Aurorarama

by Jean-Christophe Valtat

  This was probably more of a daydream than an actual scheme, until there arrived on the island, by accident, a young man named Jeremy Salmon. Jeremy, a promising steam engineer, had attempted, in what probably was a last desperate bid for funding through a publicity stunt, to drive his “pyschomotive” to the North Pole. But he lost his way and wandered through the frozen waste until he found himself, exhausted, finally reaching a mirage island he had been pursuing for hours. The islanders, of course, rescued him, and brought him to the castle. There he accepted, probably out of love, and unaware of her true intentions, the beautiful yellow-eyed Myrtle’s proposal that they elope together to New Venice. Depleted as he was by the return trip, he died on arrival, leaving Myrtle to her own dark devices.

  A resourceful girl in spite of her inexperience, she soon found employment in the Circus of Carnal Knowledge, a theatrical institution that specialized in pornoperas, a then fashionable genre in the dissolute Pearl of the Arctic. It happened that this cornerstone of the local entertainment scene was rehearsing its own risqué adaptation of Snowdrift & Reliance. Myrtle, through her thorough knowledge of the text and her eerie familiarity with the main character, had little trouble convincing the director that she was the part. But, in spite of the efforts of all those involved, Myrtle’s virginity remained unyielding, and the play flopped miserably at the premiere. It was by a twist of fate that on the very same evening that had seen her failure to avenge herself on New Venice, her fantasy almost came true when the mad painter Edouard de Couard, as part of the “Blue Wild” event he had organized, destroyed most of the city by placing tons of toxic blue pigment in the Air Architecture ventilation shafts.

  In the devastating aftermath of the “Blue Wild,” strange things had happened to Myrtle. Driven mad by her unfulfilled desires, she drifted through the city in search of relief, offering herself to the hurrying shadows of strangers, who relentlessly passed her by. Amidst the general panic, however, one man did not resist her, as his state did not allow him to: Igor Plastisine, an empty-eyed muscular hunk in blue boxer shorts and a tartan plaid who under the enthralling influence of a powerful psychoactive principle known as Pineapples and Plums recited in a trance an endless series of letters and numbers. Their tryst took place, it is said, on the very soil of the Greenhouse, near which she had met him. But, whether from an explosion caused by the poisonous cobalt emanations or sparked by the uncertain consummation of their feverish act, the Greenhouse burst into flames, and crumbled in a chaos of red-hot iron girders and torch-like palm trees. One of those fell right onto the back of poor Igor, who quickly succumbed on top of Myrtle’s unconscious body, saving her life by his death.

  But Myrtle had another lover who had been searching for her everywhere in that pale Pompeii of the Pole. This man was known to most people as Eddie Endlessex, the larger-than-life male star of the Circus of Carnal Knowledge, but to a few he was known as Edmund Elphinstone, the heir of a family of brilliant, if slightly oddball, New Venetian artists (his grandfather Samuel had engraved a map of New Venice renowned for being exact down to the very last stone, and his father, Ebenezer, had completed a mammoth-sized myriorama of the Frozen Ocean whose thirty-two panels could be arranged in any order and create billions of combinations, though they were virtually indistinguishable from one another). Edmund’s gambling debts, diagnosed satyriasis, and well-known addiction to nitrous oxide, vulgarly known as laughing gas, had closed to him the doors of a respectable career in the Arts, and it was behind a large handlebar moustache and Parseval-type pudenda that the poor prodigal son concealed his notoriety. He had never fallen in love with anyone before Myrtle, the pure, unsoiled, incorruptible Myrtle. He had to rescue her or destroy himself. And he was the one who found her under the blackened remains of Igor Plastisine, and loaded her on his back.

