In 1965

by Albert Robida

  The next day, taken o the Temple of the Arts, I had the opportunity to perceive centaur painting and sculpture. I’m not a connoisseur, and I probably wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between a Leonardo da Vinci and a contemporary impressionist if it weren’t for the cracks indicating the age of the Leonardo, but I can say that the centaurs don’t seem to be to be very well endowed with regard to the Fine Arts.

  That doubtless comes from their impetuous nature, which tends to active occupations rather than meticulous endeavors. Certainly, if Raphael and Michelangelo had had four muscular legs as indefatigable as theirs, they wouldn’t have produced as many masterpieces, and of lesser quality; without a doubt, Raphael and Michelangelo would have preferred galloping joyously through the meadows and the woods, the plains and the mountains.

  My self-esteem had to suffer somewhat among the centaur artists, I saw a great many disdainful expressions and I overheard a few uncomplimentary remarks.

  “The height of the body, all right, although the chest, shoulders and arms of the quadrumane are feeble, but the rest is quite disgraceful!”

  “What a lack of harmony and proportion in the ensemble!”

  “What weakness in those two miserable little legs, which transport him with difficulty at a slow pace!”

  etc...

  Firmly determined not to take offense at anything, I contented myself with enclosing myself in my dignity, while I was sketched standing up, sitting down or walking.

  The following day was the solemn day of the royal audience. The large Centaur Island has enjoyed a rather advanced civilization for centuries; it has seen the petty principalities that once divided it disappear; the fusion of the various tribes has taken place over time, and nothing any longer remains but a single immense federated kingdom, with viceroys descended from ancient chiefs in the provinces. The southern part of the island, inhabited by the centaurs of the more primitive and less civilized striped race, is a sort of colony of that kingdom, or if you like, a tributary province, conquered in the past by long wars.

  I was therefore admitted to appear before His Majesty, a centaur in the prime of life, of proud and haughty bearing, representing a dynasty that already counted twenty-three kings, among whom, it was said, there were a number of remarkable monarchs. I saw the Queen, a mild and likeable centauress of about thirty, who gave me her royal hand to kiss with a charming grace.

  The young princes reminded me of the children of my friend Kapalouia by their vivacity and mischievousness.

  His Majesty charged Bibouf with having my full-length portrait painted for his cabinet of curiosities. He congratulated Bibouf and Galibou and accorded them decorations. As for me, who earned them those decorations and, in consequence, deserved them more than they did. His Majesty only gave me a pair of bracelets of a metal resembling silvered copper.

  Oh, when I get Bibouf, Galibou and Pingo to Bordeaux!

  The end of the week resembled the beginning; I made the acquaintance of all the notable individuals in the capital. It was always the same; at first sight I excited a keen astonishment that was quite flattering, but afterwards, in the speeches and conversations, I caught a number of criticisms that were more or less disagreeable to hear.

  All those rather tiring official presentations had the advantage of introducing me to a host of interesting individuals and furnishing with notions of the institutions of Centaur Island precious for the relation of my voyage, my misfortunes and my captivity to be written on my return to my homeland, so I didn’t neglect to take notes.

  Now, O humiliation, we arrive at the public exhibition.

  One morning, Pingo said to me: “Come along then, your new apartment is ready, you’ll be content!”

  I had heard centaur carpenters or metalworkers hammering, filing, and driving in nails without thinking that it was for my benefit. Pingo took me through a courtyard and into the gardens. At the back, under a hangar closed by sliding doors, I perceived a large square cage about five meters by four, provided with solid iron bars and fitted at the top with rolling blinds, to close all four sides completely in case of need.

  Bibouf and Galibou were there, making a last inspection.

  “You see, my dear Zephyrin,” Galibou said to me, “extremely precious little animal, last representative of a race of mammals disappeared from the entire surface of the globe, that you’ll be very comfortable in this new apartment.”

  “My dear Galibou,” I said, sharply, “I’ve noticed that, although a centaur, you possess a few vague sentiments of humanity; I appeal to those sentiments! You’re not going to lock me in there!”

  “But yes, it’s necessary! You’ll be very comfortable, it’s nice here, in the fresh air of the garden, under the lovely shade...”

  “Me, in captivity! In a cage, as in the Jardin des Plantes! Me, Zephyrin Canigousse, long-haul captain!”

  “You dare to complain, precious little animal, but we could have made a gift of you to the Museum, and who knows whether, in order better to preserve you in your present state, you wouldn’t have been immediately naturalized and placed under glass, sheltered from any accident? Instead of that, Bibouf and I are making sacrifices, offering you an existence full of amusements and distractions...”

  “And you’re still complaining!” groaned Bibouf. “You’re still protesting!”

  “Distractions you shall have in abundance,” Galibou went on. “The public will come, people of all classes, there’ll be comings and goings. People will talk to you, you’ll have conversation, people will say amiable things to you. You’ll only be in that cage for your receptions, during the day, from ten o’clock until five; the rest of the time you’ll come up to our apartment, or we’ll go out together, we’ll go for a stroll, you’ll take exercise...”

