The Fiery Wheel

by Jean de La Hire

  The resuscitated woman leapt on to the floor and hurled herself into her father’s arms, in tears.

  And while they embraced, recklessly, Ahmed Bey pushed them gently toward the door to the broad marble staircase. There, Ra-Cobrah and two servants were waiting. In accordance with the master’s orders, they escorted the father and daughter respectfully up the staircase and showed them into a small drawing-room. They left them alone there, in order that the Captain, instructed by Ahmed Bey, could inform his daughter gradually as to the miracles in consequence of which she found herself back on Earth, in a body that was not her own.

  Chapter Four

  Which concludes, without androplasty,

  with the anticipated betrothal

  Meanwhile, the initial emotion having passed, and in response to a gesture from the Doctor, Monsieur Torpène and his friends, along with Arthur Brad, had sat down on the divans again.

  Immediately, Ahmed Bey reincarnated the soul of Paul de Civrac in the body dressed in a smoking-jacket, and simultaneously reincarnated Francisco’s soul in the body deseed in a valet’s costume.

  The spectators of the astounding scene were in an indescribable state of mind. Their reason refused to believe in a reality that their senses would not, however, allow them to doubt. But their reason had to bow to the evidence when Paul de Civrac and Francisco began to speak.

  A few minutes sufficed for Paul and Francisco to take account of what had happened to them. Their mental faculties recalled their disincarnation on the planet Mercury, and they were entirely at their ease as soon as Ahmed Bey, having made the introductions, had acquainted them briefly with the origins of their present bodies, that of Arthur Brad, and the moving reincarnation of Lolla.

  He concluded by saying: “I’ve chosen your current ‘outfit’ as best I could, Monsieur de Civrac, and yours too, Francisco. Nevertheless, if your new faces don’t please you, I can remodel them in the resemblance of your previous ones.”

  “How?” asked Paul de Civrac.

  The Doctor explained the operation of androplasty.

  “Well, no,” said Paul. “I’ve had enough of extraordinary things. I want to resume my simple human life like anyone else, without delay. My entire family consists of a brother and a sister; I’ll explain the unprecedented adventure to them, and they’ll love me in my new appearance as much as in the old one. However, there’s someone who’ll make the final decision—if my face doesn’t please her, it will be necessary to resort to the androplasty, Doctor. Have you a mirror here? I wouldn’t be displeased to make my own acquaintance…before asking you to introduce me to Mademoiselle Mendès...”

  Smiling, Ahmed Bey took Paul to the dressing-room and left him there.

  “What about you, Francisco?” he said, when he came back.

  “Me, Monsieur? I was so ugly that I can only have gained by the change. I’ll keep my new face, whatever it might be. As for the body, I can see that it’s better than the one my poor mother gave me. Perhaps the muscles aren’t as solid, but good food and exercise will take care of that. It only remains, Doctor, for me to thank you, Mercury isn’t a place for a Spaniard or a Christian. Without giving you orders, though, I’d be very glad to see the Captain and the Señorita again. Is she, at least, as beautiful as she was before?”

  “I think so, Francisco. You’ll be able to judge for yourself...” He turned to Paul, who was coming back from the dressing-room. “Well, Monsieur de Civrac, does your portrait suit you?”

  “It suits me, Doctor, and I thank you. But I’ll shave off my moustache and change my hairstyle.”

  “No androplasty, then?”

  “No, no androplasty.”

  “Francisco doesn’t want any either.”

  “He’s right! He looks good in his new skin. The best of all of us is Arthur Brad.”

  “It’s a pity that Bild isn’t here,” said Brad. “He wouldn’t be annoyed. But Doctor, although I had a good lunch and dinner, I’m hungry.”

  “Me too!” said Paul.

  “And me!” Francisco sighed.

  “It’s four o’clock in the morning, Messieurs,” said Ahmed Bey, “but one can still have supper at that time.”

  On these words, a door opened and Ra-Cobrah’s voice announced: “The Master is served!”

