Off on a Comet, Jules Verne [10 ebook reader .txt] 📗

CHAPTER XVII

THE VENTURE MADE

 

What would be the consequences of this sudden and complete disruption,

Servadac and his people hardly dared to think.

 

The first change that came under their observation was the rapidity of

the sun’s appearances and disappearances, forcing them to the conviction

that although the comet still rotated on its axis from east to west,

yet the period of its rotation had been diminished by about one-half.

Only six hours instead of twelve elapsed between sunrise and sunrise;

three hours after rising in the west the sun was sinking again in the east.

 

“We are coming to something!” exclaimed Servadac. “We have got

a year of something like 2,880 days.”

 

“I shouldn’t think it would be an easy matter to find saints enough

for such a calendar as that!” said Ben Zoof.

 

Servadac laughed, and remarked that they should have the professor

talking about the 238th of June, and the 325th of December.

 

It soon became evident that the detached portion was not revolving

round the comet, but was gradually retreating into space.

Whether it had carried with it any portion of atmosphere,

whether it possessed any other condition for supporting life,

and whether it was likely ever again to approach to the earth,

were all questions that there were no means of determining.

For themselves the all-important problem was—what effect would

the rending asunder of the comet have upon its rate of progress?

and as they were already conscious of a further increase

of muscular power, and a fresh diminution of specific gravity,

Servadac and his associates could not but wonder whether

the alteration in the mass of the comet would not result in its

missing the expected coincidence with the earth altogether.

 

Although he professed himself incompetent to pronounce a decided opinion,

Lieutenant Procope manifestly inclined to the belief that no alteration

would ensue in the rate of Gallia’s velocity; but Rosette, no doubt,

could answer the question directly, and the time had now arrived in which

he must be compelled to divulge the precise moment of collision.

 

But the professor was in the worst of tempers. Generally taciturn and morose,

he was more than usually uncivil whenever any one ventured to speak to him.

The loss of his telescope had doubtless a great deal to do with his ill-humor;

but the captain drew the most favorable conclusions from Rosette’s

continued irritation. Had the comet been in any way projected from

its course, so as to be likely to fail in coming into contact with the earth,

the professor would have been quite unable to conceal his satisfaction.

But they required to know more than the general truth, and felt that they

had no time to lose in getting at the exact details.

 

The opportunity that was wanted soon came.

 

On the 18th, Rosette was overheard in furious altercation

with Ben Zoof. The orderly had been taunting

the astronomer with the mutilation of his little comet.

A fine thing, he said, to split in two like a child’s toy.

It had cracked like a dry nut; and mightn’t one as well live

upon an exploding bomb?—with much more to the same effect.

The professor, by way of retaliation, had commenced sneering

at the “prodigious” mountain of Montmartre, and the dispute

was beginning to look serious when Servadac entered.

 

Thinking he could turn the wrangling to some good account,

so as to arrive at the information he was so anxiously seeking,

the captain pretended to espouse the views of his orderly;

he consequently brought upon himself the full force of

the professor’s wrath.

 

Rosette’s language became more and more violent, till Servadac,

feigning to be provoked beyond endurance, cried:

 

“You forget, sir, that you are addressing the Governor-General of Gallia.”

 

“Governor-General! humbug!” roared Rosette. “Gallia is my comet!”

 

“I deny it,” said Servadac. “Gallia has lost its chance of

getting back to the earth. Gallia has nothing to do with you.

Gallia is mine; and you must submit to the government which I

please to ordain.”

 

“And who told you that Gallia is not going back to the earth?”

asked the professor, with a look of withering scorn.

 

“Why, isn’t her mass diminished? Isn’t she split in half?

Isn’t her velocity all altered?” demanded the captain.

 

“And pray who told you this?” again said the professor,

with a sneer.

 

“Everybody. Everybody knows it, of course,” replied Servadac.

 

“Everybody is very clever. And you always were a very clever scholar too.

We remember that of old, don’t we?”

 

“Sir!”

 

“You nearly mastered the first elements of science, didn’t you?”

 

“Sir!”

 

“A credit to your class!”

 

“Hold your tongue, sir!” bellowed the captain again, as if his

anger was uncontrollable.

 

“Not I,” said the professor.

 

” Hold your tongue!” repeated Servadac.

 

“Just because the mass is altered you think the velocity is altered?”

 

“Hold your tongue!” cried the captain, louder than ever.

 

“What has mass to do with the orbit? Of how many comets do you know the mass,

and yet you know their movements? Ignorance!” shouted Rosette.

 

“Insolence!” retorted Servadac.

 

Ben Zoof, really thinking that his master was angry, made a threatening

movement towards the professor.

 

“Touch me if you dare!” screamed Rosette, drawing himself up

to the fullest height his diminutive figure would allow.

“You shall answer for your conduct before a court of justice!”

 

“Where? On Gallia?” asked the captain.

