Anxiously Garth looked out into the swirling waters, but the saurian appeared to sink quite as fast as the _Seal._ The strokes of the brute’s paddles, though now feebler, were yet enough to occasion the inventor no small uneasiness. Neither forward nor backward could the vessel move, although urged on by the full power of her engines. The enormous weight across her deck held her almost motionless. So the minutes dragged by, each one fraught with the suspense of a lifetime, and there came no change for the better in the situation of the _Seal_ and her occupants, save that the last spark of life had flickered from the monster, and he lay still in death. Yet even this was something to be thankful for. While he lived there had ever been a danger that, by some random stroke of his paddles, he might have smashed in one or other of the vessel’s deck-plates. Now that danger was past. But still the vessel sank in the crimsoned waters. Soon, unless this sea was of unusual depth, she must touch bottom; and then--a slow, lingering death for the two men aboard her--death by suffocation, deep down in the gloomy depths of this subterranean sea. The lonely vigil grew too much for Garth at last, and, placing the tube to his lips, he summoned the engineer. “It’s no use,” he remarked hopelessly, as the latter entered the wheelhouse; “we might as well let things take their course. The brute’s jammed too firmly across the deck for us to move him.” “It’s what Silas would call ‘checkmate,’ then?” questioned Wilson. “That’s it; but it seems jolly hard, just as we’d bested the brute, too. How’s that crack going on where his tail caught us?” “I’ve fixed the door of the room--it’s Mervyn’s study, you know, where the smash is--so that the water cannot spread to other places. I say, it was a good thing we decided to have water-tight doors to all the compartments!” But Garth did not answer. He was gazing fixedly outside. The water, stained until now to a crimson hue by the life-blood of the saurian, was clearing rapidly. “Look!” the inventor cried suddenly. Wilson followed the direction of his gaze. Close alongside a jagged, black rock was thrusting itself upward as the vessel sank. “If the brute’s body will only catch on that we may escape after all,” Garth cried excitedly. “Get below again, Tom, old man, and start your engines like blazes when you hear me ring.” The next few moments were full of painful anxiety to the engineer as he waited, gripping his levers, for the signal which should tell him that the vessel was free. It came at length, and a wild huzza almost escaped him as he felt the _Seal_ begin to move. Ere long she was sweeping through the water at her usual pace, and then Wilson felt free to raise her. When she reached the surface the lad rejoined his comrade in the turret.