The Nyctalope on Mars 2: The Triumph of Love

by Jean de La Hire

  The following day, Sanglier and Bastien went back alone. They left Christiane at the château with Noël, but a Noël totally devoted to Saint-Clair, awaiting the arrival of circumstances that would permit him to ask the brother for his sister’s hand in marriage.

  Two days after that, using that banal means of locomotion, the railway, the butler Baptiste took the train to Saint-Flour, where a domestic from the Château de Pierrefort was waiting to conduct him to Madame Rondu. And on October 22, Franz Montal, defeated, reappeared in the light of day and resumed, with no fear of the XV, the direction of the Aéro-Garage Universel.

  On that same day, Monsieur Sanglier received a visit from a young man whose card read, simply: Damprich, Naval Ensign.

  On the following day, that same Damprich obtained an audience with General Darmant, then Minister of War. The consequences of that interview, as we have seen, were memorable.

  A week later, 3000 elite troops, comprising NCOs and soldiers, with 30 officers under the ultimate command of Colonel Bouttieaux, departed in 310 military aircraft from various garrisons in France and Algeria. The respective speed of each airplane was regulated in such a way that the 310 machines joined up in formation south of Biskra. There were 314, to be exact; one of the four additional aircraft carried Noël de Pierrefort, Christiane and Bastien; the second carried the astronomer Camille Flammarion and two young engineers; the third carried Maurice Reclus, the expedition’s historian, Henri François, the special correspondent of the newspaper Le Matin, and young Blériot, the son of the famous aviator;11 the fourth and last was manned by Ensign Damprich and the technician Normand.

  At sunset on November 3, the 314 aircraft deposited their 3042 passengers—including one sole female, Christiane—on the immense esplanade of the radiomotive station in the Congo. On the next day, they set to work, under the command of Colonel Bouttieaux and the technical direction of Ensign Damprich. They worked hard, awaiting news in the meantime of the Nyctalope and the companions, who had left with him for Mars.

  Part Four: The Nyctalope vs. the XV

  I. The Execution

  On Mars, things were not going as Saint-Clair had dared to hope.

  When he had left the Council Chamber with Koynos, a heavy silence full of amazement and reflection had at first descended upon the members of the XV assembled in tribunal. Their amazement and reflection was certainly admiring, but admiration does not always dispose the man heart to justice and generosity; often, when the admirer dreads being supplanted by the object of his admiration, it engenders cruelty, anger and a blind desire to overcome, kill and destroy.

  The silence was broken by these words from Oxus: “Brothers, you have heard the Nyctalope’s propositions. Decide!”

  One of the XV got up then. His hood was quivering furiously and his eyes, the only things visible through its almond-shaped holes, were fiery.

  “The Nyctalope’s propositions are, I admit, noble, clever, and flattering, in a sense!” he said in a furious voice. “But what have we to gain from his alliance? The Nyctalope’s mind is strong, but that strength can only extend into the domain of practicality on one condition—if we permit it. If we do not permit it, an electric current will destroy that strength along with the mortal body that it animates. Thus, all the Nyctalope’s power is ours, not his. Now, we are powerful by ourselves. Adding this man to us would augment his own power, but diminish that which we possess in by virtue of so many individualities forming the aggregate of the Fifteen…

  “With Saint-Clair dead, his companions, lost on Mars, are bound to die before very long. Death also awaits the 3000 men occupying the radiomotive station in the Congo; two radioplanes departing from here, with four Brothers armed with electro-mirrors, would rapidly sweep that human dust from within and without the station—and we would once again be the sole masters of our destiny.

  “As for the women, their fate has been decided by our previous deliberation. Within our houses, they are ours, and we, both within our houses and without, are the Master’s. The former does not detract from the latter, and more than the latter detracts from the former.

  “I vote, therefore, for Saint-Clair’s death. As for Koynos’ death, I will vote for that a third time, if twice is not sufficient.”

  And the man sat down.

  Who was he? The Brothers knew, for they recognized the orator by his voice, but the rule imposed a duty upon them to appear ignorant, and the tribunal conformed to that law, for no sign of approval or disapproval agitated the hoods.

