Danny Dunn on the Ocean Floor Read online

  COPYRIGHT INFORMATION

  Copyright © 1960, renewed 1988 by Jay Williams & Raymond Abrashkin.

  *

  Published by Wildside Press LLC

  www.wildsidepress.com

  THE DANNY DUNN SERIES

  Danny Dunn and the Anti-Gravity Paint

  Danny Dunn on a Desert Island

  Danny Dunn and the Homework Machine

  Danny Dunn and the Weather Machine

  Danny Dunn on the Ocean Floor

  Danny Dunn and the Fossil Cave

  Danny Dunn and the Heat Ray

  Danny Dunn, Time Traveler

  Danny Dunn and the Automatic House

  Danny Dunn and the Voice from Space

  Danny Dunn and the Smallifying Machine

  Danny Dunn and the Swamp Monster

  Danny Dunn, Invisible Boy

  Danny Dunn Scientific Detective

  Danny Dunn and the Universal Glue

  DEDICATION

  This book is for Mike Burnham, Jr. and also for Katie Meadow

  OPENING QUOTATION

  “Nothing is impossible. Some things are just harder to believe than others.”

  —Professor Euclid Bullfinch

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  The authors are deeply grateful to Dr. Bruce C. Heezen of the Lamont Geological Observatory for his assistance; to W. Clois Ensor for advice about complicated musical matters; to the Mexican Government Tourist Bureau for much information about Mexico; to Moses Asch for allowing us to study the sounds of fish on recordings of the Science Series of Folkways Records and Service Corporation; and to Mary Cock and Reginald Weedon for their courtesy in providing working space.

  We also wish to acknowledge our profound indebtedness to the writings of the pioneers of deep-sea exploration: Dr. William Beebe, Professor Auguste Piccard, Captain Jacques-Yves Cousteau, and Lieutenant Commander George Huout.

  CHAPTER ONE

  The Sounds of Fish

  Professor Euclid Bullfinch hummed cheerily to himself as he set a large crucible—a pot made to withstand high heat—in the furnace that filled one corner of his laboratory.

  He checked the temperature setting and shut the furnace. Then he seated himself at one of the stone-topped laboratory benches. He opened his notebook and for a moment chewed the end of his fountain pen as he looked thoughtfully out the open window. The sweet scent of honeysuckle came from his garden, along with the murmur of bees, and the Professor drew a deep contented breath.

  Then he wrote, “Mixture placed in oven, 10:21, 300°. Why has no one tried this approach to this type of plastic before? Perhaps the results will not justify—”

  The laboratory door flew open. A red-headed boy and a pretty girl with a dark pony-tail flying behind her, burst into the room. “Professor!” the boy shouted. “We need your help!”

  Professor Bullfinch looked up over the rims of his glasses. Then, in a mild tone, he said, “Shut the door, please, Danny.” When, a little sheepishly, the boy had done so, the Professor put down his pen and went on, “I perceive from the calm way in which you stopped to obey me that there’s no emergency. No one has drowned, or burned up, or been swallowed in an earthquake, I take it?”

  “Oh, no, nothing like that,” said Danny Dunn. He rubbed his snub nose and added, “Gee, Professor, I see what you mean. I guess we shouldn’t have come busting in like that. I’m sorry. I just didn’t stop to think.”

  The girl, whose name was Irene Miller, said, “Oh, dear, I hope we haven’t interrupted any important work. We’d better come back another time, Dan.”

  “No, no,” the Professor protested with a smile. “I merely wished to point out that it’s too warm a day for unnecessary bustling about. Sit down, both of you. I have been experimenting with a new type of plastic.”

  “Is it for Dr. Grimes’s project?” Danny asked.

  “Yes. He should be here soon, and I hope to have the answer to one of his problems.”

  The two young people sat down, and Danny carefully set a small case on one of the benches. It contained a battery-operated tape recorder which he had assembled from a kit with Irene’s help.

