Had the second bulkhead been pierced? From here it was hard to tell. Brunel knew, with true precision, the kinds of impact that Great Eastern had been built to withstand. But he did not know what had happened to his ship in the interim, the ways she’d been repaired, degraded, jerry-rigged, kept afloat on the cheap.
Brunel watched as Nautilus now fully retreated from the wound it had itself opened, her serrated prow catching on a plate of half-inch metal, taking it with her as she departed, tearing it as if it were no more substantial than a leaf of paper in a diary or journal. The retreat was accompanied by another low and terrible wail, of metal, this one less the rattling sub-sonics of the first attack, but more a cry, an oddly human cry: a babe-in-arms, high, piercing, in wild distress.
As Brunel watched, Nautilus she retreated from the wound and the water with increasing force and volume did rush into the gap. Now Nautilus was a full three hundred yards back and from this distance Brunel could for the first time see the Great Eastern entire, and see the belly, and see the wound. Brunel felt a pain in his own gut. Sharp and wrenching and pulsing with each systole.
Now the image in the glass fixed, all still, as if it were a Nièpce plate. Full stop. And time it seemed to stop with it. The long, precarious moment where any future were possible. Followed by—
Full speed ahead.
They were headed north. Toward the pole. For what reason Brunel could only surmise, though the most simplest one—Occam!—be the most likely: that having wounded Great Eastern, Nautilus wanted her to give chase. To make her expend resources on the pursuit, not on the repair.
And so Nautilus, barely sub-surface, she ran full North. And just visible through the aftward edge of the iris’d glass: the grand and damaged Great Eastern, perhaps a mile behind. By the high whine of the dynamos Brunel knew that Nautilus was at her full speed. Yet Great Eastern—incomparably larger—she kept up.
Abruptly Brunel found himself hurled to the port side of the salon. Looking out the Glass he could see clearly what was now transpiring. Nautilus was making a sharp right full rudder. Where moments before she was polar-bound, now she was charted for the tropics. The Great Eastern had the speed, but nowhere near the mobility. And in an instant Brunel understood. There was no other way to image it, no other account to propose. The madman Nemo had brought Nautilus round, and was taking her in for another strike!
What Brunel then did was not without art but it was without conscious thought—a reaction instinctive, his hands moving before his mind instructed them to do so. What those hands in sequence did:
• Reach down, and seize from the debris strewn along the salon floor a substantial metal dinner plate.
• Raise up, and with that dinner plate smash the glass ampoule of the salon’s electrical bulb.
Shards rained down, one of them lodging in Brunel’s right eye. The pain was sharp, immediate. Above, the electrical filament nova’d out in sudden exposure to oxygen—bright flash then all gone dark. Through pain and blindness Brunel reached down and tore off one of the filigreed ormolu hands—already twisted at sharp angle—from the fallen Breguet clock. He took the ormolu hand—did time stop?—and shoved it up against the fixture. His vision was still occluded by the shard that had pierced his right eye, and half-dimmed from the flash, the world a throbbing rhodopsin purple— But as he raised the clock-hand to the overhead fixture and lodged it home he could sense the sparks and feel the buzz of voltage shooting up fingers to wrist to forearm to shoulder to heart.
The spasm ran through him and he fell to the floor convulsed. But in the long instant he’d held the metal to the fixture he’d shorted out Nautilus‘s electrical system, burning to ruin the thin wire that was round the armatures so carefully wrapped. That the dynamoturbines, and the ship they powered, were now—
Dead stop.
Brunel on the salon floor: surrounded by shards and clock and books and charts, convulsing in wild spasm even though the electricity was no longer in circuit with his body. He arched and flipped like some large fish dumped from net onto the deck of a trawler. And as he did he saw so many images, not in sequence but in simultaneity, each and all of them at once, projected before him like Balinese puppet-shadows, but sharper, and with a clarity far exceeding that of memory. Some of the images had sound, and odor too.
