The Land God Made in Anger. John Davis Gordon

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СКАЧАТЬ a large stretch of hard, ribbed sand, then ahead low rock shelves appeared out of the gloom, weed surging at him, and all the time the myriad of fish cruising about him and then darting aside. McQuade swam and swam, heart knocking, for about fifty yards, then turned into a circle towards deep-sea and began a sweep back towards the anchor, searching. The seabed shelved off deeper and deeper underneath him, rock and sand and then rock again, fading off into the opaqueness. He checked his wrist-compass and swam on through his circle, scanning left and right, every minute expecting the welcome sight of the Kid to emerge out of the darkness, and the rope of the anchor-buoy. But ahead was only the shifting gloom of sand and weed and rock; he swam and he swam for another five minutes, then he was suddenly overcome with a fearful loneliness and a desperate need to confirm his position, and he turned upwards, and kicked.

      He rose slowly, at the same rate as his ascending bubbles and it suddenly felt as if all the fiends of the ocean were rising up behind him with jaws agape and he had a desperate desire to thrash up to God’s own air; then the surface was dancing above his head, and he burst through it. He looked for the dinghy, whirled in the water, then saw it, and the float.

      He was astonished. He had overswum it by two hundred yards. He had been completely disorientated down there. Tucker sped the boat across the swells and came up beside him. McQuade grabbed the gunnel and kicked and heaved himself over. He spat out the regulator. ‘Have you seen Kid?’

      ‘No,’ Tucker said worriedly. ‘Should I have?’

      ‘Take me back to the float.’

      Tucker swung the boat around. ‘We’re doing this all wrong.’ McQuade panted. ‘You lose your way down there … Tomorrow we’re all going down together … In a long line, about twenty feet apart so each man can still see the next … And we sweep the seabed in a pattern …’

      Tucker was all eyes. ‘Oh Lord … And now? Are you packing it in for the day?’

      With all his heart McQuade wanted to pack it in, but he still had at least half an hour of air left in his tank. He looked at the sun: he still had at least an hour of useful daylight.

      ‘No.’ He rammed his regulator back into his mouth and he toppled backwards into the sea again.

      He dived down on the float’s line again, until he could see the anchor; then off he swam again, south-west this time.

      He swam and swam, twenty-five feet below the surface, turning his head left and right, trying to keep an estimate of the distance he was covering. He knew he was breathing inefficiently in his nervousness and the air would probably last less than half the normal time. He tried to take shallow breaths. He swam and swam over waving weed and rambling rocky shelves and stretches of sand. Both the chart and his depth-sounder had told him that this part of the seabed was flat, and they were basically right, but every now and again there were ravines and grottos that faded into weedy darkness, waving, and all kinds of fish cruised and drifted amongst them. It was when he estimated that he had only about ten minutes of air left, that the submarine almost burst out of the watery gloom at him.

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      At one moment there was only gloom, the next there it was, materializing like a ghost twenty feet in front of him, and his heart lurched. For an instant he did not grasp what he was seeing: it was a long dark shape that seethed and beckoned like a mass of wraiths, giant webs reaching out to ensnare him. He recoiled, his eyes wide and his heart pounding with the roar of his bubbles, then he realized what he was looking at, and he stared at the big shrouded shape that disappeared off into the freezing darkness. Old fishing nets festooned the ghostly hulk, shrouds of nets partly supported by corks, stretching off into the gloom, great ghostly waving webs as high as a house wafting slowly back and forth and towards him like giant anemones. And behind these shrouds lay the long sleek tomb, festooned in waving weed and encrusted in barnacles, and hundreds of fish swam around like sentinels.

      McQuade hung in the water, wide-eyed, his heart pounding. He felt no excitement, only a primitive fear that made him want to whirl around and flee from a haunted place, with all his pounding heart he just wanted to get the hell away from this ghastly tomb from battles long ago, thrash his way back to the surface. Then he pulled himself together.

      At least he had to get a marker-float tied to this submarine … He looked over his shoulder, desperately hoping that the Kid would appear, but all he saw was gloom out of which anything could attack him. He hesitated, his heart knocking, and he knew that if he turned away now he might never find this dreadful machine again, and kicked himself towards it.

      He was near the stern section and could just make out one rudder. It was crushed against a large shelf of rock that rose abruptly out of the swirling weed. In front of it, embedded in the sand, was part of a propeller. He swam towards it, eyes wide, pulse racing, looking for a place to tie his float onto, but quickly turned aside: it was thickly shrouded in nets. He turned and swam up the side of the submarine.

      He moved fast, ten feet off the bottom and as far away from the ghostly hulk as he could, looking for a gap in the nets through which he could safely swim, in order to tie a float onto the submarine. There were fish everywhere. The hull stretched away, disappearing, encrusted with barnacles, half buried in the sand. There were many rents and gaps in the nets, but no way was he going to try any place where he might get snagged. He swam as fast as he could, desperate to get this over; then suddenly a big shape loomed up in front of him, and he recoiled again, as if he had seen a giant; then he realized he was looking at the conning tower.

      It rose up above him, dark and menacing behind the seething nets, and immediately behind it bristled the gun platform, the guns pointing towards the surface. McQuade hovered in the water, staring at it; the guns wavering with weed, fish swimming amongst them: and oh, that conning tower was the ghostliest part of all, like a giant guarding the portal to the mausoleum below, the way he had to enter the dreadful tomb. With all his heart he just wanted to thrash his way to the surface and get the hell away from this haunted place. Then he swam slowly towards it, and he could just make out some numbers showing through barnacles on the side of the tower; the letter U, then 1, then part of 0 or the top part of 9, then another 9, then 3 or part of an 8. And, beckoning at him, was a gap in the nets. It was big enough, but he wanted to see if there was an easier place, and he turned and swam on.

      The bow section of the submarine tapered away into mistiness, wafting in broken nets, swarming in fish. McQuade swam fast, desperate to get this over. There were no holes in the hull. He swam past the portside hydroplane; it was half-buried in sand, buckled against a wedge of rock. Then the hulk tapered into the bows, and the wafting nets ended.

      McQuade swam to the bows, fearful of what might burst out at him from around the point. But only fish darted out of his way. The bows were clear of the sand, elevated slightly as if the submarine had been driven backwards into the rocks at the stern. There were the four torpedo ports encrusted in barnacles, but apparently undamaged. He peered down the long deck. It was awash in weed, the nets wafting upwards on both sides. He could not see the conning tower from here. He took a deep rasping breath and kicked, and began to swim down the deck towards it.

      He swam down the avenue of waving nets, his eyes wide and darting and his heart pounding, the long barnacled foredeck a few feet beneath him; and now he could make out some planking between the weed; on he swam, on, his breathing roaring, nets wafting on either side, then his heart lurched again as the conning tower suddenly loomed up at him, dark and menacing. Closer and closer it loomed. Then he could make out a handrail, and he grabbed it.

      He clung to the rail, the tower above him, the shrouds of nets surging about him. He buried his hand into his pouch and feverishly pulled out a cork float. He partly СКАЧАТЬ