The Twenty-One Balloons PMC

by William Pene du Bois

  “How do we keep the wheel straight when it’s in the air?”

  “You’ll see,” he said.

  We soon reached the top and the Merry-Go-Round lunged upward as it lost its grip on the pole. The wind immediately started to carry us off over the Island. We were gaining altitude fast and, of course, still spinning around at great speed. I must admit this was a truly delightful and exciting ride, unlike any other balloon experience I have ever had. I saw now how the boats were kept level. A child in each boat held the ripcord of his boat’s balloon. Whenever a boat went a little higher than the others, the ripcord would be pulled releasing a little hydrogen until the boat was again on the same level.

  “You must only be able to take short trips,” I told F-1, “if you constantly have to release gas to keep the Merry-Go-Round level.”

  “That’s right,” he answered. “The length of our trips depends on many things such as the calmness of the weather, how well we distribute the weight in the boats, and how skillfully we control the ripcords. But you understand,” he added, “the Balloon Merry-Go-Round wasn’t built for travel but rather for short pleasure trips.”

  “Oh, of course,” I said.

  The Balloon Merry-Go-Round was heading directly for the mountain. I saw that we were going to fly over it. I asked F-1 if this were not dangerous.

  “It isn’t dangerous, but it’s rather unfortunate because it always means a short trip.”

  “Why?” I asked.

  “Because the huge crater of the volcanic mountain is full of hot air which forms sort of a vacuum. When we fly over the crater, the Merry-Go-Round is sucked downward rather violently and we always use up a lot of gas controlling it and keeping it level.”

  “Isn’t this hazardous?” I asked.

  “No,” said F-1, “by the time we reach the mountain, we will be high enough to clear it by a great distance. The only danger in taking a ride in this is landing on the ground or on the mountain, or worst of all, in the mountain when the wind is calm. Krakatoa is a small island, and if there is any wind at all, it will carry the Merry-Go-Round out to sea. Once when we first got it, we took a trip on a very calm day. We went straight up, spun around a while, and gradually lost altitude, landing in a forest of palm trees. No one was hurt, but some of the boats were damaged and one of the balloons was torn. Since then, we have only risked trips when there is wind.”

  We were nearing the mountain and I leaned over the side of my boat to look down at the crater. There was a thick gray smoke crawling around inside. It was like looking into a horrible pit full of elephants. When we were directly over the mountain there was a sickening atmosphere of hot air permeated with sulphurous gases. The Merry-Go-Round started tossing around violently over the pit, and the children with the ripcords kept a careful watch directly across our giant wheel at opposite boats to keep the Merry-Go-Round as steady and level as possible. Hanging on tightly, I leaned over the side of the boat in order to have a direct look into the volcanic crater itself. In places where the smoke had cleared a bit I could see a lake of thick molten lava boiling and bubbling in slow motion. It was a sickening, frightening sight. As I was leaning over, the Merry-Go-Round suddenly plunged downward, then swayed from side to side as the children steadied it. I must have taken a deep gasp of breath, out of fear, I suppose, and my lungs were suddenly filled with hot sulphurous fumes. The Merry-Go-Round was still spinning fast, as well as pitching and rocking in the air. I hastily drew my head back into the boat, shut my eyes, and lay down on the bottom of the boat. I could hear the rumbling of the mountain beneath me mixed with the hissing noise of hydrogen being released from the balloons. I think I was as close to being sick then as it is possible for anyone to be. We were soon over the mountain and in fresh, calm air again and I sat up feeling considerably better.

  “To tell you the truth, Sir,” said F-1, who apparently could well see that I had nearly lost my British breakfast, “I was nearly sick myself that time. The mountain seems unusually violent this morning. I hope this isn’t a bad sign.”

  I took this to be the remark of a younger balloonist comforting an older one who had nearly made a fool of himself. I told him that my behavior was quite inexcusable.

