The engine started suddenly, and Hoagie appeared. "Where's Jake?" he cried, staring toward the bow.

"Gone!" growled Mike. "Mom, take the wheel."

Boom, boom, boom…

The shark was still alive! Immortal?

The fin was knifing in from the port, heading for the bow. Mike pressed the switch. The great fish hurtled into the air, fifty yards ahead of them, shuddering in their path. It fell with a crash.

From the deckhouse they heard the condenser recharging with a screech.

Mike hit the switch again: Beep-beep.

The sharp leapt again and crashed down, but now the heartbeat was gone. Then the feeblest drumbeat... halting, irregular: Bump, bump... bump...

"You're killing him!" Ellen shrieked. "Again!"

Beep-beep.

The monster sprang from the water and directly into their path. It rose higher and higher, until it seemed to be dancing on its tail. From its flank protruded the shaft of the harpoon, a festering, ruddy sore, oozing blood. She gripped the wheel tightly, jammed the throttle lever forward, and aimed for the wound.

When the jagged, broken bowsprit struck, it penetrated to the stem.

Beep-beep.

The shark grew rigid and began to shake in great, rending quakes that shook the craft from stem to stern.

Beep-beep.

The shark, still impaled on the jagged bowsprit, bent double, straightened like a bow released, and convulsed. The ketch trembled as if shaken by a giant, invisible hand.

Down by the bow, stern up, she pitched forward until water was pouring through the anchor hawse. The mainmast cracked, six feet above the deck, with a sound like a redwood falling. Slowly, then faster, the enormous pole fell aft, slamming across the quarter deck three feet from where they stood.

"She's finished!" yelled Mike. He jumped forward, unlashed the inflatable from the deckhouse top, and tossed it over the side.

They climbed in as water poured over the gunwales. They paddled away. Ellen watched the stern, with its gilded letters, slide into the sea.

Thunder growled. To Ellen it sounded like Jake's voice, deep in anger.

"Yes, Mom, but when he smiled..."

It was raining, but soon the sun peeked through and tinted the clouds with gold.

In half an hour they were safe on a sixty-foot cutter of the Bahamian Defense Force.

They reported officially that the shark of Whiskey Cay was dead.

***

The little houngan stared out to sea. Great towering cumulus clouds, fat-bellied with rain, were building ruddy spires to the east. He heard the thunder rumbling, and the pain tore at his chest.

The sun was setting above Masthead Point. He could hear the surf on the seaward side of the island booming steadily, the heartbeat of the sea.

But his loa's heart had failed. He knew it in his own.

In a high, plaintive voice, he began to chant. Slowly he turned on the sand:

Maître Agwe, where are you...?

Don't you see I'm...