Captains Stupendous

by Rhys Hughes

  ‘Are you quite sure about that?’

  ‘Indeed. How can you doubt my sincerity?’

  ‘I doubt anything I’m permitted to.’

  ‘Ah yes! A joke, of course!’

  He shrugged and I felt his shoulder rub against my own, for I refused to wander too far away from him in this creamy murk. We continued like that for perhaps half an hour. I couldn’t smell the river but it had to be just ahead of us. Where else would a captain choose to moor a ship? But up to a lonely old door he went, fumbled in his pocket for a key, opened it wide and stepped into a narrow bare passage.

  The passage led to a spiral staircase. He climbed this and I followed. It was utterly mystifying. The river couldn’t be upstairs! Or could it? Right at the very top, another door opened onto a flat roof. We were on top of a tall building, perhaps an apartment block or factory, I couldn’t tell which. Despite the elevation, the view was negligible. Just colourless lights, very vague, in the congealed fog. For a dreadful moment I wondered if reality itself had dissolved back into nothingness.

  This idle fancy passed as I realised that my companion was climbing a rope ladder. I couldn’t see the top of it, and the illusion was strange, as if he was engaged in climbing onto the other side of the sky like an angel or steeplejack employed by the gods, but presumably it led to another roof. The building I stood on was clearly higher than I had supposed. I watched him vanish into the almost tangible clouds; after a moment of loneliness, I followed him. I’m not expert at climbing such flimsy ladders; it swayed like the pendulum of an over-wound clock.

  It was longer than any rope ladder dangled from the side of any ship in my experience; but that experience was fairly limited, despite my travels, and so I clenched my teeth and continued upwards. Suddenly the sky was solid. A roof of metal above me! I was at a loss to account for this, but it made no difference to my ascent, for the rope ladder went through a hatch that was open. I hauled myself up and through the hole. I was exhausted by the climb and sprawled like a dying fish.

  While I rested on the floor, the captain reeled in the rope ladder, shut the hatch, locked it and strode over to a console that resembled a forest of levers. I was clearly on the bridge of a ship, but it was a vessel of unusual design.

  ‘Monsieur Faraway…’ I began.

  He ignored me, strode to the porthole with a megaphone.

  Opening this window and raising the cone to his lips, he bawled, ‘Cast off!’ to some unseen accomplice below.

  There was a violent lurch. I clung to the floor more tightly.

  ‘Is the river in flood?’ I gasped.

  The captain turned to look down at me. Then he offered me a hand and pulled me to my feet, laughing as he did so. The vessel steadied itself, but I was grateful for a chair he offered me. I sat down firmly and watched as he busied himself with the levers on the console. Now I felt the throb of a powerful engine in the very substance of the hull. Through the extremely large portholes directly ahead, I could discern nothing at all. Just fog and pale glows. Not a good time to set sail!

  I repeated my question. The captain turned and said, ‘The river? What do you mean? Is it some sort of riddle?’

  ‘By no means. The current seems strong, though.’

  He smiled. ‘The only currents that concern this ship are currents of air. I have no interest in the river at all. Only if we are forced to come down in it will I pay it any attention. What’s the matter? You seem to be quivering with fright! Or perhaps you are sick?’

  I shook my head and forced a grin, but doubtless my expression wasn’t healthy. For I had only just realised what kind of ship I had come aboard. Not the regular sailing kind. Not one of those. If I jumped out a window, I would fall a long way before landing.

  Unbelievable as it sounds, I was on an airship!

  Distance Is No Object

  ‘Scipio!’ I cried. ‘What has got into you?’

  The captain looked at me sharply. He rubbed his jaw with his damaged hand, the one with the missing finger, and for a moment he frowned with a twinkle of ferocious amusement in his eyes. Then his rage, if that’s what it was, subsided and he merely said:

  ‘Why do you call me by my brother’s name?’

  Had I not been seated in a chair, I would have toppled over in surprise. I had made a ludicrous mistake that would change my life forever. ‘You mean to claim you are Scipio’s twin?’

  ‘Triplets we are, the Faraway Brothers, not twins. I am Distanto. Now it’s my turn to enquire who you are.’

