Journey Through the Impossible (19 page)

Tartelet: And will you be so kind as to take us there?

First Altorian: What do you mean? We will ask your permission to
introduce you to our Academy of Sciences.

Tartelet: The Academy of Sciences?

First Altorian: And then you will be placed in the Museum of Natural History.

Valdemar: You mean ... mounted?

Second Altorian: Oh no. Embalmed.

Tartelet: Embalmed? Just a minute, now.

First Altorian: Oh, later, only after you are dead.

Valdemar: That's very kind of you, sir.

Tartelet: Lead on, then. We'll follow you.

Valdemar: My goodness, it's a long way to the city! Couldn't we rest
a little before we go on?

First Altorian: This is the home of a scientist who recently arrived
with his daughter from the remotest regions of Altor. (Pointing to
a house on the right) He'll welcome you to his cottage.

Tartelet: A cottage! That? Its walls are studded with precious stones!

Valdemar: And the roof is thatched with gold! We're just beggars
here. My diamond is worthless now. Here it is.

(He takes it out of his pocket)

First Altorian: You'll find bigger and more beautiful diamonds than
that lying on the ground wherever you go.

Valdemar: Damn!

First Altorian (examining it): We don't even use them to pave our roads.

Valdemar: It isn't worth as much as an ordinary paving stone. I'm
ruined! And I'm not going to keep it. Definitely not! (Throwing it
away) Ah! Definitely not.

Tartelet: Well, I'd like to keep it as a souvenir of the center of our
globe. (He picks it up)

(Enter Volsius at the door of the cottage, dressed as an Altorian)

Volsius: Foreigners?

Tartelet: Inhabitants of planet Earth, sir.

Volsius: Earth! A planet of the twenty-fifth magnitude, lighted by
only a single sun.

Valdemar: Does he think that isn't enough?

Tartelet: Excuse me, sir. Do you have several suns here?

Volsius: Here there are two, and six moons that rise, one after the
other, above the horizon of Altor.

Tartelet: Two suns?

Valdemar: Six moons! So if one of them deluneates-I mean, disappears from view...

Tartelet: You still have five. You seem to be well informed about the
planet we've just left.

Volsius: Yes, we know all about it. Two hundred thousand years of
progress, from one generation to another, have brought us to the
highest peak in every field. Our telescopes, whose magnification
can be said to be unlimited, enable us to see your Earth as if it
were less than a league away.

Tartelet: Splendid!

Volsius: But there are a few points on which our scientists would like
some clarification. There is some kind of city with a small hill
overlooking it, a river meandering through it, large buildings,
squares, and people everywhere, many people, bustling about in
the fog during the winter and in the dust during the summer.
What is it?

Tartelet (aside): A city that never gets watered. It must be Paris.

Volsius: We have distinctly made out a large public square with a
bridge at one end. Across from the bridge there is a sort of palace
in which a crowd of busy people gather. They obviously talk a lot
and they never agree.

Valdemar: I know that country. I've been there. The bridge is called
the Pont de la Concorde15 and the palace at the end of it is called
the Palace of Discor.... I mean, the Chamber of Deputies.16

Tartelet: Yes, it's the palace of the legislative body. (Aside) What was
I going to do there?

Volsius: What goes on in this palace?

Valdemar: What goes on? Cabinet ministers get voted out of office.

Volsius: It also seems that in this city people jostle each other around
from time to time. They fight, then they kiss, then they fight some
more, then they kiss again.

Tartelet: That settles it! It's Paris, the capital of our fair land of
France.

Valdemar: Paris. They eat beef, etc.

Volsius: Your country is not easy to govern, then.

Tartelet: And what about yours, sir?

Volsius: Ours? Well, that's different. It governs itself.

Tartelet: Governs itself?

Volsius: Yes, for several thousand years now we've been trying out
every system of government: absolute government, which was
overthrown by a constitutional monarchy, then constitutional
government, which was overthrown by the Republic.17

Tartelet: And the Republic itself?

Volsius: Overthrown by the republicans.

Tartelet: And have you finally settled on something?

Volsius: Yes, we have no government at all.

Valdemar: And does it work?

