always the sharks.

The next morning the sky was dirty grey and the sea rough, but the afternoon was calm. The wind had dropped and the clouds had blown away. Armed with a huge hammer and a crowbar, Genaro prepared to go down. and search the wreck.

Ben put on Genaro's helmet, and he stepped off and disappeared. Ben kept his ear to the phone until Genaro. called to say that he had reached bottom. Fifteen minutes later, he called to report that he was within the vessel looking around. After that Ben heard no more from the bottom of the sea.

Time moved slowly; an hour had passed. Another half hour labored by. There was no way of telling if he had gotten into trouble. Once again Ben called. No answer. He called again. Then again. Then again. Finally, his voice came to Ben faintly, as from a great distance, saying to leave him alone. Ben cursed softly. His attachment for Genaro was something now much more than friendship and his stomach, knotted and anxious, showed him that Genaro was very close to him. Genaro was staying down too long for that depth! The Japanese looked at him anxiously, waiting to pull him up. Ben shrugged. What could he do? He couldn't pull him up through the wreck.

A horrid stillness hung over the craft, and the sun burned hot across the yellow sky. Ben was tired from pacing the deck, and hoarse from yelling down the phone. Just when he decided to go after him, Genaro signaled; and they pulled him up as fast as they could. By the time Genaro poked his iron head into the sunlight, he was nearly unconscious.

Ben took him aboard and carried him into the decompressing chamber, for he had come up too swiftly. The man he was carrying was sick and deathly pale. Ben rubbed him down and put him to bed. He was half delirious and mumbling unintelligibly.

one

He tossed restlessly for hours, but towards morning he quieted down and slept.

Ben was tired and irritable, and had a headache. He didn't try to think. He went to Genaro's cabin, and wandered to the window. A wind had begun to blow, chill and damp, and it was raining.

They awoke late next morning. They had not slept well, and the headache still continued with ever-ceaseless throbbing. Ben dashed some water on his face and went below for some breakfast. While he was eating, the Japanese cabin boy told him that Genaro was going down to the galleon. Ben finished quickly and went up to the deck.

The Spaniard was strangely different. It was as if his innermost being had been submitted to some uncanny transformation. Of Genaro, as Ben had begun to really know him, only the outer shell was left; and even his countenance and manner had changed.

Ben argued with him, for he was in no condition to go down, but he was resolute. When Ben asked him what he had found, he was silent. Then Genaro said quietly that there was no gold in the galleon. Ben suggested that they move on to another spot, but the Spaniard only shook his head sadly with an indefinable, faint expression on his lips, something stealthy —a smile yet not a smile-Ben remembered it but couldn't explain it. He began getting into his diving suit.

They re-enacted the drama again that day. Genaro stayed down for hours, refusing even to keep in touch with Ben by phone. When he came up at last, pale, drawn, bleeding at the nose, he only glowered in mysterious silence.

As the days passed he became even more unrecognizable. He could not remain still for a minute and moved about his cabin in short, jerky steps

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