  ‘Distanto? Distanto Faraway!’

  He slitted his eyes again and said, ‘You have the same name as me? Although I accept that this world is full of bizarre coincidences, I really don’t believe that statement of yours.’

  ‘No, you misunderstand. I am Lloyd Griffiths.’

  I explained exactly who I was in fine detail, giving him an account of my work as a journalist, my meeting with Monsieur Scipio, our adventure in Romania, and the fact that I had received the shipless sailor’s pledge to aid the struggle of my own people against the English. Distanto nodded at this and waved a hand for me to continue. He continued adjusting levers, steering the dirigible through the fog.

  I told him that I wanted freedom for my nation; and yet, with evil war between Britain and Germany likely in the next few months, I was having second thoughts about stirring up trouble back in Wales. Far more ethical to postpone my dreams until the conflict was over! In fact I regarded it as my duty to fight a rampaging Kaiser.

  He asked me why I thought this, and I told him.

  I had always admired German culture, but the expansionist designs of the current regime were intolerable. The Hun would stamp Europe into a black mush if given the chance. The Welsh must join the English and put aside their ancient bitter grudges. This temporary rapprochement applied equally to the valiant Scots and Irish.

  ‘You are quite the pragmatist,’ he observed.

  ‘The Kaiser is a tyrant,’ I said.

  Distanto replied calmly, ‘I share your dislike of that mildewed dictator and certainly I’ll aid my own country, France, in the event of an invasion, but I don’t consider myself hugely patriotic. It’s more the case of a choice between two bad options: I’m obliged to choose the least bad of the pair. I wonder if the same thoughts are going through your mind at this moment when you compare me with my brother?’

  I scarcely knew how to respond to this cryptic remark, but fortunately he didn’t appear to require an answer. He said, ‘My navigator fell to his demise a few nights ago; I require a replacement. When you followed me out of the tavern and through the city, as if urged by destiny, I decided to take advantage of your unfathomable persistence and pressgang you into the vacancy. The post is now yours.’

  ‘Navigator!’ I blurted. ‘But I’m untrained!’

  Distanto smiled thinly. ‘It’s not difficult for a clever fellow to learn the rudiments on the job. Since the accident, I’ve been doing the calculations myself, but I’m already fully engaged steering this vessel, and frankly I’m overwhelmed with work. There are books on the subject in the navigator’s cabin, which now belongs to you.’

  ‘Don’t you have any other crewmen who might fill the role instead? I know you have accomplices; an unseen person cast off the mooring ropes when you shouted down the order.’

  Distanto waved a dismissive hand. ‘He was just a local I hired for that specific task after I landed. I fly alone now; but it’s simply not safe to fly this way for long. The job is yours.’

  ‘Very well, I accept, because I have no choice.’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Griffiths. But what’s the stink that rises from you? It’s unlike any odour I’ve encountered—’

  ‘I suffer from a rare fungal infection,’ I explained.

  ‘It’s not unpleasant actually.’

  ‘In no way does it hamper my competence.’

  ‘Good. That’s reassuring. Plot a new course, please. There are charts, compasses and other instruments over there.’ He po
inted with the stub of his severed finger at a table in the corner. I rose and went over to inspect the enigmatic tools of my new trade.

  I found Dresden on the first map. ‘Where are we headed to?’ I asked, as I shuffled through the other charts.

  ‘Brazil,’ he replied nonchalantly.

  ‘Cachu planciau!’ I blurted.

  ‘No doubt a vulgar curse in your own language?’

  I nodded mutely and he smiled with approval and heaved a chuckle. I understood how different he was from Scipio. I’m not saying he was less brave, less resourceful or even less cultured; but he had a coarse strain in him that the other brother lacked. Whether I would feel more comfortable in his presence as a consequence, or less, remained to be seen. But for the meantime, my thoughts were elsewhere.

  ‘Brazil’s in the southern hemisphere!’ I gasped.

  ‘Most, not all,’ he corrected me.

  ‘And why are we going there, Monsieur?’

  ‘Because distance is no object.’

