The Mysterious Island
the valley, and that the stranger’s retreat would be there.
Nothing of the sort. They were obliged to ascend the south-western spur,
and re-descend on that arid plateau terminated by the strangely-wild
basalt cliff. From time to time one of the colonists stooped down and
felt for the wire with his hands; but there was now no doubt that the
wire was running directly towards the sea. There, to a certainty, in the
depths of those rocks, was the dwelling so long sought for in vain.
The sky was literally on fire. Flash succeeded flash. Several struck the
summit of the volcano in the midst of the thick smoke. It appeared there
as if the mountain was vomiting flame. At a few minutes to eleven the
colonists arrived on the high cliff overlooking the ocean to the west.
The wind had risen. The surf roared 500 feet below.
Harding calculated that they had gone a mile and a half from the corral.
At this point the wire entered among the rocks, following the steep side
of a narrow ravine. The settlers followed it at the risk of occasioning
a fall of the slightly-balanced rocks, and being dashed into the sea.
The descent was extremely perilous, but they did not think of the
danger; they were no longer masters of themselves, and an irresistible
attraction drew them towards this mysterious place as the magnet draws
iron.
Thus they almost unconsciously descended this ravine, which even in
broad daylight would have been considered impracticable.
The stones rolled and sparkled like fiery balls when they crossed
through the gleams of light. Harding was first--Ayrton last. On they
went, step by step. Now they slid over the slippery rock; then they
struggled to their feet and scrambled on.
At last the wire touched the rocks on the beach. The colonists had
reached the bottom of the basalt cliff.
There appeared a narrow ridge, running horizontally and parallel with
the sea. The settlers followed the wire along it. They had not gone a
hundred paces when the ridge by a moderate incline sloped down to the
level of the sea.
The engineer seized the wire and found that it disappeared beneath the
waves.
His companions were stupefied.
A cry of disappointment, almost a cry of despair, escaped them! Must
they then plunge beneath the water and seek there for some submarine
cavern? In their excited state they would not have hesitated to do it.
The engineer stopped them.
He led his companions to a hollow in the rocks, and there--
“We must wait,” said he. “The tide is high. At low water the way will be
open.”
“But what can make you think-” asked Pencroft.
“He would not have called us if the means had been wanting to enable us
to reach him!”
Cyrus Harding spoke in a tone of such thorough conviction that no
objection was raised. His remark, besides, was logical. It was quite
possible that an opening, practicable at low water, though hidden now by
the high tide, opened at the foot of the cliff.
There was some time to wait. The colonists remained silently crouching
in a deep hollow. Rain now began to fall in torrents. The thunder was
re-echoed among the rocks with a grand sonorousness.
The colonists’ emotion was great. A thousand strange and extraordinary
ideas crossed their brains, and they expected some grand and superhuman
apparition, which alone could come up to the notion they had formed of
the mysterious genius of the island.
At midnight, Harding carrying the lantern, descended to the beach to
reconnoiter.
The engineer was not mistaken. The beginning of an immense excavation
could be seen under the water. There the wire, bending at a right angle,
entered the yawning gulf.
Cyrus Harding returned to his companions, and said simply,--
“In an hour the opening will be practicable.”
“It is there, then?” said Pencroft.
“Did you doubt it?” returned Harding.
“But this cavern must be filled with water to a certain height,”
observed Herbert.
“Either the cavern will be completely dry,” replied Harding, “and in
that case we can traverse it on foot, or it will not be dry, and some
means of transport will be put at our disposal.”
An hour passed. All climbed down through the rain to the level of the
sea. There was now eight feet of the opening above the water. It was
like the arch of a bridge, under which rushed the foaming water.
Leaning forward, the engineer saw a black object floating on the
water. He drew it towards him. It was a boat, moored to some interior
projection of the cave. This boat was iron-plated. Two oars lay at the
bottom.
“Jump in!” said Harding.
In a moment the settlers were in the boat. Neb and Ayrton took the
oars, Pencroft the rudder. Cyrus Harding in the bows, with the lantern,
lighted the way.
The elliptical roof, under which the boat at first passed, suddenly
rose; but the darkness was too deep, and the light of the lantern too
slight, for either the extent, length, height, or depth of the cave to
be ascertained. Solemn silence reigned in this basaltic cavern. Not a
sound could penetrate into it, even the thunder peals could not pierce
its thick sides.
Such immense caves exist in various parts of the world, natural crypts
dating from the geological epoch of the globe. Some are filled by the
sea; others contain entire lakes in their sides. Such is Fingal’s Cave,
in the island of Staffa, one of the Hebrides; such are the caves of
Morgat, in the bay of Douarnenez, in Brittany, the caves of Bonifacio,
in Corsica, those of Lyse-Fjord, in Norway; such are the immense Mammoth
caverns in Kentucky, 500 feet in height, and more than twenty miles in
length! In many parts of the globe, nature has excavated these caverns,
and preserved them for the admiration of man.
Did the cavern which the settlers were now exploring extend to the
center of the island? For a quarter of an hour the boat had been
advancing, making detours, indicated to Pencroft by the engineer in
short sentences, when all at once,--
“More to the right!” he commanded.
