“Yes?” said Barbicane.
“Twelve thousand yards.”
“What!” exclaimed Barbicane, starting; “you say—”
“Twelve thousand yards.”
“The devil!” cried the president, making a gesture of despair.
“What is the matter?” asked Michel Ardan, much surprised.
“What is the matter! why, if at this moment our speed had already diminished one-third by friction, the initiatory speed ought to have been—”
“Seventeen thousand yards.”
“And the Cambridge Observatory declared that twelve thousand yards was enough at starting; and our projectile, which only started with that speed—”
“Well?” asked Nicholl.