Near one o’clock in the morning, I was seized with dreadful fatigue. My limbs stiffened under the strain of violent cramp. Conseil was obliged to keep me up, and our preservation devolved on him alone. I heard the poor boy pant; his breathing became short and hurried. I found that he could not keep up much longer.
“Leave me! Leave me!” I said to him.
“Leave my master? Never!” replied he. “I would drown first.”
Just then the moon appeared through the fringes of a thick cloud that the wind was driving to the east. The surface of the sea glittered with its rays. This kindly light reanimated us. My head got better again. I looked at all the points of the horizon. I saw the frigate! She was five miles from us, and looked like a dark mass, hardly discernible. But no boats!
I would have cried out. But what good would it have been at such a distance? My swollen lips could utter no sounds. Conseil could articulate some words, and I heard him repeat at intervals, “Help! Help!”
Our movements were suspended for an instant; we listened. It might be only a singing in the ear, but it seemed to me as if a cry answered the cry from Conseil.
“Did you hear?” I murmured.
“Yes! Yes!”
And Conseil gave one more despairing call.
This time there was no mistake! A human voice responded to ours! Was it the voice of another unfortunate creature, abandoned in the middle of the ocean, some other victim of the shock sustained by the vessel? Or rather was it a boat from the frigate, that was hailing us in the darkness?
Conseil made a last effort, and leaning on my shoulder, while I struck out in a despairing effort, he raised himself half out of the water, then fell back exhausted.
“What did you see?”
“I saw,” murmured he—”I saw—but do not talk—reserve all your strength!”
What had he seen? Then, I know not why, the thought of the monster came into my head for the first time! But that voice? The time is past for Jonahs to take refuge in whales’ bellies! However, Conseil was towing me again. He raised his head sometimes, looked before us, and uttered a cry of recognition, which was responded to by a voice that came nearer and nearer. I scarcely heard it. My strength was exhausted; my fingers stiffened; my hand afforded me support no longer; my mouth, convulsively opening, filled with salt water. Cold crept over me. I raised my head for the last time, then I sank.
At this moment a hard body struck me. I clung to it, then I felt that I was being drawn up, that I was brought to the surface of the water, that my chest collapsed: I fainted.
It is certain that I soon came to, thanks to the vigorous rubbings that I received. I half opened my eyes.
“Conseil!” I murmured.
“Does master call me?” asked Conseil.
Just then, by the waning light of the moon, which was sinking down to the horizon, I saw a face which was not Conseil’s, and which I immediately recognized.
“Ned!” I cried.
“The same, sir, who is seeking his prize!” replied the Canadian.
“Were you thrown into the sea by the shock of the frigate?”
“Yes, professor; but, more fortunate than you, I was able to find a footing almost directly upon a floating island.”
“An island?”
“Or, more correctly speaking, on our gigantic narwhal.”
“Explain yourself, Ned!”
“Only I soon found out why my harpoon had not entered its skin and was blunted.”
“Why, Ned, why?”
“Because, professor, that beast is made of sheet-iron.”
The Canadian’s last words produced a sudden revolution in my brain. I wriggled myself quickly to the top of the being, or object, half out of the water, which served us for a refuge. I kicked it. It was evidently a hard, impenetrable body, and not the soft substance that forms the bodies of the great marine mammalia. But this hard body might be a bony carapace, like that of the antediluvian animals; and I should be free to class this monster among amphibious reptiles, such as tortoises or alligators.