  Danny was greatly interested in science, and knew much more about its principles than most boys of his age. His father had died when he was very young, and his mother had taken a post as housekeeper for Professor Bullfinch. Danny had grown up under the wing of the famous scientist, who had taught him a great deal, and the Professor felt as much affection for Danny as if the boy were his own son. Irene lived next door. Her father was an astronomer who taught at Midston, the local university, and she, too, had the ambition of becoming a scientist when she grew up.

  She said, now, “If you’re sure we’re not interrupting, Professor… Go ahead, Dan. Tell the Professor about your theory.”

  “I’ll do more than that,” Danny grinned. “I’ll play it for you.”

  The scientist sat back and lit his pipe. “Play it?” he asked. “Is it a theory about music?” Danny shook his head. He pulled the tape recorder out of its case. It had its own tiny amplifier, which he turned on, and then he threw the battery switch. At once, from the miniature machine, came a series of grunts that sounded like a cross between a pig and the plunking of a bass fiddle.

  The Professor raised his eyebrows. “It certainly isn’t music,” he said. “But what is it?”

  “A fish,” said Danny.

  “It’s a toadfish,” Irene added. “Isn’t it lovely?”

  “I… don’t… think… so,” said the Professor slowly. “Interesting? Yes. Odd? Yes. Lovely? No.”

  Irene giggled. “Well, I was just thinking of that little fish floating in the sea and grunting happily to himself. That’s kind of lovely, isn’t it?”

  “I see what you mean.” The Professor nodded.

  “We’ve got a whole lot of them,” Danny said.

  “What on earth do you plan to do with a whole lot of toadfish?” asked the Professor. “And where do you keep them?”

  “No, not toadfish,” said Danny. “A lot of fish sounds. On tape.”

  “Really? You don’t look wet.”

  “We haven’t been in the water. We got them from your friend, Dr. Brenton, at the University,” Danny said. “He’s been doing experiments in animal behavior. Nobody knew until recently that fish made any sounds, but the Naval Research Laboratory recorded some, and so did Dr. Brenton. He let me tape them from his recordings.”

  “Ah, yes, I seem to have heard of those experiments,” said the Professor. “Very interesting. You said you wanted my help. Do you want me to get you some live fish?”

  “Nothing like that, Professor.” Danny leaned forward earnestly. “Here’s my theory. I’ve been listening to the different sounds, and I think there’s a definite pattern to them. If we could figure it out, we might be able to understand the language of fish!”

  The Professor drew in a mouthful of smoke and let it trickle slowly between his lips. “My dear boy,” he said at last, “mere patterns of sound don’t make a language. We must be sure they go along with specific actions or meanings. For instance, all the songs of birds may or may not be language. But crows do communicate with each other by means of certain cries. They warn each other; they tell when an owl is present—these cries might perhaps be called a language of a sort.”

  Danny said, “I see. Well, listen to this.”

  Again he turned on his recorder. This time there came a series of short barks.

  “That’s a sea catfish,” he explained.

 
“Sounds as though he’s imitating a sea dogfish,” the Professor remarked.

  “He’s being held in someone’s hand,” said Danny. “So that might be a fear sound or a threatening sound.”

  “The sounds seem to fall into groups,” Irene put in. “Some are clicks; some are grunts; some are soft whistles or beeps—”

  “She can hear tones I can’t make out at all,” Danny said admiringly. “She has a better ear than I have.”

  “Let us apply the scientific method,” said the Professor, putting his fingertips together. “To begin with, we ought to classify the sounds. Suppose you play them, Dan. And Irene, you repeat them and tell me what they are. Then we can sort them out.”

  He took a sheet of paper and drew several columns on it. At the tops of the columns he wrote CLICKS, BEEPS, CHIRPS, WHISTLES, GRUNTS.

  “That’s enough to start with,” he said. “Go on, Danny—begin.”

  A short time later, Danny’s mother, Mrs. Dunn, entered the lab with a tray of oatmeal cookies and lemonade. “I thought you might—” she began, and stopped short, with her mouth still open.

  Irene, sitting on a laboratory bench, was going, “Quirp? Pleeoop! Quirp!”

