Off on a Comet (7 page)

The precocity of vegetation caused some embarrassment. The time for
the corn and fruit harvest had fallen simultaneously with that of the
haymaking; and as the extreme heat precluded any prolonged exertions,
it was evident "the population" of the island would find it difficult to
provide the necessary amount of labor. Not that the prospect gave
them much concern: the provisions of the gourbi were still far from
exhausted, and now that the roughness of the weather had so happily
subsided, they had every encouragement to hope that a ship of some
sort would soon appear. Not only was that part of the Mediterranean
systematically frequented by the government steamers that watched the
coast, but vessels of all nations were constantly cruising off the
shore.

In spite, however, of all their sanguine speculations, no ship appeared.
Ben Zoof admitted the necessity of extemporizing a kind of parasol for
himself, otherwise he must literally have been roasted to death upon the
exposed summit of the cliff.

Meanwhile, Servadac was doing his utmost—it must be acknowledged, with
indifferent success—to recall the lessons of his school-days. He would
plunge into the wildest speculations in his endeavors to unravel
the difficulties of the new situation, and struggled into a kind of
conviction that if there had been a change of manner in the earth's
rotation on her axis, there would be a corresponding change in her
revolution round the sun, which would involve the consequence of the
length of the year being either diminished or increased.

Independently of the increased and increasing heat, there was another
very conclusive demonstration that the earth had thus suddenly
approximated towards the sun. The diameter of the solar disc was now
exactly twice what it ordinarily looks to the naked eye; in fact, it was
precisely such as it would appear to an observer on the surface of the
planet Venus. The most obvious inference would therefore be that the
earth's distance from the sun had been diminished from 91,000,000 to
66,000,000 miles. If the just equilibrium of the earth had thus been
destroyed, and should this diminution of distance still continue, would
there not be reason to fear that the terrestrial world would be carried
onwards to actual contact with the sun, which must result in its total
annihilation?

The continuance of the splendid weather afforded Servadac every facility
for observing the heavens. Night after night, constellations in
their beauty lay stretched before his eyes—an alphabet which, to his
mortification, not to say his rage, he was unable to decipher. In the
apparent dimensions of the fixed stars, in their distance, in their
relative position with regard to each other, he could observe no change.
Although it is established that our sun is approaching the constellation
of Hercules at the rate of more than 126,000,000 miles a year, and
although Arcturus is traveling through space at the rate of fifty-four
miles a second—three times faster than the earth goes round the
sun,—yet such is the remoteness of those stars that no appreciable
change is evident to the senses. The fixed stars taught him nothing.

Far otherwise was it with the planets. The orbits of Venus and Mercury
are within the orbit of the earth, Venus rotating at an average distance
of 66,130,000 miles from the sun, and Mercury at that of 35,393,000.
After pondering long, and as profoundly as he could, upon these figures,
Captain Servadac came to the conclusion that, as the earth was now
receiving about double the amount of light and heat that it had been
receiving before the catastrophe, it was receiving about the same as the
planet Venus; he was driven, therefore, to the estimate of the measure
in which the earth must have approximated to the sun, a deduction in
which he was confirmed when the opportunity came for him to observe
Venus herself in the splendid proportions that she now assumed.

That magnificent planet which—as Phosphorus or Lucifer, Hesperus or
Vesper, the evening star, the morning star, or the shepherd's star—has
never failed to attract the rapturous admiration of the most indifferent
observers, here revealed herself with unprecedented glory, exhibiting
all the phases of a lustrous moon in miniature. Various indentations in
the outline of its crescent showed that the solar beams were refracted
into regions of its surface where the sun had already set, and proved,
beyond a doubt, that the planet had an atmosphere of her own; and
certain luminous points projecting from the crescent as plainly marked
the existence of mountains. As the result of Servadac's computations, he
formed the opinion that Venus could hardly be at a greater distance than
6,000,000 miles from the earth.

"And a very safe distance, too," said Ben Zoof, when his master told him
the conclusion at which he had arrived.

"All very well for two armies, but for a couple of planets not quite so
safe, perhaps, as you may imagine. It is my impression that it is more
than likely we may run foul of Venus," said the captain.

"Plenty of air and water there, sir?" inquired the orderly.

"Yes; as far as I can tell, plenty," replied Servadac.

"Then why shouldn't we go and visit Venus?"

Servadac did his best to explain that as the two planets were of
about equal volume, and were traveling with great velocity in opposite
directions, any collision between them must be attended with the most
disastrous consequences to one or both of them. But Ben Zoof failed to
see that, even at the worst, the catastrophe could be much more serious
than the collision of two railway trains.

The captain became exasperated. "You idiot!" he angrily exclaimed;
"cannot you understand that the planets are traveling a thousand times
faster than the fastest express, and that if they meet, either one
or the other must be destroyed? What would become of your darling
Montmartre then?"

The captain had touched a tender chord. For a moment Ben Zoof stood with
clenched teeth and contracted muscles; then, in a voice of real concern,
he inquired whether anything could be done to avert the calamity.

"Nothing whatever; so you may go about your own business," was the
captain's brusque rejoinder.

All discomfited and bewildered, Ben Zoof retired without a word.

During the ensuing days the distance between the two planets continued
to decrease, and it became more and more obvious that the earth, on her
new orbit, was about to cross the orbit of Venus. Throughout this time
the earth had been making a perceptible approach towards Mercury, and
that planet—which is rarely visible to the naked eye, and then only
at what are termed the periods of its greatest eastern and western
elongations—now appeared in all its splendor. It amply justified the
epithet of "sparkling" which the ancients were accustomed to confer
upon it, and could scarcely fail to awaken a new interest. The periodic
recurrence of its phases; its reflection of the sun's rays, shedding
upon it a light and a heat seven times greater than that received by the
earth; its glacial and its torrid zones, which, on account of the great
inclination of the axis, are scarcely separable; its equatorial bands;
its mountains eleven miles high;—were all subjects of observation
worthy of the most studious regard.

