For a horrified moment he did not grasp what he was looking at. All he knew was that something was blocking the tube right in front of his torch – and the same instant he saw the two devilish eyes, and the big octopus flew at him.
It came flying out of its lair and in one terrifying impact it was onto McQuade’s face, its thick tentacles clutching his head and shoulders. McQuade recoiled, terrified, horrified, and dropped the torch and struggled backwards, both hands clawing at the dreadful beast, trying to tear it from his head, its fiendish suckered belly plastered to his mask. He could see nothing and all he knew was the horror of the squelchy beast in his hands, its huge tentacles lashed around his shoulders. He crashed into the ladder, and his regulator was wrenched from his mouth and he sucked in choking black water and he retched while his hands clawed into the mass of tentacles, trying to wrench the regulator from the coiling suckers. He kicked and clawed blindly. His head crashed into the edge of the hatch and he sucked in killer water again and half-screamed in choked terror. He kicked again with all his might, and his head burst through the hatch, and the octopus saw its escape and in an instant it was gone.
The octopus shot off into the gloom in a great cloud of ink and streaming tentacles two yards long. McQuade blindly flailed around his head for the regulator, choking, strangled, panic-stricken, terrified, then his desperate hand found it and he rammed it back into his mouth. He sucked and choked and gagged and sucked again. He clung to the rim of the bridge, heart pounding, gasping, shuddering, looking about wild-eyed for more dreadful fiends, then he kicked towards the surface.
He rose frantically between the waving nets, keeping pace with his own bubbles, trying to control his terror and the retch of bitter seawater in his throat. For an eternity he rose and rose, then the silver surface was heaving just above him, and he burst through it.
He spun in the water looking for the dinghy, then rammed his head under and swam wildly for it. He thrashed and thrashed, horrified of the dreadful fiends following him from behind. Tucker swung the dinghy towards him. The Kid was already aboard. McQuade thrashed up to it, and frantically heaved himself out of the water, and the Kid grabbed his belt. He crashed into the dinghy. He spat out his regulator and ripped his mask off and clutched his face.
‘Oh Jesus …’ he shuddered. ‘Oh Jesus …’
Tucker was open-mouthed. ‘Did you find it?’ the Kid demanded.
‘Big … fucking octopus … lives in it …’ McQuade panted.
‘Oh Lord …’ Tucker moaned.
‘He’s gone now …’
‘Oh good,’ the Kid said. ‘And his wife and family have gone too?’
‘Back to the ship,’ McQuade panted at Tucker. ‘Top up our tanks. And make a spear … Tie a big knife to a broomhandle. Then two of us are going down …’
‘Let’s think about this,’ Tucker whined.
‘We’re going down again! If we stop to think about it, I’ll never go back again!’
It felt better having the Kid swimming beside him, but not a hell of a lot better.
They followed the float-line down. Down they swam, down into the gloom – ten feet, fifteen – then the nets came into view, wafting up to meet them, and then the long shape of the submarine, fading away, and McQuade felt his stomach contract again. He stopped, and hovered. He could not yet see the conning tower; the float’s line curved away into the gloom towards it. The Kid hovered beside him, wide-eyed, his bubbles streaming up. McQuade peered downwards, desperate to get this over; then he kicked down between the waving nets.
He swam in front, Tucker’s home-made spear in one hand, his satchel of tools hanging from his chest, the nets looming up on both sides of them. He swam down between their treacherous tentacles, his heart knocking above the unreal roaring of his breathing, until the conning tower loomed. And with all his fearful heart he did not want to go near the dreadful place again and he swam straight at it fiercely, and grabbed the rim, and peered over the top.
There was no octopus. McQuade pulled himself over, spear first, and surged down to the hatch.
There was a ghostly yellow glow in the conning tower, coming from the torch he had dropped. The Kid surged alongside him, peering down wide-eyed. McQuade thrust his new torch into the hatch and shakily shone it around. Then, before he lost his nerve, he grabbed the ladder and pulled.
He burst down again into the conning tower. The Kid came surging after him in a flurry of bubbles, clung to the ladder and peered around. McQuade looked fearfully at the lower hatch: then he gripped his spear like a long dagger, surged at the hatch and stabbed down it.
He jabbed the spear down into the black hole, banging the blade against the metal sides for half a minute, then he hung back from the hatch fearfully, waiting for another awful mansize octopus to come flying out. They waited, hearts hammering, bubbles roaring, before McQuade shone his torch into the terrible opening.
The black water was cloudy with bits of barnacle and weed his spear had knocked off, but he could see to the bottom. And what he could see, at the end of the escape tube, was a seaman’s boot.
It was only the sole that was visible. McQuade stared at it, and he felt sick in his guts. That boot symbolized the whole horror of the charnel house that was waiting for him down there. What was inside that boot? The bones of a seaman’s foot? Would there still be rotting flesh attached to it? Toenails? A rotten, flesh-sodden sock? And ankle bones, shin bones, a whole human leg? A whole human skeleton, still in its rotting German naval uniform that would crunch apart into dreadful soupiness the moment he disturbed it? God, how many other boots and skeletons lay awaiting him down there in that dreadful hell-hole? The Kid looked back at him wide-eyed. McQuade took a deep breath, and before he lost his nerve, he pushed his head into the dreadful hatch, and kicked.
They had discussed this manoeuvre. McQuade shoved his shoulders down into the hole, and the Kid grabbed him and supported him in a vertical position. McQuade frantically jostled his shoulders and kicked again, the Kid shoved him downwards, and McQuade’s hips entered the hole, and he jammed to a stop.
All he knew was the terrifying descent, then the sudden grating of his airtank against the barnacled sides, and he was stuck. Stuck upside-down in this terrible place, both arms ahead of him helpless, his bubbles roaring in his ears and the blood pounding in his face and that boot just four feet in front of his wild eyes. All he wanted to do was thrash and go plunging backwards up this terrifying tube, and he kicked his feet frantically, and wrestled his shoulders and beat his hands to shove himself up backwards, but up there in the conning tower the Kid shoved him down harder. And McQuade screamed, and he sucked in bitter black water around his regulator and shook his head frantically and he wrestled his shoulders furiously and beat his gloved fists upon the barnacles. All he knew was that he was going to die in this horrible hell-hole with the blood pounding in his head, die die die in this terrible place, and the Kid gave him another shove downwards. McQuade thrashed his legs, bashing his knees, twisting his hips and beating his hands, desperately trying to tell the Kid to pull him out, until up there the Kid got the message from his frantic movements, and McQuade felt his hand grab his belt, and heave.
The Kid crouched over the hatch and heaved again, and McQuade felt himself unwedge. He came grating backwards up the tube, scraping and grinding through the clouds of dislodged barnacles and weed. He came surging out backwards into the conning tower, gasping, reeling.
He lurched away from that terrible hatch and grabbed the ladder and clung, head down, bubbles roaring, gasping, his whole body shuddering. The Kid held onto the ladder, staring. McQuade clung there half a minute, getting the blood out of his pounding face and the pounding out of his heart, then he shook his head furiously and held up his finger in warning. Then he pulled off his fins and shoved himself