by Satyajit Ray
What took place that next instant gives me goose bumps even now. I can vividly remember the state of terror as well as amazement we all were in.
Out of the blue, a mass of furry flesh flew across the air at great speed and jumping on Blackmore’s chest fiercely scratched him in the face. Blackmore’s revolver slipped out of his hand but the shot instead of hitting us struck one of the glass retorts.
Losing his balance, Blackmore stumbled into the water tank kept in the middle of the room. In the meantime, much gratified with his suitable revenge, Mustafa had returned to his master. The moment Blackmore’s body touched the liquid, like a fish he made a heavy stroke to jump out but all at once the body became stiff and sank under the liquid. The three of us saw with amazement that the uncovered portion of his body—i.e. from his neck to his face and from his wrist to his hand—was in no time transformed into glittering gold!
Saunders in a near whisper muttered, ‘The price of gold . . . the price of life . . .’
In other words, to follow Saavedra’s formula of alchemy, he enjoined the use of a living being—like humans, flowers, animals and birds—for conversion to gold instead of metals.
Blackmore, the owl, the squirrel and the rose—had once been mortal natural live objects.
Now all of them are immortal.
The Mystery of Munroe Island
Munroe Island, 12 March
I have jotted down the events of the past three weeks in my diary, though at random. And whenever I get some free time, I try to arrange my erratic jottings in some kind of coherent order.
Needless to say, I have once again engaged myself in yet another expedition. This island may have had an original name 300 years ago when humans from the mainland stepped on to it, but its name never reached the ears of the civilized world. For now, we will refer to it as Munroe Island.
Our group consists of five people. One of them is my old friend, Jeremy Saunders, at whose instigation we have undertaken this journey. To discuss the initial phase of this mission I need to introduce Callenbach. He is part of our group. A resident of California, he is a professional photographer and a large, strongly-built man with a devil-may-care attitude. He is about forty-five years old, but judging by his conduct, he appears half his age, almost like an overgrown child. Callenbach has known Saunders for quite a few years. Last December, at the behest of the National Geographic, Callenbach had visited a few cities of north-west Africa to photograph their local festivals. There in the city of Agadir in Morocco, he had a strange experience. Agadir is a coastal city of Morocco, the majority of whose inhabitants are fishermen. Callenbach had visited a fishermen’s colony to familiarize himself with its denizens and to depict their lifestyle in his photographs. When he entered the house of one particular fisherman his attention was drawn to a three-year-old boy. The boy was playing with a bottle which contained a rolled up piece of paper in it. Saunders’s curiosity was aroused. He took the bottle from the boy and noticed that the bottle was stoppered with a sealed cork. He broke open the seal and pulled out the paper. It was a letter written in English. Judging by the style of handwriting it seemed to be quite ancient. After checking with the boy’s grandfather, Callenbach was told that the bottle had belonged to their household since the time of his grandfather. As the fisher folk are Muslims who speak Arabic, there was no question of them reading the letter.
Callenbach had taken out the letter from the bottle and within a few days left for London after completing his work. He then showed this letter to Saunders. It was a letter consisting of a few words written in pencil.
Latitude 33oEast—Longitude 33oNorth, 13
December 1622
In this unknown island we have found such an amazing plant whose immortal quality is bound to revolutionize human life. To disseminate this news, despite Brandon’s severe warning, I’ve put this letter inside a bottle and will float it into the sea. Blackhole Brandon is now the all-in-all of this island. Therefore, after reading this letter if any people turn up here in search of this plant, they ought to be prepared to face a confrontation with Brandon. I’m about to become a victim at the hands of Brandon.
Hector Munroe
The first thing Saunders did upon receiving the letter was to visit London’s marine department—where all ancient sea travel related documents are archived—to research the records of the years 1621–22, in case there had been any news of shipwrecks in the Atlantic Ocean. Among the three shipwrecks in the year 1622 the name of Hector Munroe was found in one list of passengers. His ship—the Conquest—was going from Gibraltar to the Virgin Islands in the Atlantic Ocean. It was shipwrecked near Bermuda. No reason was provided for the accident. The report by the marine departments states that no one survived. Yet the fact that Hector Munroe had indeed survived is proved by the letter in the bottle. As for the reference to Brandon in the Munroe letter, no one of that name was travelling in that ship. After further investigation, Saunders discovered that in the beginning of the seventeenth century there was a notorious pirate by the name of Greg Brandon. Apparently Brandon was devoid of one eye. All that remained in its place was a hole. And because of that he was named Blackhole Brandon. Driven by his greed for gold he had killed more than a thousand people. Jamaica at that time was the main haunt of English pirates. Perhaps the Conquest came under attack by Brandon’s pirate ship and was destroyed. The reason for Munroe’s survival could be that Brando himself had saved him. One needs to remember that Munroe was a doctor. In those days, a capable doctor was much valued, even in a pirate ship. At that time during sea travel if a ship was struck by diseases like scurvy, pellagra and beriberi, the chances of a sailor’s survival were rather bleak. Hence the presence of a competent doctor—someone who could treat such cases as well as perform surgeries if necessary—became an indispensable part of any sea voyage. Hector Munroe certainly fitted into this scenario. However, how both Brandon and Munroe arrived at this unknown island remains a mystery.
