Blake returned, and with Skink’s help lifted the weighty helmet, let it down over Hal’s head, and locked it to the suit.
The pump was started and air began to come through the hose into the helmet. Hal peered out between iron bars through the narrow window and felt like a prisoner in a death cell. The sun beating upon the suit and the metal helmet made him feel faint.
Was he going to collapse before he even got into the water? Then what would Blake think of him?
All told, the helmet, suit, and boots weighed two hundred and fifty pounds. It was as if he were trying to carry a two-hundred-and-fifty-pound man. The perspiration rolled down his face. Leaning heavily upon Roger and Skink, he shambled over to the rail.
Dr Blake had lowered a short ladder. Hal sat on the rail and the three men helped him to get his heavy feet over and down on to a rung of the ladder. Then he slowly descended the ladder into the water.
The feet seemed to become lighter when they went under the surface. When his suit and helmet had also submerged, he was free of the terrific weight.
But he still felt like a prisoner awaiting execution. He could do little for himself. His fate was in the hands of the men above. If that pump stopped he was done for.
If his hose buckled, he would get no air. If they let him down too fast he would get the ‘squeeze’, and if they drew him up too fast he would get the ‘bends’.
And he could not forget that he had an enemy above, one who would stop at nothing to get him out of the way.
His feet touched bottom. He stood in a fairyland of grotesque coral figures, pink monsters, purple fans, blue and gold trees with branches like the antlers of a moose.
The airline attached to his helmet and the lifeline fastened to his shoulder strap went up, up, and disappeared through the roof. It looked like a roof, a roof of frosted glass. He could not see through it. He could see the hull of the ship where it sank into the water, but above the waterline everything was invisible. He could not see Roger peering down, or Dr Blake at the pump, or Skink paying out the lifeline and hose.
But he suddenly realized that too much was being paid out. As soon as he touched bottom the two lines should have been held taut. Instead, more had come down, and coils of the black hose and white lifeline lay on the lagoon floor beside him. He must be careful not to get tangled in those loops.
He practised walking. It was an awkward business. He had to lean far forward like a falling tree. It was a hard job to pull up a foot, advance it, and put it down again. The stiffness of his suit, now puffed up with air, made every move difficult.
Suddenly he received unexpected and unwanted help. One of the strong currents that stagger across the bottom of Truk lagoon caught him in the back and pushed him forward a dozen feet. He had no time to see what this did to his lifeline and hose. He had no sooner steadied himself than a reverse current carried him fifteen feet backwards and sideways.
He clung to a coral branch as the currents tried to make sport with Mm. With his free hand he pulled in the slack of his lines.
He noticed unhappily that the air-hose was tangled in a staghorn coral. Any pull on it against the coral cut off his air supply.
Then he felt something moving in the helmet. Something was crawling through his hair. It made a shiver run up and down his backbone.
He could not get at it with his hands. There was nothing to do but keep on trying to free his airline.
The many-footed thing was walking over his right ear now. He closed his right eye as it crossed his eyelid. It crept down his nose.
Now he could see it and what he saw made his blood freeze. It was a scorpion.
He had a wild desire to crash his head against the inside of his helmet to smash the evil creature. But he knew that at the least movement the scorpion would bury its sting in his face. The poison would flow into his flesh. It might not kill him, but might easily make him unconscious. Then he would fall, his air-hose would be buckled against the coral, and without air he would be done for.
Even if he smashed it with a quick blow it would have time in its death struggle to stab him. Suppose it plunged its lance into his eye? Then he would go around the rest of his life with one eye. If there was any rest of his life.
He must keep steady and cool. After all, he was used to dealing with wild things. He had let tarantulas and black widows walk over his hand. He knew that if you didn’t bother a wild creature it wasn’t likely to bother you.
So he tried to forget the thing that was now crawling over his lips and chin and concentrated on freeing his airline. He edged forward in his clumsy armour to the staghorn around which his line was locked. He must do this job himself, for he knew he was too far down for those at the surface to see his trouble. He had been told to jerk on the lifeline if he wished to be hauled up. But he could not be hauled up until that airline was loose.
