THE FIRST PORTION of the ceremony had ended and the Incomparables’ gala could now get underway.
But first, there would be one final opportunity for trading shares.
The black warriors moved farther aside to clear the approach to the Stock Exchange, around which the passengers from the Lynceus gathered.
Five stockbrokers, played by the associated bankers Hounsfield and Cerjat and their three clerks, sat at five tables set up beneath the building’s colonnade, and within moments they were calling out the rhymed orders that the passengers feverishly placed with them.
The stocks were named after the Incomparables themselves, each represented by one hundred shares that rose or fell in value depending on predictions regarding the players and the outcome of the contest. All transactions were handled in cash, in French or local currency.
For a quarter of an hour the five middlemen ceaselessly shouted execrable lines of verse, which the traders, following the fluctuations of the stock quotes, improvised hastily and with copious amounts of padding.
Finally, Hounsfield and Cerjat signaled the close of business by getting up from the table and walking down the stairs, trailed by their three clerks; they joined, as did I, the players crowding back into their former places, their backs to the prison.
The dark warriors again lined up in their original order, though at Rao’s command they avoided the immediate vicinity of the Stock Exchange to allow free passage.
The gala performance began.
First the four Boucharessas brothers made their appearance, each wearing the same acrobatic costume, which consisted of a pink leotard and black velvet trunks.
The two eldest, Hector and Tommy, lithe and vigorous adolescents, each carried in a solid tambourine six dark-colored rubber balls. They walked in opposite directions and soon turned to face each other, stopping at two very distant points.
Suddenly, at a softly called signal, Hector, who was standing near our group, vigorously launched his six balls one by one from his tambourine.
Meanwhile, Tommy, standing at the foot of the altar, successively projected from the musical disk in his left hand all his rubber projectiles, which crossed paths with his brother’s.
This first feat accomplished, each juggler began bouncing individual balls back to his opposite number, effecting a constant exchange that now continued without interruption. The tambourines vibrated in unison, and the twelve projectiles formed a kind of elongated arc in perpetual motion.
Thanks to the perfect synchronicity of their movements, combined with a marked physical resemblance, the two brothers (one of whom was left-handed) gave the illusion of a single person reflected in a mirror. For several minutes the tour de force went on with mathematical precision. Finally, at a new signal, each player caught half the projectiles in the hollow of his upturned tambourine, abruptly ending the to and fro.
Immediately, Marius Boucharessas, a bright-looking ten-year-old, ran forward while his two older brothers cleared the area.
The child carried in his arms, on his shoulders, and even on top of his head a collection of young cats, each wearing a red or green ribbon around its neck.
With the edge of his heel, he drew two lines in the sand about forty to sixty feet apart, parallel to the side occupied by the Stock Exchange. The cats, jumping spontaneously to the ground, posted themselves in two equal camps behind these conventional boundaries and lined up facing each other, all the green ribbons on one side and all the red on the other.
At a sign from Marius, the graceful felines began a frolicsome game of Prisoner’s Base.
To begin, one of the greens ran up to the red camp and three times, with the tips of its barely unsheathed claws, tapped the paw that one of its adversaries extended; at the last tap it swiftly ran away, chased close behind by the red, which tried to catch it.
At that moment, another green ran after the pursuer, which, forced to turn back, was soon aided by one of its partners; the latter lit upon the second green, which was forced to flee in turn.
The same maneuver was repeated several times, until the moment when a red, managing to tag a green with its paw, let out a victorious meow.
The match halted, and the green prisoner, entering enemy territory, took three steps toward its camp, then stood stock still. The cat that had earned the honor of the capture went to the greens’ camp and began anew, by sharply rapping three times on a tendered paw, freely offered.
At that point, the alternating pursuits resumed with gusto, culminating in the capture of a red, which obediently stopped dead before the enemy camp.
Fast-paced and captivating, the game went on without any infractions of the rules. The prisoners, in two symmetrical and lengthening rows, sometimes saw their number decrease when a player’s skillful tag was able to deliver one of its teammates. Such alert runners, if they reached the opposing camp unhindered, became untouchable during their stay over the line they’d crossed in glory.
Finally, the group of green prisoners grew so large that Marius imperiously decreed the red team the victors.
