“In truth, my poor friend,” Gontran said, “aren’t you deluding yourself with false hope?”
“What?” exclaimed Fricoulet. “I repeat that the three of us will be able to overcome the most insurmountable difficulties. In any case, I have adopted as a motto an adage as old as the world, but which has always been successful for those who have faith in it: ‘Heaven helps those who help themselves.’” He clapped his friend on the shoulder and added: “As for you, your lack of self-confidence comes from an excess of modesty...love of science has already accomplished miracles for you. You can’t tell me that Mademoiselle Selena isn’t capable of making you do things more surprising still…”
In spite of his sadness, the young Comte could not help smiling.
After a brief pause, the young engineer went on: “So, in consequence of that rogue Sharp’s theft, we’re almost in the same situation as Robinson Crusoe on his island, but with the difference that Robinson could gather fruit from the trees—which, without making him fat, at least prevented him from dying of hunger…while we…” Suddenly, he interrupted himself, slapped his forehead in a gesture of inspiration. Kneeling on the ground, he took a box from under Monsieur Ossipoff’s bed, which he opened. It contained a few dozen biscuits and four tins of preserves. “There you are—a good deed never goes unrewarded,” he said.
“What’s that?” asked the old man.
“A kindness of Mademoiselle Selena’s with regard to Sharp. Not wishing to abandon him here without resources, she demanded that I leave him this little reserve, without mentioning it to anyone.”
“That child has always had a heart of gold,” murmured the old scientist, tenderly.
“And that good deed will work to her advantage too,” replied Fricoulet.
“What do you mean?” asked Gontran.
“In order that we can get her back from her kidnapper, it will be necessary for us to construct a means of locomotion—and for that, we’ll need time, and during that time, our stomachs will claim their due.”
Flammermont pointed to the contents of the box. “Is that what you’re counting on to sustain all three of us?”
“No, just to give us the time to construct other aliments.”
“Construct!” exclaimed Gontran. “It’s a nice word.” Seriously, he added: “Then you’re going back to your original idea of fabricating legs of mutton and lamb cutlets?”
On hearing these words, Ossipoff looked at Fricoulet with a surprised expression. “Monsieur de Flammermont’s joking, isn’t he?” he said.
“Certainly, as that’s not what I’m thinking.”
“Explain yourself, then,” said Gontran, a trifle piqued.
“I simply want to find a means of procuring us assimilable elements and permitting our organic system to repair the everyday losses caused by the expenditure of strength to which we’ll be subject.”
Flammermont shrugged his shoulders. “There, you see,” he said. “You’re back to my sheep, whose legs are, I believe, the only assimilable substances capable of rendering us the reparative services of which you speak.”
“My poor friend,” retorted Fricoulet, “the loss of your fiancée has completely turned your head—otherwise, you’d recall that in that foodstuffs, the basis of human nutrition, useless water accounts for four-fifths of the weight. The remaining fifth consists of solid materials such as albumin, fibrin, creatin, gelatin, chondrine, etc.”
“I’m in agreement with you on that point,” replied Flammermont, ironically. “So let’s fabricate food, for water we have in quantity…come on! Where are we going to find your albumin, fibrin, etc., etc…?”
Ossipoff answered him. “No need for all that, my dear boy—for, among the substances that make up food, there’s a certain number absolutely irrelevant to nutrition, being completely useless—chondrin and gelatin, for example. Others, like fibrin and albumin, aren’t simple substances but compounds, following known proportions, of oxygen, hydrogen, carbon and nitrogen. We therefore have no need of bread and meat for our nourishment; all our efforts must be devoted to the extraction of the truly nutritive substances from Selenian materials and adapting them to us.”
“In other words,” said Fricoulet, “synthesizing them.”
Gontran, on whose lips a mocking smile had been playing for a few seconds, folded his arms and exclaimed: “In truth, I admire you. If I’ve understood your explanations correctly, it’s simply a matter of devoting ourselves to the work of chemical analysis. Now, the first thing we need—an indispensable thing, when it comes to mounting this fine project—is instruments. Now…”
Fricoulet, whose eyes were wandering around the room, started. “No need to say more,” he interrupted, triumphantly. “I anticipated your objection, and this is what will answer it magnificently.”
