I couldn't help smiling as Conseil wiped himself out of existence.Deep down, the Canadian must have been overjoyed at not havingto contend with him.
"Then, sir," Ned Land said, "since Conseil is no more, we'll have thisdiscussion between just the two of us. I've talked, you've listened.What's your reply?"
It was obvious that the matter had to be settled, and evasionswere distasteful to me.
"Ned my friend," I said, "here's my reply. You have righton your side and my arguments can't stand up to yours.It will never do to count on Captain Nemo's benevolence.The most ordinary good sense would forbid him to set us free.On the other hand, good sense decrees that we take advantage of ourfirst opportunity to leave the Nautilus."
"Fine, Professor Aronnax, that's wisely said."
"But one proviso," I said, "just one. The opportunity mustbe the real thing. Our first attempt to escape must succeed,because if it misfires, we won't get a second chance, and Captain Nemowill never forgive us."
"That's also well put," the Canadian replied. "But your proviso appliesto any escape attempt, whether it happens in two years or two days.So this is still the question: if a promising opportunity comes up,we have to grab it."
"Agreed. And now, Ned, will you tell me what you mean bya promising opportunity?"
"One that leads the Nautilus on a cloudy night within a shortdistance of some European coast."
"And you'll try to get away by swimming?"
"Yes, if we're close enough to shore and the ship's afloat onthe surface. No, if we're well out and the ship's navigatingunder the waters."
"And in that event?"
"In that event I'll try to get hold of the skiff. I know how tohandle it. We'll stick ourselves inside, undo the bolts, and riseto the surface, without the helmsman in the bow seeing a thing."
"Fine, Ned. Stay on the lookout for such an opportunity,but don't forget, one slipup will finish us."
"I won't forget, sir."
"And now, Ned, would you like to know my overall thinking on your plan?"
"Gladly, Professor Aronnax."
"Well then, I think--and I don't mean 'I hope'--that your promisingopportunity won't ever arise."
"Why not?"
"Because Captain Nemo recognizes that we haven't given up allhope of recovering our freedom, and he'll keep on his guard,above all in seas within sight of the coasts of Europe."
"I'm of master's opinion," Conseil said.
"We'll soon see," Ned Land replied, shaking his head witha determined expression.
"And now, Ned Land," I added, "let's leave it at that. Not another wordon any of this. The day you're ready, alert us and we're with you.I turn it all over to you."
That's how we ended this conversation, which later was to havesuch serious consequences. At first, I must say, events seemedto confirm my forecasts, much to the Canadian's despair.Did Captain Nemo view us with distrust in these heavily traveled seas,or did he simply want to hide from the sight of those shipsof every nation that plowed the Mediterranean? I have no idea,but usually he stayed in midwater and well out from any coast.Either the Nautilus surfaced only enough to let its pilothouse emerge,or it slipped away to the lower depths, although, between theGreek Islands and Asia Minor, we didn't find bottom even at2,000 meters down.
Accordingly, I became aware of the isle of Karpathos, one ofthe Sporades Islands, only when Captain Nemo placed his fingerover a spot on the world map and quoted me this verse from Virgil:
Est in Carpathio Neptuni gurgite vates
Caeruleus Proteus . . .*
*Latin: "There in King Neptune's domain by Karpathos, his spokesman/ is azure-hued Proteus . . . " Ed.
It was indeed that bygone abode of Proteus, the old shepherd ofKing Neptune's flocks: an island located between Rhodes and Crete,which Greeks now call Karpathos, Italians Scarpanto. Through the loungewindow I could see only its granite bedrock.
The next day, February 14, I decided to spend a few hours studyingthe fish of this island group; but for whatever reason, the panelsremained hermetically sealed. After determining the Nautilus's heading,I noted that it was proceeding toward the ancient island of Crete,also called Candia. At the time I had shipped aboard the Abraham Lincoln,this whole island was in rebellion against its tyrannical rulers,the Ottoman Empire of Turkey. But since then I had absolutely no ideawhat happened to this revolution, and Captain Nemo, deprived of allcontact with the shore, was hardly the man to keep me informed.
