________________________________________________
_ THE WAY HE SAID THIS, the unexpectedness of this scene, first the
biography of this patriotic ship, then the excitement with which this
eccentric individual pronounced these last words--the name Avenger
whose significance could not escape me--all this, taken together,
had a profound impact on my mind. My eyes never left the captain.
Hands outstretched toward the sea, he contemplated the proud
wreck with blazing eyes. Perhaps I would never learn who he was,
where he came from or where he was heading, but more and more I
could see a distinction between the man and the scientist.
It was no ordinary misanthropy that kept Captain Nemo and his companions
sequestered inside the Nautilus's plating, but a hate so monstrous
or so sublime that the passing years could never weaken it.
Did this hate also hunger for vengeance? Time would soon tell.
Meanwhile the Nautilus rose slowly to the surface of the sea, and I
watched the Avenger's murky shape disappearing little by little.
Soon a gentle rolling told me that we were afloat in the open air.
Just then a hollow explosion was audible. I looked at the captain.
The captain did not stir.
"Captain?" I said.
He didn't reply.
I left him and climbed onto the platform. Conseil and the Canadian
were already there.
"What caused that explosion?" I asked.
"A cannon going off," Ned Land replied.
I stared in the direction of the ship I had spotted. It was heading
toward the Nautilus, and you could tell it had put on steam.
Six miles separated it from us.
"What sort of craft is it, Ned?"
"From its rigging and its low masts," the Canadian replied,
"I bet it's a warship. Here's hoping it pulls up and sinks this
damned Nautilus!"
"Ned my friend," Conseil replied, "what harm could it do
the Nautilus? Will it attack us under the waves? Will it cannonade
us at the bottom of the sea?"
"Tell me, Ned," I asked, "can you make out the nationality
of that craft?"
Creasing his brow, lowering his lids, and puckering the corners
of his eyes, the Canadian focused the full power of his gaze on
the ship for a short while.
"No, sir," he replied. "I can't make out what nation it's from.
It's flying no flag. But I'll swear it's a warship, because there's
a long pennant streaming from the peak of its mainmast."
For a quarter of an hour, we continued to watch the craft bearing
down on us. But it was inconceivable to me that it had discovered
the Nautilus at such a distance, still less that it knew what this
underwater machine really was.
Soon the Canadian announced that the craft was a big battleship,
a double-decker ironclad complete with ram. Dark, dense smoke
burst from its two funnels. Its furled sails merged with the lines
of its yardarms. The gaff of its fore-and-aft sail flew no flag.
Its distance still kept us from distinguishing the colors of its pennant,
which was fluttering like a thin ribbon.
It was coming on fast. If Captain Nemo let it approach, a chance
for salvation might be available to us.
"Sir," Ned Land told me, "if that boat gets within a mile of us,
I'm jumping overboard, and I suggest you follow suit."
I didn't reply to the Canadian's proposition but kept watching
the ship, which was looming larger on the horizon. Whether it
was English, French, American, or Russian, it would surely welcome
us aboard if we could just get to it.
"Master may recall," Conseil then said, "that we have some experience
with swimming. He can rely on me to tow him to that vessel,
if he's agreeable to going with our friend Ned."
Before I could reply, white smoke streamed from the battleship's bow.
Then, a few seconds later, the waters splashed astern of the Nautilus,
disturbed by the fall of a heavy object. Soon after, an explosion
struck my ears.
"What's this? They're firing at us!" I exclaimed.
"Good lads!" the Canadian muttered.
"That means they don't see us as castaways clinging to some wreckage!"
"With all due respect to master--gracious!" Conseil put in,
shaking off the water that had sprayed over him from another shell.
"With all due respect to master, they've discovered the narwhale
and they're cannonading the same."
"But it must be clear to them," I exclaimed, "that they're dealing
with human beings."
"Maybe that's why!" Ned Land replied, staring hard at me.
The full truth dawned on me. Undoubtedly people now knew
where they stood on the existence of this so-called monster.