  “What did I tell you, Messieurs? Monsieur de Civrac, Brad, would you care to follow me? You too, Francisco. Today, you’re not Captain Mendès’ orderly, but my guest. As for you, Messieurs”—the Doctor turned to the group formed by Torpène, Brularion and their friends—“you know the way to the dining room. It’s around the table that we’ll talk about science, astronomy and adventures!”

  And they went up the staircase. At the op, Monsieur Torpène and his friends went one way while Ahmed Bey took Civrac, Brad and Francisco into the small room to which the Captain and his daughter had been taken.

  At the appearance of the four men, Lola Mendès and her father got up from the sofa on which they had been sitting. Ahmed Bey took hold of Lolla’s hand, and Paul’s, and without saying a word, brought the two young people face to face, in the full light of the chandelier.

  There was a minute of silence, passionate observation, hectic joy and controlled emotion. Lolla wept; Paul tried in vain to stem the tears that we misting his own eyes—and suddenly, grasping the young woman’s hands, the young man took a step forward and deposited, on the pure forehead that was raised toward him, the most ardent and chaste of kisses...

  Through the gaze of their corporeal eyes, the immortal souls had recognized one another.

  “Captain Mendès,” said Paul de Civrac, in a tremulous voice, turning to Lolla’s father, “I have the honor of asking you for your daughter’s hand!”

  “Father,” said Lola, “I beg you to grant me Monsieur Paul de Civrac as a husband.”

  The Captain, his eyes moist with tears, advanced toward the fiancés and hugged both of them. “God has truly united you in Heaven,” he said. “On Earth you will be my two children.”

  “Viva el Señor Capitan!” cried a stentorian voice. Everyone turned to the door, where a tall fellow was standing, his mouth open with the proffered cry.

  “Francisco!” said the Captain.

  “The very same, Señor, although somewhat changed, to his advantage. But the Señorita will decide whether she still wants me to serve her in future.”

  “Of course I want that, Francisco!”

  Then Arthur Brad emerged from the corner in which he had put himself during the familial effusions. A stout figure—even stouter than the Fiery Wheel—he advanced and bowed to Lolla Mendès, to the extent that his rotundity permitted.

  “Mademoiselle,” he said, “let me present my good wishes…and my congratulations to you, my dear de Civrac...”

  “But it’s Arthur Brad!” Lolla exclaimed. Impishly, she offered her cheek, on which the American placed a paternal kiss.

  “It’s a pity,” he said, “that that stubborn old fool Jonathan Bild isn’t here...”

  “We’ll talk about it at table, Monsieur Brad,” said the Doctor. He offered his arm to Lolla Mendès—and a few minutes later, all of Ahmed Bey’s guests, himself included, were gathered around a table presided over by the beautiful Lolla.

  There was little conversation during the first courses. Then the Doctor, who was less emotional than his guests, related his adventures succinctly. Paul de Civrac recounted his, as did Brad and Francisco. The stories connected and linked up with one another easily.

  “As for purely scientific observations,” the Doctor said, “they’ll be the subject of an article that the scientific supplement of the Universel will soon publish, and which Monsieur de Civrac and Monsieur Brad will write with me. Our work won’t conclude there, however. Tomorrow, with Monsieur Brad and some skilled technicians, I shall begin the construction of a machine that will put us in communication with Jonathan Bild, resident on the planet Venus. I shall be happy, Messieurs, for you to monitor our work as closely as possible. I repeat once agai
n that that science has even more need than we do of your testimony.”

  “A machine, you say?” said Brularion.

  “Yes, a machine similar in every respect to the one with which Bild is equipped on Venus. Once our apparatus is established, we shall be able to communicate with Bild, as, for instance, the wireless telegraph station in the Eiffel Tower communicates with the one at Bizerte.”

  “But the Earth and Venus are between eleven million and sixteen million leagues apart, in the periods when we’re best placed to observe the planet.”

  “That’s of no importance,” the Doctor replied, “and the name that Bild and the Venusians have given their machine will be sufficient in itself to reassure you...”

  “What do they call it, then?”

  “The interplanetary radiotelephonograph.”