  I winced at this facile retort, and it seemed he shared my disgust with it, for he sighed and added quietly:

  ‘To pick up the rest of my fee. Dom Daniel paid me half in advance; I completed his commission, and so I go to claim the other half. I don’t fly this airship just for my own amusement. I am in business. I advertise my services to anyone in need of them. Even an airship captain must eat, Mr Griffiths. I was paid to fly to the Arctic and that’s what I did; now I’m on my way back to Brazil, as arranged.’

  ‘The Arctic? Is that where you lost your finger?’

  It was an indelicate question, certainly, but it escaped my lips before I might hope to restrain it. And Distanto wasn’t offended at all. He laughed and shook his head. ‘Hardly! You suppose frostbite was the cause? I was the agency of its removal, Mr Griffiths. When I was a boy I was told by a fortune-teller that I had no fate line.’

  I closed my eyes and remembered Scipio, his brother. ‘So you decided to carve one into your own flesh, into the palm of your hand? In order to control your destiny! Is that correct?’

  ‘Yes indeed. But I used a hatchet and missed!’

  A violent shudder went through me. It lasted only an instant but I was profoundly affected by it. Desperate to change the subject, I asked about Dom Daniel, his client. And he told me. Dom Daniel, it so happened, was a mad genius, a prophet of sorts, a man who dreamed terrible dreams of a future blighted by the pollution of industry, of a coming age when greed and rapacity would despoil our planet. These dreams were so powerful it was impossible for Dom Daniel to sleep peacefully; so he had resolved to cheat the nightmares as best he might.

  Distanto continued, ‘He believes that within the next hundred years or so, the forests will be mostly gone; that humanity will have rendered our environment poisonous and ugly. Our race is fated to consume itself into oblivion. Such is his particular creed.’

  Bicycle Interlude

  While Distanto related the story of the strange Brazilian who had engaged his services, a different visionary was crossing into Persia. The eccentric inventor Jason Rolfe was mounted on a bicycle with a pulsejet engine; he had already crossed Europe on the device, dressed in a suit of homemade armour; he had also traversed the length of Turkey. Now he was entering a realm even more exotic and evocative.

  Once he had held a lance in his hands, a lance similar to that planted in a Mexico beach by Francisco Hernández de Córdoba centuries earlier; but it had been snatched from his grasp when he attempted to transfix Scipio Faraway while the mariner was patronising a pavement café in Bucharest. He was unarmed as a consequence; and in the brigand-infested parts now to be cycled through, that was a disaster.

  So he planned to make himself a substitute. Unable to dismount from his machine because of its astounding velocity, he had to devise a way of manufacturing the weapon while in motion. Far from being an impossible task, this could be achieved with only a little resourcefulness; and Jason Rolfe had no shortage of that. Already he had learned to eat and drink on the saddle, to collect food as he zoomed.

  Although he attempted to remain on paved roads as much as possible, there were times when he had to veer off and proceed over the untamed landscape, whether to avoid wild goats or grosser hazards. The roads in this part of the Near East weren’t much smoother or easier than the open country anyway; and his bicycle was a stout one, with superb suspension and vulcanised tyres of extreme durability.

  Often he passed through forests and orchards. Fruit sometimes fell into his lap; other times he was able to reach out and grab it as he passed. As for quenching his thirst, the rains were sweet, and the visor of his helmet was an inverted beak that channelled them into his mouth. Mr Rolfe’s odd expedition wouldn’t fail for lack of nourishment, that was certain, even if it was destined to come unstuck somehow.

  Over the Zagros Mountains he went, into Persia; and through secretive groves he raced, blossom-heavy branches lashing his face like the scented whips of resentful djinn. With a gauntleted hand he broke off some of the straighter branches, bound them together with the cord he carried in a box bolted to the crossbar between his knees. Also in this supply chest was an extremely vicious knife, a camping tool.

  This blade formed the head of his new lance; and a formidable weapon the end result was! Fully 30 feet long, it jutted in front of the demonic bicycle like the horn of a mutant unicorn, glinting with dew or moonlight, a deterrent to any bandits he might encounter! And it would serve also as the agency of his vengeance, if by an unlikely chance he encountered me a second time, the bounty still on my head.