  Professor Bullfinch, rubbing his chin, said, “Quirp?”

  Danny, dancing about excitedly, cried, “No, no. More like this: Wheerp! Wheerp!”

  “Professor,” said Mrs. Dunn.

  He nodded absently and said, “Perhaps, queerp?”

  “Danny!” Mrs. Dunn said.

  “Yes, Mom?” said Danny. “Queerp, queerp!”

  “Dear me,” said Mrs. Dunn. “If you’re all feverish, you’d better not eat anything. I’ll just take these cookies back to the kitchen.”

  Danny ran to her and threw his arms around her. “No!” he shouted. “You couldn’t be so cruel. I’m sorry. We were working on fish sounds.”

  “Ah, so that’s what it was,” said Mrs. Dunn, her blue eyes twinkling. “Fish sounds? Well, here’s one for you: Crkl-crkl-crkl!”

  “I give up,” said Danny. “What is it, Mom?”

  “Frying fish,” laughed his mother.

  “Splendid,” said the Professor. “That’s one your friend Joe Pearson would like, Dan. Isn’t he an expert on food?”

  “Speaking of food,” said Mrs. Dunn, “don’t I smell something burning? I don’t think I have anything in the oven…”

  The Professor sprang to his feet, clapping a hand to his rosy, bald head. “Great heavens!” he cried. “My plastic! I forgot all about it!”

  CHAPTER TWO

  Cooking Chemicals

  They could all smell it now—a strong, smoky, faintly sweetish odor. Professor Bullfinch sprang to the furnace and pulled open the door.

  “Ah, me,” he sighed. “This goose is certainly cooked.”

  As the two young people drew closer, he fished the crucible out with a long iron hook. The pot had turned dark brown, and the stuff in it was smoking.

  “Is it ruined?” Danny asked.

  “I’m afraid so. However, it won’t be too hard to duplicate the mixture.”

  The Professor opened the window to let the fumes escape. At that moment the wall telephone rang. Mrs. Dunn answered it and, after speaking for a moment, hung up and said, “That was Dr. Grimes, Professor.”

  “Dr. Grimes? Where is he?”

  “At the airport.” Mrs. Dunn pulled the corners of her mouth down and, in a good imitation of Dr. Grimes’s gruff tones, said, “Tell Bullfinch to come and fetch me. I don’t trust the careless speeding of taxicabs.”

  They all laughed. “That sounds like Grimes,” said the Professor. “He’s planning to explore the bottom of the sea, but he’s afraid of a taxi. I’ll go at once. Dan, you and Irene may eat my share of the cookies.”

  He took his jacket from a peg behind the door. As he was putting it on, Danny said, “Professor, may Irene and I stay here in the lab and work on our list of fish noises?”

  Professor Bullfinch stopped with one arm in a sleeve. “Danny,” he said gently.

  The boy blushed. “I know just what you’re going to say,” he protested. “You don’t want me to do any experimenting while you’re gone.”

  “We-e-ell,” said the Professor, “the last time I left you alone in the lab you tried to launch a CO2 rocket through the window without opening the window. It isn’t that I don’t trust you, my boy. It’s just that you do have a habit of acting, sometimes, without thinking.”

  “I won’t this time, Professor,” said Danny.

  “And I’ll see that he does exactly what you tell him,” Irene promised.

  “Very well. As a matter of fact, there is something you can do for me,” said Professor Bullfinch. “When the crucible is cool, you can throw the mixture out. Don’t bother to clean the crucible; just leave it on the bench.”

  He bustled off, and Mrs. Dunn went back to her housework. Danny and Irene sat down once more with the tape recorder, the cookies, and the lemonade, listening to the strange sounds and trying to list them under the proper columns.

  Every now and then Danny checked the crucible, and after fifteen minutes or so he decided that it was cool enough to handle. He was able to pick it up easily, and he carried it to the trash can. He tilted it and then he said, “Hey, Irene! This thing’s empty.”

  She hurried to his side. “How can it be empty? I don’t think plastic would evaporate.”