Undoubtedly the latter's encounter with the Abraham Lincoln,
when the Canadian hit it with his harpoon, had led Commander Farragut
to recognize the narwhale as actually an underwater boat,
more dangerous than any unearthly cetacean!
Yes, this had to be the case, and undoubtedly they were now chasing
this dreadful engine of destruction on every sea!
Dreadful indeed, if, as we could assume, Captain Nemo
had been using the Nautilus in works of vengeance!
That night in the middle of the Indian Ocean, when he imprisoned
us in the cell, hadn't he attacked some ship? That man now buried
in the coral cemetery, wasn't he the victim of some collision
caused by the Nautilus? Yes, I repeat: this had to be the case.
One part of Captain Nemo's secret life had been unveiled.
And now, even though his identity was still unknown, at least
the nations allied against him knew they were no longer hunting
some fairy-tale monster, but a man who had sworn an implacable
hate toward them!
This whole fearsome sequence of events appeared in my mind's eye.
Instead of encountering friends on this approaching ship, we would
find only pitiless enemies.
Meanwhile shells fell around us in increasing numbers.
Some, meeting the liquid surface, would ricochet and vanish into the sea
at considerable distances. But none of them reached the Nautilus.
By then the ironclad was no more than three miles off. Despite its
violent cannonade, Captain Nemo hadn't appeared on the platform.
And yet if one of those conical shells had scored a routine hit
on the Nautilus's hull, it could have been fatal to him.
The Canadian then told me:
"Sir, we've got to do everything we can to get out of this jam!
Let's signal them! Damnation! Maybe they'll realize
we're decent people!"
Ned Land pulled out his handkerchief to wave it in the air.
But he had barely unfolded it when he was felled by an iron fist,
and despite his great strength, he tumbled to the deck.
"Scum!" the captain shouted. "Do you want to be nailed to the Nautilus's
spur before it charges that ship?"
Dreadful to hear, Captain Nemo was even more dreadful to see.
His face was pale from some spasm of his heart, which must have stopped
beating for an instant. His pupils were hideously contracted.
His voice was no longer speaking, it was bellowing. Bending from
the waist, he shook the Canadian by the shoulders.
Then, dropping Ned and turning to the battleship, whose shells
were showering around him:
"O ship of an accursed nation, you know who I am!" he shouted
in his powerful voice. "And I don't need your colors to
recognize you! Look! I'll show you mine!"
And in the bow of the platform, Captain Nemo unfurled a black flag,
like the one he had left planted at the South Pole.
Just then a shell hit the Nautilus's hull obliquely, failed to breach it,
ricocheted near the captain, and vanished into the sea.
Captain Nemo shrugged his shoulders. Then, addressing me:
"Go below!" he told me in a curt tone. "You and your companions,
go below!"
"Sir," I exclaimed, "are you going to attack this ship?"
"Sir, I'm going to sink it."
"You wouldn't!"
"I will," Captain Nemo replied icily. "You're ill-advised to pass
judgment on me, sir. Fate has shown you what you weren't meant
to see. The attack has come. Our reply will be dreadful.
Get back inside!"
"From what country is that ship?"
"You don't know? Fine, so much the better! At least its nationality
will remain a secret to you. Go below!"
The Canadian, Conseil, and I could only obey. Some fifteen
of the Nautilus's seamen surrounded their captain and stared with
a feeling of implacable hate at the ship bearing down on them.
You could feel the same spirit of vengeance enkindling their every soul.
I went below just as another projectile scraped the Nautilus's hull,
and I heard the captain exclaim:
"Shoot, you demented vessel! Shower your futile shells! You won't escape
the Nautilus's spur! But this isn't the place where you'll perish!
I don't want your wreckage mingling with that of the Avenger!"
I repaired to my stateroom. The captain and his chief officer
stayed on the platform. The propeller was set in motion.
The Nautilus swiftly retreated, putting us outside the range
of the vessel's shells. But the chase continued, and Captain Nemo
was content to keep his distance.
