The captain of the Demeter prayed. The fog that surrounded the schooner had made the whole day shadowy and dull, but with the setting of the sun, it grew darker still. The captain was a hard man of the sea, and yet he sobbed now in terror. Terror of that which was to come, that which would soon emerge to walk the lonely decks; that which had taken all of the crew, save him and the first mate, who had gone into the sea to escape what festered within the ship and spread doom.
in the deepening twilight the captain once again contemplated whether he would have been wiser to have followed the mate into the briny embrace of the sea, as the terrified man had advised him just before he threw himself into the waves and vanished, rather than lashing himself to the steering wheel like this, with only a small cross on a string of rosary to protect him from...the man of the night. The man - if it could be called that - would come soon, up from the hold with their boxes full of dirt - Lord, the captain understood now their dread, unholy significance, and cursed himself for not having cast the filthy things into the waters as soon as the trouble began! - and seek him out for evil nourishment. But the cross! That was all that stood between him and damnation.
Through his exhausted senses there penetrated a sound, not from the hold where the horror lurked, but from over the side: A splashing and fumbling, as of someone climbing up from the water and ascending the timber. A shipwreck victim, perhaps, having approached unseen in the fog? The captain dared hope for possible company, perhaps even help from that which he dreaded. The rope binding him to the wheel prevented him from rushing over and peering down, but the sounds of movement were closer now. He realized then that they were all around the ship, as though a multitude had been disgorged from the sea and fog.
When the first hand emerged from over the side nearest him, the captain was too tired to scream, but his mind froze and shattered at this new horror. In form the hand was mostly human...save for being scaled like a fish, and possessing webs between the digits. Now the heads of the boarders showed themselves - huge, lidless eyes, set in faces like some perverted blending of man and frog; on the necks pulsed gills. And as he saw them, they spoke. Not any human tongue, but a deep croaking that issued from their flabby-lipped mouths. Ancient were they, and had long been tracking this vessel with its' unusual cargo.
From belowdeck swept a shadow, a black shape with a white face from which blazed two eyes like pools of molten blood. No assailant approached the captain, but terror clotted in his weakened heart and sucked him to merciful oblivion. His corpse now slumped hideously over the wheel, licked by the creeping mist. The figure in black fixed his hellfire-shot eyes on the amphibian things just starting to set their webbed feet on deck, and a voice harsh and icy as the winds over distant mountains snarled "Away, spawn of Dagon! Back to your watery pits!"
And the Deep Ones felt fear of this being they faced, and splashed one by one back into the waves, where they were safe...from the vampire called Dracula.