  Edmund took Myrtle to the useless blue ruins of the Heaven and Hell Hospital, where she was recognized by one of her servants, Olaf Jansen, who, following Isabella’s intuition and orders, as well as—allegedly—the telepathic promptings of the strange marsupial pet offered to her by Douglas Norton, had come to New Venice in the hope of fetching her back to Crocker Land. But the passionate Elphinstone would not leave her side, and in order to ensure a modicum of discretion from him, Jansen had no option but to bring Edmund to the island as well, before it was too late to save Myrtle. When they arrived at the crystal castle after a long, exhausting trip, Myrtle was so deeply comatose that most doctors would probably have declared her dead. But Elphinstone was not a doctor. He was a man in love and he believed in the power of his feelings to bring his sleeping beauty back to life. Isabella was too shocked and sad, and perhaps too steeped herself in the supernatural, to oppose Elphinstone’s commitment and single-mindedness. For days and weeks, he took care of Myrtle in a secluded tower of the castle, read books to her and played her heart-wrenching music on Isabella’s glasharmonica, bathed and oiled her and shocked her with an electric generator the islanders had found on a wrecked whaler. Though she was not brought back to life by such dedication, she was eventually found to be pregnant, even though her pulse was imperceptible, and her breath left no blur on a mirror.

  Isabella, learning the news, cast Elphinstone out of the castle, making him so desperate that she had to resort to the physical strength and firepower of the meek Crockerlanders to keep him away. Edmund lingered outside, lying in the snow and howling through the fog during the whole seven days of his endless agony. He never lived to see his premature orphans, two little mirror images of each other, being borne out of the womb of their motionless mother. At the sight of such a wonder, the Islanders knelt down in awe, and Isabella, who had a noble heart, gave the children the name of their father; a man, after all, whose love had been stronger than death.

  “That was a sad story,” said Gabriel to the twins, as they walked in front of him down a narrow corridor, crystal candelabras in hand. Reginald shrugged his shoulders, forcing Geraldine to do the same. They reminded Gabriel of those little figures cut out of folded paper and then unfolded to show a string of gingerbread-man shapes.

  “We have not lived it,” said the boy. “It is other people’s memories.”

  “It was losing grandmother Isabella that was the real blow,” added Geraldine. “She took such wonderful care of us.”

  “I hear she is still around and has quite a haunting presence,” said Gabriel.

  Geraldine turned toward Gabriel and smiled, while Reginald explained.

  “Oh, you must mean our mother, Myrtle. She is the one with that ability, not Grandmother. But she certainly resembled Grandmother Isabella when she was young.”

  “Isn’t she very pretty? I wish we were as pretty,” added Geraldine, a bit coquettishly, thought Gabriel.

  He looked at the nape of her neck and discovered he felt an insistent desire to kiss it, faintly accompanied by the more obscure and unsettling urge to bite her ponytail. But with Reginald around, in his little black Lord Fauntleroy costume, that kind of privacy was, of course, impossible. From what he had heard, though, Siamese twins often got married. They were surely used to a certain amount of promiscuity. And—the thought bothered Gabriel a little—Reginald had exactly the same nape, after all. It struck him that they were fairly reminiscent of his dream about Rocket and Pocket.

  “You are very pretty, I think,” he said, intending to be polite, but surprised at how sincere and confident he sounded. “It is just a lot of prettiness to handle at the same time.”

  He heard them giggle and it pleased him.

  “We rejoice that you’ve finally joined us as our grandmother wanted you to, Mr d’Allier,” said Geraldine suddenly, turning toward Gabriel.

  So that was why they had kindly proposed to take him to his room, he reflected. They had something to say to him.

  “Oh, that Lancelot thing, it was really about me, then. But I fail to see where I fit in.”

  “She saw you in her crystal cabinet,” explained Geraldine, as if that clarified anything.


  “That sounds great, but I am not sure I understand.”

  “You can follow us there, if you’re not too tired,” proposed Reginald.

  For a few minutes, they followed a mind-boggling series of corridors and stairways, the siblings sometimes whispering to each other in some strange language, until they reached a door that Reginald opened with a key linked by a chain to the pocket of his velvet waistcoat.

  “Please, go in,” he said, as the siblings stepped aside. Gabriel entered a polyhedral kiosk where the crystal all around him seemed to have a different quality than elsewhere in the palace. It was less translucent and more reflective, so that he could see infinite images of himself surrounding him, quite as if he were standing at the bottom of a kaleidoscope.

