"No, we're being towed."
"Towed! Towed!" exclaimed Smith in a weak voice. "What's towing us?"
"We don't know, sor," replied a cockney.
There was a silence in which Caradoc stood tall and cadaverous as a
ghost. "Am I dreaming this, Madden?" he muttered finally. "Did you say
we were being _towed_?"
"That's right."
"What's towing us--not--not the dry dock--don't say the dry dock's
towing us!"
"We don't know, sor," repeated the cockney.
"Where are we going?"
"To be killed, sor."
Caradoc moved slowly over to the rail and sat against it near Madden.
"A cool breeze," he murmured gratefully.
The American was lost amid the wildest speculations as to the mysterious
agent that had the _Vulcan_ in tow. He was trying to think
logically, but found it hard in that atmosphere of terror. The utter
weirdness of the whole affair defied analysis. The towing of the
_Vulcan_ by an unknown power was the very climax of the fantastic.
No hypothesis he could form even remotely approached an explanation.
It could not be some sea monster surging steadily at the tow line of
the _Vulcan_. That theory was untenable. A monster might attack;
it would never tow.
But any other, attempt to account for the strange predicament fell
equally as flat. What human agency would operate so mysteriously in this
hot, stagnant sea? Why should any group of men entrap the helpless crew
of the _Vulcan_ with such a display of mystery and power? It was
useless.
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