The Great Hunger | Page 5

it bring
to light when it came up?
"Row!" ordered Peer, and began hauling in.
The boat was headed straight out across the fjord, and the long line
with its trailing hooks hauled in and coiled up neatly in the bottom of a
shallow tub. Peer's heart was beating. There came a tug--the first--and
the faint shimmer of a fish deep down in the water. Pooh! only a big
cod. Peer heaved it in with a careless swing over the gunwale. Next
came a ling--a deep water fish at any rate this time. Then a tusk, and
another, and another; these would please the women, being good eating,
and perhaps make them hold their tongues when the men came home.
Now the line jerks heavily; what is coming? A grey shadow comes in
sight. "Here with the gaff!" cries Peer, and Peter throws it across to him.
"What is it, what is it?" shriek the other three. "Steady! don't upset the
boat; a catfish." A stroke of the gaff over the side, and a clumsy grey
body is heaved into the boat, where it rolls about, hissing and biting at
the bottom-boards and baler, the splinters crackling under its teeth.
"Mind, mind!" cries Klaus--he was always nervous in a boat.
But Peer was hauling in again. They were nearly half-way across the
fjord by now, and the line came up from mysterious depths, which no
fisherman had ever sounded. The strain on Peer began to show in his
looks; the others sat watching his face. "Is the line heavy?" asked Klaus.
"Keep still, can't you?" put in Martin, glancing along the slanting line
to where it vanished far below. Peer was still hauling. A sense of
something uncanny seemed to be thrilling up into his hands from the
deep sea. The feel of the line was strange. There was no great weight,

not even the clean tug-tug of an ordinary fish; it was as if a giant hand
were pulling gently, very gently, to draw him overboard and down into
the depths. Then suddenly a violent jerk almost dragged him over the
side.
"Look out! What is it?" cried the three together.
"Sit down in the boat," shouted Peer. And with the true fisherman's
sense of discipline they obeyed.
Peer was gripping the line firmly with one hand, the other clutching
one of the thwarts. "Have we another gaff?" he jerked out breathlessly.
"Here's one." Peter Ronningen pulled out a second iron-hooked cudgel.
"You take it, Martin, and stand by."
"But what--what is it?"
"Don't know what it is. But it's something big."
"Cut the line, and row for your lives!" wailed the doctor's son. Strange
he should be such a coward at sea, a fellow who'd tackle a man twice
his size on dry land.
Once more Peer was jerked almost overboard. He thought of the forest
fire the year before--it would never do to have another such mishap on
his shoulders. Suppose the great monster did come up and capsize
them--they were ever so far from land. What a to do there would be if
they were all drowned, and it came out that it was his fault.
Involuntarily he felt for his knife to cut the line--then thrust it back
again, and went on hauling.
Here it comes--a great shadow heaving up through the water. The huge
beast flings itself round, sending a flurry of bubbles to the surface. And
there!--a gleam of white; a row of great white teeth on the underside.
Aha! now he knows what it is! The Greenland shark is the fiercest
monster of the northern seas, quite able to make short work of a few

boys or so.
"Steady now, Martin--ready with the gaff."
The brute was wallowing on the surface now, the water boiling around
him. His tail lashed the sea to foam, a big, pointed head showed up,
squirming under the hook. "Now!" cried Peer, and two gaffs struck at
the same moment, the boat heeled over, letting in a rush of water, and
Klaus, dropping his oars, sprang into the bow, with a cry of "Jesus,
save us!"
Next second a heavy body, big as a grown man, was heaved in over the
gunwale, and two boys were all but shot out the other way. And now
the fun began. The boys loosed their hold of the gaffs, and sprang apart
to give the creature room. There it lay raging, the great black beast of
prey, with its sharp threatening snout and wicked red eyes ablaze. The
strong tail lashed out, hurling oars and balers overboard, the long teeth
snapped at the bottom-boards and thwarts. Now and again it would leap
high up in the air, only to fall back again, writhing furiously, hissing
and spitting and frothing at the mouth,