Near four o'clock in the afternoon, unable to control the impatience
and uneasiness devouring me, I went back to the central companionway.
The hatch was open. I ventured onto the platform. The captain was
still strolling there, his steps agitated. He stared at the ship,
which stayed to his leeward five or six miles off. He was circling it
like a wild beast, drawing it eastward, letting it chase after him.
Yet he didn't attack. Was he, perhaps, still undecided?
I tried to intervene one last time. But I had barely queried
Captain Nemo when the latter silenced me:
"I'm the law, I'm the tribunal! I'm the oppressed, and there
are my oppressors! Thanks to them, I've witnessed the destruction
of everything I loved, cherished, and venerated--homeland, wife,
children, father, and mother! There lies everything I hate!
Not another word out of you!"
I took a last look at the battleship, which was putting on steam.
Then I rejoined Ned and Conseil.
"We'll escape!" I exclaimed.
"Good," Ned put in. "Where's that ship from?"
"I've no idea. But wherever it's from, it will sink before nightfall.
In any event, it's better to perish with it than be accomplices
in some act of revenge whose merits we can't gauge."
"That's my feeling," Ned Land replied coolly. "Let's wait for nightfall."
Night fell. A profound silence reigned on board. The compass
indicated that the Nautilus hadn't changed direction. I could hear
the beat of its propeller, churning the waves with steady speed.
Staying on the surface of the water, it rolled gently, sometimes to
one side, sometimes to the other.
My companions and I had decided to escape as soon as the vessel came
close enough for us to be heard--or seen, because the moon would wax
full in three days and was shining brightly. Once we were aboard
that ship, if we couldn't ward off the blow that threatened it,
at least we could do everything that circumstances permitted.
Several times I thought the Nautilus was about to attack.
But it was content to let its adversary approach, and then it would
quickly resume its retreating ways.
Part of the night passed without incident. We kept watch for an
opportunity to take action. We talked little, being too keyed up.
Ned Land was all for jumping overboard. I forced him to wait.
As I saw it, the Nautilus would attack the double-decker on
the surface of the waves, and then it would be not only possible
but easy to escape.
At three o'clock in the morning, full of uneasiness,
I climbed onto the platform. Captain Nemo hadn't left it.
He stood in the bow next to his flag, which a mild breeze was
unfurling above his head. His eyes never left that vessel.
The extraordinary intensity of his gaze seemed to attract it,
beguile it, and draw it more surely than if he had it in tow!
The moon then passed its zenith. Jupiter was rising in the east.
In the midst of this placid natural setting, sky and ocean competed
with each other in tranquility, and the sea offered the orb of night
the loveliest mirror ever to reflect its image.
And when I compared this deep calm of the elements with all the fury
seething inside the plating of this barely perceptible Nautilus, I
shivered all over.
The vessel was two miles off. It drew nearer, always moving toward
the phosphorescent glow that signaled the Nautilus's presence.
I saw its green and red running lights, plus the white lantern hanging
from the large stay of its foremast. Hazy flickerings were reflected
on its rigging and indicated that its furnaces were pushed to the limit.
Showers of sparks and cinders of flaming coal escaped from its funnels,
spangling the air with stars.
I stood there until six o'clock in the morning, Captain Nemo
never seeming to notice me. The vessel lay a mile and a half off,
and with the first glimmers of daylight, it resumed its cannonade.
The time couldn't be far away when the Nautilus would attack
its adversary, and my companions and I would leave forever this
man I dared not judge.
I was about to go below to alert them, when the chief officer
climbed onto the platform. Several seamen were with him.
Captain Nemo didn't see them, or didn't want to see them.
They carried out certain procedures that, on the Nautilus, you could
call "clearing the decks for action." They were quite simple.
The manropes that formed a handrail around the platform were lowered.
Likewise the pilothouse and the beacon housing were withdrawn
into the hull until they lay exactly flush with it. The surface
of this long sheet-iron cigar no longer offered a single protrusion
that could hamper its maneuvers.
