A sense of ancient rotting evil hung in the water like a shimmering cloudiness, a miasma of living dread that was not quite definable, yet was as real and nerve grating as fingernails raking across a blackboard. There was a breath of hostility in the darkness, such as one can sometimes feel in graveyards on stormy nights, that feeling that something does not want you to be there, that feeling that drives the cold shivers up and down your spine.

Without warning, Howard felt an excuriating pain shoot through his head. He put his hands to his face mask and grimaced, thereby accidentally swallowing a bit of the fowl water. It burned like acid in his mouth. Then, as suddenly as it had come, the pain disappeared.

Howard looked about him and wondered what had happened. The inky blackness of the water made it impossible to see anything. Except for the dancing motes of light which would not go away. He wondered if they were real, or if his eyes were playing tricks on him, trying so hard to see into the malignant darkness that they had begun to imagine things. Night diving had never scared him before, but this was different. This was Bottomless Lake.

It was then that he had noticed a misty vision coming towards him out of the blackness. It was a vision from his past, from the very first recovery mission he had ever been on. Because of dangerous snakes and fish in the water, they did not dive that night. Instead, they had used the hooks. And the very first dead body he had ever seen floated towards him now. It was a dark haired young girl. She had fallen into the river while attending a college party. She had probably never been what people would call beautiful--her face was too round and her nose was slightly crooked from a childhood accident--but now death had robbed her of everything. The hooks had mangled her. One of the curved pieces of steel had entered her open mouth and come out near her ear. Several small fish were nibbling there, but that was not the worst. She was incomplete, and it was obvious that every biter in the sea had taken a piece. Harold swallowed hard as the line suddenly went taut and dragged the body back into the darkness from which it had come.

But a new, more horrible apparition appeared. Out of the darkness came a drowning boy. Howard recognized him instantly. His brother Arnold had not been changed by the passing years. After fifteen years he still looked the same, and he was still drowning! He was paddling and flailing his arms wildly in a desperate attempt to get to the surface. But it was all in vain. Arnold Phillips was sinking instead of rising. Then he spotted Howard. Instantly an expression of hope came over his still boyish face. He held out his hands, clutching, pleading, helpless hands. His eyes begged, and his lips mouthed a silent, "Help Me." He was dying. Howard wanted to scream, but again, he could only watch his brother die, too petrified to move. He could not have moved a muscle to save life. Arnold's face distorted hideously into a death grimace as he fought for the last precious seconds. Then it was over. The eyes were open, but life had gone. The still begging hands relaxed. The limp body, only a few feet from Howard now, began to sink. As it fell slowly, leisurely because it had all the time in the world now, past Howard, the flesh melted away until there was nothing left but the skeleton. The empty eye holes stared at him unforgivingly as they sank into the blackness, down, down, down, and then were gone.

There was a powerful splash beside him and Howard knew instantly that it was the other diver entering the water. He shook his head to clear it and realized that he himself had only been in the water a few seconds. Yet it felt like he had been here for half an hour. He had already seen things that could not be. There was something terrible here, something down below in the deep. Every nerve in his body tingled and signaled that there was danger here. It was so dammed wrong here. He had a sudden dizzying sensation of tottering on the edge of a cliff with the endless pit yawning before him; one slip and he would fall almost forever. Until he met the horror that lived in the pit! And he knew he was going to slip.

Bill Hariss lit his torch and the sudden glare in the water shook Howard back to reality. He closed his eyes and tried to get his emotions under control. He told himself that this was his job, no matter what the circumstances. The Coast Guard had trained him for this. He had even saved several people's lives. He knew how to do this. He had made countless dives in the service, and even more since then for the county Sheriff's department. It was his job to go down there and get those kids. They would all be dead, but he knew that an hour ago when he got the call. It was his job, so he steeled himself and lit his torch. He gave Hariss the "ready " signal, and noticed that the State Patrolman's eyes were wide and frightened.