  However, Kipper, the accuser, got up and said: “I agree with the vote that has just been registered, and I second it.”

  “Does anyone else want to speak?” Oxus asked.

  No one got up.

  “Everyone agrees with the vote?”

  No one replied—but the silence signified an affirmative answer.

  Oxus extended his right hand and said: “If we were men of Earth, I would speak against the sentiments that you have expressed, my brothers, in condemning the Nyctalope—but we have placed ourselves beyond the moral laws of humankind. Truly, we are strong enough to refuse any addition to our strength. Saint-Clair is therefore condemned. Things will be as if he were no longer alive—but I shall exercise my right as Master, specified in our constitution, to which you have sworn respect, obedience and fidelity; I have decided that Saint-Clair shall live another 30 full days, during which you can, provided that you are unanimous, revoke your sentence…”

  “Honored be the Master!” said Kipper.

  “And his will obeyed!” intoned the 12 judges, in unison.

  “As for Koynos,” Oxus added, “Let him be executed immediately, before the assembled Fifteen, all of the companions and one in ten of the slaves. The Nyctalope will also witness the execution, which shall be by the blade, as is ordained in the case of any crime that can only be expunged by bloodshed. I order it thus, in order that the example might be more memorable. Kipper, as accuser, will give the order to the executioner. The execution will take pace on the esplanade to the west of my palace.” He got up, opened his arms wide is a gesture prescribed by ritual, and announced: “The tribunal is dissolved. With a pure conscience, Brothers, go in peace…”

  An hour later, the esplanade to the west of Oxus’ palace presented a strange and grandiose spectacle.

  The 13 Brothers, surrounded by tall guards armed with electro-mirrors, were standing in a row on a platform, dressed in their official costumes of white flannel, with green leather boots and colonial helmets. In front of their line, Oxus, dressed in red, sat in a high-backed armchair. To the right and left of the platform, at right angles to it, 100 companions were aligned in two parallel lines. Some distance away, facing the platform, eight ranks of slaves formed the fourth side of the square. Five hundred soldiers surrounded the square itself.

  In the center of this formation, two scaffolds were standing, 20 paces apart. The larger of the two supported a block, next to which stood a half-naked guard leaning on the hilt of an enormous scimitar, whose blade was gleaming in the sunlight. The second, much smaller, scaffold bore a sellette on which Saint-Clair was sitting impassively, with his hands free and his arms folded across his chest.

  Suddenly, the lugubrious howl of a siren rent the air.

  Three men emerged from a bunker in the ramparts: two slaves escorting Koynos.

  The condemned man was only clad in a sort of long black chemise without a collar, from which his bare neck, admirable in its whiteness and muscularity, sprang like the base of a column—and on that neck, the man’s head, the face pale but calm, was still, proud and almost insolent. Koynos’ hands were free, like Saint-Clair’s. He marched at a measured pace towards the scaffold. Two companions drew aside to let him pass, and then resumed their places. Followed by his two guards, Koynos briskly mounted the steps of the scaffold and came to a halt in front of the executioner.

  Then, on the platform, a Brother moved forward to stand beside Oxus’ armchair. It was Kipper. In a loud voice, he sa
id: “By the unanimous judgment of the Tribunal of Fifteen, and by the will of our Master Oxus, Brother Koynos, fulfilling the function of Commander of the Fifteen, has been condemned to death for having betrayed his oath. Before Saint-Clair, his accomplice—whose sentence, by virtue of the Master’s generosity, has been suspended for 30 days—Koynos will have his head cut off!”

  “Honored be Oxus!” cried the XV, with one voice. “Punished be the traitor!”

  The cry was repeated by the companions. As for the slaves, in accordance with the ritual, they bound profoundly and then straightened up—and that completed the brief ceremony.

  Koynos turned to the Nyctalope. “Adieu, my friend!” he said, in a tone of infinite sadness. “Ask Xavière to forgive me, if the spilling of my blood cannot prevent yours from being spilled—and console Yvonne. Adieu!”