Now the thing was on his throat and still going down. If it tried to get through under his collarband it would almost certainly be squeezed and would strike.
Hal tried to control the trembling that made his hands unsteady as he worked over the tangled airline. It was maddening to feel the thing explore his collarband, go around his neck, and then around again. Every impress of its feet felt like the prick of a needle.
But now it was going up again … over the left jaw and cheek … over the left eye … across the forehead and back into the hair.
Hal was weak with relief. After you have had it on your face and eyes, it was nothing to have a scorpion in your hair.
It was moving about quite lazily now. Evidently it liked this jungle. Hal began to hope. With luck, he might get to the surface without being bitten.
But when they took off the helmet, would the scorpion get excited and go into its act?
Now he could feel it no longer. It was either lying quietly in his hair, or had gone on up into the helmet.
Hal felt he had been through thirty years in thirty minutes. ‘Bet my hair’s grey,’ he chuckled to himself. He felt so nervous now that he could almost let himself go into hysterics.
Part of this was due to what is called ‘rapture of the depths’, a sort of intoxication like the intoxication of alcohol. It is caused by staying too deep too long while undergoing severe nervous tension. It is also called nitrogen narcosis since it is due to the effect of nitrogen on the central nervous system under pressure.
It makes men do strange things. They forget where they are. Their cares slip away and they begin to dream. They fancy that coral heads are mansions and the coloured fish are lovely ladies.
Everything was becoming unreal to Hal. He laughed and cried. He was very happy and nothing seemed to matter. He felt like lying down and going to sleep in the coral garden.
But some instinct kept his hands working on the airline. Finally it came away clean. He reached for the lifeline and gave it a tug.
Then he passed out and floated away on billows of dreams.
When he came to he found himself lying on the deck of the Lively Lady. His helmet had been removed. They were working to pull off his boots and suit.
It was good to feel the sun after the chill of the water at the bottom. Good to breathe fresh air that couldn’t be cut off by a kink in a hose. Good to feel the solid deck
underneath.
Then he thought of the scorpion. His hand jerked up before he could stop it and his fingers ran through his hair. Nothing was there.
He began to laugh weakly.
‘It’s in the helmet,’ he said. ‘You’ll find it in the helmet.’
‘Find what?’ Blake asked.
‘The scorpion.’ Again he laughed and tears stood in his eyes.
‘He’s silly with rapture,’ Skink said.
Dr Blake turned the helmet upside down and looked inside. There was nothing to be seen.
‘You’ll feel better soon,’ he said to Hal. ‘You’re imagining things.’
T tell you there was a scorpion in that helmet It walked all over my face. It nearly drov
e me crazy.’
Skink smiled at Dr Blake. ‘They do think funny things when they get the rapture,’ he said. ‘Doesn’t pay to send down men without experience. They cause more trouble than they’re worth.’
Dr Blake nodded gravely.
‘Another thing,’ Hal said. ‘Those lines. They weren’t kept taut. A lot of slack came down. It got tangled around the coral. I had a devil of a time with it’
A pained expression came over Dr Blake’s face. ‘Hunt,’ he said, ‘there’s one thing we don’t do on this ship. When we get a bad break we don’t make excuses. We don’t try to blame somebody else.’
The words shocked Hal out of his rapture. His mind cleared.
‘I don’t know what I was saying, but it must have been pretty bad. I didn’t mean to make excuses.’ He raised himself on one elbow. ‘But if I ever find that somebody put that scorpion into my helmet I’ll punch the living daylights out of hun.’
‘There was no scorpion in your helmet,’ insisted Dr Blake. ‘Roger, help me stow these things away.’ They went below. Hal closed his eyes.
Skink picked up the helmet and looked inside. He seemed surprised to find nothing there.
