The Extraordinary Adventures of a Russian Scientist Across the Solar System (Vol. 1)

by Georges Le Faure; Henri de Graffigny

  Flammermont looked at his friend in frank alarm. Him, the inventor of the aeroplane! What was that about? He understood immediately, though, from the tender and affectionate gaze that Ossipoff directed at him, that Fricoulet simply wanted to raise him up a peg or two in his future father-in-law’s estimation.

  “Ah, my dear Gontran,” the old man said, eventually, “I can’t congratulate you enough on having succeeded in bringing this construction to fruition. For many years, without being able to succeed, inventors have been desperately trying to develop devices totally different in kind from those unstable floating vessels called aerostatic balloons, capable of flying by mechanical means.”

  “It’s in France that the matter has been examined most exhaustively,” Gontran declared, with an assurance that made Fricoulet smile. “Going back as far as 1863, a whole host of projects has been mounted by Nadar, La Landelle, Ponton d’Amécourt, Bright, Pénaud, and so on.”31

  Selena heard to the young man speak, amazed by all this science of which the Comte de Flammermont, as a clever fellow, had made provision. He had foreseen that the aeroplane would become an object of discussion, and had wanted to be able to play his part.

  “The list of those who’ve made efforts in this direction is certainly long,” said Fricoulet, “but who among them has succeeded in proving anything? Who among them has ever shown a heavier-than-air apparatus”—he emphasized these words—“taking off and steering through the air.”

  Ossipoff looked the young man up and down. “If you will permit,” he said, “one of my compatriots, named Philips,32 imagined a helical propeller with four horizontal branches fixed to a spherical hub, which was nothing more than a little aeolipile filled with water. When the shell was put on the fire, the water that it contained heated up and was transformed into vapor, which escaped through little holes bored at a convenient place in the branches of the propeller. By means of the reaction the escaping vapor produced, the hub and its wings turned, much as a hydraulic turnpike does; the propeller lifted itself up into the air by means of a screw effect, and climbed rapidly. I saw a trial in Varsovia in 1845.”

  Gontran chuckled disdainfully. “But could that apparatus work on a large scale?” he asked. “I recall seeing Ponton d’Amécourt’s aluminum steam-helicopter in a museum. I’ve also read a description of a very similar mechanism designed by the Italian Forlanini33—but that sort of thing hasn’t made much headway.”

  In the face of Gontran’s aplomb, Fricoulet had difficulty maintaining a serious expression; he knew what his friend’s scientific knowledge amounted to better than anyone.

  “That’s precisely why, my dear son,” the old scientist retorted, “I find the result you’ve obtained marvelous…if you had only had to copy it, that would have been quite simple.”

  “Gontran invented—which was easier,” said Fricoulet.

  “The most difficult thing,” Osipoff continued, “was to obtain a mechanism of surprising lightness…”

  “Why is that?” asked Fricoulet, impassively.

  Ossipoff did not reply at first, but leaned toward his daughter’s ear. “This little gentleman,” he said, “is beginning to annoy me with his mania for speaking when no one is speaking to him…just to show off the fact that he knows something.” The old man clicked his tongue and frowned; with his mouth curled sarcastically, he said in a curt tone: “You know, I suppose that the intensity of gravity at the surface of our world causes bodies to fall at a velocity of 4.9 meters in the first second;34 thus, it is necessary to counter that force. Now, it has been established that a one horsepower steam engine, which can lift a weight of 75 kilograms to a height of one meter, applied to an ascensional helix, only renders it capable of lifting a weight of 15 kilograms.”

  “Why tell me that?”

  “Why? Why?” grumbled Ossipoff. “You don’t seem to have any other words in your mouth. Well, to get to this, of course: to make you recognize that, to make aerial navigation possible with apparatus heavier than air, it’s necessary to create power-units weighing no more than 10 kilograms per horsepower of output.”

  “Why?” said Fricoulet, again.

  The old man shrugged his shoulders. “In order that they can lift themselves along with their propellers.” Ossipoff looked at Gontran triumphantly. “Isn’t that rigorously scientific?” he concluded.

  “Which is to say…” The young man said.