So I didn't allude to this event when, that evening, I chanced to bealone with the captain in the lounge. Besides, he seemed silentand preoccupied. Then, contrary to custom, he ordered that bothpanels in the lounge be opened, and going from the one to the other,he carefully observed the watery mass. For what purpose?I hadn't a guess, and for my part, I spent my time studying the fishthat passed before my eyes.
Among others I noted that sand goby mentioned by Aristotle and commonlyknown by the name sea loach, which is encountered exclusively in the saltywaters next to the Nile Delta. Near them some semiphosphorescent redporgy rolled by, a variety of gilthead that the Egyptians ranked amongtheir sacred animals, lauding them in religious ceremonies when theirarrival in the river's waters announced the fertile flood season.I also noticed some wrasse known as the tapiro, three decimeters long,bony fish with transparent scales whose bluish gray color is mixedwith red spots; they're enthusiastic eaters of marine vegetables,which gives them an exquisite flavor; hence these tapiro were muchin demand by the epicures of ancient Rome, and their entrailswere dressed with brains of peacock, tongue of flamingo,and testes of moray to make that divine platter that so enrapturedthe Roman emperor Vitellius.
Another resident of these seas caught my attention and revivedall my memories of antiquity. This was the remora, which travelsattached to the bellies of sharks; as the ancients tell it,when these little fish cling to the undersides of a ship, they canbring it to a halt, and by so impeding
Mark Antony's vessel during the Battle of Actium, one of them facilitatedthe victory of Augustus Caesar. From such slender threads hangthe destinies of nations! I also observed some wonderful snappersbelonging to the order Lutianida, sacred fish for the Greeks, who claimedthey could drive off sea monsters from the waters they frequent;their Greek name anthias means "flower," and they live up to itin the play of their colors and in those fleeting reflections thatturn their dorsal fins into watered silk; their hues are confinedto a gamut of reds, from the pallor of pink to the glow of ruby.I couldn't take my eyes off these marine wonders, when I was suddenlyjolted by an unexpected apparition.
In the midst of the waters, a man appeared, a diver carrying a littleleather bag at his belt. It was no corpse lost in the waves.It was a living man, swimming vigorously, sometimes disappearingto breathe at the surface, then instantly diving again.
I turned to Captain Nemo, and in an agitated voice:
"A man! A castaway!" I exclaimed. "We must rescue him at all cost!"
The captain didn't reply but went to lean against the window.
The man drew near, and gluing his face to the panel, he stared at us.
To my deep astonishment, Captain Nemo gave him a signal.The diver answered with his hand, immediately swam up to the surfaceof the sea, and didn't reappear.
"Don't be alarmed," the captain told me. "That's Nicolas fromCape Matapan, nicknamed 'Il Pesce.'* He's well known throughoutthe Cyclades Islands. A bold diver! Water is his true element,and he lives in the sea more than on shore, going constantly fromone island to another, even to Crete."
*Italian: "The Fish." Ed.
"You know him, captain?"
"Why not, Professor Aronnax?"
This said, Captain Nemo went to a cabinet standing near the lounge'sleft panel. Next to this cabinet I saw a chest bound with hoopsof iron, its lid bearing a copper plaque that displayed the Nautilus'smonogram with its motto Mobilis in Mobili.
Just then, ignoring my presence, the captain opened this cabinet,a sort of s
afe that contained a large number of ingots.
They were gold ingots. And they represented an enormous sum of money.Where had this precious metal come from? How had the captainamassed this gold, and what was he about to do with it?
I didn't pronounce a word. I gaped. Captain Nemo took out the ingotsone by one and arranged them methodically inside the chest, filling itto the top. At which point I estimate that it held more than 1,000kilograms of gold, in other words, close to 5,000,000 francs.
After securely fastening the chest, Captain Nemo wrote an addresson its lid in characters that must have been modern Greek.
This done, the captain pressed a button whose wiring was incommunication with the crew's quarters. Four men appeared and,not without difficulty, pushed the chest out of the lounge.Then I heard them hoist it up the iron companionway by means of pulleys.