Volsius: It works perfectly. In fact, it works too well, because the
result of progress is that everyone has become scholarly. The shoemakers write poetry and the bakers take up astronomy. We
haven't enough workers, and we'll get to the point where we have
to pass a decree making ignorance compulsory.

Tartelet: You'll make ignorance compulsory?

Volsius: Another problem is a surplus population, which is becoming
very awkward, since it increases every day, and the average lifespan here is two or three hundred years.

Valdemar: People live for three hundred years here?

Volsius: Yes, sir.

Valdemar: Don't you have any doctors?

Volsius: We were foolish enough to abolish them. Since then, we've
tried to train some new ones, but they haven't had time to make a
thorough study of medicine, and the result is that they cure their
patients.

Valdemar: Excuse me, but could you explain one small point for me,
please? Why is it that here I feel as light as a feather? I'm walking
around like a butterfly.

Tartelet: So am I. Without even trying, I lift my feet so high that it
seems to me I must look like a rooster.

Valdemar: Or a turkey!

(They lift their legs very high as they walk)

Volsius: It's very simple, gentlemen. Do you expend the same energy
to walk on this planet as you did on your own?

Tartelet and Valdemar: Yes, of course.

Volsius: And since the mass of Altor is one-twentieth that of Earth,
the gravitational pull toward the center is much weaker here, and
your muscular strength appears to increase a hundredfold.

Tartelet: Ah, yes. I see.

Valdemar: I don't follow that at all.

Tartelet: So if I were to give dancing lessons here....

Volsius: You would see your pupils leaping to unusual heights.

Tartelet: What if I were to do an entrechat?

Volsius (laughing): You might fly away.

Valdemar: Don't do anything foolish, Tartelet. Don't try an
entrechat.

Volsius: But I was told that four foreigners had arrived.

Tartelet: Our travelling companions aren't far away. They're busy
studying the great construction works being carried out here.

(Enter George and Ox)

Volsius: It's a gigantic project that our engineers have undertaken.

George: Yes, yes, it certainly is gigantic. Enormous gates and huge
locks that seem designed to open a passage and let all the water in
the ocean drain out of the bed that nature created for it.

Volsius: You're quite right. That is exactly what it is all about, gentlemen.

George: But why? What's the purpose?

Ox: This world on which we have just landed has been in existence
for millions of years. It has exhausted the soil needed to feed its
huge and growing population. It has exhausted the quarries
needed to house them. It has dug bottomless mines to satisfy the
needs of an extravagant civilization and industry, with the result
that this planet is pitted everywhere with enormous holes, down
to its uttermost depths.18

Valdemar: You mean we aren't safe here?

Volsius: No! Because the walls surrounding the central fire are no longer
solid enough, and it threatens to break through to the outside.

Ox: And thousands of craters might open up at any minute.

Tartelet: Well! We chose a fine time to arrive!

Valdemar (to Volsius): Excuse me, sir. How do you get to Copenhagen from here?

Volsius: Don't worry. Our scientists tell us they have discovered a way
to save us all from starving to death or being consumed by fire.

George: And how will they do that?

Ox (sarcastically): The first step is to cultivate the vast sea-covered
plains by diverting the ocean through the huge cavities that I just
mentioned, down into the center of this planet.

Volsius: Where it will extinguish the fire that threatens to break out.

George: Would they dare to carry out that momentous project?

Ox: That incredible madness!

George: It's a marvellous plan. I wish I could help to carry it out.

Volsius: Nothing could be easier. This is the day when the huge locks
you saw just now will be opened. Come, gentlemen. Before we
take you to our capital, my daughter and I will do the honors and
show you around our house.

(George and Ox head for the cottage on the right, followed by Volsius)

Tartelet (takes out his handkerchief and a piece of paper falls to the
ground): Well, well, what's that? Ah! It's the telegram for Valdemar
that was handed to me back on Earth, and I forgot to give it to
him. Hey! Valdemar! Valdemar!

(George, Ox, and Volsius enter the cottage. As Valdemar is about to
follow them, Tartelet takes him by the arm)

Valdemar: Mr. Tartelet!

Tartelet: My friend, just as we were about to take our places in the
Columbiad, a telegram arrived for you.

Valdemar: A telegram? Where is it?