  “Now, close your eyes, think of something or someone, and open them again,” said Reginald, still standing in the corridor.

  Gabriel, of course, could not help thinking about Stella. As he opened his eyes, he saw dim shapes coming from inside the crystal and joining each other like pools of spilled water, gaining depth, light and colour as they did. And then they were her, walking away along the Marco Polo Midway in her black hooded coat with her overbrimming satchel that always seemed about to burst. She was doing her usual tightrope routine on the edge of the sidewalk, leaving little light footprints in a thin layer of fresh snow, which always made Gabriel want to run and catch her before she fell. All around him he could see the city in the dubious daylight, as completely and clearly as if he were in the middle of the street, and could even hear, he thought, the faint sound of distant bells floating from the church of St. Anthony. He felt like extending his arms but he realized that he would only bump against the crystal. Her own arms wide apart, meanwhile, Stella dwindled into the perspective distance and the ill-starred, starry-eyed Gabriel knew that for his own sake he had to let her go for good.

  “How can I stop this?”

  “Close your eyes and turn away,” said Geraldine.

  He did as he was told and waited for a while, nauseated and disconsolate, the picture persisting, as if trapped under his eyelids. He could have spared himself that trick, he thought bitterly.

  “Well, that was something,” he said, peeling back his eyelids again, quickly wiping a tear with his bandaged hand before he turned back and went out.

  “Did you see what I saw?” he asked, a bit embarrassed, as Reginald locked the door.

  “How could we? It is your mind, not ours,” Geraldine said reassuringly, but the insistent smile on Reginald’s face could have been from more than politeness.

  “But I still do not see why your grandmother chose me,” said Gabriel, trying to shake off the memory of Stella walking out of his helpless reach.

  The siblings shrugged their four shoulders.

  “Maybe she liked your name,” offered Reginald pensively. “But mostly she remembered that only someone called d’Allier knew of her story, someone whose knowledge of the city and commitment to its values could not be doubted.”

  Gabriel wondered with concern what exactly Isabelle d’Ussonville had witnessed of his antics. It also vexed him that the world and his grandmother had been spying on him, when his lifestyle demanded nothing if not the greatest discretion.

  “Before she left us,” Geraldine continued, “she told us that only Lancelot and the Lady of the Lake would find out who she was.”

  “Lady of the Lake?” said Gabriel. But just as he was about to deny any connection, he remembered that when he had identified Isabelle d’Ussonville he had indeed been with the former Sandy Lake.

  “This … Lady of the Lake, what part does she play in this?”

  “Grandmother didn’t say,” Geraldine answered.

  “Not negligible, I would say,” Reginald added, nodding his head.

  “This is your room,” they said, stopping at an open door. Gabriel peeked inside. He was relieved to see that the sheets and pillows, at least, were not made of crystal.

  “It is a beautiful room.”

  “Oh, that’s nothing, you should see ours,” said Geraldine, as Reginald elbowed her in their common ribs. Geraldine blushed, which made Reginald blush as well.

  Gabriel felt like laughing.

  “Thank you for bringing me here.”

  “Thank you for staying with us,” said Reginald, who was a very polite boy. He had the same voice as Geraldine, but, with his white hair carefully combed back, he looked more serious than her, or at least he tried to.

  “We seldom have visitors,” said Geraldine, a bit impishly. “Let alone wicked anarchists.”

  “Oh, these are just spare clothes the anarchists lent me,” said Gabriel modestly.

  “Wicked or not, we are in any case honoured to have met you,” said Reginald, “and we wish you a very good night.”

  “Good night to you, and thanks for your kind hospitality.”

  Gabriel bowed and they stood silent in the doorway for a glowing, embarrassing while, as when people do not want a pleasant evening to end, but none of them dares to be the first to admit it. Gabriel, especially, would have done anything not to find himself on his own, mulling over Stella.