  “Look at it. It doesn’t look as if there’s anything in the pot.” As he said this, he put his hand in it. He looked up at her with a puzzled air. “There is something,” he said. “I can feel it, but it’s transparent.”

  Irene touched the surface of the stuff. It had a curious, velvety texture, not smooth like glass, so that it did not reflect the light well. This made it hard to see.

  Danny tried tapping the bottom of the crucible to get the plastic out. Then he took a hammer and hit the clear material as hard as he could.

  The hammer bounced up as if it had struck stone.

  “Perhaps you’d better leave it alone,” Irene suggested. “You might break the crucible.”

  Danny pursed up his lips. “Let’s just try the electric drill,” he said. “That ought to do it.” He got out a power drill and fitted a high-speed bit into it. He started the motor and pressed the bit against the mysterious substance. The point of the bit skittered off and chipped a small piece out of the edge of the crucible.

  “There,” said Irene. “Now you’d better leave it alone.”

  Danny was examining the plastic. “This stuff isn’t even scratched,” he said. He picked up the crucible and carried it back to the furnace.

  “What are you going to do?” Irene asked.

  “Only one thing to do. I’ll heat it up again.”

  “Danny!” said Irene warningly. “You’ve forgotten your promise.”

  Danny turned to a pair of wide, perfectly innocent blue eyes on her. “I have not,” he answered. “This isn’t experimenting. Professor Bullfinch told me to throw the stuff away, didn’t he? And I can’t throw it away when it’s solid, can I? I’ll have to heat it up to make it liquid so that it’ll throw.”

  Irene thought about that for a moment and then said, “I guess you’re right.”

  Danny put the crucible back in the furnace, and they both watched until curls of white steam began to rise from the plastic. Danny took a steel poker and touched the material. It rippled thickly, like molasses.

  The crucible had two handles, and he got a pair of metal hooks and hooked them into the handles. He took one and Irene took the other, and they carefully lifted the melting pot out of the furnace.

  “Now it’s too hot to pour into the trash bin,” Danny said. “Let’s take it over to the window sill and let it cool for a minute or two.”

  Just as they were lifting it to the sill, there came a loud whistle. A th
in dark boy with a mournful expression on his face had come into the garden. Under one arm he carried a football.

  “Hi, Dan,” he called. “Hello, Irene. Come on out.”

  “Can’t Joe,” Danny replied, resting his elbows on the sill. “We’re busy.”

  Joe Pearson, who was Danny’s closest friend, eyed the crucible. “What’s that thing?” he said. “A cooking pot? Or a chemical pot?”

  “Both,” Danny grinned. “We’re cooking some chemicals.”

  Joe paused, and a wary look came over his face. “Oh—oh,” he said. “Another experiment, eh? When is this one going to explode?”

  “It isn’t,” said Danny. “This is Professor Bullfinch’s experiment. I have to throw it away.”

  “Won’t he mind?”

  “Oh, Joe, don’t be a glop,” said Irene. “He wants us to throw it away.”

  “Why? Doesn’t he like it any more?”

  “It was an experiment that didn’t work out.”

  “I see,” Joe sighed. “There are lots of things about this I will never understand. Just tell me one thing. What’s a glop?”

  Irene laughed. “It’s what you are when you talk foolishly.”

  “I get it. Looks to me as if we’re all glops together. Well, when are you going to be finished with the throwing away? Because I just got this neat football from George Cahill in a trade. I swapped him my boxing gloves for it.”

  They could see, now, that one of Joe’s eyes was swollen and discolored.

  “July is a little early for football, isn’t it?” Danny asked.

  “Oh, I’m doing my Christmas shopping early,” said Joe airily. “Anyway, I didn’t want the boxing gloves any more. Come on out, and we’ll have a game.”

  “Looks like a pretty good ball,” Danny commented.

  “In perfect condition.” Joe tossed it up and caught it a few times. The sight was too tempting for Danny.

  “Pitch it here,” he said. “Let’s see it.”

  Joe drew back his arm.