He ran to the other side of the room, rummaged in a shadowy corner for a few seconds, and emerged dragging a box carefully along the ground. He deposited it at Flammermont’s feet.
“What’s that?” asked the latter.
“Well?” said Ossipoff, in his turn.
“It’s your box of instruments.”
“How’s that?”
“You know very well—it’s the box that we put aside in order to analyze, when the opportunity arose, the lunar atmosphere. Now, the various events that overtook us during our sojourn caused us, by a stroke of good luck, to postpone that study indefinitely. The box was forgotten and left here—it will do the job for us, I promise you.” Rapping on the lid, he said to Flammermont, jokingly: “With this, as you’ll see, we’re going to fabricate legs of mutton and four-pound loaves, since those aliments are absolutely necessary to your well-being.”
Once the box was opened, the old scientist could not contain an exclamation of pleasure at the sight of the instruments buried in the straw. “A eudiometer, an aneroid, thermometers, a compass, test-tubes, a box of reagents!” he murmured, while his face became clearer at every discovery he made. “There’s more here than we’ll need.” After a moment he added: “Let’s take things in order. The first thing to do is to make sure of the composition of the air we’re breathing and he importance of the atmosphere—don’t you agree, my dear Gontran?”
“Absolutely, absolutely,” the young man repeated twice over. Privately, he added, while scratching his ear: Provided that he doesn’t take it into his head to consult me about the cookery he’s going to do. With this thought, he darted an imploring glance at Fricoulet.
The latter understood his mute prayer and, suppressing a smile, asked the old man: “What method are we…” Immediately, he corrected himself: “…are you going to use?”
The aged scientist reflected briefly. “My God! At first I thought of the eudiometric method devised by Gay-Lussac90…but as you know, it can only be used on very small quantities of gas, by which reason there’s a wide margin of error. Now, in the situation we’re in, I can’t afford to make mistakes, and I need to obtain scrupulously exact results…”
“In that case,” Fricoulet exclaimed, “employ phosphorus…it’s the simplest method and the quickest!”
“That’s what I thought,” Ossipoff replied, dryly. He took a wine-glass from the box of reagents, which he filled to a depth of two-thirds with distilled water. Then, he plunged graduated test-tube into the water which contained exactly five cubic centimeters of air—after which, he inserted a long stick of damp phosphorus into the tube. Having done that, he put the apparatus in a corner and set about unpacking the other instruments.
The young Comte, who had watched this operation curiously, drew Fricoulet aside and whispered in his ear: “Explain it to me.”
“The stick of phosphorus that you can see glowing in the dark,” the engineer replied in a low voice, “absorbs oxygen from the ambient air and combines with it. Soon, when the phosphorus is no longer surrounded by white fumes and has lost all its radiance, Ossipoff will withdraw the test-tube and, as it’s graduated, he’ll only have to return the new volume of gas to the init
ial pressure to establish what fraction of it has disappeared, absorbed by the phosphorus.”
“That’s the oxygen, isn’t it?” said Gontran.
“Indeed—and the gas remaining in the test-tube will be the nitrogen…”
“Unless the composition of the lunar atmosphere differs from that of the terrestrial atmosphere—as I’ve heard Monsieur Ossipoff suggest several times.”
At that moment, the old man uttered an exclamation and pointed to Fricoulet’s candle. “We’re soon going to find ourselves in darkness,” he said. The wick was, indeed, charring and only emitting a flickering light.
“Oh, if only we could make gas!” sighed Gontran.
Ossipoff clapped his hands. “Why not?” he said. “I mean liquid gas. It’s quite simple, since we have alcohol and turpentine.” And while he made up the mixture in an ordinary glass flask, Fricoulet fabricated a wick with the aid of a cotton ribbon—which, plunged into the liquid and ignited, immediately flared up, distributing a bright light.
Gontran was amazed. Oh, these men of science! he thought.