  “Here, sir,” said Geraldine, after a while. She handed him the candelabra she held, then noticed the bandages around his hands.

  “Do you want us to call a maid to help you with your clothes?” she asked, a barely perceptible smile hovering on her face. “They are very sweet, and fond of foreigners.”

  “No, please, do not wake anyone on account of me.” He took a deep breath. “I am sure we can work this out together,” he said, his voice almost a whisper.

  In the light of the candelabras, the twins looked at each other and smiled.

  CHAPTER XXVIII

  The Aurorarama

  In like manner, recollected images are attributed to the moving lights, in the splendid exhibition of the Aurora Borealis. The Icelandic beholds in them the spirit of his ancestors, and the vulgar discern encountering armies, and torrents of blood, in the lambent meteors of a winter-sky.

  John Ferriar, “An Essay Toward a Theory of Apparitions,” 1813

  After having taken advantage of the pale hazy daylight for a quick morning tour, Brentford, the Aerial Anarchists, and the Inughuit had a much better understanding of Crocker Land, that mythical place that had, under various names, eluded and deluded so many explorers.

  The Island, of which the mirage appeared much bigger than the reality, consisted of an inner plateau about twenty miles in diameter, rimmed all around by small basaltic mountain ranges that showed unequivocal signs of volcanic activity. In that respect and some others, it resembled Iceland, particularly in the numerous geysers and hot springs scattered across it. These warmed the surface considerably, and this difference of temperature with the surrounding Arctic air produced a continual veil of vapour that made the island indistinct from its foggy, icy surroundings. Only an aerial view could, under certain weather conditions, disclose the secret of its improbable presence. Interestingly, when seen from more earthbound angles, its hollow shape could be construed as a hole leading to the centre of the earth.

  As the nocturnal approach of the Ariel had revealed, the main feature of the Island was the mile-wide crystal located roughly at its centre. Even for a trained crystallographer, as Hardenberg had revealed himself to be, it was difficult to say whether it had come from a meteorite whose impact had caused a volcanic eruption, or had slowly emerged from the bowels of the earth. The pale emerald-like crystal resembled clinopyroxene, with some chrysolite penetration twinning, but was, Hardenberg said, unusually birefringent. The double vision it caused made orientation in the castle a little difficult, especially after a few drinks, a phenomenon the anarchists had experienced the night before while trying to find the way back to their rooms after supper.

  The social life of the Islanders was organized around the Crystal Castle, though it held no power but a symbolic one. The four settlements that surrounded it were themselves long and wide tunnels, about forty
feet in height, dug straight into the gemstone, in a way that left the crystal as thin as slightly tinted glass sheets, which were reinforced here and there by pillars of basalt, like some kind of Arcadian arcades. Dome-shaped houses lined these tunnels; a basalt pillar about six feet high mounted with an oil lamp stood in front of each house. A series of wells, directly linked to the hot springs, were placed at regular intervals along the central path and warmed the houses through a network of pipes of a type already known, if Nicolo Zeno is for once to be trusted, amongst the Norse dwellers of Greenland—a fact which tended to prove that the islanders were indeed their descendants.

  But the most curious aspect of their organization, as one of their guides explained, was that the four villages, each set at one of the four compass points, corresponded to a season of the year, by particular settings of the pipes network: the Eastern village, Gorias, had a soft, springtime temperature, with some flower beds and bowers of small trees, and was peopled by children and adolescents, colourfully dressed and playful. Findias, in the South, was almost summery, filled with small wheat fields and springing fountains, inhabited by strong but graceful young adults dressed in white. Middle-aged persons, their hair already grey, and wearing brown clothes, lived in Murias, the Western village, where one found all sort of nuts and berries, apple orchards, and, most surprisingly under those latitudes, vines with enormous red grapes, from which they made a good ice wine that Isabella had baptized Château-Cristal. The North village was called Falias, and though it was colder than the others, the white-haired elders who lived there, all dressed in grey, remained idly seated in front of their houses, mostly occupied, it seemed, with chatting and playing board games.