  Flying over water in this spinning airship was completely enjoyable. The magnificent seascape of the Pacific Ocean passed before your eyes half of the time, and Krakatoa in its entirety was beneath you for your careful observation with each turn of the Merry-Go-Round. The Island looked beautiful from the air. Its vegetation was so rich, warm, and soft-looking. The mountain looked so fearful and exciting. The magnificent houses of all nations looked like extraordinary doll’s houses on felt lawns, and the Krakatoan crystal house shone like a jewel. The contrast between the trimmed interior and untrimmed ring of jungle around the Island was easy to see from our boats. The Island looked like a formal garden surrounded by a bushy untrimmed hedge.

  After a flight lasting approximately thirty-five minutes we were near the surface of the water. The children, controlling their ripcords like experts, lowered the Merry-Go-Round gently and smoothly into the Ocean. We made one complete turn in the water and came slowly to a stop. “Well,” I exclaimed, “that was undoubtedly the most thrilling and unusual trip I have ever had the pleasure of taking.”

  The children in the boats, Mr. F., and I then all leaned back and relaxed a while in the sun, looking up at the balloons which were now half empty and bobbing back and forth with the wind. Suddenly one of the boys, the same one who had fired the starting gun, stood up and said, “All right, everybody, let’s go.”

  At this command, the rest of the children stood up and carefully deflated their balloons and folded them up in their boats without letting any part of them touch water. They folded them lengthwise first, then rolled them from the top toward the bottom where the gas escape was, thus forcing all of the gas out of them and making small neat bundles. They opened the little lockers in the boats, where the sails were, took the sails out, and replaced them with the folded balloons. Each boat had one mainsail.

  “How do you sail these boats when they are all attached together like a wheel?” I asked. “And what do you use for masts?” These were foolish questions, I immediately realized, for while I was asking them I managed to figure out these problems for myself.

  First of all, the children detached the boats one from the other at their bows and sterns. When this was done, they were still attached to each other by the poles which formed the spokes of the giant wheel. These poles were obviously the masts when the boats were used for sailing. The children, two on each pole, all pushed together toward the center hub until the poles slid out through the brass oar-lock rings on their boats. Then, still working two on each pole, they unscrewed the poles from the brass hub in the center. They all unscrewed their poles except one boy, the boy who gave the commands. He pulled his pole in with the hub still attached to it, unscrewed the hub in his boat, and put it away in a separate locker. Now that they each had their masts, it was a simple problem to put them into the mast holes. Mr. F. and I did our best to work as efficiently as any of the other crew members. Soon the mainsail was rigged up and we were ready to sail back to the Island. Only the need for a boom was absent from this compact invention. We lowered the centerboards and lined up. It was evidently the custom to race home. The boy who gave the signals took out his gun, fired it, and we were homeward bound as fast as the wind would take us. I am afraid I was more of a hindrance than a capable assistant to young F-1. We finished the race last by about seven minutes. The boats were moored to a dock near the freighter in the hidden inlet and we assembled on shore. F-1 explained to me that the boy who had given the signals was the “Captain of the Day,” some sort of honor each child received in turn.

  The Captain of the Day told the rest of us that since this was my first trip in the Balloon Merry-Go-Round, the results of the boat race wouldn’t count on the Official Scoring Sheet. F-1 let out a whooping cheer at this which made me feel quite badly. The Captai
n of the Day then took me aside and told me, in a most polite way, that he thought it would be an excellent idea if I learned a bit about sailing since I now found myself to be a citizen of Krakatoa. I assured him that I would.

  The Captain of the Day then closed the meeting by saying that the Merry-Go-Round would be reassembled around the flying pole right after supper. “And I want you all to be here and help,” he said, looking sternly in my direction.

  After forty years of schoolteaching I found myself being ordered about by a child. I couldn’t help but find this heretofore impossible turnabout amusing. I was indeed far away from the usual dull school routines I so disliked.

  “I’ll be there!” I said in a loud voice, as everybody looked at me and laughed.

