After five minutes of violent and useless churning of the screw, Matt turned to Cassidy. The mate, grave-faced and anxious, was looking at him and waiting for orders.
"Rig the electric projector, Cassidy," said Matt calmly.
"Aye, aye, sir," replied the mate.
When the little searchlight was in position, a gleam was thrown through one of the forward lunettes out over the bow of the Grampus. Matt, feeling keenly the weight of responsibility that rested on his shoulders, mounted the iron ladder to the conning tower and looked through one of the small windows.
To his intense astonishment he found the bottom of the sea pervaded with a faintly luminous light, perhaps due to some phosphorescence given off by the marine growth. Through this glow traveled the brighter gleam of the searchlight.
The Grampus was lying in a dense forest of nodding, moss-covered stems. The algae of the ocean bed, with its lianes and creeping growth, twisted all about the submarine, fluttering and waving in the currents caused by the swiftly revolving propeller.
A gasp escaped Matt's lips, however, when he fixed his attention forward. For a full minute he stood on the ladder, taking in the weird and dangerous predicament of the Grampus.
Then an exclamation fell from his lips, and he looked down to see Captain Nemo, Jr., slowly mounting to his side.
"Look!" whispered Matt hoarsely, nodding toward the lunettes.