Ossipoff was already thinking about something else; while arranging his instruments, he said: “We shouldn’t restrict ourselves to the air, for water must also contribute to our nutrition. Like me, you must have noticed that the lunar water has a taste quite different from that of terrestrial rivers and seas. I think that its analysis will reveal to us some element of which we might be able to make use. I propose to make that analysis by means of the electric battery, which will give us the relationship of the volumes of gas, and then by evaporation, which will leave residues the nature of which it will be easy for us to determine. Do you approve of that manner of procedure?”
Gontran, to whom this question was specifically addressed, nodded his head as if he understood. “Certainly,” he replied. “That’s the procedure I think we should follow, if…”
“If…?”
“If we were in possession of the indispensable instrument—which is to say, the electric battery.”
“That’s no obstacle,” said Fricoulet. “We can construct one easily.” In response to the young Comte’s interrogative gaze, he went on: “The zinc that lines this box, the copper coins that we have in our pockets, and finally, a piece of cloth borrowed from our clothing—aren’t those all the constitutive elements of a battery? We’ll steep them in water to which a little sulfuric acid has been added, and the current we obtain will be sufficient to electrolyze the liquid…” As Gontran became enraptured, the young engineer added: “There’s nothing new in the procedure—it dates from 1800, and was employed by Nicholson and Carlisle to make the first analysis of terrestrial water.”91 While speaking, he had cut a piece from one of the tails of his frock-coat into roundels, while Ossipoff was doing the same to zinc removed from the lid of the box.
Flammermont watched them assemble the battery, shaking his head dubiously. In spite of the explanations he had been given, he could not imagine that all these manipulations would result in anything nutritive and stomachable. If they can do what they claim, he thought, the terrestrial expression ‘living on air’ will be found to be true—and that would be too bizarre! Suddenly, he uttered a slight exclamation that attracted the attention of Ossipoff and his companion.
“What’s the matter?” Fricoulet asked.
“The stick of phosphorus has gone out,” Flammermont replied.
The old man left the battery in the hands of the engineer and went to the apparatus. After withdrawing the phosophrus from the test-tube and rapidly making his calculations he triumphantly exclaimed “Hurrah! I wasn’t mistaken in my suppositions.”
“Have you, by chance, found a sheep in that test-tube?” asked the young Comte, jokingly.
Ossipoff smiled and replied: “No, but something that might certainly replace the flesh of that quadruped.” Gontran opened his eyes wide as Selena’s father continued: “Instead of being composed, as on Earth, of 79 parts of nitrogen for 21 parts of oxygen, the air that we are breathing is composed of equal volumes of those two gases!”
“That’s why we’re not experiencing any difficulty because of the low air pressure,” said Fricoulet.
A few moments later, Ossipoff and the engineer were bent over the voltameter silently examining the bubbles of gas forming in the battery and filling the test-tubes.
“That’s bizarre,” murmured the old man.
Fricoulet took a drop of water submitted to the analysis and spread it over his hand. “Of course!” he said. “I was sure of it!”
“Of what were you sure?” asked the old scientist.
The engineer examined the drop of water meticulously and replied: “Like the air, this water does not have the same composition as on Earth.”
“What do you mean?”
“That it contains twice as much oxygen as terrestrial water and that it is composed of three volumes of that gas for one of hydrogen.”
“But in that case,” said Gontran, “It’s oxygenated water!”
“Definitely.”
“It’s undrinkable!”
“Not at all, but it’s necessary to distil it in order to get ride of its surplus oxygen.”
Ossipoff said nothing, however; with his lips pursed, his eyes half-obscured by lowered lids and his chin in his hand, he appeared to be plunged in profound meditation.
“What are you thinking, Monsieur Ossipoff?” asked Gontran.
“I’m thinking that we have oxygen, hydrogen and nitrogen…but that what we still have to do is to find carbon.”
“Carbon!” exclaimed he young Comte. “What would you do with it if you had it?”
“I would put it in the presence, in certain proportions, of the substances we already possess—and that combination would give birth to the substance destined to serve us as nourishment.”
On hearing these words, Gontran shrugged his shoulders prodigiously. “Oh, of course!” he murmured. “I should have expected that!”
Fricoulet jogged his elbow and leaned towards him “A true scientist,” he whispered, “should expect everything.”