  The whole trip had taken about five hours and we had therefore missed lunch. I devoured an excellent supper at the B.’s chop house, and then Mr. F. and I reported to the flying pole. The Captain of the Day rang the bell on top of the shack assembling all of the children and we were divided into eight groups of five. (B-1 and B-2 were still busy.) With five on each boat, we had the Merry-Go-Round reassembled and ready to go in less than half an hour. I will confess, though, that after this busy second day on the fabulous Island, I was well ready for bed and slept like a top.

  IX

  Concerning the Giant Balloon Life Raft

  THE NEXT MORNING I ATE BREAKFAST WITH my fellow-Krakatoans at Mr. C.’s Chinese restaurant. I will tell you quite frankly that I have no idea of what I ate at any of the meals on “C” Day. I am not too partial to Oriental food and didn’t even dare to ask what I was eating for fear that any accurate description or analysis would only add to the uneasiness with which I suffered through each meal. I noticed that many of the children toyed with their dishes with equal apprehension. I used their method of eating some of the portions which consisted of removing the toasted almonds from the top carefully, with a fork, and leaving the rest. Mr. F. scolded me for this display of timidity and poor taste, and told me that to acquire an appreciation of good food I should show a little more courage and will to experiment. I assured him that I had a great desire to become an accomplished gourmet while living under the Restaurant Government, but preferred to arrive at this in gradual stages over a long period of time.

  Mr. F. asked me what I wanted to do after breakfast. I told him that being on the Island in the position of a perpetual guest with no work to do, I was fast getting to think of living in terms of holidays back home. On a hot Sunday in San Francisco like this “C” Day of the Month of Lamb in Krakatoa, I would most probably go to some beach and do some swimming. I suggested a swim to Mr. F. He thought this to be a fine idea so we put on bathing suits and bathrobes and made our way through the outer fringe of jungle to a nicely cleared fine coral beach. I had arrived in Krakatoa on the afternoon of “A” Day. It was now the morning of “C” Day. In that short time, I had become quite used to walking about on the moving landscape. I was amazed at how fast I had acquired my “mountain legs” and felt rather proud of myself.

  The little beach looked very funny to me when I stopped and thought about it and compared it to beaches back home, for here the ocean was quite calm and the beach was going up and down.

  “How’s the swimming here?” I asked.

  “Excellent,” said Mr. F. “You’ll see.”

  I waded in the water up to my waist and there experienced a delightful sensation. The sand beneath me rose up with the surface of the earth until I found my feet out of water. It then lowered me down in the water up to my neck. I stood in one place and went in and out of water, spending a few seconds in the blazing tropical sun and then being dunked again up to my neck in clear cool water; up and down, in and out, without having to move at all from the place where I was standing. Mr. F. had waded out a little deeper in the water than I had and seemed to enjoy being entirely dunked up over his head at the earth’s lowest drop, and then rising with the earth until he was only up to his knees in water. Once when temporarily up to my waist I dove in toward deeper water to do a little swimming. I hadn’t gone very far when I felt the sand rise beneath me and lift me by the stomach out of water, a most peculiar feeling. Mr. F. explained to me that it was necessary to wade out quite far to do good swimming. “You should walk out far enough so that you are up to your waist in water when the surface of the earth beneath you is at its highest rising point.” I did this, half walking and half “dog paddling,” and when I was far enough out, enjoyed a good swim.

  Back on the beach Mr. F. and I decided to take a sun bath. He told me that he had found it best to let the surface of the earth roll you around when it moved and not to try and lie in any one position. We did this and were nicely toasted on all sides by the hot sun. I was enjoying a most pleasant morning and decided right away to make this a daily habit.