  How curious to make a lance from scratch like he did, from whatever materials came to hand! We should contrast his actions in this regard with those of Mario Granieri. Remember him?

  Mario was the follower of Huerta who fled Mexico and sailed to Spain with the fabled lance of Córdoba in his possession. When he arrived and established himself, he decided to perform an unwise experiment; for he had fallen under the spell of alchemy, poor Mario, and believed he could improve the power of the lance. Specifically, he thought he might turn its head into gold, an amazing status symbol!

  And so he melted down, in a crucible, the metal point that history had already imbued with a remarkable propensity to create change. The steel bubbled and squeaked in the ceramic vessel; and Mario danced around it like an uncoordinated devil-worshipper …

  The European Desert

  We finally broke out of the fog on the southern side of the Alps. This was a relief, for I had started to feel like an imprisoned angel, surrounded only by solid whiteness, the walls of a grotesque celestial jail. Of Germany and Switzerland I saw nothing from the air; only when we crossed into France did the weather allow a spectacular view.

  I took great delight in gazing at the meadows and towns far below; but I wasn’t permitted to shirk my responsibilities. Distanto made sure I paid close attention to my calculations and route-plottings. Too many airships had gone missing because of slack navigation in recent years; he had very little desire that his own should do so too.

  And yet there were times when he would engage the autopilot, set the engine to the minimum speed and attempt to show his friendlier side. He wasn’t an especially likeable man, but I soon realised he was inept rather than misanthropic; his social skills were negligible, but he didn’t have an obnoxious soul. This is still my judgment.

  He told, for instance, the tale of Dom Daniel with relish; but there was no mockery in his tone. That Brazilian gentleman had spent the majority of his decades, from youth to old-timer, collecting the seeds of plants, for his ambition was no less than the preservation of the complete flora of the South American jungles. It was this collection, carefully sealed in flasks, that Distanto had flown to the far north.

  ‘But that’s no place for tropical vegetation!’ I cried.

  Distanto laughed at my naivety.

  ‘Mr Lloyd, the world is full of surprises; despite my experiences I am still constantly caught out by it. Dom Daniel had co
me into ownership of a rare atlas. I forget who drew the maps inside it. Possibly it was the work of Hippolyto Joseph da Costa, the mystic. That name is nagging the back of my mind. The atlas was peculiar.’

  ‘In what way?’ I challenged.

  ‘One of its engravings showed an Arctic island that was no less fertile and balmy than the Amazon forest. How so? It was warmed by volcanic activity, by steam and maybe magnetism; I can’t vouch for the latter. The perfect nursery for his project! His seeds might be preserved there during the inevitable ecological disaster; in some future age, a more enlightened race, having learned its lesson, would discover the stash and thus be able to repopulate the blasted earth with beauty. A worthy dream or fancy for any man, don’t you agree, my friend?’

  I arched my eyebrows at this. ‘Haliad hallt!’

  ‘Another curse? You want to know if the island was real? Yes, it was. It exists there, far to the north of Novaya Zemlya. Lush it is, an anomaly beyond any other on our entire globe.’

  ‘And did you leave Don Daniel’s seeds on it?’

  ‘That’s what I was paid to do.’

  ‘A successful mission then, Monsieur Faraway!’

  He smoothed his moustache.

  ‘Not exactly, Mr Griffiths. After I secreted the first batch of seeds in a suitable location, I saw a commotion amongst the trees that already grew there; and I’m sorry to report that a dinosaur appeared and swallowed the sealed flasks one by one; this was an unforeseen eventuality. I could do nothing to prevent it. I didn’t bother to deposit the second batch of seeds after that; they are still on board.’

  ‘You will return them to Dom Daniel?’

  ‘I will, but I still intend to claim my full fee from him. Dinosaurs weren’t part of the deal. My vessel is unarmed and I wasn’t paid to bag a trophy. I flew out of that prehistoric Eden as fast as helium bags and diesel engines could take me! I saved my skin.’

  ‘A dinosaur! Surely you jest?’