Hastily descending the cliff I ran to her assistance, when I saw Moira
spring on to a flat rock upon which she generally landed from her
canoe. At the same moment a snaky tentacle rose out of the sea and
caught her, while other tentacles quickly enveloped her. The monster
now dragged its shiny bulk upon the rock, and except in a nightmare
surely no man had beheld such a creature before. It resembled a
monstrous spider, but out of all proportion to anything in Nature. Its
eyes, like white saucers with jet black centres, stared from its flat
head, and the tentacles with which it seized its prey were provided
with suckers to hold what they fastened upon.
Even in her extremity Moira thought more of my safety than her own. "Go
back!" she cried. "You cannot help me. The sea devil has the strength
of ten men."
Not heeding her warning I continued to advance to her assistance but as
I approached the sea-spider drew back into its native element, and
presently sank with its prey beneath the waves.
In my first feeling of dismay for what had happened, I could not
believe that Moira had been taken from me, and as I remembered my
ingratitude to her and thought of how surly I had become, absorbed in
my own trouble, I threw myself down upon the rocks in an agony of
remorse.
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