The cats, without a moment’s delay, went back to the child and scampered up his body, taking the places they’d had on arrival.
As he walked away, Marius was replaced by Bob, the last of the brothers, a ravishing blond boy of four with big blue eyes and long curly hair.
With incomparable mastery and miraculously precocious talent, the charming lad began a series of impressions accompanied by eloquent gestures. The sounds of a train picking up speed, the cries of various domestic animals, the shriek of a blade against a whetstone, the sudden pop of a champagne cork, the gurgling of poured liquid, fanfares of a hunting bugle, a violin solo, and the plaintive notes of a cello formed a staggering repertoire that could give whoever momentarily shut his eyes the illusion of total reality.
The prodigy took his leave to rejoin Marius, Hector, and Tommy.
Soon the four brothers moved aside to let through their sister Stella, a charming adolescent of fourteen, who, dressed as Fortune, appeared balancing on the crest of a narrow wheel that she kept in constant motion beneath her feet.
Rolling smoothly, the girl began turning the narrow rim in every direction, pushing off with the tips of her heels in an uninterrupted series of small hops.
In her hand she held a large, deep, convoluted horn of plenty, from which money made of light, shining paper poured forth like a shower of golden coins and floated slowly to the ground, producing no metallic echo.
The louis, double louis, and large hundred-franc disks formed a sparkling train behind the lovely traveler, who, maintaining a smile on her lips and her place on the wheel, performed miracles of equilibrium and speed.
As with certain magician’s cones that endlessly disgorge an infinite variety of flowers, the reservoir of coins seemed inexhaustible. Stella had only to shake it gently to sow its riches, a thick, uneven bed soon partially crushed by the circumnavigations of the errant wheel.
After many twists and turns, the girl vanished like a sprite, sowing her pseudo-metallic currency to the last.
All eyes now turned to the marksman Balbet, who had just taken from the Zouave’s tomb the cartridge pouches, which he fastened to his flanks, as well as the weapon that was none other than a very old-fashioned Gras rifle.
Walking quickly to the right, the illustrious champion, the focus of everyone’s attention, stopped before our group and carefully selected his spot, peering toward the north of the square.
Opposite him at a great distance, beneath the commemorative palm, stood the square stake topped by a soft-boiled egg.
Further on, the gathered natives craning their necks behind the row of sycamores moved aside at a sign from Rao to clear a wide berth.
Balbet loaded his rifle; then, shouldering it with precision, he aimed carefully and fired.
The bullet, skimming the upper portion of the egg, removed part of the white, leaving the yolk exposed.
Several projectiles fired in succession continued the process; little by little the albumen envelope disappeared to reveal the inner core, which remained intact.
Sometimes, between two reports, Hector Boucharessas ran up to turn the egg, gradually baring every point of its surface to the shots.
One of the sycamores acted as a backstop to halt the bullets that penetrated its trunk, part of which had been planed flat to prevent ricocheting.
The twenty-four cartridges in Balbet’s provision were just enough to complete the experiment.
When the last of the smoke had poured from the weapon’s barrel, Hector took the egg in the palm of his hand to show it around.
Not a trace of white remained on the delicate inner membrane, which, though entirely uncovered, still enveloped the yolk without showing a single scratch.
Then, at Balbet’s request, to show that no excess boiling had eased his task, Hector closed his fist on the yellow orb and let the liquid ooze between his fingers.
The builder La Billaudière-Maisonnial appeared on schedule, carting before him, like a knife-grinder, a strangely complicated crank device.
Halting in the middle of the square, he set the voluminous machine down in the axis of the altar; two wheels and two legs kept it in perfect balance.
The entire mechanism consisted of a kind of millstone activated by a pedal, which could set in motion a whole system of cogs, levers, rods, and springs forming an inextricable tangle of metal; from one side emerged a jointed arm ending in a hand armed with a dueling foil.
After replacing the Gras rifle and cartridge pouches on the Zouave’s tomb, Balbet took from a narrow bench that formed part of the new apparatus a handsome fencing outfit comprising a mask, plastron, glove, and foil.
At once, La Billaudière-Maisonnial, facing us, sat on the now empty bench and, his body hidden from sight by the astounding mechanism rising before him, rested his foot on the long pedal that turned the millstone.