Tartelet: You weren't there yet. They handed it to me and-my
goodness!-I must confess that I put it in my pocket and forgot
about it.

Valdemar: Good God! It was an answer! An answer from Miss Babichok! Well, give it to me, then. Give it here!

Tartelet (gives him the telegram): Here it is.

Valdemar (reads): "Terrible event. At wedding banquet Cousin Finderup choked on fish bone." (Sadly) Dead! He's dead. Poor Finderup is d.... (Smiling) During the wedding banquet! Between
noon and one o'clock. And Babichok is a widow! (Cheerfully) Ah!
A widow, she's a widow, my friend. And on her wedding-day. Yes!
Between noon and one o'clock. Ah!

Tartelet: Read the rest.

Valdemar: Yes, yes. I'll read it. (Very sadly) Cousin Finderup swallowed a fishbone. Cousin Finderup choked to death. (Cheerily)
"Come back quickly. (With feeling) No matter if you are still a
little overweight, if diamond is a lot overweight." (Speaking) Ah!
That's so nice, so sweet, so tender!

Tartelet: Very tender. Yes.

Valdemar: Babichok, dear Babichok. She wants me. She's waiting for
me. Quick, quick! I'll run to her. Horses! A carriage! A railway!

Tartelet: You want to travel through the limitless reaches of outer
space in a carriage or a railway?

Valdemar: That's true. I wasn't thinking. So this is where you hand
me that telegram!

Tartelet: Unfortunately, yes.

Valdemar: And when it arrived, I was only fifteen hundred leagues
from Babichok.

Tartelet: So? It was just a little oversight.

Valdemar: Just a little oversight, he says! When Babichok is waiting
for me, when she's free, a widow, choked to death-I mean, he is,
Finderup. Are you aware, sir, that I'm entitled to hold you responsible for anything that may happen?

Tartelet: Responsible? Me? Really!

Valdemar (angrily): If she marries someone else, will you undertake
to strangle that person, sir?

Tartelet: Mr. Valdemar, I advise you to use a more appropriate tone
of voice when you speak to me, or else....

Valdemar: Or else? Or else what? What?

Tartelet: Be careful, Mr. Valdemar.

Valdemar: Be careful yourself. And don't forget that on this planet
my strength is ten times greater.

Tartelet: And so is mine, I suppose. And to prove it.... (Bam.) There!

(He gives him a vigorous kick in the seat of the pants. Valdemar goes
flying two meters off the ground.)

Valdemar: Hey! What was that for?

(He falls to the ground.)

Tartelet (laughs): Ha, ha, ha! A weaker force of gravity. Point your
toes out, sir, point your toes out!

Valdemar: Ah! You scoundrel!

(He kicks Tartelet)

Tartelet (flying into the air): Ah!

(He falls back to the ground)

Valdemar: A weaker force of gravity, sir. A weaker force of gravity.
Sh! Someone's coming!

(Eva comes out of the building, dressed as a young Altorian woman)

Eva: The door of my father's house is open to you, gentlemen.

Tartelet: Your.... Ah, yes. Excuse me, miss.

Eva: Your friends are waiting for you.

Valdemar: We'll join them now.

Tartelet (threateningly): Whenever you wish, sir!

(They meet at the door)

Valdemar (in a friendly tone): After you.

Tartelet (in the same tone): Go ahead.

Valdemar (in the same tone): I couldn't possibly.

Tartelet: Well, then, if you insist.

(They both go in at the same time)

Eva (dreamily): My mysterious protector has told me that George will
soon recover his sanity, but perhaps for the last time. And this
must be the place where our cruel enemy will put him through a
trial that would destroy him. Oh, I don't want to be a stranger in
his eyes any longer. My reason for following him was to share his
danger. I'll make myself known to him, but only to him. Dr. Ox
still keeps looking at me, but he hasn't recognized me.

(Enter Ox.)

Ox: There she is! It's really her.

Eva: It's him!

Ox: Just a moment, please.

Eva: My father is waiting for me. If you will excuse me....

Ox: The man who is in there is not your father, and I recognize you.

Eva: Well, I don't know you.

Ox: I don't know what power or what miracle has brought you here,
but you are Eva, and you know that I....

Eva: I don't know you, I said.