  The night before, I had borrowed an atlas from Mr. F. and had looked up Krakatoa in it before going to sleep. I found that it was situated in the Sunda Strait between Sumatra and Java and that it was about twenty-five miles from both of these two huge islands. Looking at the map and trying to trace the path of my voyage in the Globe, I was amazed to see how much land I had missed on my trip. I must have flown between Mindanao at the southern end of the Philippines and the Celebes Islands over the Celebes Sea. I must have flown over Borneo one whole night, narrowly missing mountains and being at times very close to the ground. I shuddered when I tried to imagine the rude awakening I would have had if the Globe had struck a mountaintop in Borneo while I was peacefully asleep on my inflated mattress. The Pacific Ocean is the biggest body of water in the world. Krakatoa, which was only eighteen square miles in size, was one of the smallest Islands in the Pacific. I set out to land in Asia, the world’s biggest continent, completely missed many enormous islands, traveled thousands of miles over water, and landed on this tiny piece of land. Had a sea captain set out across the Pacific Ocean for, let us say, China and missed it by a few thousand miles and landed instead on Krakatoa, he would have been stripped of his commission and had his ship taken away from him. But to balloonists, stories such as mine are typical, and balloon trips are only considered unusual if you arrive within one hundred miles or so of your planned destination. I was thinking how delightful this all was, of the freedom and surprise of balloon travel, and of the Balloon Merry-Go-Round I had taken such a fantastic trip on that afternoon. Then it occurred to me that the Balloon Merry-Go-Round was a pretty big affair, and it seemed to me that it should be visible, when up in the air on a clear day, from either Java or Sumatra. I asked Mr. F. about this while we were basking in the sun.

  “We don’t worry much about that,” he said; “there are several reasons why. One of them is that the Balloon Merry-Go-Round is painted sky blue and therefore isn’t really visible from too great a distance. Another is that the Balloon Merry-Go-Round never goes over five or six miles on its longest trips, and that doesn’t bring it very close to either Java or Sumatra. Then too, the mountain has a reputation for belching forth strange things and the whirling balloons and boats look quite like a big blue smoke ring from the distance. But there is this very important reason why we don’t worry about its being seen: in 1877, our second year here, the mountain was so violent that it scared the people living on the shores of the Sunda Strait in both Java and Sumatra so much that they moved their homes inland about twenty-five miles on both islands. The whole of Krakatoa was violently rocked from end to end. Waves were formed in the Sunda Strait traveling outward from the Island as a center, giant waves which swept onto the shores of Java and Sumatra completely inundating many homes. The noise was formidable and the waves caused so much damage that the people moved away from the tips of the islands in great haste. We have reason to believe that no one dares to live within a radius of fifty miles from us.”

  “Great heavens!” I exclaimed. “How did such an explosion affect you who were living right here on the Island?”

  “It was quite bad. Many of the huts we lived in at the time col
lapsed like card houses. No one was hurt much though many of us were knocked unconscious or had our wind knocked out from being thrown abruptly to the ground. The noise of the explosion wasn’t too bad on the Island. I suppose the fact that we were right on the Island made the noise more bearable. If you stand right near or on a large artillery piece when it is fired, you are much less bothered by the noise than if you are fifty feet away. We picked ourselves up, helped those who needed help, and went about the business of rebuilding our houses.”

  This brought up another point that had been puzzling me. “Why,” I asked Mr. F., “do you people live here on top of this dormant volcano when with a handful of diamonds you could live a life of lavish ease and comfort in any other country?”

  “Your question is a puzzler, and there is really no logical answer to it. It suggests a series of other questions of exactly the same nature. For instance: why doesn’t a millionaire in any other country consider himself rich enough to retire, why does he try to make another million? Why do tycoons with several millions of dollars try to make a billion, a sum so huge they couldn’t possibly spend it in a lifetime? As long as our diamond mines are kept secret here we, the twenty families of Krakatoa, match the rest of the world in wealth. The diamond mines have a peculiar magnetic effect on us. We couldn’t live happily in any other country, we would be haunted with the unbelievable dream of this unheard of wealth back on the Island. But we can’t take our diamonds, that is all of our diamonds, to another country without destroying their value. We are slaves of our own piggishness, we have locked ourselves in a diamond prison. On the other hand, we’re very happy here; and I suppose the fascination of knowing that we are each one of us richer than the combined Midases, Nabobs, and Croesi of history enters too into the Krakatoan spell which keeps us here.”