ALBACORA 123 



fish. Again Lou drew the bait slowly in front of the 

 albacora's line of vision. 



"He sees it," Howard said. "He sees it." 



Perhaps he did. For an instant the albacora seemed 

 to take notice, but then he slowly swung away. 



"Damn!" said Lou. 



"Damn, dumb fish," I said. 



"A wise old devil," Howard corrected. 



Twice more the fish ignored our bait. We were sailing 

 in continuous circles that led nowhere, drawn on by the 

 albacora, baited by the fish, in fact, just as we were 

 trying to bait him. 



As we made a fifth run, the sun was directly behind 

 us and the glare from the ocean burned so intensely that 

 it was hard for me to see. For a moment I had the feel- 

 ing that everything was slowly being reversed. We were 

 not the hunters here on this alien ocean. We were the 

 hunted. Forces which I could not understand, could only 

 sense, were turning things around so that that albacora 

 was hunting us down, taking us on a course he knew, 

 but we could only guess. I shook my head. It was ri- 

 diculous. 



More than thirty minutes had passed when the alba- 

 cora reappeared. 



"He sees the bait," I shouted. "He's going for it." 

 With a splash of his tail he dove. 



Howard threw the coil into the ocean and Lou's line 

 began running out at a slow, even pace. Then it stopped 