  “Die tranquil, Koynos,” replied Saint-Clair, with an emotion that filled his eyes with a flood of tears, despite his strength of mind. In English—a language the executioner probably did not understand, but Koynos understood perfectly—he added: “Die happy; if I fail, Xavière will avenge you herself!”

  The executioner had made a sign with his left hand that Koynos understood. Koynos took two steps forward, taking him to the block. He knelt down, and gently set his head on the polished wood—and his powerful neck remained there, motionless.

  The Sun, high in the cloudless sky, was causing everything to sparkle and shine resplendently. Beyond the esplanade, extending to the ramparts alloyed with electrified copper, was the soil of Argyre Island, red with plants and flowers. Further away, the calm sea stretched to infinity, a delicate silver grey with hints of blue. Everywhere, nature offered a scene of exquisite and gentle peace, strange in its coloration, its light and limpid atmosphere untroubled by a breath of wind—and on the esplanade, the motionless men seemed like statues arranged in a square, almost unreal around the somber scaffolds, whose polished metalwork reflected the Sun’s rays.

  What a silence! It must have weighed upon their breasts, and made the blood pound in their temples and their ears.

  Suddenly, though, all the eyes fixed upon the scaffold widened or closed, according to each man’s sentiments.

  The executioner set his legs apart. He flexed his muscular torso. He lifted the scimitar in both hands; it threw off a beam of light. And suddenly, rapidly, he brought it down.

  With a single blow, the head was detached from the trunk. A fountain of blood sprang forth. The head fell, rolled…

  The executioner gathered it up with a swift movement, seizing it by the hair, and then lifted it up and made a tour of the scaffold, displaying that admirable head of an intelligent, strong man to the spectators…

  Chance had determined that it was not even smeared with blood. The closed eyes were two shadows in the white face, and the face had all the placidity of death nobly and courageously accepted.

  At the moment when the bright scimitar had been lifted, Saint-Clair had closed his eyes. He did not open them again until one of the two slaves that had brought him touched his shoulder lightly.

  In a refinement of the scene, the head and the body of the victim were to remain on the scaffold for an hour, within view of anyone passing across the esplanade. Thus, forgetting their science and their inventions—which would have been able to deliver death without bloodshed, within a second, in the depths of a prison—the XV, because they truly loved life, and to make it even dearer to the companions and slaves, surrounded death with an apparatus calculated to make an impact on minds, to make it fearful, and also to make it understood that the supreme tribunal would spare no one, and that its concern for discipline and fidelity extended so far as self-mutilation, in depriving itself of one of its own members…

  Was the moral goal that the XV attained, by that meaningful display, so contrary to the progress of matter and mind? Perhaps that was the question that Saint-Clair asked himself as he leapt down to the ground and marched towards the houses of Cosmopolis, between his two guards, without darting a single glance towards the scaffold. He went along the entire length of a row of still-motionless companions. He tried to read the eyes of the men, but saw nothing therein but a sort of fanatical gleam. As he passed in front of the XV’s platform, he looked up at the Brothers. He paused momentarily to look at Oxus. He saw nothing, in the eyes of the Commanders or the Master, but pride…

  Then he shrugged his shoulders, and thought: These creatures, who might have been moved when I spoke to them, have imposed silence on their hearts. They are scientific monsters. I admire them, but I cannot help hating them. If I held them all in my hands, now, I’d annihilate them without remorse—and I’d rather die a thousand times than live in a society organized and governed by them. They are the very negation of all liberty!

  II. The Steel Prison

  The prison of Cosmopolis was located underground, beneath Oxus’ house. It comprised several cells, differently equipped according to the punishments that its inmates were to suffer. Some of these cells were simple rooms, with a camp-bed, a table and a toilet. Others contained nothing but a bed of planks. They all opened on to a corridor in which two armed slaves maintained a permanent guard. The means of egress from this corridor was an electric elevator, whose exit door was in the guard-room of Oxus’ house, to the right of the front steps. This guard-room was continuously manned by a squad of soldiers, which served the function of prison warders.