  “You won’t try to run away,” Bibouf went on. “It’s not in your interest, my friend. First of all, where would you go? With your ridiculous conformation, you can’t go very quickly. Then, you’d be recognized and brought back here without delay...unless dishonest men stole you, but for that we have law courts. That’s not all, one day a week the price of entry changes; it’s no longer two piecettes that people pay to see you, it’s ten. Ten, my little friend, that’s flattering for you! That day, naturally, you’ll only have a select public, you’ll take tea with people of the highest society...”

  “See how delicate we are,” added Galibou. “Pingo wanted to plant a tree in your cage, and people would have demanded that you climb it in order to do a few exercises, as you must do in your homeland, but we’ve divined that that would annoy you and we’ve got rid of the tree. You can therefore do as you wish in the cage; we’ll give you books, games, pencils, you can write, you can devote yourself to works of some sort to demonstrate that you have a certain intelligence. As I said to Pingo, that way you’ll become a much more interesting little phenomenon. But Pingo is at the cash register, and he’s already signaling to me that the public is here already, and it’s only half past nine. It’s a success, my friend, a success!”

  XV. Return of the quadrumane Zephyrin to his homeland after seventeen years and three months of captivity

  Yes, it was a success. From the morning onwards a numerous public crowded into the garden in front of my cage, centaurs of all social classes, workers, peasants on market days, bourgeois centaurs with their families, a great many children, and even, sometimes, schoolchildren brought by their masters and mistresses—at discount prices.

  Pingo was the titular director of the exhibition, the “Manager,” as the English say. Bibouf and Galibou remained in the wings, outside vile questions of money; they were content to supervise and organize. From time to time, one or other of them gave a scientific lecture.

  I was well treated. From day to day, the two scoundrels became increasingly amiable. That was because they were raking in superb receipts, sometimes as many as seven or eight hundred piecettes, and five times that on distinguished days. I represented a considerable capital, so they heaped me with
consideration and strove to find distractions for me.

  We took hygienic strolls every evening. Pingo put me in the crate to traverse the city, but as soon as we were in the country. I got out and walked, philosophizing with the two scientists, under the surveillance of the vigilant Pingo.

  Let’s be cunning, let’s be patient, let’s wait, I said to myself. The opportunity will eventually come to give my captors the slip and return to my homeland...or rather, no, I won’t give them the slip; no, I’ll escape, but I want to take them with me in my flight, to abduct all three of them…O vengeance! My old plan still remains good, it’s just a matter of being patient, of finding a way, of being ingenious, in order to engender the opportunity...

  And I waited! And do you know how long I was on the lookout for that opportunity, how long I remained captive, behind my bars, in the power of my persecutors?

  Seventeen years!

  I lived for seventeen years on Centaur Island, seventeen years and three or four months, without succeeding in finding the saving stratagem, the possible plan for getting away from Pingo and returning home, where, although a bachelor, I nevertheless had relatives and friends who must be anxious about the length of my absence! I didn’t stay in the centaur capital for more than eighteen months, during which Bibouf and Galibou used the most ingenious means to maintain the curiosity of the inhabitants: debates, polemics and even little lectures given my me, for I quickly arrived at being able to speak the centauran language fluently—lectures on humankind, its mores, its customs, its nations, etc.

  Afterwards, we left for long tours of the provinces. In the utmost depths of the island, there was no point of thinking of escape. I was patient, for we had to end up eventually in the coastal provinces. But in the coastal cities, Bibouf and Galibou were suspicious, I sensed their narrower surveillance. Pingo never quit me. I talked about bathing, excursions on the sea during the summer—which lasted for three quarters of the year—but it fell on deaf ears; the odious Pingo sniggered...

  Alas, I ended up renouncing my original plan, nurtured for so long, and the hope of taking them with me in order to take them to Europe. I was no longer thinking of any but one thing, of fleeing, all alone, but of fleeing!

  I escaped more than once; I wandered on the shore, seeking in vain to take possession of some kind of boat, but I had to go back, thwarted, every time, to wait for a better opportunity.

  Yes, that existence lasted seventeen years! Bibouf and Galibou, heaped with honors, having become illustrious scientists, thanks to me, members of all the institutes on the island, ended up yielding me completely to Pingo, only reserving full property in my body following my death, for, as a supreme honor, my skull was demanded by the Academy of Sciences, and my place in the Museum was already prepared.

  With Pingo my appearances took on a less scientific character. That centaur had the mentality of an exhibitor of bears. I had to deliver myself to a few exercises in public, to sing, to dance, to perform acrobatics and deploy a few petty talents. Yes, we had become fairground performers!

  I saw the country with him. For some time we traveled in the regions of the striped centaurs. Briefly, I thought about fomenting revolt among them and seeking to provoke them to rise up against their powerful neighbors. I conspired…and then I felt remorse. That island of centaurs was living happily and peacefully in the sunlight of the Pacific Ocean. Was I going to trouble that happiness? No, let’s think of something else!

  Finally, Pingo launched me in the theater. The centaurs only have open air theaters, always placed in marvelous locations, where plays are performed of the genre of our tragedies, with choruses, as among the Greeks, and sometimes also dramas of a more modern taste.

