aptitude as unusual, had I not induced Miss
West and Wada to try their hands. Neither had luck like mine. I finally
persuaded Mr. Pike, and he went behind the wheel-house so that none of
the crew might see how poor a shot he was. He was never able to hit the
mark, and was guilty of the most ludicrous misses.

"I never could get the hang of rifle-shooting," he announced disgustedly,
"but when it comes to close range with a gat I'm right there. I guess I
might as well overhaul mine and limber it up."

He went below and came back with a huge '44 automatic pistol and a
handful of loaded clips.

"Anywhere from right against the body up to ten or twelve feet away,
holding for the stomach, it's astonishing, Mr. Pathurst, what you can do
with a weapon like this. Now you can't use a rifle in a mix-up. I've
been down and under, with a bunch giving me the boot, when I turned loose
with this. Talk about damage! It ranged them the full length of their
bodies. One of them'd just landed his brogans on my face when I let'm
have it. The bullet entered just above his knee, smashed the collarbone,
where it came out, and then clipped off an ear. I guess that bullet's
still going. It took more than a full-sized man to stop it. So I say,
give me a good handy gat when something's doing."

"Ain't you afraid you'll use all your ammunition up?" he asked anxiously
half an hour later, as I continued to crack away with my new toy.

He was quite reassured when I told him Wada had brought along fifty
thousand rounds for me.

In the midst of the shooting, two sharks came swimming around. They were
quite large, Mr. Pike said, and he estimated their length at fifteen
feet. It was Sunday morning, so that the crew, except for working the
ship, had its time to itself, and soon the carpenter, with a rope for a
fish-line and a great iron hook baited with a chunk of salt pork the size
of my head, captured first one, and then the other, of the monsters. They
were hoisted in on the main deck. And then I saw a spectacle of the
cruelty of the sea.

The full crew gathered about with sheath knives, hatchets, clubs, and big
butcher knives borrowed from the galley. I shall not give the details,
save that they gloated and lusted, and roared and bellowed their delight
in the atrocities they committed. Finally, the first of the two fish was
thrown back into the ocean with a pointed stake thrust into its upper and
lower jaws so that it could not