Just then Captain Nemo turned to me:
"You were saying, professor?" he asked me.
"I wasn't saying a thing, captain."
"Then, sir, with your permission, I'll bid you good evening."
And with that, Captain Nemo left the lounge.
I reentered my stateroom, very puzzled, as you can imagine.I tried in vain to fall asleep. I kept searching for a relationshipbetween the appearance of the diver and that chest filled with gold.Soon, from certain rolling and pitching movements, I sensed thatthe Nautilus had left the lower strata and was back on the surfaceof the water.
Then I heard the sound of footsteps on the platform.I realized that the skiff was being detached and launched to sea.For an instant it bumped the Nautilus's side, then all sounds ceased.
Two hours later, the same noises, the same comings and goings,were repeated. Hoisted on board, the longboat was readjusted intoits socket, and the Nautilus plunged back beneath the waves.
So those millions had been delivered to their address. At what spoton the continent? Who was the recipient of Captain Nemo's gold?
The next day I related the night's events to Conseil and the Canadian,events that had aroused my curiosity to a fever pitch.My companions were as startled as I was.
"But where does he get those millions?" Ned Land asked.
To this no reply was possible. After breakfast I made my wayto the lounge and went about my work. I wrote up my notes untilfive o'clock in the afternoon. Just then--was it due to somepersonal indisposition?--I felt extremely hot and had to take offmy jacket made of fan mussel fabric. A perplexing circumstancebecause we weren't in the low latitudes, and besides, once the Nautiluswas submerged, it shouldn't be subject to any rise in temperature.I looked at the pressure gauge. It marked a depth of sixty feet,a depth beyond the reach of atmospheric heat.
I kept on working, but the temperature rose to the pointof becoming unbearable.
"Could there be a fire on board?" I wondered.
I was about to leave the lounge when Captain Nemo entered.He approached the thermometer, consulted it, and turned to me:
"42 degrees centigrade," he said.
"I've detected as much, captain," I replied, "and if it gets evenslightly hotter, we won't be able to stand it."
"Oh, professor, it won't get any hotter unless we want it to!"
"You mean you can control this heat?"
"No, but I can back away from the fireplace producing it."
"So it's outside?"
"Surely. We're cruising in a current of boiling water."
"It can't be!" I exclaimed.
"Look."
The panels had opened, and I could see a completely whitesea around the Nautilus. Steaming sulfurous fumes uncoiledin the midst of waves bubbling like water in a boiler.I leaned my hand against one of the windows, but the heat was so great,I had to snatch it back.
"Where are we?" I asked.
"Near the island of Santorini, professor," the captain answered me,"and right in the channel that separates the volcanic isletsof Nea Kameni and Palea Kameni. I wanted to offer you the unusualsight of an underwater eruption."
"I thought," I said, "that the formation of such new islands hadcome to an end."
"Nothing ever comes to an end in these volcanic waterways,"Captain Nemo replied, "and thanks to its underground fires,our globe is continuously under construction in these regions.According to the Latin historians Cassiodorus and Pliny, by the year19 of the Christian era, a new island, the divine Thera, had alreadyappeared in the very place these islets have more recently formed.Then Thera sank under the waves, only to rise and sink once morein the year 69 A.D. From that day to this, such plutonic constructionwork has been in abeyance. But on February 3, 1866, a new isletnamed George Island emerged in the midst of sulfurous steam nearNea Kameni and was fused to it on the 6th of the same month.Seven days later, on February 13, the islet of Aphroessa appeared,leaving a ten-meter channel between itself and Nea Kameni. I wasin these seas when that phenomenon occurred and I was able to observeits every phase. The islet of Aphroessa was circular in shape,measuring 300 feet in diameter and thirty feet in height.It was made of black, glassy lava mixed with bits of feldspar.Finally, on March 10, a smaller islet called Reka appeared next toNea Kameni, and since then, these three islets have fused to formone single, selfsame island."
"What about this channel we're in right now?" I asked.
