OCR Text |
Show ^b settled into the water the propeller took hold, dug into the sea and forced the boat onward. "A little more -J" The men talked as if the boat ware alive, and as it sank into the trough the fist of rock moved backward and away. The next wave was forming. They felt the boat reach the trough and than, like a balloon, begin a slight movement upward. Ry now the rocks were opposite the stern, and all three men moved backwards. The boat rose; momentarily it seamed to float out of tha dusk into a high cool sky, light as the throat of a lily, though against the levitation came a heavy, heart-deadening drag toward shore. A timber, held in the lava fist, reached out with a pair of rusty spikes, and as the sea lifted and drove the boat landward tha spikes moved closer, felt about like a finger; then suddenly -- with a sweep of water - lowered and dug in. The poles rushed to stab at tha spikas, flailed about. Sid's foot slipped; ha fell against Asano, and as both reached for support the pole fell away. The only one left was the Sergeant's; ha stood braced, awaiting the blow. The waters receded, carrying the boat backward; than they began to fill again, sweeping tha hull inward. Quickly the spikBS made a thrust, and at the same tima Koontz stabbed outward. Tha pole struck a knob, glanced aside; then entering a cleft it stopped and grew rigid. Koontz strained against it, |