50 DAHLAK 



twelve-bore and shot at them furiously, determined to get 

 one at all costs. He did not of course succeed. 



After this foretaste we arrived on the deep sea-bed, having 

 heaved and tugged the boat over the blinding sandy hell of 

 that bar. Drunk with sun and heat we were already worn 

 out. One of the men had to stay and row. This thankless 

 task fell to me. 



Cecco and Gigi got ready. The boat was motionless on the 

 level sea that hurt the eyes with its blueness. On this side, 

 the terrace jutted twenty to thirty yards from the coast, 

 then the wall of coral undergrowth dropped on to the 

 invisible sea-bed. The water was fairly limpid, vertical 

 visibility being about eight yards, horizontal visibility 

 twelve yards. 



*Hey there, look at those fins, those fins!' I jumped to my 

 feet pointing a shaking finger. Forty yards from us, the thin 

 clear fins of Sheikh Said. I rowed four angry strokes. Cecco 

 gripped the gun. Five or six fins zig-zagged leisurely on the 

 surface. Cecco fired straight into their midst but they didn't 

 so much as budge. I dropped the oars and fired with the 

 rifle. This time one of the mysterious animals seemed 

 wounded. It tossed and dived, its fin appearing and dis- 

 appearing on the surface. Cecco and Gigi hurled them- 

 selves into the sea but it was gone, unseen. They had still 

 not had even a glimpse of it. 



The heat, the sweat, the sluggishness, the bad temper, oh ! 

 those wretched fish. . . . 



I held the dinghy thirty yards distant from the others. I 

 could guess what was happening by their movements. If 

 they continually immersed in one spot, slowly, without 

 hurrying, it meant there was a grouper. If they started 

 swimming determinedly with a halt from time to time, it 

 was pretty certainly a barracuda; the halts were a way of 