"Here it is," Captain Nemo replied, showing me a chart of theGreek Islands. "You observe that I've entered the new isletsin their place."
"But will this channel fill up one day?"
"Very likely, Professor Aronnax, because since 1866 eight littlelava islets have surged up in front of the port of St. Nicolason Palea Kameni. So it's obvious that Nea and Palea will joinin days to come. In the middle of the Pacific, tiny infusoriabuild continents, but here they're built by volcanic phenomena.Look, sir! Look at the construction work going on under these waves."
I returned to the window. The Nautilus was no longer moving.The heat had become unbearable. From the white it had recently been,the sea was turning red, a coloration caused by the presenceof iron salts. Although the lounge was hermetically sealed, it wasfilling with an intolerable stink of sulfur, and I could see scarletflames of such brightness, they overpowered our electric light.
I was swimming in perspiration, I was stifling, I was about to be cooked.Yes, I felt myself cooking in actual fact!
"We can't stay any longer in this boiling water," I told the captain.
"No, it wouldn't be advisable," replied Nemo the Emotionless.
He gave an order. The Nautilus tacked about and retreated from thisfurnace it couldn't brave with impunity. A quarter of an hour later,we were breathing fresh air on the surface of the waves.
It then occurred to me that if Ned had chosen these waterwaysfor our escape attempt, we wouldn't have come out alive from thissea of fire.
The next day, February 16, we left this basin, which tallies depthsof 3,000 meters between Rhodes and Alexandria, and passing well outfrom Cerigo Island after doubling Cape Matapan, the Nautilus leftthe Greek Islands behind.
CHAPTER 7
The Mediterranean in Forty-Eight Hours
THE MEDITERRANEAN, your ideal blue sea: to Greeks simply "the sea,"to Hebrews "the great sea," to Romans mare nostrum.* Borderedby orange trees, aloes, cactus, and maritime pine trees,perfumed with the scent of myrtle, framed by rugged mountains,saturated with clean, transparent air but continuously underconstruction by fires in the earth, this sea is a genuine battlefieldwhere Neptune and Pluto still struggle for world domination.Here on these beaches and waters, says the French historian Michelet,a man is revived by one of the most invigorating climates in the world.
*Latin: "our sea." Ed.
But as beautiful as it was, I could get only a quick look at thisbasin whose surface area comprises 2,000,000 square kilometers.Even Captain Nemo's personal insights were denied me,because that mystifying individual didn't appear one single timeduring our high-speed crossing. I estimate that the Nautiluscovered a track of some 600 leagues under the wave
s of this sea,and this voyage was accomplished in just twenty-four hours times two.Departing from the waterways of Greece on the morning of February 16,we cleared the Strait of Gibraltar by sunrise on the 18th.
It was obvious to me that this Mediterranean, pinned in the middleof those shores he wanted to avoid, gave Captain Nemo no pleasure.Its waves and breezes brought back too many memories, if not toomany regrets. Here he no longer had the ease of movement and freedomof maneuver that the oceans allowed him, and his Nautilus feltcramped so close to the coasts of both Africa and Europe.
Accordingly, our speed was twenty-five miles (that is,twelve four-kilometer leagues) per hour. Needless to say,Ned Land had to give up his escape plans, much to his distress.Swept along at the rate of twelve to thirteen meters per second,he could hardly make use of the skiff. Leaving the Nautilusunder these conditions would have been like jumping off a trainracing at this speed, a rash move if there ever was one.Moreover, to renew our air supply, the submersible rose to the surfaceof the waves only at night, and relying solely on compass and log,it steered by dead reckoning.
Inside the Mediterranean, then, I could catch no more ofits fast-passing scenery than a traveler might see from anexpress train; in other words, I could view only the distanthorizons because the foregrounds flashed by like lightning.But Conseil and I were able to observe those Mediterranean fishwhose powerful fins kept pace for a while in the Nautilus's waters.We stayed on watch before the lounge windows, and our notes enableme to reconstruct, in a few words, the ichthyology of this sea.