  A fashionable author wrote a play expressly for me in which I played a brief but important role. I saw my name in large letters on the posters: The Quadrumane Zephyrin.

  In that play I was, it’s necessary to confess, a sort of ape, an orangutan or a gorilla, and I stole the child of a rich family of centaurs in order to carry him away to my natal forest.

  That was what the author in question made of me! No matter, he was the one who furnished me with the means of my escape. May he accept all my thanks!

  In the provinces, we gave a series of performances of The Perfidious Quadrumane. I linked myself in amity with two centaur artistes, my fellow actors in the play, in which they played the father and the mother of the stolen centaurin. Those worthy folk, without prejudices in my regard, treated me as a comrade. We often chatted about my homeland, about Bordeaux, Paris and Europe, whose inhabitants were by no means quadrumane savages, as the scientists of Centaur Island claimed...

  And I proposed to them that they depart with me for that unknown and marvelous world. I made hopes of fortune shine in their eyes, assuring them, by legal contract, of an honest partnership.

  In the end, they gave in. We were on the coast at the time, not far from the place where I had once been cast ashore. With their savings and mine—for I received a modest wage that provided me with pocket money—they secretly bought a boat, and then food supplies for six weeks. One day, after the performance, I forced one of the bars in my cage-bedroom, reached the beach where they were waiting for me, and we leapt aboard our boat.

  With what celerity I hosted the sail, with what an explosion of joy I seized the tiller and headed out to sea. It was just in time, moreover. Pingo arrived, galloping along the shore anxiously. He mistook us for fishers and hailed us to ask us whether we had seen a kind of chimpanzee with the face of a centaur, mounted on two paltry legs, wandering around.

  Saved! Finally! And I was about to being back to my homeland two specimens of the centauran race! Triumph in the end, after so many years!

  In order to reach the open sea we had to travel for some distance along the shore through a line of islets and reefs. It was necessary to be prudent and not run aground on departure. Fortunately, the moon was shining brightly and the boat steered well. Between all those rocks however, the waves became a trifle rough, and we began to dance. Then the enthusiasm of my two friends waned rapidly, sea-sickness caused their fine resolutions to capsize. After having struggled for three-quarters of an hour, they collapsed piteously on the deck, and renounced everything: the fine voyage, the glory, the fortune. They even threatened…

  What could I do? I reasoned, I argued, I begged. I refused categorically to return to land and tried to make them go below decks in order to lock them in. When they saw that I was determined not to yield, they recovered a little energy. They got up, unsteadily, and leapt into the sea. The coast was not far away; I saw them swimming vigorously and, after a good quarter of an hour, go ashore in an inlet.

  Adieu, dreams of fortune, lets save ourselves first! And alone, in my feeble boat, I set sail for the high seas.

  After six weeks of navigation, horribly fatiguing, a week of tempests when I nearly perished a hundred times over, my boat is falling apart. Fortunately the great equatorial current carries me without too much difficulty. Finally, land appears, our land, the world of human beings! It’s the coast of South America…ships in sight…men…a port...

  It’s Valparaiso... Saved! I’m saved!

  There I find a ship for Bordeaux, which repatriates me, and I reach home after an absence of eighteen years.

  That’s my great adventure. I haven’t said anything; no one would have believed me, since I didn’t bring back anything to show. If I’m talking about it now, it’s because, having recovered from my fatigues, having taken the time to ripen my plans and organize my expedition in silence, I’m preparing to set forth again any day now, well equipped and well accompanied, for Centaur Island, in order to rediscover it and give the world its sixth continent.

  And this time, by no matter what means, I intend absolutely to bring back Pingo, Bibouf and Galibou!

  Notes

  1 ISBN 978-1-61227-075-3.

  2 By “tubes” Robida means a large-scale version of the kind of pneumatic tubes then used in Paris as an
alternative postal service, in which small packages were impelled by compressed air. A memorable journey through a passenger-carrying tube of that sort is described in “Un Potache en 1950,” and they are a significant background feature of “En 1965.”

  3 Robida’s illustration shows a vehicle with three wheels set in a linear arrangement, one in front of another. An “autoflyer” is a primarily a road vehicle, which employs its wings in order to jump over inconvenient obstructions—and idea that failed to catch on even in futuristic fiction, although similar vehicles are featured in Victor Margueritte’s Le Couple (1924; tr. as The Couple, Black Coat Press, ISBN 978-1-6122-362-4).

  4 “Houille rouge” [red coal] was a phrase that had taken on a macabre meaning in France during the Great War, with reference to the blood whose spillage was fuelling the war. Robida is, therefore, making a joke in re-adapting it to a quasi-literal meaning; Charles is an industrial engineer employing red-hot lava inside volcanoes as a power source for electricity generation.

  5 “White coal” was a phrase already used in 1919 to refer to hydroelectric power.

  6 The reference is to the Perrault version of “Barbe-Bleue” [Bluebeard], in which the curious wife stations her sister, Anne, as a lookout to warn her about her husband’s return, and asks her repeatedly whether she can see anyone coming.

  7 The playwright Eugène Labiche (1815-1868), in Le Misanthope et l’Auvergnat (1852).

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