The fall stunned me. I went down deep, but I am a good swimmer, and two strong strokes brought me back to the surface. Had anyone seen me fall? Would they send a boat?
The night was very dark. I saw a black shape disappearing to the east, its lights growing fainter. It was the frigate. I was lost.
“Help! Help!” I shouted, swimming desperately after it. My clothes stuck to me and pulled me down. I was sinking. I could not breathe. “Help!” My mouth filled with water.
Suddenly a strong hand seized my clothes and pulled me up, and I heard these words in my ear: “If master would be so good as to lean on my shoulder, master would swim much more easily.”
I grabbed the arm of my faithful Conseil. “You! Is it you?”
“It is I, waiting for master’s orders.”
“Did the shock throw you into the sea too?”
“No. But I am in master’s service, so I followed master.”
The good fellow thought it was the most natural thing in the world.
“And the frigate?”
“I think master should not count on the frigate. When I jumped, I heard the men at the wheel shout that the propeller and the rudder were broken. The ship cannot steer.”
“Then we are lost!”
“Perhaps,” said Conseil calmly. “But we still have several hours, and one can do a great deal in several hours.”
His calm gave me new strength. He cut my heavy clothes open with his knife and pulled them off me while I kept us both afloat; then I did the same for him.
Our only hope was the frigate’s boats, so we had to stay afloat as long as we could. We took turns: one lay still on his back while the other swam and pushed him along. It was not much of a chance, but there were two of us, and hope is strong in the human heart.
The sea was calm, and wherever we moved, the water shone with tiny points of light. But at about one in the morning a terrible tiredness seized me, and my legs grew stiff with cramp. Conseil had to hold me up alone. I could hear him gasping. He could not last much longer.
“Leave me! Leave me!” I said.
“Leave master? Never! I would rather drown first.”
Just then the moon came out from behind a cloud. I saw the frigate, a dark shape far away, hardly visible. But there were no boats! I wanted to shout, but my swollen lips made no sound. Conseil cried “Help!” again and again.
We stopped and listened. It seemed to me that a voice answered.
“Did you hear?” I whispered.
“Yes! Yes!”
Conseil called again, and this time there was no mistake: a human voice answered ours. Conseil raised himself half out of the water and fell back, exhausted.
“What did you see?”
“I saw… but master must not talk. Master must save his strength!”
Then, I do not know why, I thought of the monster for the first time. Conseil was pulling me again, and the voice came nearer each time he called. But my strength was gone, my mouth filled with salt water, and I felt cold. I raised my head one last time, and I sank.
At that moment I struck something hard and held on to it. I felt myself pulled up out of the water, and I fainted.
I soon came to, because someone was rubbing me hard.
“Conseil!” I murmured.
“Did master call?”
In the last light of the moon I saw another face beside his, and I knew it at once. “Ned!”
“The same, Professor, still chasing his prize!”
“Were you thrown into the sea too?”
“Yes, Professor, but I was luckier than you. Almost at once I found a floating island to stand on.”
“An island?”
“Or, to be exact, our giant narwhal. And now I know why my harpoon didn’t go in. Professor, this beast is made of iron!”
His words turned everything in my head upside down. I climbed to the top of the thing that had saved us and kicked it. It was hard and smooth, without scales, and it rang like metal: it was made of iron plates held together with rows of bolts. The monster that had puzzled the whole scientific world was something even more astonishing. It had been made by human hands. We were lying on the back of a boat that could travel under the water, shaped like a huge steel fish.
Just then the water began to bubble behind the boat, where a propeller was turning, and it started to move. We just had time to grab the highest part of its back, which stood about two meters out of the water. Luckily it was not going fast.
“As long as it stays on the surface, I don’t mind,” Ned muttered. “But if it takes it into its head to dive, I wouldn’t give two cents for my life.”
We had to speak to whoever was inside, but I could find no door or opening. Then the moon set, and we held on all night in complete darkness. Several times I thought I heard faint sounds from inside, like orders being given. Who lived in this strange boat?
At last dawn came. The mist cleared, and I was about to examine the hull when I felt it slowly sinking under us.
“Hey! Open up, you unfriendly devils!” cried Ned, kicking the ringing metal.
The sinking stopped. Then we heard bolts sliding back inside. A plate moved, a man looked out, gave a strange cry and disappeared at once. A few moments later eight strong men with masked faces came out without a sound and pulled us down into their terrible machine.