In the wall of the helmet were several openings that led back through passages to the air-hose. Skink went to the air-pump and gave it a few vigorous strokes, sending a strong blast of air through the passages of the helmet.
Now when he picked up the helmet, there was the scorpion. He dumped it into the sea. Then he replaced the helmet on the deck and went off whistling.
Chapter 4
The aqualung
Blake and Roger came up carrying aqualungs.
‘I believe you’re familiar with the aqualung, Inkham,’ Blake said.
‘Oh yes,’ replied Skink, with a characteristic toss of his head. ‘I’ve done more than fifty hours with the aqualung.’
‘Then you can teach Hal and Roger.’
Hal grimaced. There was nothing he would like less than to be bossed by Skink.
Inkham’s chest swelled up like a pouter pigeon’s. ‘All right, fellows,’ he said in a voice of command. ‘Do as I do. First we put on our fins and our masks. Then the weighted belt. And now for the aqualung.’
He lifted the aqualung and threw it over his shoulder. The large cylinder of compressed air lay along his backbone. Just above the upper end of it at the nape of his neck was the regulator, shaped like an alarm clock. Attached to the regulator was a loop of air hose just long enough to go around to the mouth and bask, to the regulator. A mouthpiece was set in the hose in front of the mouth.
Hal and Roger put on their aqualungs. Roger grunted a little, for the cylinder was heavy.
‘You won’t mind it when you go below,’ Blake said. ‘It weighs thirty-two pounds out of water, but only three pounds in water.’
‘Now the mouthpiece.’ commanded Skink. ‘You fit the rubber flanges behind your lips and grip the rubber nubbins between your teeth. You’ll find it’s just like the mouthpiece of the snorkel. You breathe through the mouth just as you do with the snorkel. Now practise breathing.’ Roger’s face purpled as he tried to get air. ‘Inhale sharply,’ Skink instructed. ‘That will start it moving.’
Soon they were both breathing very comfortably. The air from the tank tasted exactly like fresh air except for the slightly rubbery flavour from the tube and mouthpiece.
‘I hope you realize,’ Dr Blake said, ‘what a miracle you have on your back. I should say that, except perhaps for the submarine, the aqualung is the greatest invention in all the history of diving. We owe it to Captain Cousteau of the French Navy. Now for the first time since man’s ancestors came out of the sea millions of years ago, man is able to go back into the sea and feel at home. With this thing, man is able to move about under the sea almost as easily as on land - more easily in some ways, because he is supported by the water. You have freedom. No heavy suit, no copper helmet and lead shoes, no lines running to the surface, no air-pump to get out of order … well, you’ll see for yourselves.’
Hal removed his mouthpiece long enough to ask, ‘How much air does the tank hold?’
Blake was about to answer, but Skink cut in. After all, he had been appointed teacher, and he wasn’t going to let anybody else take his job, not even Dr Blake. ‘The cylinder contains seventy cubic feet of air at two thousand pounds per square inch pressure,’ he said, proud of his knowledge. ‘It’s good for about an hour below.’
‘If you don’t realize you’ve been down for an hour and the air suddenly gives out, what do you do?’
Hal addressed the question to Dr Blake, but Skink answered.
‘Put your hand behind your back. You’ll find a lever beside the cylinder. Press that and you get five minutes’ more air - enough to get you to the surface.’
‘Why should it take five minutes to come up?’ asked Roger.
‘Because,’ said Skink, lifting his eyebrows to show that he thought the question very foolish, ‘if you’ve been down deep, a hundred feet or so, you can’t come up like a flash. If you do you’ll get the bends. You have to stop two or three times and let your body adjust to the change in pressure. But you wouldn’t understand about that.’
Roger glared at Skink. ‘You’re mighty smart, aren’t you?’
Skink said sharply, ‘Smart enough to teach you a thing or two.’
Roger was about to retort, but Dr Blake stopped him. ‘That’s enough, Roger. No back talk. Now, all of you, get overboard.’