 

“No; on the earth.”

 

“The earth! Pshaw! You know we shall never get there;

our velocity is changed.”

 

“On the earth,” repeated the professor, with decision.

 

“Trash!” cried Ben Zoof. “The earth will be too far off!”

 

“Not too far off for us to come across her orbit at 42 minutes

and 35.6 seconds past two o’clock on the morning of this coming

1st of January.”

 

“Thanks, my dear professor—many thanks. You have given me all

the information I required;” and, with a low bow and a gracious smile,

the captain withdrew. The orderly made an equally polite bow,

and followed his master. The professor, completely nonplussed,

was left alone.

 

Thirteen days, then—twenty-six of the original Gallian days, fifty-two of

the present—was all the time for preparation that now remained.

Every preliminary arrangement was hurried on with the greatest earnestness.

 

There was a general eagerness to be quit of Gallia. Indifferent to

the dangers that must necessarily attend a balloon ascent under such

unparalleled circumstances, and heedless of Lieutenant Procope’s

warning that the slightest check in their progress would result

in instantaneous combustion, they all seemed to conclude that it

must be the simplest thing possible to glide from one atmosphere

to another, so that they were quite sanguine as to the successful

issue of their enterprise. Captain Servadac made a point of showing

himself quite enthusiastic in his anticipations, and to Ben Zoof

the going up in a balloon was the supreme height of his ambition.

The count and the lieutenant, of colder and less demonstrative temperament,

alike seemed to realize the possible perils of the undertaking,

but even they were determined to put a bold face upon every difficulty.

 

The sea had now become navigable, and three voyages were made to Gourbi Island

in the steam launch, consuming the last of their little reserve of coal.

 

The first voyage had been made by Servadac with several of the sailors.

They found the gourbi and the adjacent building quite uninjured

by the severity of the winter; numbers of little rivulets

intersected the pasture-land; new plants were springing up under

the influence of the equatorial sun, and the luxuriant foliage

was tenanted by the birds which had flown back from the volcano.

Summer had almost abruptly succeeded to winter, and the days,

though only three hours long, were intensely hot.

 

Another of the voyages to the island had been to collect the dry

grass and straw which was necessary for inflating the balloon.

Had the balloon been less cumbersome it would have been conveyed

to the island, whence the start would have been effected;

but as it was, it was more convenient to bring the combustible

material to the balloon.

 

The last of the coal having been consumed, the fragments

of the shipwrecked vessels had to be used day by day for fuel.

Hakkabut began making a great hubbub when he found that they were

burning some of the spars of the Hansa; but he was effectually

silenced by Ben Zoof, who told him that if he made any more fuss,

he should be compelled to pay 50,000 francs for a balloon-ticket,

or else he should be left behind.

 

By Christmas Day everything was in readiness for immediate departure.

The festival was observed with a solemnity still more marked than

the anniversary of the preceding year. Every one looked forward

to spending New Year’s Day in another sphere altogether, and Ben Zoof

had already promised Pablo and Nina all sorts of New Year’s gifts.

 

It may seem strange, but the nearer the critical moment approached,

the less Hector Servadac and Count Timascheff had to say to each

other on the subject. Their mutual reserve became more apparent;

the experiences of the last two years were fading from their minds

like a dream; and the fair image that had been the cause of their

original rivalry was ever rising, as a vision, between them.

 

The captain’s thoughts began to turn to his unfinished rondo;

in his leisure moments, rhymes suitable and unsuitable,

possible and impossible, were perpetually jingling in his imagination.

He labored under the conviction that he had a work of genius to complete.

A poet he had left the earth, and a poet he must return.

 

Count Timascheff’s desire to return to the world was quite

equaled by Lieutenant Procope’s. The Russian sailors’

only thought was to follow their master, wherever he went.

The Spaniards, though they would have been unconcerned to know

that they were to remain upon Gallia, were nevertheless looking

forward with some degree of pleasure to revisiting the plains

of Andalusia; and Nina and Pablo were only too delighted

at the prospect of accompanying their kind protectors on any

fresh excursion whatever.

 

The only malcontent was Palmyrin Rosette. Day and night he persevered in his

astronomical pursuits, declared his intention of never abandoning his comet,

and swore positively that nothing should induce him to set foot in the car

of the balloon.

 

The misfortune that had befallen his telescope was a never-ending theme

of complaint; and just now, when Gallia was entering the narrow zone

of shooting-stars, and new discoveries might have been within his reach,

his loss made him more inconsolable than ever. In sheer desperation,

he endeavored to increase the intensity of his vision by applying to his

eyes some belladonna which he found in the Dobryna’s medicine chest;

with heroic fortitude he endured the tortures of the experiment,

and gazed up into the sky until he was nearly blind. But all in vain;

not a single fresh discovery rewarded his sufferings.

 

No one was quite exempt from the feverish excitement