Grandin shouted. "Over the side and swim for it. I may be wrong, prie-Dieu I am, but I fear there will be devil's work here anon. Come!" He lifted himself to his feet, balanced on the rail a moment, then slipped into the purple water that swirled past the doomed ship's side a scant seven feet below us.
I followed, striking out easily toward the quiet water ahead, the kapok jacket keeping me afloat and the rushing water carrying me forward rapidly.
"By George, old fellow, you've been right this far," I congratulated my companion, but he shut me off with a sharp hiss.
"Still, you fool," he admonished savagely. "Keep your silly tongue quiet and kick with your feet. Kick, kick, I tell you! Make as great commotion in the water as possible—nom de Dieu! We are lost!"
Faintly luminous with the phosphorescence of tropical sea water, something seeming as large as a submarine boat shot upward from the depths below, headed as straight for my flailing legs as a sharpshooter's bullet for its target.
De Grandin grasped my shoulder and heaved me over in a clumsy back somersault, and at the same time thrust himself as deeply into the water as his swimming coat would permit. For a moment his fiery silhouette mingled with that of the great fish and he seemed striving to embrace the monster, then the larger form sank slowly away, while the little Frenchman rose puffing to the surface.
"Mordieu!" he commented, blowing the water from his mouth; "that was a near escape, my friend. One little second more and he would have had your leg in his belly. Lucky for us I knew the pearl divers' trick of slitting those fellows' gills with a knife, and luckier still I thought to bring along a knife to slit him with."
"What was it?" I asked, still bewildered by the performance I had just witnessed. "It looked big enough to be a whale."
He shook his head to clear the water from his eyes as he replied: "It was our friend, Monsieur le Requin—the shark. He is always hungry, that one, and such morsels as you would be a choice titbit for his table, my friend."
"A shark!" I answered incredulously. "But it couldn't have been a shark, de Grandin, they have to turn on their backs to bite, and that thing came straight at me."
"Ah, bah!" he shot back disgustedly. "What old wives' tale is that you quote? Le requin is no more compelled to take his food upside down than you are. I tell you, he would have swallowed your leg up to the elbow if I had not cut his sinful gizzard in two!"
"Good Lord!" I began splashing furiously. "Then we're apt to be devoured any moment!"
"Possibly," he returned calmly, "but not probably. If land is not too far away that fellow's brethren will be too busy eating him to pay attention to such small fry as us. Grâce à Dieu, I think I feel the good land beneath our feet even now."
It was true. We were standing armpit-deep on a sloping, sandy beach with the long, gentle swell of the ocean kindly pushing us toward the shore. A dozen steps and we were safely beyond the tide-line, lying face down upon the warm sands and gulping down great mouthfuls of the heavy, sea-scented air. What de Grandin did there in the dark I do not know, but for my part I offered up such unspoken prayers of devout thanksgiving as I had never breathed before.
My devotions were cut short by a