  “…That it’s absolutely false,” Fricoulet finished for him, calmly.

  The old man stated and turned his interrogative gaze toward the Comte, who nodded his head in agreement. “Absolutely false.”

  “But Rinfaggy,35 in his book on Aerial Navigation…”

  “…Is entirely mistaken,” the young engineer continued, gravely, “As you will recognize….”

  “Indeed! Let’s see, my dear Gontran, please explain…”

  The Comte de Flammermont was, however, too fearful of compromising himself to respond to the old man’s invitation. He remained silent, thinking it much more prudent to let his friend answer in his stead.

  “Firstly, isn’t it true that the velocity of 4.9 meters per second that bodies in free fall attain is progressively accelerated? How many centimeters does a heavy object fall in the first tenth of a second?”

  Mikhail Ossipoff slapped his forehead. “Only a few centimeters!” he exclaimed. “That’s true…but then…”

  “Then it’s only a matter of combating, each tenth of a second, against a considerably lesser force of gravity…which permit the employment of machines weighing more than ten kilograms per horsepower of output, as you just said, Besides, it’s not the helicopter principle that we’ve applied in the construction of this aeroplane, for it wasn’t sufficient for us to have an ascensional force; we also needed a means of moving through the ambient air.”

  “That’s true,” Ossipoff replied, dryly. Leaning towards Selena, he murmured: “It’s strange how this fellow irritates me; he talks all the time, doubtless repeating parrot-fashion what he’s learned from Gontran.”

  The young woman could scarcely restrain a smile. Designating the Comte de Flammermont with a sideways glance, the old man added: “See what a difference there is between the man who truly understands and the only who has only a smattering of science…the modest silence of the former speaks more eloquently in his favor than all the loquacity of the latter.”

  “By the way, Monsieur Fricoulet,” Selena said, to change the subject, “when my father was hit by a bullet, I saw you throw cannonballs of some kind at your enemies. What was in them? Gunpowder? Dynamite?”

  “Or selenite?” murmured Gontran.

  “Nothing of that sort,” Fricoulet retorted. “They were simple receptacles contained liquefied hydrogen chloride. When they reached the ground, the receptacles burst and the acid, suddenly decompressed, was transformed into a corrosive and asphyxiant gas, so effectively that those of our assailants who were not burned and corroded by the jets of acid were choked and poisoned.”

  What a beautiful thing science is! Gontran thought.

  At that moment the barometer indicated an altitude of 1500 meters above sea-level and Mikhail Ossipoff leaned on the guard-rail gazing pensively at the panorama which fled beneath them with vertiginous rapidity. The Ural Mountains were no more than a mass of shadowy hills and a few sprigs of grass; the human habitations had completely disappeared and the capricious shadows of clouds—vaporous spirals sprinkling the limpid atmosphere beneath the aeroplane’s enormous wings—were racing over the immense fields.

  “A big town!” cried Selena suddenly.

  “It’s Perm,” Fricoulet replied, having consulted his map.

  It was, indeed, the capital of the Perm district, a rather large town situated on the Kama at the confluence of three smaller rivers: the Chusovaya, the Iren and the Barola, about 250 versts from the Ural Mountans. The aeroplane, whose speed was then 32 meters a second—115 kilometers per hour, almost twice the speed of an express train—passed over Perm at
a low altitude. At the sight of it, the inhabitants disappeared into their little houses, releasing cries that reached the aviators’ ears as a confused racket. In an instant, the streets were deserted.

  At 10 p.m., the Albatros passed directly over the town of Vyatka, about 700 kilometers from the Urals. With the aid of a favorable wind the aeroplane had crossed that enormous distance in a little more than five hours. It was making very good progress, but the provision of mineral oil that served the machine as fuel was running out.

  Gontran, who was leaning on the guard-rail chatting to Selena, suddenly felt a hand on his shoulder; it was Fricolet, who drew him aside and said: “We’re out of oil.”

  “Well, that seems to be troubling you,” said the young Comte. “Do we need it, then?”

  The engineer looked at his friend in amazement. “What! Don’t you understand how my aeroplane works?”

  “Vaguely,” Gontran replied, with a smile.

