The sea monster escapes into Apollo’s Fountain

The sea monster’s escape into the Fountain of Apollo turns a transfer into a sudden struggle and reverses the intended movement of the scene: the creature is no longer being carried toward confinement but is forcing its way into the water that serves as its prison.

Transfer Interrupted

As Yves de la Croix loosens the canvas restraints, the fountain’s pumps begin to grind and creak through the night. The nozzles gurgle, groan, and gush; water rises in the shape of a fleur-de-lys, and the central stream reaches the tent’s peak. Droplets fall across Apollo’s chariot, dimple the pool, and spatter the sea monster.

The fountain’s display is not a distant spectacle for the creature. Water striking its body brings an immediate, physical response: it screams, thrashes, and lashes Yves with its tails. He staggers backward, and his shouted order to turn off the fountain registers how quickly the ceremonial machinery has become a danger to the people handling the animal.

The Break into the Pool

Snarling, the sea monster struggles free of the basin. Yves jumps away from its teeth, claws, and tails while the workers run to carry out his order. The creature lurches, then tumbles into the water. Its escape is abrupt and bodily, not a controlled release: the basin and the workers’ restraint give way to the pool.

The fountain’s role changes with that plunge. It is both the mechanism whose water has provoked the creature and the place where it can now withdraw. The sea monster escapes into its prison in the Fountain of Apollo, so the immediate danger of the transfer ends without ending its captivity. The scene’s reversal is therefore limited but consequential: the handlers lose control of the creature’s movement, while the pool absorbs it back into confinement.

Aftermath and Significance

Marie-Josèphe de la Croix catches Yves by the arm as a ripple breaks against his foot and flows around his boots. The water soaks the hem of his cassock. She smiles at the incongruity, privately imagining her brother walking on water and thinking that he ought to be able to keep his clothes dry. Her response briefly shifts attention from the creature’s violence to the soaked clothing and the familiar bond between the siblings; it does not erase the danger of what has just happened.

The pumps stop, and the fountain’s display subsides: its streams fall lower, the fleur-de-lys wilts, and the nozzles bubble before going quiet. At last the pool’s surface shows no ripple, not even bubbles. That stillness closes the immediate disturbance, but not the larger condition it exposes. The sea monster has reached the water by escaping its handlers, yet the water it enters remains part of the enclosure that holds it.