Balbet, protected by his mask, glove, and plastron, energetically traced a straight line in the ground with the tip of his foil. Then, his left sole leaning on the fixed stroke, he elegantly took his guard before the articulated arm that emerged from the left, plainly standing out against the white background of the altar.
The two swords crossed, and La Billaudière-Maisonnial, with a movement of his foot, set the millstone turning at a certain speed.
The mechanical arm, after several expert and rapid feints, suddenly straightened and landed a direct hit on Balbet, who despite his widely celebrated agility had not managed to parry this infallible and marvelous thrust.
The artificial elbow had bent back, but the millstone kept turning, and soon a new deceptive evasion, completely different from the first, was followed by an abrupt jab that struck Balbet full in the chest.
The assault continued, thrust following upon thrust. The quarte, the sixte, and the tierce, as well as the prime, the quinte, and the octave, mixing with “disengages,” “doubles,” and “cuts,” formed innumerable, unknown, and complex hits, each ending in an unexpected and lightning-quick thrust that always found its mark.
His left foot glued to the line that prevented his escape, Balbet sought only to parry, attempting to ward off the opposing foil and divert it to the side before it could touch him. But the millstone-driven mechanism was so perfect, the unfamiliar thrusts contained such distracting ruses, that at the last second the fencer’s defensive maneuvers were regularly outwitted.
Now and again, La Billaudière-Maisonnial, with several pulls and pushes of a long toothed rod, completely varied the arrangement of the wheels, thereby creating a new cycle of feints unknown even to himself.
This process, capable of engendering an infinite number of fortuitous results, was not unlike the light taps that one applies to the tube of a kaleidoscope, which give rise, visually, to crystal mosaics with eternally new color combinations.
Balbet finally conceded the contest and stripped off his protective gear, delighted by his defeat, which had afforded him the chance to appreciate a mechanical masterpiece.
Lifting two short handles attached behind the bench he had just abandoned, La Billaudière-Maisonnial slowly departed, wheeling away his astonishing pedal device with great effort.
After his departure, a black boy of twelve suddenly rushed forward with a mischievous grin, capering as he went.
This was Rhejed, one of the emperor’s young sons.
He held under his left arm a kind of red-furred rodent that swiveled its thin, pointed ears in every direction.
In his right hand, the boy carried a light door painted white, which seemed to have been taken from a small armoire.
Setting this thin partition on the ground, Rhejed gripped the visible handle of a crudely made stylus slid vertically into his red loincloth.
Without missing a beat, he killed the rodent with a swift jab of the narrow blade, which sank into the furry neck and remained planted there.
The child grabbed the hind paws of the still-warm cadaver and placed it above the door.
Soon a sticky drool began flowing from its gaping mouth.
This phenomenon seemed to have been anticipated by Rhejed, who after a moment turned the door over and held it at a slant slightly above the ground.
The viscous flow, running down this second side of the partition, soon formed a circular layer of a certain width.
Finally, once the animal source had run dry, Rhejed laid the rodent at the very center of the fresh pool. Then he lifted the door upright without worrying about the cadaver, which remained stuck in place, held fast by the strange glue.
With a crisp movement, Rhejed loosened his loincloth and glued its end to the first side of the door, which was less coated than the second.
The red cloth adhered easily to the slobbery varnish, which it covered completely.
The door, again laid flat, hid part of his long wrap, leaving visible only the glued rodent.
Rhejed, spinning on his axis to unravel his loincloth, took several steps away and froze in an expectant posture.
For some time a peculiar odor, emanating from the flowing drool, had spread with remarkable pungency over Trophy Square.
Without appearing the least surprised by the potency of these effluvia, Rhejed raised his eyes skyward as if awaiting the appearance of an invited guest.
Several minutes passed in silence.
Suddenly Rhejed let out a cry of triumph, pointing south to a huge bird of prey drifting high above and approaching rapidly.
To the child’s intense joy, the shiny black-plumed fowl swooped down upon the door, planting two tall, thin claws next to the rodent.
Above the hooked beak, its two quivering, nostril-like openings seemed to be endowed with a powerful sense of smell.
The revelatory odor had no doubt spread all the way to the bird’s lair, and, first enticed and then guided by its keen olfactory organ, it had unfalteringly located the prey offered up to its voracity.