  “Mademoiselle Selena’s lovely eyes are much more interesting, aren’t they?” grumbled Fricoulet. “Know, then, that for lack of oil we’ll fall from an altitude of 1500 meters.”

  Flammermont could not repress a cry, which brought Selena and her father running.

  “What is it?” asked the young woman.

  “It’s…” the young Comte hastened to reply.

  “…That Gontran and I have to get to the nearest place where we can obtain mineral oil. The country’s resources are something of a mystery to us.” Fricoulet, fearing that his friend was about to say something imprudent, had cut him off hurriedly.

  Mikhail Ossipoff immediately said: “Petroleum, of which considerable wells exist in the Caucasus, forms the basis of a very important commerce in Russia, which is very widespread. You’ll find it even in the smallest town in the region we’re crossing.”

  So much the better, thought the engineer—and he decided that the Albatros would make a stop at Popovska, a small town 150 kilometers from Vyatka. Darkness was falling at that very moment, and a landing could be effected without frightening the local inhabitants. They would camp there, and the aeroplane would resume its flight at dawn on the following day.

  That was what they did. The descent took place without hindrance and, while Fricoulet, aided by Selena, put up the tent and prepared a meal, Gontran and Ossipoff went to a neighboring village to fill the on-board reservoir with petroleum. The following morning, at dawn, the Albatros took off again.

  In round numbers the distance between Viatka and St. Petersburg, as the crow flies, is 1000 versts, or 1100 kilometers. It was midday when our travelers passed over the capital of all the Russias; as a precaution, Fricoulet went up to a high altitude in order not to attract the attention of its citizens. Selena and her father, leaning over the guard-rail, strove to pierce the low clouds that veiled the city they might never see again.

  During the long journey that our travelers had made, however, the wind had turned and had been blowing from the north for several hours; it had become distinctly sharp, and made the cordage of the Albatros vibrate as it flew before it like a bird before a storm. Selena, hiding her head in her hands, shivered as she huddled close to her father, frightened by the whistling of the wind and the trembling of the apparatus.

  “How fast are we going?” asked Ossipoff, with imperturbable composure.

  “About 45 meters a second,” Fricoulet replied.

  Gontran opened his eyes wide in alarm. “But that’s 162 kilometers an hour,” he stammered. “Aren’t you afraid…?”

  “I’m only afraid of one thing,” the engineer replied, “and that’s falling. Now, we need that speed to combat the breeze and conserve our stability. There’s only one thing that worries me…”

  As he spoke, he consulted the compass.

  “What?” asked Ossipoff.

  “That I can no longer steer as I’d like to. I have to veer with the wind and tack as much as I can…it’s almost impossible to go against the current.”

  “Go with it, then.”

  “That’s what I’m obliged to do…but it’s drawing us southwards.”

  For several hours the aeroplane followed the line of the Berlin railway in this fashion. It passed successively over Gatchina, Dunaburg and Vilna. Then, at Orzestkitovsky, it left Russian territory and began flying over the former Poland.36

  “We’re getting lower,” the young Comte observed from time to time, dividing his attention between the barometer and Selena.

  “I’m very well aware of that,” Fricoulet retorted, angrily. He had opened the taps as wide as possible, thus imparting to the machine all the speed of which it was capable and, clinging to the rudder-wheel, persisted in trying to steer northwards.

  “Wasn’t the wind on your agenda, then, old chap?” asked Gontran, ironically.

  “The engineer shrugged his shoulders. “Not a wind like this,” he grumbled. “It’s blowing at least 40 meters a second…how can you fight it?” And he stamped his foot on the platform.

  “Oh well! Don’t fight it,” said Gontran.

  “Oh,” murmured Fricolet, his eyes fiery and his lips taut, “to think that man, with all his science, is at the mercy of this impalpable and nameless thing, this blind and brutal force. The wind!”

  A tear of rage glittered on the brim of his eyelid, and for another half-hour, he continued the struggle—but there was no point in bursting the boiler and shattering the propeller; the wind was his master.

  Finally, having consulted the map, he murmured: “I need a reference-point. I need to know where we are, damn it!”

