two.

"Lights first," commanded the Professor. "The pump, you know."

I did know! Frantically I scrambled in the dark till I located the
batteries. They were right side up and still wired together.

The air grew rapidly foul with no one at the pump. Panting for breath I
blundered at the task of connecting the light. After what seemed an
eternity I accomplished it.

The light revealed Stanley with an air tank lying across his leg. The
mouthpiece of his breathing tube had been forced back over his head,
gashing his face in its journey. His face was white with pain.

The Professor was caught under the heavy bench. I freed him and together
we attended to Stanley, finding that his leg wasn't broken but only
badly bruised.

The mound-shaped monster, dislodged possibly by the fall, was nowhere to
be seen.

I resumed work at the pump, the connections of which were so strongly
contrived that they had withstood the shock of the upset.

For a moment we were content to rest while the air grew purer. Then we
were forced squarely to face our fate.

* * * * *

The Professor summed up the facts in a few concise words.

"We're certainly doomed! Here at the bottom of Penguin Deep we're as out
of reach of help as though we were stranded on the moon. We're as good
as dead right now."

"If we have nothing left to hope for," whispered Stanley after a time,
"we might as well close the air valves and get it over with at once. No
use torturing ourselves...."

The Professor moistened his lips.

"It might be wise." He turned to me. "What's your opinion, Martin?"

But I--I confess I had not the stark courage of these two.

"No! No!" I cried out. "Let's keep on living as long as the air holds
out. Something might happen--"

I avoided their eyes as I said it, utterly ashamed of my cowardly
quibbling with death. What in the name of God could possibly happen to
help us?

The Professor shrugged dully, and nodded.

"I feel with Stanley that we ought to get it over in one short stab. But
we have no right to force you...." His voice trailed off.

We readjusted our mouthpieces. I turned automatically at the pump; and
we silently awaited the last suffocating moment of our final doom.

* * * * *

As before, attracted by the light, a strange assortment of deep-sea life
wriggled and darted about us, swimming lazily among the looped coils and
twists of our cable which had