SECOND PART
CHAPTER 21: A Mass Execution
(continued)
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.
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