There was his father, dressed up for the evening before going to the Athenaeum, ascot knotted carefully so as to look as if done without fuss or care, and the smell of his father’s shaving lotion, the fragrance done up for him by J. Floris, perfumer, of Jermyn Street. (Marc Brunel felt it made him smell like an English gentleman, a status to which—having been born low, and in France—he could only aspire.) Musk, stephanotis, bergamot. There was his own desk in London, a still-life now, with of course the Hadley’s quadrant set apart from all else as if backlit. There was the moment of terror as when beneath the Thames the tunnel gave way: the inrush of water certain but not yet arrived, and all was for a moment silent and calm, but the next instant high sharp river water in his nostrils, and no ability to breathe without breathing liquid, and tossed about into the side of the tunnel and around and out with no thought save that of his own doom. There was the grandeur of Paddington Station, its tracks parallel all the way to the horizon, the day it was complete, a week before the ceremonies and the crowds, before the stink of coal and steam, before the pressing mass of people coming to London from afar, before the stain and tarnish of time, when the station itself—for that moment—resembled nothing so much as his imagination of it. There was Mary Elizabeth’s hand, which he took in his own in a carriage in Leicester Square, her small and damp hand, trembling now as he asked her if she’d be willing to become his wife, and knowing that this was one of life’s grand moments, yet knowing it more than feeling it, and a part of him on the upper right corner of the carriage, looking down at Isambard and Mary engaged in this strange and distant dance. There was the smell of oiled metal—that, too, was a smell of his father—and an image of thick linked chains, each one wider than a man’s waist, all rolled up dockside as Great Eastern readied for her first aborted launch. There was an evening in Erromango when he’d eaten a fruit whose name he never learned, together with the charred meat of waterfowl. And felt in mouth and nose and belly as if he were in paradise. There was the song his mother sang to him in cradle—yet how could he remember this? Babes-in-arms recall nothing of those years!—with its high, reedy melody and verses that went from one to the next and after each three a chorus: disturbing in lyric, reassuring in melody. There was the horror of standing, paralyzed, on the Great Eastern‘s deck on her proudest day, unable to move trunk or limb, tears coursing down his cheeks, body made still by some terrible drug, and every atom of his being wanting to cry out, my captors, they are standing here, seize them, imprison them, and set me free!, while the speeches droned on, and Scott Russell strutted back and forth like a man who is sure what is true. He could not move then—
And he could not move now. Yet there was within him now a satisfaction. That of the choice made right. If he were dying, heart stopped by the application of electricity, it was to save the life of his grandest and best creation. And in that there was pleasure amidst the pain.
When Brunel had left his room he’d by reflex strapped on his cheroot case, his leather cheroot case, the one inscribed “I.K.B. Athenaeum Club Pall Mall,” and which now contained only sea-cheroots. It was wedged beneath his back in a way that was sharp and painful but he could not reach it or even reach its strap and he had no means to dislodge it. As he convulsed now on the salon’s dense Amritsar carpet, blood coursing from his forehead and the fluid leaking from his right eye, and the sharp line of nerves from hand to arm to shoulder to heart each a thin taut line of flame, as his brain shut down and the screen became white, blank, all-surrounding, as if by the billowing sea-creature he’d been wrapped and shrouded, as if he were being lowered down slow into his grave, his one last thought placed him on the very tip of l’île du Palais. Where the Seine
splits in two, on the point of the island like the prow of a ship, under the shade of an old and spreading tree, then turning his head to see the young woman of his life. He knew her name—how did he know her name?—and it echoed in his head, until the white shroud went whiter still, with hexagons of pulsing yellow and lines of deep optic purple dancing along its surface, now opening up a path, beckoning, down a white-lined tunnel, beneath some other Thames, taking him to a place where there was nothing to trouble the waters, and all his pains were gone, and all memory too, and ahead nothing, save the floating city of his dreams. Cloaking him, floating him, out and up and away.
FORTY-THREE
WHAT HAD TORN Great Eastern—what had bilged her amidships, with water now flooding in between her two hulls as fast as her pumps could void it—sped away fullspeed. Vanished in the distance. Langhorne—whose vision, unsuited for close work, was naturally inclined toward the longer distances—did gaze at that spot where the phosphorescent eyes had disappeared. Thus he was the first, e’en before the glass-man, to see those luminous eyes reappear. Larger. Brighter. Heading swift and sharp and silent toward the Great Eastern.
