The Floating Island (11 page)

“Then
—
you accept the situation?” asked
Pinchinat.

“No, but do not complicate it.”

“And our luggage on the road to
San Diego!” remarked his highness, crossing his arms.

“And our concert to-morrow!” exclaimed
Zorn.

“We will give it by telephone,”
said the first violin, but the joke had anything but a soothing effect on the
excited ‘cellist.

The observatory, it will be
remembered, occupied the middle of a vast square, on which abutted the First
Avenue. At the other end of this principal artery, some two miles long, which
separated the two sections of Milliard City, the artistes could perceive a sort
of monumental palace, surmounted by a belfry of very light and elegant
construction. They said to themselves that this must be the seat of government
of the island, the residence of the municipality, supposing that Milliard City
had a mayor and etceteras. They were not mistaken. And just then the clock in
the belfry gave forth a joyous carillon, the notes of which reached the tower
with the last undulations of the breeze.

“Listen!” said Yvernès. “That is
in D major.”

“And in two-four time,” said
Pinchinat.

The clock was striking five.

“And dinner,” exclaimed Sebastien
Zorn, “and bed! Are we, owing to this miserable Munbar, to spend the night on
this platform a hundred and fifty feet in the air?”

It was to be feared so, if the
lift did not afford the prisoners the means of quitting their prison.

In fact the twilight is short in
these low latitudes, and the sun falls like a projectile below the horizon. The
four looked away to the furthest limits of the sky, over a deserted sea,
without a sail, without even a trace of smoke. Across the country ran the trams
away to the shore of the island, and between the two harbours. At this time the
park was crowded. From the tower it looked like an immense basket of flowers
—
azaleas, clematis,
jasmine, glycenas, passion-flowers, begonias, salvias, hyacinths, dahlias,
camellias, roses of a hundred varieties. The people were crowding in, grown men
and young folks, none of those little fops which are the shame of the great
cities of Europe, but strong, well-built adults. Women and girls, most of them
in pale straw-coloured dresses, the hue preferred in the torrid zone, leading
little lap-dogs in silk coats with chains laced with gold. Here and there these
people were following the sandy paths, capriciously winding among the lawns.
Some were reclining on the cushions of electric cars, others were seated on
benches sheltered by the trees. Farther off young gentlemen were playing
tennis, and cricket, and golf, and also polo, mounted on spirited ponies.
Groups of children
—
American
children of astonishing exuberance, among whom originality is so precocious,
particularly in the case of the girls
—
were
playing on the grass.

The commercial quarters of the
town were still busy at this time of day.

The moving footways still ran on with
their burden of passengers down the principal streets. At the foot of the tower,
in the square of the observatory, there was a passing crowd whose attention the
four prisoners endeavoured to attract.

Pinchinat and Frascolin yelled
again and again to them. They were heard, evidently, for arms were stretched
out towards them, and even words reached their ears. But there was no sign of
surprise. Nobody seemed astonished at the group on the tower.

The words that came aloft were “good-bye”
and “how do you do,” and “good-evening,” and other formulas of polite greeting.
It seemed as though the people had been informed of the arrival of the four
Parisians on Floating Island.

“Ah!”  said Pinchinat, “they are
laughing at us.”

“I think they are,” remarked Yvernès.

An hour went by
—
an hour during
which their appeals were in vain. The pressing invitations of Frascolin met
with no more success than the furious invectives of Zorn. And the dinner-hour
was approaching, the park was beginning to empty, the idlers in the streets
were clearing off. It was maddening.

“Certainly,” said Yvernès, “we
resemble the people whom some evil genius attracted within a sacred enclosure,
and who were condemned to perish for having seen what their eyes should not
have seen.”

“And we are to be left to the
tortures of hunger,” said Pinchinat.

“That shall not be until we have
exhausted every means of prolonging our existence,” said Zorn.

“If we have to eat each other, we
will let Yvernès be number one!” said Pinchinat.

“When you please!” sighed the
first violin in a subdued voice, bowing his head to receive the fatal blow.