But no danger was to be apprehended from Mercury; with Venus only did
collision appear imminent. By the 18th of January the distance between
that planet and the earth had become reduced to between two and three
millions of miles, and the intensity of its light cast heavy shadows
from all terrestrial objects. It might be observed to turn upon its own
axis in twenty-three hours twenty-one minutes—an evidence, from the
unaltered duration of its days, that the planet had not shared in the
disturbance. On its disc the clouds formed from its atmospheric vapor
were plainly perceptible, as also were the seven spots, which, according
to Bianchini, are a chain of seas. It was now visible in broad daylight.
Buonaparte, when under the Directory, once had his attention called to
Venus at noon, and immediately hailed it joyfully, recognizing it as
his own peculiar star in the ascendant. Captain Servadac, it may well be
imagined, did not experience the same gratifying emotion.

On the 20th, the distance between the two bodies had again sensibly
diminished. The captain had ceased to be surprised that no vessel
had been sent to rescue himself and his companion from their strange
imprisonment; the governor general and the minister of war were
doubtless far differently occupied, and their interests far otherwise
engrossed. What sensational articles, he thought, must now be teeming to
the newspapers! What crowds must be flocking to the churches! The end
of the world approaching! the great climax close at hand! Two days more,
and the earth, shivered into a myriad atoms, would be lost in boundless
space!

These dire forebodings, however, were not destined to be realized.
Gradually the distance between the two planets began to increase; the
planes of their orbits did not coincide, and accordingly the dreaded
catastrophe did not ensue. By the 25th, Venus was sufficiently remote to
preclude any further fear of collision. Ben Zoof gave a sigh of relief
when the captain communicated the glad intelligence.

Their proximity to Venus had been close enough to demonstrate that
beyond a doubt that planet has no moon or satellite such as Cassini,
Short, Montaigne of Limoges, Montbarron, and some other astronomers have
imagined to exist. "Had there been such a satellite," said Servadac,
"we might have captured it in passing. But what can be the meaning," he
added seriously, "of all this displacement of the heavenly bodies?"

"What is that great building at Paris, captain, with a top like a cap?"
asked Ben Zoof.

"Do you mean the Observatory?"

"Yes, the Observatory. Are there not people living in the Observatory
who could explain all this?"

"Very likely; but what of that?"

"Let us be philosophers, and wait patiently until we can hear their
explanation."

Servadac smiled. "Do you know what it is to be a philosopher, Ben Zoof?"
he asked.

"I am a soldier, sir," was the servant's prompt rejoinder, "and I have
learnt to know that 'what can't be cured must be endured.'"

The captain made no reply, but for a time, at least, he desisted from
puzzling himself over matters which he felt he was utterly incompetent
to explain. But an event soon afterwards occurred which awakened his
keenest interest.

About nine o'clock on the morning of the 27th, Ben Zoof walked
deliberately into his master's apartment, and, in reply to a question as
to what he wanted, announced with the utmost composure that a ship was
in sight.

"A ship!" exclaimed Servadac, starting to his feet. "A ship! Ben Zoof,
you donkey! you speak as unconcernedly as though you were telling me
that my dinner was ready."

"Are we not philosophers, captain?" said the orderly.

But the captain was out of hearing.

Fast as his legs could carry him, Servadac had made his way to the top
of the cliff. It was quite true that a vessel was in sight, hardly more
than six miles from the shore; but owing to the increase in the earth's
convexity, and the consequent limitation of the range of vision, the
rigging of the topmasts alone was visible above the water. This was
enough, however, to indicate that the ship was a schooner—an impression
that was confirmed when, two hours later, she came entirely in sight.

"The
Dobryna
!" exclaimed Servadac, keeping his eye unmoved at his
telescope.

"Impossible, sir!" rejoined Ben Zoof; "there are no signs of smoke."

"The
Dobryna
!" repeated the captain, positively. "She is under sail;
but she is Count Timascheff's yacht."

He was right. If the count were on board, a strange fatality was
bringing him to the presence of his rival. But no longer now could
Servadac regard him in the light of an adversary; circumstances had
changed, and all animosity was absorbed in the eagerness with which
he hailed the prospect of obtaining some information about the recent
startling and inexplicable events. During the twenty-seven days that she
had been absent, the
Dobryna
, he conjectured, would have explored the
Mediterranean, would very probably have visited Spain, France, or Italy,
and accordingly would convey to Gourbi Island some intelligence from
one or other of those countries. He reckoned, therefore, not only upon
ascertaining the extent of the late catastrophe, but upon learning
its cause. Count Timascheff was, no doubt, magnanimously coming to the
rescue of himself and his orderly.

The wind being adverse, the
Dobryna
did not make very rapid progress;
but as the weather, in spite of a few clouds, remained calm, and the
sea was quite smooth, she was enabled to hold a steady course. It seemed
unaccountable that she should not use her engine, as whoever was on
board, would be naturally impatient to reconnoiter the new island, which
must just have come within their view. The probability that suggested
itself was that the schooner's fuel was exhausted.

Servadac took it for granted that the
Dobryna
was endeavoring to
put in. It occurred to him, however, that the count, on discovering an
island where he had expected to find the mainland of Africa, would not
unlikely be at a loss for a place of anchorage. The yacht was evidently
making her way in the direction of the former mouth of the Shelif,
and the captain was struck with the idea that he would do well to
investigate whether there was any suitable mooring towards which he
might signal her. Zephyr and Galette were soon saddled, and in twenty
minutes had carried their riders to the western extremity of the island,
where they both dismounted and began to explore the coast.