_ they stared at each other.

"Did you hear that?" Scotty demanded.

"I'll say I did!"

"That octopus wailed," Scotty insisted. "Twice!" He hesitated, then put
Rick's thoughts into words. "Only--octopuses don't wail. They don't make
noise of any kind."

"This one did," Rick said. "A wailing octopus! This is either a new
scientific find, or ..."

"Or we've found what the fancy frogmen didn't want us to find," Scotty
concluded.

CHAPTER XI

Lights on Clipper Reef

"This," Hobart Zircon boomed, "is a phenomenon that will rock the
science of zoology to its very depths! We will examine this creature and
determine his genus and species, and we will name him after you two.
_Octopus waili branti-scotti._ Or perhaps _Octopus screami_ would be
better."

"Of course we're not certain that it was a wail," Rick said soberly. "He
might have been singing. He might even have been telling us to go catch
him a fish."

Tony Briotti observed, "This may not be an isolated phenomenon. Who
knows? A search may disclose screaming squid, or simpering sharks, or
burbling barracuda."

"Seriously," Zircon asked, "have either of you a theory to account for
this? Or do you really believe that the octopus wailed?"

"We'd be in a better position to answer that if we'd had a chance to
explore the cave," Scotty replied. "How can we tell? Maybe the octopus
really did wail, and we were the lucky ones who heard the sound for the
first time." He grinned. "We should have wailed back and tried to strike
up a conversation."

Rick agreed. "I'm with Scotty. We just don't know. I agree that a
wailing octopus is a new kind of beast, but that's not entirely
impossible, is it?"

"Perhaps not." Tony stared at the sunset. "I'm trying to recall the
physiology of _Octopus vulgaris_, as the garden variety of octopus is
called, but my memory isn't working. It isn't beyond reason. After all,
some fish make sounds. I've caught croakers myself that were pretty
noisy. But I've never heard of octopus sounds until now."

Scotty chuckled. "Haven't I read that octopuses have some intelligence?
We might teach him to sing. He'd be a natural for television."

"You say that the sound was loud?" Tony asked.

"Very loud. My head hurt. Did yours, Scotty?"

"I'll say! For a minute I thought my brain cells were rubbing together."

Zircon sighed. "I am stumped. And not only by your Wailing Willie,
either. This whole affair baffles me, including the presence