At this moment a noise was heard
in the depths of the tower. The cage of the lift came up and stopped at the
platform. The prisoners, expecting to sec Calistus Munbar, prepared to give him
the welcome he deserved.

The cage was empty.

Be it so. There was plenty of
time for that. The hoaxed would not fail to find the hoaxer. The thing to do at
once was to descend to his level, and the way to do that was to enter the cage.

That is what they did; and as
soon as they were in it began to descend, and in less than a minute they were
at the ground level of the tower.

The door opened. The four went
out. The interior court was deserted. They crossed it and took one of the paths
along the square.

A few people were moving about
who appeared to take no notice of the strangers. At a remark from Frascolin,
advising him to be cautious, Zorn restrained his tempestuous recriminations. It
was of the authorities that they must demand justice. There was no danger in
doing that. It was decided to return to the Excelsior Hotel and wait until the
morning to claim their rights as free men; and the quartette began to walk
along First Avenue.

Did they attract much attention?
Yes and no. People looked at them, but not to any great extent
—
as though, perhaps,
they were some of the few tourists occasionally visiting Milliard City. The
quartette, under the influence of such extraordinary circumstances, did not
feel very comfortable, and thought they were gazed at much more than they
really were. On the other hand, it was not astonishing that the people appeared
strange to them, these islanders of a moving island, these men voluntarily
separated from their kind wandering over the face of the largest ocean of the globe.
With a little imagination they might fancy these Floating Islanders belonged to
another planet of the solar system. This was the opinion of Yvernès, whose
excitable brain was rather attracted by imaginary worlds. As to Pinchinat, he
was content to say,
—

“These people we are meeting have
quite a millionaire look about them, and seem to be fitted with screws behind,
like their island.”

But they got more and more
hungry, and began to hurry towards the hotel. In the morning they would see about
getting back to San Diego on one of the Floating Island steamers, after
receiving an indemnity which Calistus Munbar would have to pay, as was only
just.

But as they were going along
First Avenue, Frascolin stopped before a sumptuous edifice, on the front of
which, in gold letters, was the inscription “Casino.” To the right of the
superb arcade which surmounted the principal door a restaurant was visible, and
through the arabesqued glass could be seen a series of tables, of which some
were occupied by diners, while a numerous staff was busy about them.

“Here people eat!” said the
second violin, consulting his famished comrades with a look.

Pinchinat’s laconic reply was, “Let
us go in.”

And they entered the restaurant
in single file. No particular notice seemed to be taken of their presence in
this establishment, usually patronized by strangers. Five minutes afterwards
they were attacking the first course of an excellent dinner, of which Pinchinat
had chosen the bill of fare. Fortunately, the quartette’s purse was well filled,
and if it ran low on Floating Island it would soon be replenished by the
takings at San Diego.

The cookery was excellent, being
much superior to that of the New York and San Francisco hotels; the apparatus
used was the electric stove, admirably adapted for either a fierce or gentle
fire. The preserved oyster soup, fricasseed corn, stewed celery, and rhubarb
cakes, which are traditional, were followed by fish of extreme freshness, rump-steaks
of incomparable tenderness, game doubtless from the forests and prairies of
California, and vegetables grown on the island. As drinks, there was no iced
water in American fashion, but various beers and wines which the growers of
Burgundy, the Bordelais, and the Rhine had placed in the cellars of Milliard
City
—
at a high
price we may be sure.

This bill of fare cheered up the
Parisians. Their ideas took another turn. Perhaps they took a less gloomy view
of the day’s adventures. It is well known that orchestral musicians know how to
drink, as is only natural with those who expend their breath in chasing
sonorous waves through wind instruments, though less excusable with those who
have only to manipulate the strings. It is of no consequence, however. Yvernès,
Pinchinat, and Frascolin began to see life in rose colour, and even in the
colours of gold, in this city of millionaires. Sebastien Zorn alone refused to
follow his comrades’ lead, and did not let his anger drown in the vintages of
France.

In short, the quartette had
become very well satisfied with themselves on the whole, when the time came to
ask for their bill. It was handed to Frascolin by the superintendent in a black
coat. The second violin cast his eyes on the total, rose from his seat, sat
down again, rose again, rubbed his eyes, and looked at the ceiling.