Flammermont accepted this advice and promised himself to dissimulate, in future, any astonishment capable of making Ossipoff suspicious of the scientific capabilities of his future son-in-law.
Meanwhile, the old man remained silent, his gaze fixed on his bottles of reagents and his apparatus. Suddenly, his companions heard him repeat several times, as if speaking to himself: “That’s it—yes, that’s it.” Then he beckoned them to come closer and said to them: “This is how we’ll proceed. We’ll begin by extracting oxygen and hydrogen from the water by means of the battery. We’ll use phosphorus to absorb oxygen from the air to collect pure nitrogen. As for carbon, we’ll produce it in the form of graphite. Then, by familiar methods, we’ll produce, on the one hand, pure oxygen in the solid state and, on the other, a nutritive compound, a small volume of which will possess extraordinary qualities of assimilation. By that means, we’ll be sure of our lungs and our stomachs.”92 He turned to Flammermont. “When we arrive at that result, I’ll appeal to all your intelligence, my dear boy, to procure us a new means of locomotion to launch us in pursuit of Sharp.”
The sweet vision of his fiancée doubtless passed before the young man’s eyes at that moment, for he cried out in a vibrant voice: “Count on me, Monsieur Ossipoff. If it only depends on my determination, we’ll catch up with the rogue, even if it’s on the Sun!”
Overcome by a surge of emotion, the old man hugged the young man to his breast and held him tightly for some time.
Meanwhile, Fricoulet carefully examined the state of the larder—which is to say, the contents of the box that Selena’s foresight had left for the benefit of Sharp. “My friends,” he said, “I think it’s important to set about the task without delay, for we have only four days’ nourishment in hand, at the most: 33 biscuits and five half-pound tins of preserves—that’s all.”
“Plus a bar of chocolate that I put in my pocket to nibble during the
congress,” Gontran added. “I’ll add it to the pot.” So saying, he brought out the precious comestible and gave it to Fricoulet, who took charge of the little colony’s rations.
Chapter XXI
In which Gontran has another good idea
“Alcide!”
“Gontran!”
“I can’t do any more.”
“Come on—a little more courage.”
“Oh, I have courage—it’s my stomach that hasn’t. I haven’t provided its daily ration for 30 hours; it’s resisting and demanding its entitlement.”
The young Comte had pronounced these words in a feeble voice that made a deep impression on Fricoulet. The engineer, who was using a compression pump to liquefy and solidify nitrogen and oxygen,93 immediately abandoned his task and ran to Flammermont. “What?” he said, trying to make a joke of it. “You aren’t capable of going more than two days without eating. You make a deplorable explorer, you know.”
Gontran shook his head. “Oh,” he aid, “I’d give one of my limbs to be sat down in front of a cutlet au cresson or a beefsteak aux pommes…”
“Everyone has his whims,” replied the engineer, smiling.
“Yes, and if this goes on, that whim will be transformed into madness. I can feel it—my head is becoming empty, my ideas are getting confused and, at the same time…” He put his hands to his breast in a dolorous gesture. “Oh, I’m suffering,” he sighed.
“And nothing to get your teeth into, poor chap,” said Fricoulet, affectionately. “Oh, if things had gone as Ossipoff hoped—but you’ve seen with your own eyes the difficulties he’s encountered. Twice already, he’s started over…hence the delay—but now he claims to be certain of success.”
Gontran shook his head. “If his success is delayed any longer, it’ll come too late,” he grumbled.
As he said this, the old man—whose silhouette was visible at the far end of the room, bent over his retorts—uttered an exclamation of triumph. “Gontran! Fricoulet!” he called.
The two young man ran over, arriving just in time to catch Mikhail Ossipoff in their arms. He too was exhausted by hunger but had struggled nevertheless, with indomitable energy, until the moment of victory. With an unaccustomed effort, he extended his hand towards a receptacle at the bottom of which a blackish gelatinous substance was visible. “There,” he succeeded in stammering. “Eat…quickly…quickly…” His head slumped backwards and he became motionless, as if unconscious.
The Extraordinary Adventures of a Russian Scientist Across the Solar System (Vol. 1) Page 40