DAHLAK KEBIR, DESERT IN THE SEA 7I 



certain, however, that the grouper weighed between a 

 hundred- and-eighty and two hundred pounds. 



Bruno Vailati was the first to notice the grouper, in 

 fifteen feet of water. He was at the eastern mouth of Nocra's 

 southern channel, and exactly on the southernmost point of 

 it. The littoral there, as we noticed in the days which fol- 

 lowed, is a characteristic one : there is no coral barrier and it 

 plunges to the bottom rapidly, even precipitously. The sea- 

 floor lies at a depth of thirty to forty feet, crowned along the 

 coast by enormous lumps of rock encrusted with coral. Now 

 and again, before arriving on the underwater cliff the littoral 

 forms a brief terrace, this too of large blocks. Just on this 

 terrace, near a rock, the grouper was wandering slowly along. 



Bruno reached it. The grouper, suspicious, hid itself under 

 a stone mass. Bruno, a yard away, aimed, and shot it in the 

 centre of its skull. With a gentle twist of its head as if it were 

 squashing a fly, the grouper broke the harpoon in two, and 

 remained where it was, watching its aggressor with 

 amazement. 



Bruno dashed to the boat, grabbed another arrow and 

 screwed a second harpoon on tightly. The grouper in the 

 meantime had gone down to a depth of forty feet. It still made 

 no attempt to hide in its den. It lay up against a second stone 

 block, as if it were waiting. Bruno went into the attack again. 

 He shot for the second time. The grouper, with a flick of its 

 head, snapped this harpoon as well. The others, having heard 

 what was going on, now arrived on the scene. The grouper, 

 finally annoyed, gave a flip of its tail and departed. They were 

 just in time to see it vanish into the blue. 



An hour went by. They had all given up thinking about it. 

 Raimondo climbed back into the dinghy and called Silverio, 

 who was still underwater. Silverio wanted to do a last dive as 

 he thought there might be a decent-sized moray under that 



