CHAPTER XXX.
A FISH STORY.
Then came the same breathless pause for an answer. But this time the suspense was not regardless. To Jack’s ears came a tiny ticking in reply.
“Who wants the WHITE SHARK?”
Jack uttered a yell which apprised the others that he had at last caught the connection he was after. The boy’s hands flew as he switched to the sending key.
“Jack Chadwick and Tom Jesson. Who is this?”
“Your father,” came flashing back through space the next instant. “Good heavens, boy, we had given you up for lost. Where are you?”
“Don’t just know, right now,” flashed back Jack; “will tell you in a second.”
“Where have you been?” came crackling back impatiently. “We have passed a dreadful night of anxiety.”
“It’s too long a story now. I will tell it to you when we meet. Is the engine fixed?”
“Yes; it was mended just after that fog shut down. We didn’t miss you till then.”
Jack turned to the lighthouse keeper.
“What latitude and longitude is this island in?” he asked.
“27° 31’ N. by 79° 5’ W.“
The reply was written on a scrap of paper and handed to Jack. He flashed it over the waves of space to the operator so anxiously waiting in the cabin of the submarine.
”Why, you are not more than a hundred miles from us,“ came the reply; ”we’ll come there at top speed.”
“Tell him the harbor is on the southeast side of the island,” prompted Tom.
“The harbor is on the southeast side of the island,” flashed Jack. “Anchor off there and we will come out to you.”
“Very good, my boy. Thank heaven, we have found you,” was Mr. Chadwick’s fervent reply. Then; came the good-bye and the keys were closed; but the boys had a vivid mental picture of the scene on the White Shark. How the engines would be relentlessly driven in an effort to break a record to reach Nacassa Island!
“It ought to take them about four hours to get here,” Jack figured.
“I can hardly wait till they arrive,” said Tom impatiently. “I wish I had something to occupy my time to keep my mind off the waiting.”
“Try fishing,” suggested Carter.
Both boys broke into a laugh.
“I guess we’ve had enough fishing to last us a hundred years,” declared Tom.
“I wouldn’t go as far as that,” rejoined Jack; “but I guess we’ve had a sufficiency for a while. As the Dutchman said, ’Too much is enough.’”
“I had a great experience out here with a big fish,” said the lightkeeper.
The boys saw at once that a story was coming, and as it would help pass the time they settled back to listen. They were sitting in deck chairs just within the shadow of the little hut.
“What was it?” asked Jack.
“I don’t know that it will interest you, but it will pass the time anyhow,” said Carter, “so here goes:
“Well, I was fishing off that wharf, the one you just landed at, when I saw the biggest barracuda I had ever seen. He was all of eight feet long—the dictionary tells of ’em being twelve—thick as a telegraph pole and as steely looking as a big torpedo.
“‘Good land,’ thinks I, ‘if I could only land that fish and have him mounted, he’d sell for a good figure to some of those inter-tourists who come to Florida to go back with big fish stories.’ To tell the story right, they have to take the fish to prove it; and lots of fellows make a tidy living selling big fish to big men who wouldn’t know a barracuda from a porgie if they saw them in an aquarium.
“Well, I starts in on my preparations to land Mr. Barracuda. I saw him cock up a knowing eye at me and then sink down, down, down out of sight. But I knew somehow that he would come back, and I just sat and waited. It was funny to watch all the different kind of fish down in that water. First a flock of parrot fish, pink and white striped like zebras, would float by. Then come a striped shark, yellow and black, like a tiger, with maybe a string of young sharks—‘puppies,’ they call ’em—following her.
“Next thing would be a big old devil fish, snapping his beak, and then a school of small fry, swimming for their lives to get away from some barracuda. But, though while I waited I saw a lot of barracuda, I didn’t see the one I called mine.
“Well, I came there every day for a week, and I tried every kind of bait I could think of, but Old King Cole, as I had come to call the big fish, was always absent on pressing business. It ran along like this for maybe a month before I saw him again. I ran hot foot to the shack. Got my rod and two hundred yards of stout line. Then I baited up with live bait and went after Old King Cole.
“Well, sir, he must have been hungry, for he took my bait like a flash, and then the fight began. Gracious, how that fish fought! Just when I thought I had him tired out, he’d start again. But the funny thing was that the harder I’d fight him the livelier he seemed to get. Finally I yelled to Dick, who was up by the light, to get me a revolver quick.
“‘What you got there?’ he hollers.
“‘The biggest fish in the world; and if I don’t get him he’ll get me, by thunder!’ I yells back.
“Dick he came on the run with that gun.
“I told him to watch and I’d play the fish near the surface. Well, I gave him line and then, Ginger! on he came like a locomotive. ‘Now!’ yells I, and Dick fired. Again I called, and Dick let him have two more. The weight on the line grew dead all of a sudden and the water turned crimson. When it cleared I looked down into it and could hardly believe my eyes. There, in the shallow water, lay dead a fish three times the size of my barracuda! At first I couldn’t realize that it was a dead shark lying there, I was so astonished.
“‘All that trouble over a shark!’ grumbles Dick.
“‘I tell you I hooked a barracuda,’ I protested.
“Dick gave me a queer look. But we rigged a block and tackle and got the shark out. Well, sir, what do you think we found?”
The boys shook their heads.
“That shark had swallowed my barracuda, and the barracuda had stuck in his throat! We had to cut him open to get my fish out, and then we had a tussle to kill the barracuda. What do you think of that?”
“That you’re wasting your time here,” grinned Tom.
“How’s that?”
“Why, you ought to be writing for one of the outdoor magazines. They’d pay you big prices!”