I returned to the lounge. The Nautilus still emerged above
the surface. A few morning gleams infiltrated the liquid strata.
Beneath the undulations of the billows, the windows were enlivened
by the blushing of the rising sun. That dreadful day of June
2 had dawned.
At seven o'clock the log told me that the Nautilus had reduced speed.
I realized that it was letting the warship approach.
Moreover, the explosions grew more intensely audible.
Shells furrowed the water around us, drilling through it with an
odd hissing sound.
"My friends," I said, "it's time. Let's shake hands, and may God
be with us!"
Ned Land was determined, Conseil calm, I myself nervous and
barely in control.
We went into the library. Just as I pushed open the door leading
to the well of the central companionway, I heard the hatch
close sharply overhead.
The Canadian leaped up the steps, but I stopped him. A well-known
hissing told me that water was entering the ship's ballast tanks.
Indeed, in a few moments the Nautilus had submerged some meters
below the surface of the waves.
I understood this maneuver. It was too late to take action.
The Nautilus wasn't going to strike the double-decker where it
was clad in impenetrable iron armor, but below its waterline,
where the metal carapace no longer protected its planking.
We were prisoners once more, unwilling spectators at the performance
of this gruesome drama. But we barely had time to think. Taking refuge
in my stateroom, we stared at each other without pronouncing a word.
My mind was in a total daze. My mental processes came to a dead stop.
I hovered in that painful state that predominates during
the period of anticipation before some frightful explosion.
I waited, I listened, I lived only through my sense of hearing!
Meanwhile the Nautilus's speed had increased appreciably.
So it was gathering momentum. Its entire hull was vibrating.
Suddenly I let out a yell. There had been a collision, but it
was comparatively mild. I could feel the penetrating force
of the steel spur. I could hear scratchings and scrapings.
Carried away with its driving power, the Nautilus had passed through
the vessel's mass like a sailmaker's needle through canvas!
I couldn't hold still. Frantic, going insane, I leaped out of my
stateroom and rushed into the lounge.
Captain Nemo was there. Mute, gloomy, implacable, he was staring
through the port panel.
An enormous mass was sinking beneath the waters, and the Nautilus,
missing none of its death throes, was descending into the depths with it.
Ten meters away, I could see its gaping hull, into which water was rushing
with a sound of thunder, then its double rows of cannons and railings.
Its deck was covered with dark, quivering shadows.
The water was rising. Those poor men leaped up into the shrouds,
clung to the masts, writhed beneath the waters. It was a human
anthill that an invading sea had caught by surprise!
Paralyzed, rigid with anguish, my hair standing on end, my eyes popping
out of my head, short of breath, suffocating, speechless, I stared--
I too! I was glued to the window by an irresistible allure!
The enormous vessel settled slowly. Following it down, the Nautilus
kept watch on its every movement. Suddenly there was an eruption.
The air compressed inside the craft sent its decks flying,
as if the powder stores had been ignited. The thrust of the waters
was so great, the Nautilus swerved away.
The poor ship then sank more swiftly. Its mastheads appeared,
laden with victims, then its crosstrees bending under clusters of men,
finally the peak of its mainmast. Then the dark mass disappeared,
and with it a crew of corpses dragged under by fearsome eddies. . . .
I turned to Captain Nemo. This dreadful executioner, this true
archangel of hate, was still staring. When it was all over,
Captain Nemo headed to the door of his stateroom, opened it, and entered.
I followed him with my eyes.
On the rear paneling, beneath the portraits of his heroes, I saw
the portrait of a still-youthful woman with two little children.
Captain Nemo stared at them for a few moments, stretched out his
arms to them, sank to his knees, and melted into sobs. _
Read next: SECOND PART: Chapter 22. The Last Words of Captain Nemo
Read previous: SECOND PART: Chapter 20. In Latitude 47? 24' and Longitude 17? 28'
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