The boat, altering its course, came up alongside the right wall. The
engineer wished to see if the wire still ran along the side.
The wire was there fastened to the rock.
“Forward!” said Harding.
And the two oars, plunging into the dark waters, urged the boat onwards.
On they went for another quarter of an hour, and a distance of
half-a-mile must have been cleared from the mouth of the cave, when
Harding’s voice was again heard.
“Stop!” said he.
The boat stopped, and the colonists perceived a bright light
illuminating the vast cavern, so deeply excavated in the bowels of the
island, of which nothing had ever led them to suspect the existence.
At a height of a hundred feet rose the vaulted roof, supported on basalt
shafts. Irregular arches, strange moldings, appeared on the columns
erected by nature in thousands from the first epochs of the formation of
the globe. The basalt pillars, fitted one into the other, measured
from forty to fifty feet in height, and the water, calm in spite of the
tumult outside, washed their base. The brilliant focus of light, pointed
out by the engineer, touched every point of rocks, and flooded the walls
with light.
By reflection the water reproduced the brilliant sparkles, so that the
boat appeared to be floating between two glittering zones. They could
not be mistaken in the nature of the irradiation thrown from the glowing
nucleus, whose clear rays were shattered by all the angles, all the
projections of the cavern. This light proceeded from an electric source,
and its white color betrayed its origin. It was the sun of this cave,
and it filled it entirely.
At a sign from Cyrus Harding the oars again plunged into the water,
causing a regular shower of gems, and the boat was urged forward towards
the light, which was now not more than half a cable’s length distant.
At this place the breadth of the sheet of water measured nearly 350
feet, and beyond the dazzling center could be seen an enormous basaltic
wall, blocking up any issue on that side. The cavern widened here
considerably, the sea forming a little lake. But the roof, the side
walls, the end cliff, all the prisms, all the peaks, were flooded with
the electric fluid, so that the brilliancy belonged to them, and as if
the light issued from them.
In the center of the lake a long cigar-shaped object floated on the
surface of the water, silent, motionless. The brilliancy which issued
from it escaped from its sides as from two kilns heated to a white heat.
This apparatus, similar in shape to an enormous whale, was about 250
feet long, and rose about ten or twelve above the water.
The boat slowly approached it, Cyrus Harding stood up in the bows. He
gazed, a prey to violent excitement. Then, all at once, seizing the
reporter’s arm,--
“It is he! It can only be he!” he cried, “he!--”
Then, falling back on the seat, he murmured a name which Gideon Spilett
alone could hear.
The reporter evidently knew this name, for it had a wonderful effect
upon him, and he answered in a hoarse voice,--
“He! an outlawed man!”
“He!” said Harding.
At the engineer’s command the boat approached this singular floating
apparatus. The boat touched the left side, from which escaped a ray of
light through a thick glass.
Harding and his companions mounted on the platform. An open hatchway was
there. All darted down the opening.
At the bottom of the ladder was a deck, lighted by electricity. At the
end of this deck was a door, which Harding opened.
A richly-ornamented room, quickly traversed by the colonists, was joined
to a library, over which a luminous ceiling shed a flood of light.
At the end of the library a large door, also shut, was opened by the
engineer.
An immense saloon--a sort of museum, in which were heaped up, with
all the treasures of the mineral world, works of art, marvels of
industry--appeared before the eyes of the colonists, who almost thought
themselves suddenly transported into a land of enchantment.
Stretched on a rich sofa they saw a man, who did not appear to notice
their presence.
Then Harding raised his voice, and to the extreme surprise of his
companions, he uttered these words,--
“Captain Nemo, you asked for us! We are here.--”
Chapter 16
At these words the reclining figure rose, and the electric light fell
upon his countenance; a magnificent head, the forehead high, the glance
commanding, beard white, hair abundant and falling over the shoulders.
His hand rested upon the cushion of the divan from which he had just
risen. He appeared perfectly calm. It was evident that his strength had
been gradually undermined by illness, but his voice seemed yet powerful,
as he said in English, and in a tone which evinced extreme surprise,--
“Sir, I have no name.”
“Nevertheless, I know you!” replied Cyrus Harding.
Captain Nemo fixed his penetrating gaze upon the engineer, as though he
were about to annihilate him.
Then, falling back amid the pillows of the divan,--
“After all, what matters now?” he murmured; “I am dying!”
Cyrus Harding drew near the captain, and Gideon Spilett took his
hand--it was of a feverish heat. Ayrton, Pencroft, Herbert, and Neb
stood respectfully apart in an angle of the magnificent saloon, whose
atmosphere was saturated with the electric fluid.
Meanwhile Captain Nemo withdrew his hand, and motioned the engineer and
the reporter to be seated.
All regarded him with profound emotion. Before them they beheld that
being whom they had styled the “genius of the island,” the powerful
protector whose intervention, in so many circumstances, had been so
efficacious, the benefactor to whom they owed such a debt of gratitude!
Their eyes beheld a man only, and a man at the point of death, where
Pencroft and Neb had expected to find an almost supernatural being!