.

Bruised, even bleeding in one or two places, Colin picked himself out of the wreckage and looked across in the faint light at the owner of the _Golden Falcon_, who seemed to have escaped with a few scratches and who was standing on the reef looking out to sea as though he wished that the fight were still on.

[Ill.u.s.tration: MANTA, OR GIANT SEA-DEVIL, CAPTURED ON THE FLORIDA REEFS.

_By permission of Mr. Chas. Fredk. Holder._]

"I wonder," he said, as he saw that the boys were not hurt, "if the vampire had as much sport out of that as we did."

CHAPTER VIII

FINDING A FORTUNE IN A PEARL

Resisting a strong temptation to kick the blubbering negro, Mr. Murren succeeded in getting the fellow's attention by shouting in his ear, and yanked him up on his feet. The boat was quite unusable, the bow having been crumpled into matchwood by the force with which the sea-bat had dragged it upon the reef, so the question of reaching the sh.o.r.e was not an easy one. However, Pete knew the keys thoroughly and, in response to much questioning, admitted that it was possible with only a short swim here and there, to reach a lighthouse about four miles away.

The negro would have preferred to stay on the reef until morning, for he could sleep as easily on the sand as in a bed, but Mr. Murren knew that the two boys were not inured to hardship, Paul especially, and he compelled the boatman to show the way. It was a toilsome but not particularly dangerous journey, and when they reached the lighthouse, and had done full justice to a quickly-prepared meal, they were quite willing, as Paul declared, to tackle another sea-bat. There was a small motor-boat owned by the lighthouse-keeper, and the party borrowed this, reaching the _Golden Falcon_ without further misadventure, the capitalist recompensing the cowardly negro for the loss of his boat.

Owing to the thorough work that had been done at Bermuda, and having the a.s.sistance of his capitalist friend, Mr. Collier speedily secured the specimens and the drawings he needed of the Florida reefs. He kept Colin hustling, but found time to enter into the question of the proposed sponge-farm with a great deal of interest, and went with a party to Anclote Key, where the Bureau of Fisheries had established a station for the investigation of the sponge industry, with especial regard to the transplanting of sponges. The government expert welcomed them heartily, and an arrangement was entered into whereby the Bureau accepted Mr.

Murren's offer to use for its experiments a part of such sponge-ground as he should acquire, while he, at the same time, had the benefit of the advice of the investigators.

"It seems to me," the capitalist said, when the details had been concluded, "that's about the best kind of investment I know, getting expert opinion for yourself in such a way that it benefits the whole nation."

"It is, I think," the Fisheries official replied; "but you can't always get people to realize that. Why, even the State governments in many cases are not always ready to co-operate, and only last year the a.s.sembly of a certain State refused to permit the establishment of a hatchery, because a relative of one of the a.s.semblymen owned a summer hotel in the district, and he thought it might reduce the number of fish in a lake near the hotel."

"How absurd!"

"Of course, it's absurd, but it's amazing how often that sort of thing happens. Still, even State governments are becoming more intelligent now, and some, like Rhode Island, for instance, have been in the very forefront of Fishery administration."

"Yet it means money in the pockets of the people to conserve fish!"

"But also it means a certain small outgo from the a.s.sembly," was the reply; "there's the rub. But," he added, turning to Colin, for the boy had told him of his plans, "by the time you're through college and on the permanent rolls of the Bureau that sort of ignorance about the value of Fisheries control will probably all have pa.s.sed away."

"I hope so," the boy answered, "and I'm glad that I haven't seen anything except hearty support. Going to Brown University, of course, is a whole lot in my favor, because I understand they've always been strong on the Fisheries side."

"You're going to leave us to-night, then, Colin?" asked his host.

"Yes, Mr. Murren," the boy replied; "by taking the evening train, I can get to Providence in time for the opening of college, and Mr. Collier is kind enough to let me start right away. I can't be grateful enough to you, sir, for all your kindness on this trip."