The Eternal Adam and other stories (6 page)

At last there towered before them the huge
cone of Popocatepetl, so tall that the eye lost itself among the clouds when it
sought to find the peak. The way was desperately arid. On all sides fathomless
precipices were excavated in the slopes, and the dizzy footpaths seemed to sway
beneath the feet of those who used them. To make out the road, they had to
climb part of the mountain, 5,500 yards high, which the Indians call the
‘Smoking Rock’ and which still bore the traces of recent eruptions. Dark
crevasses traversed its steep sides. Since José had last been that way, new
cataclysms had convulsed these solitudes, which he could no longer recognise.
So he went astray in the midst of impracticable footpaths, and often he stopped
and listened, for heavy rumblings ran here and there through the gaps in the
enormous cone.

Already the sun was setting. Great clouds,
massing against the sky, made the air even darker. Rain and storm were
threatening; they are very common in these regions, where the soil favours the
evaporation of water. The last of the vegetation had disappeared from these
rocks, whose summit was lost in the eternal snows.

‘I can’t go any further!’ José was dropping
with weariness.

‘Get on, anyhow!’ Martinez spoke in a fever
of impatience.

Soon thunder-claps were re-echoing in the
crevasses of Popocatepetl.

‘Devil take me if I can find my way in
these lost paths,’ complained José.

‘Get up and get on!’ Martinez told him
roughly. He forced José to stumble forward.

‘And not a human being to guide us!’ the
seaman grumbled.

‘So much the better!’ Martinez told him.

‘You don’t know then, that every year a
thousand murders are committed in Mexico, and that the country isn’t safe?’

‘So much the better!’ said Martinez again.

Great drops of water were sparkling here
and there on the rocks, lit by the last gleams from the sky.

‘When once we’ve crossed the peaks all
around us, what do we see next?’ asked the lieutenant.

‘Mexico to the left, Puebla to the right,’
replied José. ‘If we can see anything, that is! But we shan’t see anything! It’s
too black! In front of us will be the mountain of Icctacihualt, with a good
road down in the ravine. But devil take us if we ever get to it!’

‘Get on!’

José was right. The Mexican plateau is
enclosed in an immense square of mountains. It forms a vast oval, 18 leagues
long and 67 round, hemmed in by tall slopes among which can be seen to the
south-west Popocatepetl and Icctacihualt.

Once having reached the crest of these
barriers, the traveller finds no difficulty in getting down into the Anahuac
plateau, and then pushing on northwards along a good road to Mexico. In the
long avenues of elms and poplars he can admire the cypress planted by the Aztec
dynasty, and the
schinds,
like the weeping willows of the west. Here and
there cultivated fields and flower-gardens display their products, while the
apple trees, pomegranate trees, and cherry trees flourish under a light blue
sky which makes the air of these heights dry and rarefied.

The thunder-claps now broke out, repeatedly
and with great violence, among the mountains. The wind and rain, hitherto
silent, intensified the echoes.

José cursed at every step. Lieutenant
Martinez, pale and silent, cast evil glances at his companion, who now appeared
in his eyes like an accomplice he wanted to get rid of.

A sudden flash of lightning lit up the
gloom. The seaman and lieutenant were on the edge of a precipice.

Martinez strode up to José. He gripped the
man’s shoulder, and when the thunder had died away he said ‘José, I’m
frightened!’

‘Frightened of the storm?’

‘Not of the storm in the sky, José, but I’m
frightened of the storm that’s rising within me.’

‘Oh, so you’re still thinking about Don
Orteva! ... Go along with you, Lieutenant, you make me laugh,’ replied José;
but he did not laugh at all, for Martinez was staring at him with haggard eyes.

A frightful clap of thunder roared out.

‘Quiet, José, be quiet!’ Martinez no longer
seemed master of himself.

‘This is a fine night to preach at me!’ the
seaman retorted. ‘If you’re afraid, Lieutenant, shut your eyes and stop up your
ears!’

‘I fancy,’ gasped Martinez, ‘that I can see
the captain ... Don Orteva ... with his head smashed! ... there ... there.’

A black mass, lit up the next moment by a
flash of lightning, was towering twenty paces away from the lieutenant and his
companion.

At that very instant José saw Martinez
quite close to him, pale, frantic, and sinister, and his hand grasping a
dagger!

‘What ...!’ he exclaimed.

A flash of lightning flared around them.

‘Help!’ screamed José.

Only one body was left in that place. Like
a second Cain, Martinez was rushing away through the storm, his hand grasping
his bloodstained dagger.

A few moments later two men bent over the
seaman’s body and said, ‘There’s one of them.’

Martinez was wandering like a madman
through the dark solitudes: he was running, his head bare, through the torrents
of rain.

‘Help! Help!’ he screamed, stumbling across
the slippery rocks.

Then he suddenly heard a swirling noise.

It was the little river Ixtolucca, falling
500 feet below him.

A few paces away a rope bridge had been
thrown across this very torrent. Secured to both banks by a few spikes driven
into the rock, it was swinging in the wind like a thread extended through the
void.

Martinez, hanging on to the lianas, crawled
slowly across the bridge. By sheer effort he succeeded in reaching the opposite
bank.

There a shadow rose up in front of him.

Without saying a word, he recoiled and made
his way back to the other bank.

There, too, was another human form.

He went back on his knees to the middle of
the bridge, his hands clenched in despair.

‘Martinez, I am Pablo!’ said a voice.

‘Martinez, I am Jacopo!’ said another.

‘You are a traitor! You shall die!’

‘You are a murderer! You shall die!’

Two sharp blows could be heard. The spikes
which had secured the two ends of the bridge gave way beneath the axe.

