Captain Nemo: The Fantastic History of a Dark Genius (18 page)

He had absorbed the wilderness adventures of James Fenimore Cooper, tales of wild Indians, Hawkeye and Chinganook,
The Last of the Mohicans, The Deerslayer, Drums Along the Mohawk
.
 
He had learned about survival in an untamed new world.
 

But though he furiously rubbed sticks together, he got no smoke or sparks -- only blisters.

Frustrated, Verne knocked apart his pile of firewood and scanned the islet again.
 
His stomach knotted with the first pangs of hunger, and he wondered what he might eat, since he had packed no lunch.
 
Could he perhaps fashion a stone knife or maybe a throwing ax to kill some wild animal?
 
He would skin it and roast its haunch over a crackling fire.
 

But again, he had no fire, no weapons, and he’d never killed anything in his life.
 
He couldn’t recall seeing any animals other than a few sparrows on this whole islet.
 
He doubted he could even catch fish in the river without net or line.

How could anyone survive like this?

Before the afternoon was out, Verne was miserable.
 
When he went back to the shore, he found that the broken boat lay high on a hummock of wet silt.
 
The tide had gone out, draining the estuary and leaving an expanse of glistening mud flats.
 
With a sinking feeling, he realized he could simply walk to the main shore.

Verne sloshed through brown, ankle-deep muck and lost one of his shoes in the sucking mire.
 
The mud flats stank of old weeds and refuse and belly-up fish.
 
Verne’s sunburned face was streaked with tears and mud spatters by the time he dragged himself up the bank of the Loire, then to the road back to Nantes.

Aching and weary, a one-shoed Verne stumbled toward Ile Feydeau.
 
Fortunately, the driver of a passing horsecart took pity on him and let the young man climb into the back and ride the rest of the way along the bumpy road.
 

With his clothes torn and dirty, his red hair disheveled, Verne made it back home just in time for supper.

ii

Shipwrecked.
 
Marooned on a desert island.
 

Nemo collected himself, wet, bedraggled, and hungry on the stony beach.
 
He would have to work hard here, but he had his wits, his resourcefulness, and his sheer stamina.
 
He was better equipped than most people would have been.

His time on board the
Coralie
had toughened him, given him the skills and strength to endure much adversity.
 
He had always been a clever young man, and Captain Grant had taught him many things.
 
He would survive.

One step at a time.
 
After drinking his fill from a thin silver stream that ran to the beach, Nemo looked around himself, listening to the roar of the sea as he concentrated, deciding where to begin.
 
Waves curled against black reefs that sheltered the lagoon.
 
With forced optimism, he decided that eking out a living here day by day probably wouldn’t be much more difficult than being a penniless orphan in France. . . .

As his first order of business, he dragged the battered crates, the torn sail cloth, and other bits of wreckage higher up the beach to where a line of dunes met a pitted rock wall.
 
A shallow overhang formed enough shelter for Nemo to make camp.

He cracked open the two crates and separated out the items he could use.
 
With care, he unknotted the lashing rope, knowing it might be one of his most valuable possessions until he could weave cords of his own.
 
From his shirt, he removed the waterlogged and cutlass-scarred journal that Verne had given him.

From the first crate he set out a few bolts of cloth to dry in the sun, a magnifying glass, a sewing kit with four needles and two spools of thread, a thin dagger (better suited as a letter-opener), and a set of silverware, engraved and obviously intended as someone’s dining set.
 
Nemo could use the utensils for cutting and carving other items he would need.
 
Next to them he set the small keg of black powder, which might yet be of some value to him.
 
In the back of his mind he was already formulating plans, considering options.
 

It was a start.
 

At times, he felt suddenly overwhelmed as the immensity of the problem raised itself before him.
 
But he took a deep breath and focused his thoughts, getting back to the task at hand.

In the second crate he found a tortoise-shell comb, a lady’s mirror, two bottles of brandy, a shoehorn, one black leather boot, whalebone stays for a corset, and a perfumed sachet that now smelled more of fish than flower blossoms.
 
He had no idea how he would make use of these items, but he didn’t dare throw anything away.
 
He might be on this island for a long, long time.

Nemo could see a curl of smoke rising from the volcanic crater, as if it slumbered uneasily.
 
Girdling the central volcano, lush jungles covered the island.
 
He assumed he could find edible fruits and wild game there.
 
He might even be able to trap fish in the lagoon.

He could pound the fibers of vines and make them into rope or twine.
 
He could fashion snares, weave baskets.
 
It would be difficult, but he would manage.
 
He concentrated on the possibilities, rather than the overwhelming problems.

As gulls and albatrosses screamed overhead, Nemo remembered how glad he’d been to see the birds when he was lost and adrift.
 
Now he studied the cliffs and the fallen rocks on the beach.
 
Most of the stones were black lava rock, but he recognized several chunks of flint.
 