The boys climbed over the rail and down the ladder into the lagoon. Before their heads disappeared below the surface, Dr. Blake called after them:
‘If you see anything interesting down there, bring it up.’
Hal watched to see how Roger was getting along. He was about ten feet under. The bubbles rising from his aqualung showed that he was breathing regularly. Presently he swam off, as free as a fish.
‘Hal felt as if he were floating in air. In the joy of this new experience he forgot about Skink. The weight of the aqualung and the weights on his belt were just enough to keep him from rising or falling. He hung suspended.
He gave his fins a slight kick and was surprised to see how smoothly he slid forward. He did not need to use his hands.
He turned downward, and a few kicks sent him tobogganing towards the bottom. He turned up, and rose equally fast. When he stopped kicking, the momentum still carried him on a great distance.
He stood upright in the water, standing on nothing. He could stay here indefinitely, like a star in space. He noticed only that he rose a few inches when he inhaled, and sank a trifle when he exhaled.
This gave him an idea. He filled his lungs with a long deep breath. At once he began to rise gently through the water. Before he reached the surface, he emptied his lungs. Down he went, just as gently and surely. The discovery excited him. It was as if he had his own private elevator and could go up or down at will. He didn’t need to move a muscle of his arms or legs. To rise or sink, he had only to breathe deeply in or out. His lungs were a balloon that carried him up or down, as he pleased. Normal breathing, which kept the amount of air in his lungs at about the same level, held him almost stationary.
He swam idly down and stood on the floor of the lagoon. He walked through the coral garden. His heart beat fast for the wonder of it. Think of it, being able to walk about freely on the bottom of the sea!
There was no need to worry about lines getting tangled in the staghorn coral, for there were no lines. He wasn’t tied to something on the surface, like a dog on a leash. He was complete master of his own movements, he could go where he pleased.
How different this was from suit diving! Instead of a bulky, suffocating, rubber suit he wore nothing but bathing trunks. Instead of fifty-pound boots, he wore rubber fins like the wings of the Greek god Mercury. Instead of fretting lest someone up above might stop pumping air to him, he carried his air supply along with him.
He walked with a springy step that he had never known in the world above. The
water lifted him along. The pull of gravitation had been reduced to almost nothing.
When he stumbled against a rock he did not fall but only swayed forward a little and then righted himself. He tried to fall, but found it was impossible. What an improvement this was on the upper world - this world where you could never fall!
He found that he had suddenly become a remarkable acrobat. His lightest step carried him several feet upward and forward. If he pushed the ground with his toes a little, he soared ten feet before his foot again touched bottom. He thought of the giant with the seven-league boots, and amused himself by taking long steps.
A coral head as big as a house rose before him. He gathered all his strength. He sprang and - wonder of wonders - sailed up twenty feet and more, over the head, and down to the bottom on the other side.
He had been good at the high jump in school. But he had never made a jump like this. He could never do better than five feet. The world record was only between six and seven feet. Jump that high on land and you’re a world champion. And what tremendous energy it takes to do it! But the underwater athlete could leap four times as high with ease.
He came to the edge of a canyon that sank far down out of sight. The other edge of the canyon was thirty feet away. Hal leaped, soared across the terrible gulf, and came down as light as a feather on the other cliff.
It frightened him a little and he shivered as he looked back from the cliff’s edge down into the black gorge.
But, he reminded himself, he had no reason to be afraid of a gorge. He emptied the air from his lungs to make himself as heavy as possible. Then, mustering his courage, he stepped off the edge of the cliff.
Down he sank through water where red and yellow sun rays were replaced by cold blue and finally, black. His feet touched bottom. It was very chilly here and his ears sang with the pressure. He waited a moment for his eyes to become accustomed to the darkness.
Beside him he could see the face of the coral cliff pitted with deep holes. He saw several long, slender, waving objects. At first he took them to be tendrils of seaweed. Then he recognized the tentacles of a large octopus.
03 Underwater Adventure Page 3