No answer came. I was forced to assume that they were both drowned or swept away into some inaccessible part of the subterranean ocean beyond my powers of assistance.
The only thing offered to my senses at all was the sight of the submarine now wallowing several yards away from me. What the function of the row of lights along its top was I could not guess; perhaps a signalling device of some kind. By their general illumination I could make out the details of the underwater vessel that had come upon us. An ovoid tapering to a point at both ends, it had indeed the baroque appearance of an illustration to one of Jules Verne's fantastic romances. Odd fins and propulsive devices jutted out at angles from the bolt-studded flanks. It lay without further motion in the slowly subsiding waters.
As my strength was quickly being exhausted by the effort of staying afloat in the cold water burdened as I was with my sodden clothes and Excalibur strapped to my back, I resolved to approach the submarine. Perhaps the Morlocks who piloted it now felt that their mission was accomplished in the sinking of our little boat and our deaths from drowning thereby. I could perhaps grasp one of the submarine's protuberances unseen and regather my strength until the vessel submerged again. Or if it stayed on the surface I could remain with it until it reached its home port, wherever that may be.
Beyond that I had no plan, only the faintest spark of hope kept alive by the weight of the clothwrapped sword across my shoulders. However diminished its state, Excalibur still inspired in me a bit of the courage of our heroic British ancestors, as well as that of my lost comrades. I couldn't let myself sink with it into the foul depths of the underground sea until my last ounce of will was gone. As noiselessly as possible, not letting my hands breach the water's surface, I swam toward the submarine.
I soon had hold of one of the fins near the vessel's waterline and managed to pull myself into a sitting position upon it, with only the lower part of my legs left dangling in the water. Pressing myself close to the hull, I could hear various scraping and scurrying noises inside. I took them to be the footsteps of the Morlocks and the incessant throbbing and clanking of the vessel's engine. A great exhaust of steam bubbled into the water from an aperture a few yards away from me, and I was grateful for the warmth it gave me. I could feel blood and life returning to my chilled limbs. Although my plight had not been improved a whit, a tiny bit more hope filtered through my irrational heart.
The submarine still had not moved from the point where it had erupted upon my late companions and myself. Was something amiss inside? The hurried noises that came to my ear through the metal seemed to grow more frantic, with the footsteps pounding back and forth from one end of the vessel to the other. The engine alternately roared or slowed almost to the point of stopping. Various propellers and fins dipped erratically in and out of the water. The one I was perched on tilted, but righted itself again before I could slide off. From a distance the foundering submarine might have given the bizarre impression of a giant sea turtle that had somehow lost the ability to coordinate its limbs.
My rapidly mounting suspicions about what was going on inside the vessel forced me now to revise my plans. I had saved myself from drowning by clinging to the submarine, but neither my lost companions, our overturned boat, nor any safe point to which I could swim had since appeared. The submarine gave no sign of progressing toward a landing, and was perhaps even in danger of inadvertently sinking. As the various noises banged through the hull like scrap metal in a dyspeptic mechanical oesophagus, I pondered my chances.
Finally, more from a lack of better ideas than anything else, I began to inch my way higher on the vessel. I had the vague notion that I could perhaps find a hatch or vent through which I could better discover the state of affairs inside. To what purpose I could put such knowledge I had no idea.
Using the various fins and propeller shafts for handles, I dragged myself to a point where I was lying prone upon the curved top surface, stretched between two of the glowing lights we had first spotted underwater. My calculations were at least partly correct. Through a tiny ventilator shaft with a cover that apparently closed with submersion in the water, I could hear distinctly the voices of the Morlocks inside. Their harsh gabbling was raised in argument – that much was clear, though I could understand none of the words. Volleys of scorn, accusation, contempt and other vocal passions sounded below me.
Had a mutiny split their ranks? I wondered. Their ferocious debate gave no sign of lessening, and the submarine's erratic twitches, meanwhile, continued. Perhaps, I hoped wildly, a fight would break out among them leading to a general slaughter, and I would be left the sole living tenant of the submarine. I dismissed the notion; it was too much to wish for.
So intent was I upon my eavesdropping that I almost didn't hear the slow opening of a hatchway behind me. Only when the circular metal door was thrown back upon its rasping hinges did I turn my head and see a pair of Morlocks come boiling out of the submarine's interior, their dead-white hands outstretched for me.
I leapt to my feet as they came scrambling across the hull toward me. Backing away as fast as I could upon the slippery metal, I interposed a large upright stanchion between myself and them. This brought me only a few second's grace, as I could see several more of their kind emerging from the open hatchway to join in the chase.
Hastily I decided to give up my position on the submarine. With no time to order my thoughts, I instinctively resolved that it would be better to swim or drown in the cold water than to be captured by the Morlocks and put to whatever filthy uses they could devise.
The curve of the submarine's hull was too great for me to clear if I tried to dive directly from it into the water. I quickly dropped to my stomach again and half-slid, half climbed down to the vessel's waterline. The hand of one of the Morlocks caught me by the collar of my jacket and stopped me from slipping into the water. I let go of the fin I was using as a handhold, grabbed his arm, then pulled him off his feet and in an arc over my head. I heard him collide with a spinning propeller, shriek as its blades tore at his flesh, then fall into the water.
More hands clutched at me from above, but I had slid far enough down the hull to be out of their easy grasp. A heavy iron bar whirred down toward my head. I twisted to one side and the weapon struck the submarine's metal flank with a dull clang. I turned my head away from my pursuers in order to spot the next foothold I needed for my descent.
A loop of rope fell across my throat and tightened in back of my neck. My hands flew to the noose in which one of the Morlocks had caught me, but it was already pressing into my flesh and cutting off my breath. I felt myself jerked back up the side of the submarine by the rope while the dimly lit waters grew even darker.
Hands I could no longer see grappled at me. I struck back in all directions, landing a few blows on their soft, clammy faces, until my weakened arms were at last forced behind me and tied with another section of rope. Gasping for air, with a spinning world roaring dizzily through my head, I felt myself dragged toward the submarine's hatchway.
7
I came to, trussed up and tossed against a bulkhead. I had never gone completely unconscious, but the choking and rough handling from the Morlocks had quite dazed me. My body, if not all of my mind, remembered clearly being dropped down the hatchway ladder like a sack of potatoes. And then there had been much shouting and arguing in the Morlocks' harsh tongue, and their pale, brutish faces swimming through the black veil of blood that covered my eyes, peering at me, then disappearing again.