Until the eyes they stopped. In place. Glowing. Staring.
Langhorne he called over to the glass-man and then together they summoned the captain. All gathered. And within moments the phosphorescent orbs, no longer retreating, were the object of every pair of eyes on Great Eastern‘s deck. “She be stuck,” said Ahab. Then the men they turned from sea to ship to attend to what next he might say.
“And we are not.”
One of the English officers—his name unknown to Langhorne, one of those who’d been slow to accept the new command—now spoke to Ahab. If there had been resistance in his demeanor the day preceding there was none in evidence now. He was ship’s crew, the ship had been attacked— And now the one and only thing that mattered was pursuit and slaughter. The name, origin, nationality of the captain were, compared to that, as the beatings of the wings of flies.
“Shall I steer the chaloupe?”
Ahab did fix him with a stare. It was clear he was looking straight through to the Englishman’s heart to ascertain his loyalty, his commitment, but more— To see if he possessed the belly and the wit to take on such a task.
“How many years hast thou at her wheel?”
“The full seven, sir. There be no one on board more accomplished.”
“Sailor?”
“Sir.”
“Let us board.”
And so did the chaloupe crew make for the gunwales and o’er them climb. The officer went first, then the various men in his command. Ahab he beckoned toward Langhorne and thus Langhorne did come. Before the chaloupe was by rope lowered down into the sea the Captain did turn back toward Great Eastern, on whose starboard deck had now assembled most all of the hands on board. And to them he did speak.
“Ahab knoweth not—and it cannot yet be known—what body, what motive force, lies behind those eyes. We do not know the cause of its present stillness. Whether it plays dead, lying in wait for our arrival. But what cannot be known cannot be known. Ahab will not by speculation be constrained.
“He will venture toward our Leviathan, knowing that whate’er he finds there he will conquer. The manner of that conquering is not known to him but of the outcome Ahab he is certain. Nor does he need for you, aloud, to say it. Each and every one of ye knoweth, too, who in this battle will survive. Ye have only to look at yer Captain—who hath been shot at, who hath been part-devoured, who hath been attacked by savages and pursued by the forces of law. Who hath dispatched to the mortuary five men larger than himself when they, in an alehouse in Manhattan, did make the mistake of being disagreeable. And as ye know, as ye know: who hath pierced the largest whale—the white—that e’er these seas have harbored.
“Yet though the outcome be certain, keep yer eyes fixed on the northern horizon, and keep yer Captain in yer minds and prayers—Until next we meet, on this very deck, assembled in vict’ry.” And then, as he turned:
“Who among ye will hand Ahab his lance?”
A scullery boy, scarce more than twelve years of age, did come up with it first, taking it from its tie-down in the wheelhouse, where Ahab had secured, carrying it to the gunwale, handing it o’er to the Captain. Who took it from him, giving quick nod of acknowledgement. And with that Ahab he disappeared o’er the rail, and those on deck heard the T-THUMP of his feet on the wooden floor of the chaloupe and those in the boat did welcome him. Now the rope-men on Great Eastern‘s deck did lower the chaloupe, from level with the deck ‘til she was dipped into the sea. Langhorne, seated near the bow of the chaloupe, watched as the deck receded, the ocean approached. When the Captain did give command the pulley-hooks they were slid out. The steam-chaloupe had been fast and now she was loosed, even as Ahab with whetted stone did sharpen his harpoon.
FORTY-FOUR
THERE WERE SIX of us in the boat. The man at the wheel was English from the old Great Eastern crew. He said his name and now we all knew it. His name was Redmayne. Some men in his command. All rest of us from Valparaiso. Chips was here e’en with no carpentry in sight. Me, I was a hauler and a song-man. There was no hauling to be done here, and why would we want to sing?
We were good sailors all. To be again in a boat-sized boat was just the thing. It had a steam engine but not like the fires of hell on the Great Eastern.
We were in fog. From the stern you could not see the prow. Redmayne stood at the cutwater and stared ahead. Staring into the fog. I have heard men call it sea smoke. My father he called it sea smoke. But it is none like smoke to me. Smoke will rise and will float off. Fog piles in on itself. We were all in our coats but the fog was on our face and hands. We plowed through it.
