Chapter-3
I had plunged twenty feet into the sea when suddenly a powerful hand grabbed my clothes and pulled me to the surface. Then these calm words reached my ears: “If Monsieur would lean on my shoulder, Monsieur would be able to swim more easily.”
I seized the arm of my faithful Conseil and gasped, “Did the crash throw you into the water too?”
“Not at all, Monsieur! It is my duty to serve you, so I jumped in after you.”
“But where is our ship?” I asked.
Conseil pointed to the fading lights of the ship, now miles away. “It is badly damaged, Monsieur. And I fear that no one on board has noticed our disappearance.”
Conseil kept me afloat while we shouted at the ship in the distance.
But after four hours, I realized he was growing weak.
“Let me go, Conseil,” I cried.
“Never, Monsieur!” he gasped, “I would rather drown first.”
By now, my hands were numb from the cold, my legs were stiff and cramped, and my mouth was filling with salt water. I let go of Conseil and lifted my head one last time.
Then I began to sink.
The last thing I remember was something hard knocking against me. Then I passed out.
When I opened my eyes, I was out of the water. Conseil was kneeling over me, and behind him stood Ned Land.
“Where am I?” I gasped.
“On my floating island,” said Ned, “I found it when I was thrown into the sea.”
“A floating island?” I cried.
“You may call it that, Professor,” explained Ned with a smile, “or you may call it the back of your giant narwhal. But this narwhal is bolted together with steel plates.”
I sat up and looked around. I was on top of a creature which was partly in the water and partly out. My hand pressed its skin. It was not the soft flesh which usually covers marine animals. It wasn’t even the bony shell found on turtles or alligators. This skin was smooth, polished black steel! This was not a living creature. This was an underwater boat built in the shape of a fish.
I was overjoyed. A boat meant a crew, and a crew meant people!
“We’ve been saved,” I cried.
“Not if this boat decides to dive before its crew discovers we’re here,” said Ned.
We had to find some opening or hatch to contact the people inside. I checked every inch of the deck, but all the steel plates seemed to be bolted together.
Ned began stamping on the steel plates and shouting at the top of his lungs, “Open up down there! Open up!”
Suddenly a loud clanking noise came from inside the boat. One of the steel plates lifted up and two men appeared at a hatch.
They wore otter-skin caps, sealskin boots, and loose-hanging clothes made of some strange material I had never seen before.
One of the men was short, with broad shoulders, strong arms, a large head, and thick black hair.
But it was the other man who interested me even more. He was rather tall, with a straight nose, firm mouth, and piercing eyes. He had the look of a calm, courageous man—a man accustomed to taking charge. He was obviously the captain of this under-water boat.
The captain studied us carefully for several minutes without saying a word. Then he turned to his companion and said something in a language which I did not recognize.
Hoping that perhaps the captain understood French, I began explaining to him who we were and how we came to be on his boat.
He listened politely and quietly, but nothing on his face showed that he had understood anything I had said.
“All right, Ned; it’s your turn,” I said, “Try out your best English and see if you have any better luck than I did.”
So Ned began the story, giving the same details I did. But he had no better luck at making himself understood than I had.
Then Conseil offered to try it in German. In his calm, soft voice, he repeated our story for the third time. But his German had the same result as Ned’s English and my French.
What language would these strangers understand? I tried once more, this time using some of the Latin I remembered from school. Still, there was no response from the two men.
After several minutes of silence, the captain called down the hatch in his strange language. Immediately, eight crewmen came running up on deck. They grabbed us, pushed us towards the hatch, and led us down an iron ladder into total darkness.
We groped our way along a narrow gang-way until we came to an opening. We were pushed through this opening; a door was slammed shut behind us and a bolt fastened. We felt our way around iron walls, but there was no sign of windows or even of the door through which we had entered. In the darkness, we tripped over a wooden table and four stools in the centre of the room.
“This is a disgrace!” shouted Ned, “We were friendly and talked to these idiots in French, English, German and Latin. Not only didn’t they answer us, but they locked us in this dark iron prison also.”
“Calm down, Ned,” I said. “Anger won’t get us any answers. But they might.”
But before I could finish, the lights went on. They were strange glowing lights. Then the door opened and a steward appeared. He brought us underwear, shirts, and pants—all made of that same cloth the other men wore. As we got out of our wet clothes and into dry ones, the setward began setting the table with the finest china and silver I had ever seen. Each piece had a large N engraved on it. Was this, perhaps, the captain’s initial?
But we didn’t waste time admiring these serving pieces for we hadn’t eaten in fifteen hours. We began devouring our food.
There were many delicious types of fish along with other tasty dishes which I had never seen before and could not identify.
Once we had finished, we stretched out on some floor mats and were soon sound asleep.
I had no idea as how long we slept, but I was awakened by the hissing of cool air blowing into the room.
Ned and Conseil awoke soon after me, but Ned was still as angry as he had been the night before.
“Do you think they’re going to keep us locked up in this iron box for ever?” he shouted.
“I don’t know any more than you do, Ned,” I answered, “My guess is that we have stumbled upon a very important secret, namely this submarine. And if the captain wants to keep this secret then our lives will not be important to him. If, however, this is not the case then he will probably return us to dry land as soon as possible.”
“But Professor,” cried Ned, “we have to do something. We can’t just sit and wait.”
“Do what?” I asked, puzzled.
“Escape!”
“Escape from an underwater prison?” I cried. “That’s impossible.”
“No, Professor,” said Ned. “It’s not impossible if we take over the ship.”
Arguing with Ned’s wild plans wouldn’t help our situation, so I simply tried to calm him by saying, “Let’s wait and see what happens, Ned. Just try not to lose your temper, or we’ll never get the chance to do anything at all.”
But as the hours went by with no sign of our cell door opening, Ned’s anger increased. He paced back and forth like a wild animal in a cage. He kicked the iron walls and swore at the men outside. He shouted and yelled, but the steel walls were deaf.
I began to wonder just what kind of man this captain was. How could he lock us in here for so many hours and simply forget us? Perhaps he wasn’t the kind, courageous man I thought him to be. Perhaps he was nothing more than a cruel killer.
Just then, we heard footsteps on the metal floor outside. Bolts were pulled, the door opened, and the steward stepped into the room carrying a tray of food.
Before I could move, Ned rushed at the man. Dishes went flying as Ned knocked the steward to the floor and leaked on top of him Ned’s strong hands began choking him.
Conseil and I jumped on Ned and tried to loosen his grip on the half-conscious man. We struggled for several minutes until a voice above me froze me to the spot.
The voice spoke the following words in perfect English, “Calm down, Mr. Land!” Then, in perfect French, the voice added, “Thank you, Monsieur Conseil, and you, Professor Aronnax, for your help. And now, gentlemen, if you please, listen to me!”
