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The air bubbles escaping from their tanks had attracted the predator. Nemo froze, hoping the shark would swim away, but the hammerhead circled back. Nemo grabbed Liedenbrock’s arm to get his attention. Seeing the movement, the caliph looked up and recoiled in astonishment. The guard holding the spear flailed in terror as the shark swam closer.

Nemo bounded forward, the water’s embrace forcing him into a slow-motion dance. He wrested the spear out of the befuddled guard’s gloved hand, then made certain he had a strong foothold on the rough coral surface.

The hammerhead stroked its angular tail back and forth, propelling itself toward Liedenbrock. As the shark passed overhead, Nemo thrust the spear upward with all his might. The barbed tip plunged into the shark’s belly. The hammerhead shuddered, but Nemo refused to let go of the spear. He pushed and tugged, using the jagged blade to rip open the fish’s abdomen and spill its entrails along with a cloud of red blood.

The shark wheeled away, thrashing as it died. Trembling from the effort, Nemo ripped the spear loose. The air tasted hot and metallic inside his helmet. Liedenbrock stood beside him, poised for further action. The caliph’s guard lumbered forward to retrieve the spear. His dark eyes glowered with anger and shame at his own inaction.

Both Nemo and Caliph Robur looked with contempt at the burly man, but Nemo surrendered the weapon without argument. He wouldn’t need it for what he had in mind anyway. He gestured for the men to begin the return trek to the Nautilus, whose lights gleamed in the distance like a lighthouse beacon. The dissipating blood from the shark would attract other aquatic predators . . . and Nemo had enough human enemies right beside him.

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Aboard the Nautilus, after he’d waited long enough for the underwater party to be far away, Cyrus Harding sounded the alarm. The other crew members had been primed, and they reacted to the emergency, pointing toward one of the ballast chambers. Harding raised his voice in false panic. “Sabotage! Sabotage, mates! Someone’s in the ballast rooms!”

The confused guards sensed the urgency, but they understood little. Harding could have spoken in perfect Turkish after so many years at Rurapente, but he stumbled over the foreign words with feigned confusion, explaining little. A loud siren and a flashing beacon flustered the well-muscled guards even more.

The Englishman ran toward the rear ballast chambers, and three of the five remaining guards stormed after him, drawing their scimitars. While the other crew members scrambled about, faces filled with mock terror, Harding flung open the metal bulkhead door. He pointed in alarm.

The three guards plunged inside, swords raised, ready for battle with saboteurs -- and Harding slammed the metal door, sealing them into the ballast chambers. Then, coldly and without remorse, the British boatbuilder opened the valves and filled the sealed room with cold sea water.

The trapped guards shouted and hammered their sword hilts on the other side of the door. Harding stood stony-faced. These men had executed Conseil without mercy and would have happily dispatched every member of the Nautilus crew. The followers of Caliph Robur deserved to drown.

The other Europeans turned on the remaining guards, overwhelming them. One of the engineers had retrieved the scimitar left behind by Robur’s bodyguard; now the men threw themselves at the white-clad guards, using metal bars and equipment to fight for their lives. They knocked the curved swords away from Robur’s men and retrieved the blades for themselves. Their enthusiasm and anger ran unchecked.

By the time Cyrus Harding went to meet them, turning deaf ears to the final cries of the drowning men inside the ballast chamber, the caliph’s murderous guards had already been slain with their own swords. They lay in pools of blood on the Nautilus deckplates.

After the successful revolt, the captive crew members stood