Behind Redmayne was Ahab. Ahab was lacing straps round his right leg and then through the boat. Leather straps. Through eyes and tholes. Now he was fast to the boat. Fast to the boat so if come a tug on the lance-rope he would not be pulled into the sea. I knowed his story. That he had once been pulled. And I knowed Ahab. He would not again be at the mercy. Of this Leviathan or any other.
We moved forward through the fog, dark summer fog. From up on the Great Eastern the water had looked to be light chop. Down here: What my father would call under heavy sail. Ups and downs. We were looking for a pair of eyes. Glowing. We saw them from the deck of Great Eastern but lower to the water the fog was more thick. More deep. We did not see the eyes. Maybe we don’t see the eyes until we be nigh unto atop them.
Redmayne he just looks ahead steers ahead. I watch my Ahab. Tied to the boat. I cannot see my Ahab’s eyes. Like Redmayne he looks ahead, only looks ahead. His right hand holds the lance and the rope from the lance pools on the floor of the boat. Wrapped round a cleat. Then wrapped round Ahab. When he throws his lance he wants to be at one end of the rope and Leviathan at the other. He wants to be connected to it, by rope.
Then through the fog we see them again: the eyes. The eyes in the sea. Round and glowing. Half-mile away? Redmayne calls out and we correct course. We had been heading ten degrees starboard of them but now they are dead ahead. Yes, half-mile ahead.
Now the things happen fast. So fast it seem all at once. The fog it lifts. Like that. Was fog then no fog. Clear to horizon. Then: chop gone. Just gone. Sea smooth as glass. Poured glass. Flat and shiny sea. All the way to horizon.
Those two things sudden but what happened next more sudden. Sea— Sucked out. We fall maybe six feet maybe ten. Like all the water rushing out through a hole at the bottom of the sea. Maybe twelve feet maybe more. And because fog it had gone we now see it, port astern: a wall of water. All the water what was sucked out from ‘neath us, mounted high. A wave that does not break. Maybe a mile away. And coming toward.
I had heard of this in tales and songs. The water sucked out, then up. But when it happens to you then you do not sing. The air in your chest is sucked out and then you forget to breathe. I look at my Ahab. He does not see. He looks only at the eyes, the glowing eyes. Eve
ryone else, we look round. Now Redmayne says, “Captain!” Ahab he does not hear. Or hears but does not act. His harpoon sharp and tight in his fist his raised right fist. “Captain!” As if when the water drop he did not feel or see. “Captain!” third time and now Ahab he turns. And sees a wall, a wall of water. And nothing with which to kill it save his lance raised on high.
FORTY-FIVE
ON THE AFTERNOON of 12th July a magnitude 7.5 earthquake struck the Anegada Trough between the islands of St. Croix and St. Thomas. These shocks generated a pair of tidal waves.
The first struck the town of Charlotte Amalie on the island of St. Thomas and ten minutes later the second wave did hit. Both waves struck the harbor at Charlotte Amalie first as a large recession of water, followed by a tall, hollow bore, which eyewitness accounts describe as a fifteen- to twenty-foot wall of water.
At the southern point of Water Island, two-and-a-half miles from Charlotte Amalie, the bore was reportedly forty feet high. The wave destroyed a score of small boats anchored in the harbor, leveled the town’s iron wharf, and flooded out all buildings along the waterfront area. The waters reached 250 feet inland.
Frederiksted St. Croix was then struck. The US Navy ship Monongahela was beached and her sister, the De Soto, sustained damage to her keel. Five people on St. Croix were killed, some of them 300 feet inland when the wave struck. The greatest damage occurred at Gallows Bay, Christiansted, where twenty houses were in one instant destroyed.
The sub-sea quake and subsequent landslide produced waves that worked southward toward the islands, northward into the Atlantic. The northbound wave propagated with some rapidity into the sea and did not diminish in strength as it did so. It was in this sense what is called a wave of translation: a solitary wave. Or as Scott Russell termed it: a Soliton.
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