“What is the matter with you?”
asked Yvernès.

“A shudder from head to foot,”
replied Frascolin.

“Is it dear?”

“More than dear. We have to pay
two hundred francs.”

“The four?”

“No
—
each.”

In fact, the amount was a hundred
and sixty dollars. The game cost fifteen dollars, the fish twenty dollars, the
rump-steaks twenty-five dollars, the Medoc and Burgundy thirty dollars a
bottle, the rest at the same rate.

“Confound it!” exclaimed his
Highness.

“The thieves!”  exclaimed
Sebastien Zorn.

These remarks being in French
were not understood by the restaurant manager. Nevertheless this personage was
quite aware of what was passing. But if a slight smile appeared on his lips, it
was a smile of surprise not of disdain. It seemed to him quite natural that a
dinner should cost a hundred and sixty dollars. That was the price in Floating
Island.

“No scandal!” said Pinchinat. “France
is looking at us. Let us pay.”

“And no matter how,” replied
Frascolin. “On the road to San Diego, after to-morrow, we shall not have enough
to buy a sandwich with!”

So saying, he took out his purse
and extracted from it a respectable number of paper dollars, which,
fortunately, were current at Milliard City, and he was about to hand them over
when a voice was heard,
—

“These gentlemen have not to pay
anything.”

It was the voice of Calistus
Munbar. The Yankee had just entered the room, expansive and smiling as usual.

“At last!” shouted Zorn, feeling
inclined to take him by the throat and clutch him as he clutched the
fingerboard of his ‘cello in the
forte
passages.

“Be calm, my dear Zorn,” said the
American. “Let us go into the room where coffee is waiting for us. There we can
talk at our ease, and when our conversation is over
—
”

“I will strangle you!”  replied
Sebastien Zorn.

“No, you will kiss my hands.”

“I shall not kiss you at all,”
said the ‘cellist, by turns red and white with anger.

A minute afterwards, Calistus
Munbar’s guests were lounging on soft couches while he was balancing himself in
a rocking-chair.

And this is what he said by way of
introduction:
—

“Calistus Munbar, of New York,
fifty years of age, great-grand-nephew of the celebrated Barnum, at the moment
Superintendent of the Fine Arts of Floating Island, entrusted with all that
concerns painting, sculpture, music, and the pleasures generally of Milliard
City. And now that you know me, gentlemen
—
”

“Is it by chance,” said Zorn, “that
you are not also an agent of the police, entrusted with the enticing of people
into traps and keeping them prisoners, whether they like it or not?”

“Do not be too hasty, irritable ‘cellist,”
replied the American, “and wait for the end.”

“We will wait,” said Frascolin,
gravely, “and we are listening.”

“Gentlemen,” continued Calistus
Munbar, graciously, “all I wish to touch on in this interview is the question
of music as it exists in our island. Lyrical theatres, Milliard City does not
as yet possess any, but if you wish it, they will rise from the soil as by
enchantment. Up to the present our fellow-citizens have satisfied their musical
tendencies by keeping themselves acquainted with the masterpieces of lyric art
by means of the most approved apparatus. The ancient and modern masters, the
great artistes of the day, the most sought after of instrumentalists, have been
heard by us by means of the phonograph
—
”

“A mere bird-organ” your
phonograph!” exclaimed Yvernès, disdainfully.

“Not quite so much as you may
think,” said the superintendent. “We are the possessors of instruments which
have enabled us to listen to you when you were at Boston or Philadelphia; and
if you please, you can applaud yourself with your own hands.”

At this period the inventions of
the illustrious Edison had attained their final degree of perfection. The
phonograph was no longer the mere musical-box which it resembled so closely to
begin with. Thanks to its admirable inventor, the ephemeral talent of singers
or instrumentalists had been preserved for the admiration of future races with
as much precision as the works of statuaries and painters. An echo, if you
will, but an echo faithful as a photograph reproduction, the shades and
delicacies of singing or playing in all their unalterable purity.