Page 22 (1/2)

CHAPTER 6

THE B3 PASSENGERS HAD DECIDED TO REPORT THEIR OBSERVATIONS like sportscasters Joe Zavala would do the play-by-play, Max Kane would provide the color using Willias

At two hundred eighty-six feet down, Kane announced, “The torpedoed ocean liner Lusitania is resting at this level”

At three hundred fifty-three feet, he noted, “This was the deepest any subone when Beebe made his bathysphere dives”

When the bathysphere reached six hundred feet, Kane slipped the lucky skullcap from his head and held it in his hands

“We’ve entered what Beebe called the Land of the Lost,” he said in a hushed tone “This is the reals who have been lost at sea Going back to the Phoenicians, s have descended this far, but all of them have been dead, the drowned victims of war, tempest, or act of God”

“Cheery thought,” Zavala said “Is that why you said hello to Davy Jones’s Lockerwhere drowned sailors go?”

Zavala had rigged a switch to turn off the TV camera anda short break We’ll be back with more observations in a few minutes” He pushed the button “I need a breather,” he said with a smile “You asked about the LockerIt’s the nicknaave to the lab”

“The marine center at Bonefish Key?” Zavala said

Kane glanced at the caht, Bonefish Key”

Zavala wondered why anyone would cori Scientists were strange birds

“Beebe sounds n view of the ocean,” Kane said “He knew the dangers were real, but he thought the hazards of the deep overblown”

“The ree,” Zavala said “I respect everything Beebe and Barton did, Doc, but froineer’s point of view I’d say they were just plain lucky they didn’t becoinal bathysphere was an accident waiting to happen”

Kane greeted the blunt assessment with a chuckle

“Beebe was a realist as well as a dreamer,” he said “He co on a cobweb a quarter of ain midocean”