Part 28 (1/2)

”Get back among the rocks, and watch for him!” exclaimed Kit. ”Only thing we can do now.”

”I suppose so,” said Raed.

We secreted ourselves a little back from the water behind different rocks and in little hollows, and, with guns rested ready to fire, waited for the re-appearance of the big seal. Five, ten, fifteen minutes pa.s.sed; but he didn't re-appear much.

”I say,” Wade whispered: ”this is getting a little played!”

We were all beginning to think so, when a horrible noise--a sound as much like the sudden bellow of a mad bull as anything I can compare it with--resounded from the other side of the island.

”What, for Heaven's sake, is that?” Kit exclaimed.

”Must be another of these sea-horses calling to the one over here,”

said Raed, after listening a moment.

”Let's work round there, then,” I said.

The noise seemed to have been four or five hundred yards off. Keeping the dog behind us, we hurried round by the east sh.o.r.e to avoid climbing the higher ledges, which rose sixty or seventy feet along the middle of the islet. These bare, flinty ledges, when not enc.u.mbered by bowlders, are grand things to run on. One can get over them at an astonis.h.i.+ng pace. Once, as we ran on, we heard the bellow repeated, and, on coming within twenty or thirty rods of where it had seemed to be, stopped to reconnoitre.

”Bet you, he's right under that high ledge that juts out over the water there,” said Kit.

”Wait a moment,” whispered Wade: ”we may hear him again.” And, in fact, before his words were well out, the same deep, harsh sound grumbled up from the sh.o.r.e.

”Under that ledge, as I guessed!” exclaimed Kit.

”Sounds like an enormous bull-frog intensified,” Raed muttered.

We crept down toward the brink of the ledge, Kit and Wade a little ahead. Arriving at the crest, they peered over cautiously, and with muskets c.o.c.ked.

”Here he is!” Kit whispered back of his hand.

We stole up. There, on a little bunch of ice not yet thawed off the sh.o.r.e, lay the unsuspecting monster,--a great brown-black, unwieldy body. There is no living creature to which I can easily compare it. I should judge it would have weighed a ton,--more perhaps; for it was immensely thick and broad: though the head struck me as very small for its bulk otherwise.

”Now, all together!” whispered Raed. ”Aim at its body above and back of its forward flippers. Ready! Fire!”

We let drive. The great creature gave a hoa.r.s.e grunt, and, raising itself on its finlike legs, floundered over into the sea.

”Round the ledge!” shouted Kit. ”He won't get far, I don't believe!”

Guard was tearing down, barking loudly; and we had started to run, when, above the shouting and barking, the sudden boom of a cannon was heard.

”Hark!” cried Weymouth.

”Hold on, hold on, fellows!” Raed exclaimed.

”Wasn't that our howitzer?” Donovan asked. ”Sounded like it.”

”It's the cap'n firing, for a joke, to let us know he heard us,”

Weymouth suggested.

”Oh! he wouldn't do that,” replied Raed.