An excellent find indeed.

Now he could get down to the next order of business.

Nemo gathered a pile of dry driftwood from high on the beach, then struck the steel dagger against a lump of flint.
 
He worked for half an hour until his arms and fingers ached, but finally he struck a spark that caught on a wad of dried seaweed.
 
Soon he had a smoky, foul-smelling fire crackling against the dunes.
 
The first step of civilization.

The flames cheered Nemo’s heart.
 
He sat staring into the burning driftwood, thinking of his circumstances and trying to decide how he should proceed next.
 
Once he had a plan, he could see things improving.
 
He had the power of his imagination.

At the moment, however, his stomach was knotted in agonized hunger.
 
After days with almost nothing to eat, he wasn’t sure he had the strength to forge a path through dense foliage in search of coconuts or breadfruit.
 
Instead, he waded into the lagoon and secured handfuls of mussels that clung to the rocks.
 
He used the dagger to pry open the black shells and, though their flesh was bitter, he swallowed each morsel.
 
Next, he tried rinsing and chewing some of the seaweed.
 
Despite the strange, salty taste and stringy texture, it provided some substance for his digestive system.

He slept on the sand in the shelter of the rocky overhang, hunched against repeated stomach cramps.
 
He must have derived some nourishment from the food, though, because the next morning Nemo awoke feeling much stronger.
 
Curious and alert, he set out into the jungle to explore his new world. . . .

It didn’t take him long to locate coconut palms, papayas, mangoes, and sweet berries.
 
As he had hoped, he also found thin vines and made plans to cut them.
 
Using pieces of flint from the beach cliffs, he could, with some effort, fashion stone knives or axes.

His initial exploration continued for days.
 
He spent several nights in tree branches, always careful to keep track of the way back to his initial camp down on the beach.
 
At night he heard wild boars rooting through the undergrowth and sensed the slithering rustle of snakes through the branches above.
 

As he climbed up the slopes of the volcano to get a vantage on his surroundings, the ground became rockier.
 
Nemo discovered several hot springs.
 
In a warm mineral pool, he took a long bath, reveling in the tingle of his aching muscles and the luxurious sensation of being clean again.
 
His imagination began working again, deciding how best to use this new discovery.

Halfway up the steep mountainside, he encountered a grassy, tree-dotted plateau just at the edge of the jungles.
 
Nemo looked out from the top of the plateau to where the rockface dropped off in a sheer cliff.
 
Far below, the sheltered lagoon lay placid against the beach where he had washed ashore.
 
Partway down the cliff, large natural caves peered out like eye sockets.
 

Now he decided on the next thing to do.
 
Once he fashioned a sturdy rope, Nemo could secure the line to one of the tree trunks and descend the cliff face to explore the caves.

High on the plateau edge, he recognized the potential of such a shelter.
 
From there, he would be able to see passing ships, and he could build a large signal fire on the plateau overlooking the sea.
 
His thoughts grew more ambitious -- and why not, if he had sufficient time?
 
By using pulleys and vine-fiber ropes, he could set up a counter-weighted elevator system to get him up and down the cliffside, while keeping him safe from the island’s predators.

He looked around, mentally keeping a tally.
 
When he returned to the beach, he would scratch his lists and plans inside the blank, waterstained journal Jules Verne had given him.
 
Nemo didn’t want to forget any of his ideas.

A stream that ran across the meadow would provide fresh water.
 
The volcanic hot springs were also near.
 
With hollowed-out bamboo piping, he could run water from both the stream and the hot springs down into the caves so that he could wash, cook, or even heat a bath if he wished.
 
And no landlord to throw him out, no matter what he did.

Nemo grew excited at the possibilities.
 
He had much to do.
 

He would soon grow tired of coconut and breadfruit supplemented by seaweed and mussels.
 
He would need to make spears for himself, as well as bows and arrows for hunting, nets for fishing.
 
He had seen goats running wild on the grassy meadows; in time, he might build a corral and domesticate the animals, so he could have a supply of meat and milk.

Nemo paused, still haunted by thoughts of everything he had lost because of the pirate attack and the circling sharks.
 
He missed Captain Grant, not to mention Jules Verne and Caroline Aronnax (he still kept her frayed and faded hair ribbon knotted around his wrist).
 

It might be years and years until he saw them again.
 
If ever.

#

Back on the beach, Nemo found a broad stream that drained into the ocean.
 
While wading in it, holding a stick for balance, he discovered good sticky clay on the river bottom.
 
Each time he found a new resource such as this, he immediately realized how he might use it.
 
With his hands he scooped out piles of the clay, which he formed into crude bricks.
 
He set them out on the beach to dry hard in the sun.
 

But that was only a first step, not good enough for what Nemo had in mind.
 
After two days he stacked the bricks and, using more fresh clay as mortar, built a hollow beehive structure with airholes on top:
a kiln
.