  At the end opposed to the base of the elevator-shaft, the subterranean corridor widened out into a rotunda with three low doors; these were the doors of the cells reserved for prisoners condemned to death. Strange cells! They were perfectly square, but sheets of polished steel covered their walls, ceilings and floors. Their occupants were imprisoned in steel. By way of furniture, each of these cells had a camp-bed with no mattress and no blankets—nothing more. A globe of thick glass projected a little way from the middle of the ceiling; it enclosed an electric lamp, whose light, diminished by the glass, spread weakly, diffusely and sadly through the cell.

  It was in Cell No. 1 that Saint-Clair was locked. The door was pierced by a spy-hole, which could be lifted from without in order to pass the prisoner his pittance of bread and water. To avoid the possibility of the unfortunate committing suicide with the shards of the pitcher, the water was contained in a cork-less leather gourd.

  Before being placed in his cell, Saint-Clair was obliged to undress and allow himself to be reclad in a warm mantle made of a sturdy and very thick fabric, which could not be cut or torn without a sharp instrument. A condemned man who wanted to commit suicide could only do so by asphyxiation; at regular intervals, however, one of the sentinels in the corridor lifted the spy-hole cover to see what the prisoner was doing. In any case, if ever there had been a condemned man who never thought of suicide, it was the Nyctalope.

  His first concern, as soon as he was locked in the cell, was to lie down on the cam-bed and go to sleep. Let’s take a nap, he said to himself, and recover my strength. When I wake up, rested in body and mind, I shall think about what to do, if there is anything I can do. And, as he had not enjoyed the oblivion of slumber for a long time, he fell asleep almost immediately.

  At the same moment, in Cosmopolis, the brain of a woman was thinking about the Nyctalope, and thinking about him with a firm resolution and an obstinate determination to save him. Saint-Clair had never seen this woman; he knew her only by name, but he had often heard her mentioned by the most devoted of his companions. This woman was Félicie Jolivet, Maximilien’s sister.

  When the 15 abducted Parisiennes had been shared out, Félicie had fallen to Kipper. It will also be remembered that Kipper—who was, it appeared, scarcely sensible to feminine seduction—had made Félicie into the servant of his habits. According to her master’s own testimony, Félicie was satisfactory enough. And Kipper had concluded, dryly: “Félicie is proper, docile and silent; that’s all that I require of her.”

  But this scientific brute had forgotten one thing, which is
that Félicie, like the majority of Parisiennes, was extremely feminine—which is to say, curious, subtle and clever. Silently, no doubt, for she spoke rarely and judiciously—but that was deliberate; if she said very little, she knew how to make her master say a great deal.

  Kipper, on the other hand, held forth gladly. Félicie had discovered various means of provoking her master’s monologues. And while she was delicately getting rid of the dust “that dishonors a book,” cleaning, stuffing and lighting her master’s pipe, and arranging his papers, she listened. She listened in an admirable manner, in the sense that she heard everything and never forgot anything.

  And it was in this manner that Félicie Jolivet, day by day, kept up to date with events in Cosmopolis. Before the Tribunal of XV, she had known the contents of Kipper’s denunciation of Koynos and Saint-Clair.

  Immediately after the execution, Kipper came back to rest and smoke a pipe—and when, having lighted it, Félicie slipped it between the man’s teeth, he growled: “Koynos won’t be smoking anymore, and the Nyctalope will be wishing he had something to smoke!”

  “Oh!” said Félicie Jolivet, smiling. “Are they dead?” In the depths of her heart, she had a furious desire to leap upon Kipper, gouge his eyes and rake his sardonic face with her fingernails, but she smiled…

  The brute growled: “Koynos is dead, obviously! As for the other, he’ll only die 30 days hence. The Master’s very good, in truth, for in the end...” And the monologue continued, interrupted from time to time by the necessity of drawing breath, sniffing or spitting, but lasting as long as the pipe itself, saying all and revealing all: facts and intimate thoughts regarding the past and the present, and conjectures as to the future.

  Then, as he had had very little sleep the previous night, when the monologue and the pipe were finished, Kipper went peacefully to sleep.