At the first greedy jab of its beak into the cadaver, Rhejed emitted a piercing shriek, waving his arms in wide, fierce movements.
Thus startled, the bird, unfolding its giant wings, again took flight.
But its claws, caught in the tenacious glue, took the door as well, lifting it horizontally in the air and with it the red cloth fused to its lower side.
Rhejed in turn left the ground, swinging at the end of his loincloth, much of which was still wrapped around his hips.
Despite this burden, the robust raptor soared quickly, egged on by the boy’s shouts, his peals of laughter betraying his wild jubilation.
At the moment of liftoff Talou had rushed toward his son, an expression of violent terror on his face.
Arriving too late, the unhappy father could only follow with horrified eyes the swaying body of the mischievous boy, who flew ever higher without any fear of danger.
A profound stupor petrified those present, who anxiously awaited the outcome of this terrible incident.
Rhejed’s preparations, the way he’d ensured that the area around the inert rodent was heavily coated with glue, proved the premeditation behind this aerial excursion, of which no one had had an inkling.
Meanwhile, the huge raptor, whose wingtips alone showed beyond the door, rose ever higher toward the upper reaches.
Growing smaller by the second, Rhejed swung furiously at the end of his loincloth; this increased tenfold his chances for a lethal fall, already made so great by the tenuousness of the bond joining the door to the red cloth and the two hidden claws.
Finally, no doubt tired by this unusual ballast, the bird began gliding closer to earth.
The descent soon accelerated, and Talou, filled with hope, stretched out his arms as if to draw the child toward him.
The nearly exhausted raptor plunged earthward with terrifying speed.
A few yards from the ground, Rhejed, ripping his loincloth, fell gracefully to his feet, while the unburdened fowl fled toward the south, still hauling the door garnished with a scrap of red cloth.
Too relieved to think about the scolding he deserved, Talou had rushed to his son, whom he hugged lengthily and in transports of joy.
When the emotion had died down, the chemist Bex made his entrance, pushing an immense glass cage set on top of a mahogany platform furnished with four identical low wheels.
The care lavished on the manufacture of the simple yet luxurious vehicle proved the value of its fragile cargo, which it fitted precisely.
The rolling mechanism was perfectly smooth, thanks to thick tires lining the silent wheels, whose fine metal spokes seemed newly plated.
From the back extended two elegantly curved copper handles, attached at their upper ends by a mahogany grip that Bex pushed with both hands.
The whole thing looked like a more elegant version of those robust carts that ferry trunks and packages over train station platforms.
Bex stopped in the middle of the square, leaving everyone time to examine the apparatus.
The glass cage enclosed an immense musical instrument comprising brass horns, strings, circular bows, mechanical keyboards of every kind, and an extensive percussion section.
Against the cage, at the front of the platform, a large space was reserved for two huge cylinders, one red and one white; these communicated with the atmosphere sealed inside the transparent walls through a metal tube.
The fragile stem of an exceedingly tall thermometer, on which each degree was divided into tenths, rose from the cage, into which only its narrow reservoir dipped, filled with a sparkling purple liquid. No mounting held the thin diaphanous tube, placed a few centimeters from the edge that the two cylinders lightly touched.
With all eyes fixed on the curious machine, Bex offered a series of precise, lucid, and informed explanations.
We learned that the instrument before us would soon function thanks to an electric motor hidden in its sides.
Also powered by electricity, the cylinders pursued their two contrary objectives: the red one contained an infinitely powerful heat source, while the white constantly produced an intense cold capable of liquefying any gas.
It happened that the various components of the automated orchestra were made of bexium, a new metal that Bex had chemically endowed with phenomenal thermal sensitivity. Indeed, the entire musical apparatus was intended solely to highlight, in the most striking way possible, the properties of the strange substance that the able inventor had discovered.
A block of bexium subjected to various temperatures changed volume in proportions that could be quantified from one to ten.
The apparatus’s entire mechanism was based on this single fact.
At the top of each cylinder, a smoothly turning knob regulated the opening of an inner spigot that communicated via the metal conduit with the glass cage; Bex could thus change the temperature of the interior atmosphere at will. As a result of these constant disturbances, the fragments of bexium, powerfully depressing certain springs, alternately activated or deactivated a given keyboard or group of pistons, which were moved at the correct moment by ordinary notched disks.
