Free The Crystal City Under the Sea by André Laurie Page A

have believed I should be prey to such nervous excitement. My pulse beats so fast, I almost thought I could live on air, but, now you mention it, the void in my inner man destroys that illusion.”
    “Come, come! your sang-froid is simply admirable. Do not undervalue yourself, but let us sit down to the lunch you have so well earned.”
    While they did justice to the lunch, René gave his host an account of the main facts of the journey, and gave him the specimens he had brought up with him. The prince was delighted, and already foresaw a series of discoveries—by proxy—glorious for the yacht and for himself. He passed the rest of the day at his microscope in a state of feverish agitation, which contrasted with the calm demeanour of the young lieutenant.
    The next day René got to work again, accomplishing, every day, three or four fresh descents, in order to take separate bearings, with the greatest care, at distances of two or three marine miles. Sometimes the state of the water made the operation impracticable. There was then nothing for it but to wait, and René was tortured with impatience. Although his researches had, so far, brought him no satisfactory result, his conviction remained unshaken that the mysterious subterranean dwelling which had sheltered him for some few never to be forgotten hours, or minutes, ought to be situated between the Sargassian Sea and the Azores. To explore that vast region, to sound successively every part of it,— such was the intrepid (mad, some would say) project he conceived and pursued with indefatigable perseverance.
    No one else knew of this plan but Hélène. René looked upon her as the only person capable of believing in the reality of his adventure. And if he needed encouragement, it was in that direction that he found it, in the youthful imagination, largeheartedness and characteristic good sense of the unsophisticated girl. But he had something better still—faith—the lever which removes mountains and triumphs over difficulties. That was why, notwithstanding all obstacles, he accomplished his end, Monte Cristo began to wonder at the tenacity with which his young and distinguished collaborator, as he called him, not without a shade of patronizing fatuity, set himself to repeated expeditions having no apparent result; for the india-rubber arms of the diving-bell had not brought up any hitherto unknown animal or vegetable variety.
    But there was one man on board who grew more and more curious day by day; and that was Sacripanti. The Levantine rapacity of his mind could not believe that Caoudal exposed himself every day to such danger for any purely scientific object. The conviction took hold of him, little by little, that the lieutenant must be possessed of precise and particular information respecting some treasure submerged near the Azores,—a galleon, perhaps, laden with piastres and sunk for centuries under the weight of its riches; or, who could tell? an old vessel from the East Indies, whose rotten planks concealed beneath the waves a cargo of diamonds and rubies. Nothing but the attraction of so much wealth could account for Caoudal’s perseverance. At this idea Sacripanti’s black eyes glittered; his sallow face flushed with avarice; he swore between his white teeth that, in one way or other, he would have his share of the windfall.
    His first manoeuvre in that direction was not a happy one. After having loaded René, as his custom was, with nauseous flattery in reference to his unrelaxing heroism, he suggested that these expeditions would be less monotonous if M. Caoudal had a companion. “Perhaps, without having to look very far,” added he, trying to assume a modest manner, but one which was only abject, “perhaps you might find, on board, a man whose devotion to science might equal your own, and who would feel honoured at serving you as your pupil, or even to help manoeuvre —” To which Caoudal replied that he thanked Captain Sacripanti for his obliging