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Scarecrowish bodies drifted about. One nudged him. He pushed the corpse away, relieved that it wasn’t his father. Nemo didn’t remember the man’s name, but thought he recognized him: someone who’d played a squeezebox, squeaking out impromptu melodies while the sailors danced and pounded their heels on the deckboards. . . .

Nemo didn’t have time to mourn, thinking of only one thing. He pushed forward, trying to breathe against the growing ache and dread in his chest, trying not to sob as he saw the stern of the Cynthia completely submerged, the poop deck under water. Through filtered light from above, he discerned cracked boards and gaping holes in the crew chambers.

His faceplate steamed up, and a few dribbles of water came through the breathing tube. He hoped Verne could keep up the pace on the bank, that the connected reeds would remain sealed together. His heart pounded, his lungs felt hot. He struggled forward through the muck, but didn’t for a moment consider turning back.

Nemo struggled across the splintered stumps of the Cynthia’s masts. The logs themselves floated on the surface of the Loire, while rigging pulleys and tackle dangled beneath like a giant spider’s web. Fish swam about like underwater spectators in a drama they could not understand.

As he made his way to the lower deck aft, Nemo passed ornately paneled chambers. Open doors flopped in the current, showing walls of exotic wood embellished with gold leaf for first-class passengers; now only river fish would enjoy the lavish accommodations. He found another body wedged in a door jamb, but saw the man’s wooden peg-leg and dismissed him . . . not the person he sought. He wished he could call out.

Nemo drew his knife and tugged against the restraining stiffness of the long airtube that trailed behind him. He wheezed and sucked in a deep breath, angry at fate. He’d never intended to go this far. He couldn’t get enough oxygen, but even dizzy as he was, he continued. His father might be dying down here.

Around him, muffled booming and rumbling sounds surged through the water as the Cynthia continued her death throes.

A few chambers remained sealed, their doors shut. Nemo clung to hope. Bubbles trickled from one of the closed rooms. As the ship continued to sink and twist and shift, the door opened a crack, and air boiled out.

Nemo swam there, trying to see if his father had sought refuge inside, but no one came out as he yanked the door open. He thumped at the second sealed door but heard no response from his father, no pounding, no return vibration. Where? The underwater dimness made details and options murky around him.

Quickly he moved to a third stateroom door, tilted with a heavy beam wedged across it. A line of bubbles frothed and surged from the bottom of the door, where water must be flooding into the small room.

Nemo hammered with the hilt of the dagger, hoping to detect something through the water. Just when he was about to give up, he heard a slap, a flat palm thudding against the wall.

Nemo pounded four times, and the other slapped back four more times -- the code rhythm Jacques Nemo used to signal his son -- then hammered repeatedly to get out. Half-afloat and half-balanced, Nemo wrenched at the thick beam that jammed the opening, but dizzy from lack of air, he could not budge it.

The air bubbles continued to creep higher as the chamber filled. The sounds of response inside the sealed room became more frantic.

His blood burning with desperation, Nemo dug with the point of his dagger, wedging it like a prybar. With a great twist, he tried to lever a board free, but the dagger snapped in half. He screamed in furious dismay, but no one could hear him through his helmet. He went wild, hammering and pounding on the wood with his fists, shouting for his father . . . utterly helpless. As his head and shoulders jerked, one of the hollow reeds loosened. River water dribbled into his bladder helmet.

Jamming the broken dagger back