  The Albatros descended to some 50 meters above the ground. Leaning over the guard-rail, the engineer tried to question a peasant who was working the land, but the man fled in terror.

  “Ah” said Ossipoff, suddenly, examining the map. “Isn’t that body of water Lake Balaton?”

  “You’re right,” Fricoulet replied.

  The aeroplane was, indeed, over the shore of Lake Balaton—which is to say, in the middle of Austria-Hungary.

  Almost 13 hours had passed since they had left St. Petersburg, and in that 13 hours they had traveled more than 2000 kilometers, crossing the Niemen, the Vistula, the Danube and doubtless passing over the Carpathian Mountains. In terms of speed, that was good, but not in terms of direction. Alcide Fricoulet had hoped to be further west, but, still dominated by the same current, he was being drawn irresistibly southwards.

  At the first town they encountered, Zalaegerszeg, the engineer renewed his supplies of oil and water. Then, as the north wind appeared to be weakening, he set a course due west, and by morning the Albatros was flying over the town of Gorizia. The vast sheet of the waters of the Adriatic appeared before the travelers’ eyes, gilded by the rays of the rising Sun.

  Selena clapped her hands at the superb spectacle. “How beautiful it is!” she cried, enthusiastically. “And how far south the wind had carried us!”

  A groan replied to her; it was Fricoulet, protesting in his own fashion against the young woman’s joy. “Fortunately,” he went on, “we’ll be able to steer north-west to reach Switzerland.”

  “Is that how we’ll get to France?” asked the young woman, pulling a face.

  The young engineer nodded his head affirmatively.

  “Well, I don’t compliment you on your itinerary,” Selena said. “With its extravagant peaks, Switzerland will oblige us to go up to such a height…”

  “Oh, 4000 or 5000 meters, at the most,” said Gontran, mockingly.

  “You think that’s nothing?” Selena continued. “If you’d asked my advice, I’d have suggested Italy, and I’m sure that my father wouldn’t have been sorry to see its cheerful and fertile plains instead of that horrible all-white landscape, which will remind us of Siberia.”

  “Since that’s your desire, my dear Selena,” Gontran said, “We’ll take the road of scholars…all roads lead to Rome, in any case, and what does it matter from which direction we enter France?”

  “It’s easy for you to talk,”
muttered Fricoulet.

  “Oh, you poor chap,” the Comte replied, in the same tone. “What I say is to save your self-respect as an inventor. The wind’s stronger than you—better to give way to it and feign deference to Selena’s caprice. It’s more gallant for the man and less humiliating for the constructor.”

  Fricolet shrugged his shoulders and, making no reply, gave the rudder-wheel an abrupt turn, which cause the aeroplane to veer south-west. Then, once the appropriate heading had been selected with the aid of the compass, the Albatros lost altitude, causing the inhabitants of the Italian heights to cry out in fear and amazement, and slew on with vertiginous rapidity.

  The panoramas of Venice, Padua, Verona, Brescia and Bergamo unrolled successively before the dazzled eyes of the celestial voyagers. In the vicinity of Bergamo the young engineer modified the Albatros’s course again. In mid-afternoon it passed directly over Turin, heading for the Alps, which they had to cross. For several hours, however, Fricoulet had seemed anxious. His ordinarily cheerful manner was now serious, his lips pursed by the stress of a violent cerebral tension, and his eyes narrowed by concern. His gaze went continually to the meteorological instruments and returned with an indefinable expression to his companions, who were leaning on the guard-rail, absorbed by the magnificent landscape unfolding beneath them.

  Suddenly, as he turned round mechanically, Gontran caught sight of one of these glances. He came straight over to the engineer. “Something’s worrying you, isn’t it?”

  Silently, Fricoulet pointed to the madly swinging compass and the rapidly-falling barometer.

  “Well, are we in danger?” asked the young Comte.

  The engineer shrugged his shoulders. “In this situation we’re always in danger,” he replied. “Look at those clouds heaped up threateningly over the mountains. Observe the mist spreading through the air, and the warm vapor that seems to bed rising from the ground and enveloping us. All that presages a storm, if I’m not mistaken.”

  Gontran’s gaze immediately went to Selena. “What shall we do?” he murmured, in an anguished tone.