Nevertheless, the upshot is that, after gathering all this information, Saunders was hell-bent on travelling to this island, despite the lapse of about three-hundred-and-fifty-odd years since the letter had been written. The moment I received a letter from him informing me about this venture, I immediately agreed to join him and I arrived in London within a week. Upon my arrival I realized that all arrangements for the journey were almost complete. Callenbach, of course, had told us that if this journey takes place he will definitely join us. After a chat with him, I realized he is dreaming of earning loads of money by taking pictures for television.
The fourth person in our group is a Japanese scientist, Hidechi Suma. Among his many inventions, one is a jet driven sea vessel called the Sumacraft. We realized its amazing potential by travelling 1500 miles on the sea. Even after facing many adverse situations, the Sumacraft did not once give us any trouble during the cruise. Suma had arrived in London to give a demonstration of this boat, and that’s how he met Saunders. Suma is not just the inventor of this jet boat. He has brought along various other inventions which he thinks might be useful during our expedition. Suma is also a distinguished biochemist. And Suma’s introduction won’t be complete unless I also give him this credit: I’m yet to see such a disciplined and well-turned-out person like him. Whenever you see him, you feel as if he is still living in Osaka and is about to pick up his briefcase and leave for work.
Before I name the fifth person, let me tell you how he was inducted into the group.
As soon as he decided on undertaking the expedition, Saunders put in an advertisement in all London newspapers inviting people to join the venture. Five criteria were put in to confirm eligibility. 1—Previous experience of sea travel; 2—Prior experience of being part of at least two scientific expeditions; 3—A top degree in any branch of science; 4—Good health; and 5—Experience in the use of a firearm. Other than the first requirement, our fifth candidate did not qualify in any of the other obligations. He is a writer, not a scientist; he has never been on either any sci
entific or non-scientific expeditions; only once while in school, as part of a group he had climbed 1500 feet of the Ben Nevis Mountain in Scotland. This was no major achievement considering the actual height of Ben Nevis is 4500 feet. Then how has he managed to be included in our group?
The chief reason is that David Munroe is a direct descendant of Hector Munroe. After spotting Saunders’s advertisement he straightaway landed up at Saunders’s residence and requested to be included in the group. He said he had heard from his father and grandfather about Dr Munroe, who had been Shakespeare’s contemporary. When the British navy defeated the Spanish Armada, the commander-in-chief of the British side was the Duke of Effingham, and Hector Munroe was his physician. In addition, David became determined to join the group when he got to know about the role of Blackhole Brandon. Since his childhood he had been reading tales of pirates; he has even heard a lot about adventures related to Blackhole. If we find any hidden treasure of Blackhole’s on this island, this will turn out to be a memorable adventure for David. One must mention that David is only twenty-two.
Just a glance at the young David Munroe produces doubt regarding his health and ability to do physical tasks hard. It becomes clear when you notice his hands, which other than a pen would never have touched any weapon. His lost looks and soft voice; his shoulder-length unkempt golden hair—all these point to a limited physical capacity, however powerful his imagination may be. Yet Saunders decided to choose him as he could not ignore one of his credentials—David Munroe belongs to the same lineage as the writer of the letter which is in the bottle. Other than him we also have another companion. Its David’s pet, a Great Dane called Rocket. There’s no doubt left that if anybody is physically the fittest, it’s the dog.
We have arrived here this morning. We covered 300 miles a day on the Sumacraft without any sign of land and we doubted if at all this portion of the Atlantic Ocean indeed has any such island. At sunrise, however, when Saunders looked through his binoculars and said he could spot a bit of land despite the thick fog, Callenbach instantly picked up his movie camera. I was a bit surprised, because, as a norm, much before a vessel approaches land one usually sees clusters of seagulls flying around and squawking to announce the proximity to land. Nothing like this happened this time.
After arriving here, I realized this was hardly surprising, as throughout the day, even after traversing for five kilometres, I could not locate many living beings except for a few insects and crabs near the beach. And not just that, we could not even locate any unknown species of plants. Other than the usual flora and fauna associated with this region, we did not discover anything new. But then again we have only walked around the western side of this island today.
We have camped near the seashore on the southern part of the island. There’s not much vegetation in this part; only sand and rock. The island is small in size and more or less plain and flat, though the central part of the island, which is about five kilometres from our campsite, is comparatively higher in surface and dotted with large hillocks.
David is in full form. It’s delightful to watch him play with Rocket. Within a couple of hours after our arrival we have noticed a complete change in the youth we had met in London.
It’s Callenbach who seems to be having trouble. He sneezed thirty times non-stop soon after stepping on to the island. Thereafter, he began suffering from high fever accompanied by shivering. Needless to say, he could not come with us on our walk. Both Suma and he stayed back at the camp. Suma is arranging all his tools and implements to be used for our research. In addition, he has set up a small laboratory in order to chemically analyse any new species we may discover.
Despite being so ill, Callenbach says that within a couple of days we will leave this island. He thinks many such islands are present all over the Atlantic.