  “I understand the meaning of the word,” said Brularion, “but I don’t understand the machine at all…”

  “Why bother building the machine?” said Francisco. “By means of disincarnation, Doctor, you can go to Venus and come back...”

  “That’s true,” Ahmed Bey replied. “Along with the people I would like to accompany me—but that isn’t sufficient for science, for the goal of science is to serve all of humankind equally. That’s why I’m building the machine. Since I can’t surrender the secret of the disincarnation and reincarnation of souls, we ought, in accordance with the desires of Bild and the Venusians, to give whoever wishes to do so the scientific, if not the material, means to construct a machine similar to ours. And that will only be one step. Bild and the Venusians are fully prepared to find a means of coming to Earth—that’s why Bild didn’t want to allow himself to be disincarnated.”

  “The Académie des Sciences has some fine sessions in prospect!” said Abbé Normat.

  “And Paris,” said Ahmed Bey, looking at Paul and Lolla, silently isolated in absolute bliss, “has an admirable marriage on the horizon!”

  That was the final word. The scientists got up and took their leave, taking away secrets of which they were only to speak when Ahmed Bey had revealed them publicly himself. Lolla Mendès, the Captain, Civrac and Francisco were taken to the rooms that their host had prepared for them on the first floor of the house.

  It was not until the next day that work began on the radiotelephonograph that would put the Earth in communication with the world of Venus and Jonathan Bild.

  PART SEVEN

  THE INTERPLANETARY RADIOTELEPHONOGRAPH

  Chapter One

  In which prodigious realities are witnessed

  It took exactly thirty-eight days to construct the radiotelephonograph; Dr. Ahmed Bey had left no stone unturned in order to bring the work to a rapid conclusion. His immense fortune permitted him to hire a hundred technicians selected from among the very best, and ensured that the factory at Creusot responsible for the delivery of the metal components for assembly carried out in twelve days an assignment whose magnitude would have required twenty times as long for any ordinary client.

  It was on the Gravelle plateau, in a large area of open land, that the tower with the mobile cupola that was to contain the machine was constructed. The components brought from Creusot were assembled in a neighboring hangar. To the right of the tower stood three metallic masts 120 meters high; they supported antennae similar in appearance to those of a wireless telegraphy station, but these antennae were made of an alloy of copper, gold and silver; they had a large surface area and formed an inverted pyramid of wires.

  As soon as the installation of the machine in the tower was complete, Ahmed Bey and Arthur Brad put their signatures to an invitation conceived as follows:

  M.... is invited to come, on Thursday next, at nine o’clock in the evening, to the laboratory on the Gravelle plateau, to witness the first experimental trial of the interplanetary radiotelephonograph and the transmission of the first messages between Earth and the planet Venus. At that time, Venus, the evening star, will be close to its inferior conjunction, and, in consequence near to the Earth, which will favor the communication.

  This note was sent to Monsieur Torpène, Monsieur Brularion, Abbé Normat, Dr. Payen and Monsieur Martial, and, in addition, to the presidents of the five Académies and the two Chambres, and, finally, to the Parisian editor of the Universel.

  These thirteen individuals arrived almost at the same time, whether by automobile or horse-drawn vehicle, at the entrance to the tower. They were met by Francisco and introduced into a workroom that occupied the whole ground floor of the tower, where Lolla and Paul de Civrac—who were to be married a fortnight hence—and Captain Mendès were already assembled. Monsieur Torpène made the introductions. Almost immediately thereafter, Ahmed Bey and Arthur Brad appeared, both dressed in workmen’s overalls. They had come down from the machine room installed above the work-room.

  “Would you care to follow me, Messieurs,” said the Doctor. He opened the door through which he had come and began to climb a spiral stairway, followed by Brad.

  Two minutes later, the nineteen individuals, including Francisco, were in an immense round room with an extremely high domed ceiling, brightly lit by four electric globes.

  On one side of the room seventeen armchairs had been set out against the wall, in a singular semicircular row.

  “Please sit down, Messieurs,” said Ahmed Bey, gesturing toward the armchairs with his hand.