A horrible cry re-echoed, and Martinez, clutching wildly, was hurled
into the gulf.

A league down-stream, the midshipman and
the boatswain met, after having forded the river Ixtolucca.

‘I have avenged Don Orteva!’ exclaimed
Jacopo.

‘And I,’ replied Pablo, ‘I have avenged
Spain!’

In this way was born the navy of the
Mexican Confederation. The two Spanish ships, handed over by the traitors,
remained with the new republic, and they became the kernel of the tiny fleet
which recently fought for Texas and California against the United States of
America.

In the month of September, 185-, I arrived
at Frankfort-on-the-Main. My passage through the principal German cities had
been brilliantly marked by balloon ascents; but as yet no German had
accompanied me in my car, and the fine experiments made at Paris by MM. Green,
Eugene Godard, and Poitevin had not tempted the grave Teutons to essay aerial
voyages.

But scarcely had the news of my approaching
ascent spread through Frankfort, than three of the principal citizens begged
the favour of being allowed to ascend with me. Two days afterwards we were to
start from the Place de la Comedie. I began at once to get my balloon ready. It
was of silk, prepared with gutta-percha, a substance impermeable by acids or
gasses; and its volume, which was 3,000 cubic yards, enabled it to ascend to
the loftiest heights.

The day of the ascent was that of the great
September fair, which attracts so many people to Frankfort. Lighting gas, of a
perfect quality and of great lifting power, had been furnished to me in
excellent condition, and about eleven o’clock the balloon was filled; but only
three-quarters filled, – an indispensable precaution, for, as one rises, the
atmosphere diminishes in density, and the fluid enclosed within the balloon,
acquiring more elasticity, might burst its sides. My calculations had furnished
me with exactly the quantity of gas necessary to carry up my companions and
myself.

We were to start at noon. The impatient
crowd which pressed around the enclosed space, filling the enclosed square,
overflowing into the contiguous streets, and covering the houses from the
ground floor to the slated gables, presented a striking scene. The high winds
of the preceding days had subsided. An oppressive heat fell from the cloudless
sky. Scarcely a breath animated the atmosphere. In such weather, one might
descend again upon the very spot whence he had risen.

I carried 300 pounds of ballast in bags;
the car, quite round, four feet in diameter, was comfortably arranged; the
hempen cords which supported it stretched symmetrically over the upper
hemisphere of the balloon; the compass was in place, the barometer suspended in
the circle which united the supporting cords, and the anchor carefully put in
order. All was now ready for the ascent.

Among those who pressed around the
enclosure, I remarked a young man with a pale face and agitated features. The
sight of him impressed me. He was an eager spectator of my ascents, whom I had
already met in several German cities. With an uneasy air, he closely watched
the curious machine, as it lay motionless a few feet above the ground; and he
remained silent among those about him.

Twelve o’clock came. The moment had
arrived, but my travelling companions did not appear.

I sent to their houses, and learnt that one
had left for Hamburg, another for Vienna, and the third for London. Their
courage had failed them at the moment of undertaking one of those excursions
which, thanks to the ability of living aeronauts, are free from all danger. As
they formed, in some sort, a part of the programme of the day, the fear had
seized them that they might be forced to execute it faithfully, and they had
fled far from the scene at the instant when the balloon was being filled. Their
courage was evidently the inverse ratio of their speed – in decamping.

The multitude, half deceived, showed not a
little ill-humour. I did not hesitate to ascend alone. In order to re-establish
the equilibrium between the specific gravity of the balloon and the weight
which had thus proved wanting, I replaced my companions by more sacks of sand,
and got into the car. The twelve men who held the balloon by twelve cords
fastened to the equatorial circle, let them slip a little between their
fingers, and the balloon rose several feet higher. There was not a breath of
wind, and the atmosphere was so leaden that it seemed to forbid the ascent.

‘Is everything ready?’ I cried.

The men put themselves in readiness. A last
glance told me that I might go.

‘Attention!’

There was a movement in the crowd, which
seemed to be invading the enclosure.

‘Let go!’

The balloon rose slowly, but I experienced
a shock which threw me to the bottom of the car.

When I got up, I found myself face to face
with an unexpected fellow-voyager, – the pale young man.

‘Monsieur, I salute you,’ said he, with the
utmost coolness.

‘By what right -’

‘Am I here? By the right which the
impossibility of your getting rid of me confers.’

I was amazed! His calmness put me out of
countenance, and I had nothing to reply. I looked at the intruder but he took
no notice of my astonishment.

‘Does my weight disarrange your
equilibrium, monsieur?’ he asked. ‘You will permit me -’

And without waiting for my consent, he
relieved the balloon of two bags, which he threw into space.

‘Monsieur,’ said I, taking the only course
now possible, ‘you have come; very well, you will remain; but to me alone
belongs the management of the balloon.’

‘Monsieur,’ said he, ‘your urbanity is
French all over: it comes from my own country. I morally press the hand you
refuse me. Make all precautions, and act as seems best to you. I will wait till
you have done -’

‘For what?’

‘To talk with you.’

The barometer had fallen to twenty-six
inches. We were nearly 600 yards above the city; but nothing betrayed the
horizontal displacement of the balloon, for the mass of air in which it is
enclosed goes forward with it. A sort of confused glow enveloped the objects
spread out under us, and unfortunately obscured their outline.

I examined my companion afresh.

He was a man of thirty years, simply clad.
The sharpness of his features betrayed an indomitable energy, and he seemed
very muscular. Indifferent to the astonishment he created, he remained
motionless, trying to distinguish the objects which were vaguely confused below
us.