But I cannot put Hector Munroe’s letter out of my mind. If the latitudes and longitudes match, then this is indeed the island mentioned in the letter. On this very island Munroe had discovered that amazing plant.
13 March, Noon
Callenbach’s prophecy didn’t work. There’s simply no question of leaving this island within a few days. Let me recount everything.
Getting up this morning, we bathed in the sea and finished our breakfast. Just as we were planning to go out, David suddenly said he wished to venture out with Rocket on his own. The fact that he has gathered some confidence had become noticeable since yesterday. After all, he is a writer; it’s quite a torture for him to hang around too long with elderly scientists for companions. We have come here to observe and analyse everything in minute detail and for that we need time and patience. David said he would like to search among the distant hillocks just to check out if there are any cave-like structures among them. He thinks one of these may hold Blackhole Brandon’s treasures. ‘I’ll go, inspect and be back within half-an-hour,’ he said.
I tried to reason with him and said that even if the island may not be inhabited by large animals there’s a strong chance of it having poisonous snakes and scorpions. Hence there’s no need for him to take this risk. David refused to relent. He said he would take Callenbach’s pistol with him. Moreover, he had Rocket. Therefore there was no need for us to be so anxious.
As I was thinking of how to disarm this foolish chap’s determination, I heard someone exclaim–‘No—No, No, No, No!’
Suma had come out of his camp shaking his head.
‘No—No, No, No, No!’
What was that? I was amused to see such strong words coming out from his normally smiling face. Suma was holding a small instrument which he placed on the sand in front of us and said, ‘There is something big here. A living being. About 5.7 kilometres from here—on that side.’
Suma spread his hand in the direction of the hillocks. And then he showed us his amazing instrument, which he called a Telecardioscope. This machine could detect the heartbeats of an animal from as far as ten kilometres. Exactly how far and in which direction the creature is can be gauged from the machine’s receiver by turning a knob. The moment the distance and the direction match, the instrument starts producing the sound of heartbeats along with the blinking of colourful lights. The distance of ten kilometres is indicated by the colour of deep purple. When the animal gets closer to you, like the sequence of a rainbow the colour changes from blue, green, orange, etc; finally when the animal is within a kilometre, the colour turns red. And with it the volume of the heartbeat increases, too. However, if the animal is within the radius of a kilometre, the machine stops responding.
‘The animal is in the same spot,’ said Suma. ‘And I think it’s quite big.’
‘What do you mean by big? How big is it?’ I asked.
‘I feel it’s bigger than a human being. Because the size of the animal and its heartbeat are inversely proportional. The general heartbeat of a human is seventy per minute. I find his to be a bit more than fifty.’
‘Could it be a tortoise?’ I asked. It’s not unusual for them to live here. And any other animal bigger than a human, like deer or monkey, would have a heartbeat rate much faster than a human’s.’
‘The way he is lying low, fixed in one spot, it seems like a tortoise,’ agreed Suma. ‘But what a tortoise is doing so far away from the sea and in the middle of this island is a question indeed.’
Saunders, however, dismissed the theory of a tortoise. He feels it’s a different animal and perhaps the only big one on this island. Therefore, there’s no way one can allow David to venture out alone under these circumstances.
After we watched the machine produce sound and light for a while, Suma switched it off. I couldn’t help but marvel at Suma’s competence. A dog like a Great Dane can sense the presence of another being close to him much before a human can; but even Rocket would seem like a small fry next to this machine.
We were all ready to set out for the day but the only problem was Bill Callenbach. Consuming his own medicines has produced no result. After our return I’ll give him my Miracurol
pill. This invention of mine cures all ailments within a day except for the common cold. But right now this poor fellow is tossing and turning in his bed. Perhaps he has heard about the presence of an animal here which has sparked hope that his movie camera won’t, after all, prove useless. Suma would stay on in the camp today, too. With another couple of hour’s work his mini laboratory would be ready to function.
The three of us, along with Rocket, set off. If there’s any sign of an animal nearby, Rocket would, of course, warn us. But as long as there’s no animal approaching us there’s no reason to fear.
Today, our mission was not towards the mounds in the middle of the island. I don’t think that area contains much vegetation. Today we were to venture out to the eastern side of the island. Following the seashore we would enter the forest where the foliage is the thickest. All three of us were carrying arms. Saunders had his German Mannlicher rifle slung along his shoulder; David’s pocket contained Callenbach’s Beretta automatic pistol, and my vest pocket held my Annihilin. When Callenbach was told about my machine—which when used not just kills the object but also makes it vanish at that very instant—he had warned me that if any animal appears when he is around, I won’t be allowed to use my weapon before he gets a chance to photograph it.
While we were walking it was decided that in case one wanted to wander away from the group then he had to shout out to inform the others about his whereabouts. Also, no one was allowed to stray too far from the group. Of course, this was decided only with David in mind. I can clearly see a marked change in David from his former aimless lazy self; he is now quite restless. Where we were walking right now, however, even if one of us deviated from the set direction, everyone remained visible as there were no large rocks or trees in our way.