  Monsieur Torpène had already placed Paul and Lolla in the two central armchairs; the others at down to either side without paying any attention to precedence. Only Ahmed Bey and Arthur Brad remained standing.

  “This is the interplanetary radiotelephonograph,” said the Doctor, simply.

  His extended hand pointed to an enormous, shiny and fantastic object in the middle of the room. The machine was divided into two parts, clearly separated by an empty space two meters wide. It was mounted on a white marble podium with three steps to either side.

  The right-hand section of the machine was composed, firstly, of a large container set on top of an ebony box resting directly on the marble, from the upper face of which emerged yellow-tinted metallic wires extending upward on porcelain stalks embedded in the edges of the upper casing. These wires, twisted in a helix were then wound around other porcelain stems fixed in an ebony plate, and disappeared. From the middle of that ebony plate rose a copper column ten meters high, terminated at the tip by two enormous electromagnetic coils. Next to the column there was an ebony gibbet five meters high from which a kind of copper peg was suspended, from which an insulated metal wire emerged that vanished into the wall of the room. Finally, there was a telephone transmitter underneath the peg.

  Even for a knowledgeable technologist, the machine was incomprehensible. That was the conclusion expressed after five minutes of silent examination by Monsieur Brularion and endorsed by the grave nodding of the head of the venerable president of the Académie des Science.

  Ahmed Bey smiled.

  “And yet,” he said, “this machine is justly reminiscent of the Ducretet wireless telegraph transmitting apparatus.13 It’s the enormity of the proportions that has misled you. You should also add to it this telephonic transmitter.

  “This is, then, the transmitter of the machine for suppressing distance, if I might put it like that?” said Monsieur Martial.

  “Yes,” replied the Doctor. “And this is the receiver.” He indicated the machine to the left.

  It was simpler and not as huge: porcelain pillars on an ebony box, with electromagnetic coils, commutators and, finally, a complete telephonic receiving apparatus, next top which an enormous phonograph funnel expanded.

  “If I’m not mistaken,” said Monsieur Torpène, “it’s a complete apparatus, enlarged and improved, for wireless telegraphy, combined with a telephone apparatus and a phonograph.”

  “Exactly,” said Ahmed Bey. “All that is terrestrial, but what is Venusian is these metallic wires, composed of an alloy of gold and platinum for which Jonathan Bild gave me the formula on Venus, and
whose composition I shall reveal in my paper for the Académie des Sciences. I haven’t invited you here today to give you a lecture, but simply for you to witness the first communication between Earth and the planet Venus.”

  He paused momentarily, and then went on: “In much the same fashion as wireless telegraphy, we shall send waves—not Hertzian waves but luminous ones—from the solar light storied in this machine by the Venusian method. We shall send those waves to Jonathan Bild, and he will send us others in reply. The method of transmission and reception is quite simple. I shall speak into the telephonic transmitter and the vibrations of my voice will produce forces inside the machine that will liberate the stored solar light. It will be liberated with varying intensity in accordance with the intensity of the vibrations, and those luminous waves will travel, via these wires here and the antennae outside, all the way to the Venusian apparatus, where Bild will receive them, as we shall receive those he will send to us. And the waves that Bild will send us by speaking into his machine we will receive here, via the external antennae. In the receptive section of our machine, they will be transformed into vibrations that will operate the mechanisms of this telephone, which, in its turn, will influence this phonograph—from which, Messieurs, the voice of Jonathan Bild will emerge loud and clear.”

  As the doctor spoke, his own voice had become grave and vibrant. It concluded on a triumphant note.

  The guests were suddenly invaded by an intense emotion, at the common thought of the miracle to be realized: the words of two human beings exchanged across millions of leagues of interplanetary space.

  There was a long and profound silence.

  “Messieurs,” Ahmed Bey sudden resumed, in a calmer tone, “Arthur Brad is going to speak to Jonathan Bild.”

  The Doctor pressed a button; the electric globes went out simultaneously and the dome of the tower disappeared with a sound of metallic friction. The nocturnal sky—filled with stars on the beautiful summer night—appeared to the guests, who had raised their heads.