Clouds Over Clipper Cay
Rick jerked frantically on the tie rope, four times for danger, then he
turned and swam rapidly back the way they had come. At first he felt
resistance on the line, then Zircon hurried to catch up. Not until they
were barely within seeing distance of the light did Rick stop, then he
took his belt slate, started the camera for light, and wrote "Bubbles go
by thm if we undr. They see."
Zircon held a hand to his head in a sign of chagrin that he had
forgotten, then he wrote, "Hw we gt clos?"
Rick pondered the problem. The bubbles had alarmed him in another way,
too. It was possible that the man on the boat could see four sets of
bubbles rising where only two were supposed to be. Yet, he couldn't
escape the feeling that it was important to get a look at what the
frogmen were doing. There was no way out of it. He just had to take a
chance.
He wrote, "I mak pass hldng brth so no bbls, tak pix. U sty out of rnge
& cvr me wth gn."
Rick had just one hope of getting away with it. He had to assume that
the frogmen would be busy with whatever they were doing in the cave. If
so, their backs would be to the open sea. At least the chance was worth
taking.
Zircon wrote, "OK bt be crfl."
Rick didn't need the warning. Together, they swam back until they were
close to the glow of the lights. He hoped that the darkness and breaking
surf above were concealing their bubbles. Finally Zircon halted. Rick
unsnapped the line that held him to the scientist, squeezed Zircon's
shoulder, and swam away from the reef toward the open water. He kept his
head turned so he could keep the light in his field of vision.
When he was out far enough he swam upward until he was on a level with
the light, and directly out to sea from it. He inhaled, filling his
lungs, then with camera outthrust, he drove directly toward the light.
It wasn't hard to hold his breath--not with his heart acting as a
stopper in his throat.
The light grew clearer. He started the camera and kept moving with
powerful strokes. Then he held his legs still and let inertia carry him
in a silent glide. He had to get close--close!
The light grew in intensity, and details grew clearer. He saw the
frogmen, and their backs were to him! Between them, he caught a glimpse
of something brassy and round, and he saw the octopus, clinging to the
reef to one side of the cave.
He held the camera button as long as he dared. Then when it seemed that
he would glide right into the frogmen, he twisted sideways and bent
backward like a circus acrobat, flippers moving in powerful thrusts. It
was an excellent underwater imitation of a wingover, the plane maneuver
that reversed direction by diving and turning. He planed downward until
he touched bottom, then thrust himself with frantic kicks away from the
vicinity of the cave.
His lungs were about to burst, he felt, when finally he drew a deep
breath. The gurgling sigh of his bubbles was sheer relief. He kept
moving until he bumped headlong into Hobart Zircon. The scientist
reached out and snapped his rope onto Rick's belt, then tugged twice.
Zircon led the way along the reef bottom until they reached the spot
where, they estimated, Tony and Scotty would be waiting. As they started
for the surface, Rick switched on the camera and looked at his watch.
They had been under only ten minutes! And he had been waiting for the
warning constriction of air running out!
Zircon broke water and instantly submerged again. He led the way a few
feet under the surface to where he had seen Tony and Scotty, then led
Rick to the top once more.
Tony and Scotty saw them emerge and without a word turned and started
back toward the cottage, pushing their floats. Instead of bothering with
the snorkel, Rick kept the aqualung mouthpiece in place and swam a few
feet under the surface, guiding himself by the wake of the others. He
was tired--and relieved.
The group crossed over the reef and swam to the beach in front of the
cottage. There they gathered at the water's edge and stripped off their
gear. For long moments no one spoke, then Zircon asked, "See anything,
Rick?"
"A little. Enough to get an answer, I think. We haven't discovered a new
breed of octopus, because they were installing something in the cave.
Something that makes a noise."
"Do you know that, or do you infer it?" Tony asked.
"I didn't hear the noise, if that's what you mean. But what else could
it be?"
"Too bad," Scotty said. "Now we won't have a new species named after us.
Come on, give us the word. How was it?"
Rick said, with complete truth, "I was scared to death."
"And so was I," Zircon admitted. "At first the sensation of complete
blackness caused an emotional reaction. Then I began to see that we had
done a rather foolish thing. And I almost got us into trouble by
forgetting that we send up a constant stream of bubbles." He told them
of his plan to get under the cave, and of Rick's warning.
"We thought of your bubbles," Scotty told them. "I talked it over with
Tony, and came within an ace of diving after you, although I doubt that
I could have reached bottom and found you. But we watched, and we
couldn't see any bubbles at all. It was too dark, and we were right
where the water was breaking."
"My question is, did you get a picture?" Zircon wanted to know.
"I'm sure I did. The camera was going, and it probably saw much more
than I did--since cameras don't get scared. But it won't do us much good
right now. We can't develop the film."
The boys picked up the equipment and carried it to the _Water Witch_.
Rick turned off the compressor. He was too tired to wait until all tanks
were full. Time enough for that in the morning.
When he and Scotty returned to the cottage, Tony greeted them with cups
of hot chocolate and they sat on the porch and enjoyed them.
"Let's sum up what we know," Zircon invited. "If anyone agrees that we
know anything worth summing."
"I think we do," Rick said, "and I think we ought to get it to Steve
Ames. We don't know what he's after, or what kind of gang he's fighting,
but we know one of them is here."
"Yes, and we also know that Steve's agency is primarily concerned with
protecting military secrets," Zircon added. "I agree with Rick. We must
get word of these mysterious frogmen to him."
"We discussed that earlier," Tony recalled. "In view of our discussion,
it would seem that either Rick or Scotty or both must fly to Charlotte
Amalie and tell him personally."
Scotty pointed at the sky. "Have any of you looked up there?"
All of them did. The moon was just rising, and there was enough light to
see heavy cirrus moving high overhead.
"There's a front of some kind moving down on us," Scotty said. "And did
you notice the swells tonight? Long ones. I'm no first-class weather
forecaster, but all the signs are there. We're in for a storm. The
question is, how soon will it arrive?"
"He's right," Zircon agreed. "I'm glad you're observant, Scotty.
Frankly, I hadn't even bothered looking at the weather. I suppose I
thought it would just continue to be perfect."
Rick stared at the gathering clouds for long moments, then put into
words the thing that had been bothering him.
"You know, there has been a cloud over this vacation almost from the
moment we landed at Charlotte Amalie. We didn't want to get involved in
anything but diving and exploring, but we got pulled by the ears into a
hot case. Steve warned us off that first day. The warning didn't help,
because we got dragged back into things when we went swimming, and again
at the hotel."
Three faces were turned toward him, listening. He was expressing what
all of them had been thinking, too.
"We thought we'd leave trouble behind when we came here," Rick
continued, "but it was waiting for us. We didn't look for it, until
tonight."
He drew a deep breath. "Well, from now on we have to become the hunters.
Steve Ames doesn't know there's anything strange going on here. We do,
and it's up to us to find out what. The goings-on in the octopus cave
have something to do with the case Steve is working on--and what Steve
is working on has something important to do with national security."
He smiled grimly. "I know none of you will disagree with this, because
it's the only thing we can do. Professor Zircon knew it tonight when he
tried to excuse our looking in on the frogmen as curiosity."
Zircon nodded silently.
"From now on," Rick concluded, "we have to operate as unofficial JANIG
agents, until we can get word to Steve Ames so he and his men can take
over."