Despite these fluctuations in temperature, the strings invariably remained in tune, thanks to a certain preparation Bex had created to render them especially stiff.
The crystal used for the cage walls was at once marvelously thin and impenetrably resistant, and consequently the sound was scarcely muffled by this delicate, vibrating obstacle.
His demonstration complete, Bex took his place in front of the vehicle, eyes fixed on the thermometric column and each hand poised respectively above the two cylinders.
Turning the red knob first, he blasted a strong current of heat into the cage, then abruptly stopped the air jet when he saw the violet liquid reach the desired marking after a rapid climb.
With a quick movement, as if repairing a venial oversight, he pressed on a mobile pedal, much like the running board of a carriage, that had been concealed between the two cylinders, and that, when extended, reached to the ground.
Leaning his sole on this footrest with its supple spring, he activated the electric motor buried within the instrument, certain elements of which then set into motion.
First a slow, tenderly plaintive cantilena rose, accompanied by calm, regular arpeggios.
A wheel, resembling a miniature millstone, scraped like an endless bow against a long, cleanly resonant string stretched taut above a soundboard. On this string, automatically activated hammers fell like virtuoso’s fingers, then lifted slightly, producing every note in the scale without a single gap.
By modifying its speed, the wheel produced a whole gamut of tonalities, and the resulting timbre sounded exactly like a violin melody.
Standing next to one of the crystal walls was a harp, each of its strings held by a slender wooden hook that plucked it, then curved back to regain its initial position; the hooks were attached at right angles to the tops of movable stems, whose supple and delicate motions produced languorous arpeggios.
As the chemist had predicted, the transparent envelope barely muffled the vibrations, whose penetrating resonance spread with charm and vigor.
Not waiting for this song without words to finish, Bex stopped the motor by releasing the pedal. Then, turning the red knob, he raised the internal temperature still further, keeping an eye on the thermometer. After a few seconds, he closed the heat tap and again pressed the pedal beneath his foot.
Immediately, a second wheel-bow, fatter than the first and rubbing a thicker string, gave off mellow and seductive cello sounds. At the same time, a mechanical keyboard, its keys dipping by themselves, began playing a rich, difficult accompaniment with perilously rapid passages.
After this sampling of a double sonata, Bex performed a new maneuver, this time raising the purple liquid a mere tenth of a degree.
The pseudo-violin joined the piano and cello to give the adagio the nuance of a classical trio.
Soon an additional section, playing in similar fashion, transformed the slow, serious piece almost into a lively scherzo, while maintaining the same combination of instruments.
Mechanically activating his pedal, Bex then turned the white knob, which lowered the violet column to around the zero mark midway up the glass tube.
A bright fanfare obediently burst forth from a cluster of horns of varying circumference, crowded into a compact ensemble. The entire brass family was represented in this particular corner, from the weighty bass to the pert, strident cornet. Reaching different subdivisions in the portion of the thermometer located below the glass, the white knob, moved several times, successively provoked a military march, a cornet solo, a waltz, a polka, and blaring clarion calls.
Suddenly, opening the cold tap full throttle, Bex rapidly obtained a frigid temperature drop, whose effects could be felt by the nearest spectators through the diaphanous partitions. All eyes turned to a gramophone with a large horn, which emitted a rich and powerful baritone voice. A huge box, perforated with air holes and placed beneath the device, apparently contained a series of records that caused the membrane to vibrate phonographically by means of a special wire; imperceptible fluctuations, carefully regulated by the chemist in the hyperborean atmosphere, offered us a host of recitativos and romances, sung by male or female voices in a wide range of timbres and registers. As a secondary function, the harp and keyboard took turns accompanying the sometimes lighthearted, sometimes tragic melodies in the seemingly inexhaustible repertoire.
Wishing to underscore the astounding flexibility of his extraordinary metal, not a fragment of which could be seen, Bex spun the red knob and waited a few seconds.
In no time the glacier changed into a furnace, and the thermometer shot up to its highest point. A group of flutes and fifes immediately punctuated a rousing march over sharp, regular drumbeats. Here again, different oscillations in temperature produced unexpected results. Several fife solos, discreetly supported by the brass fanfare, were followed by a graceful duet, based on the echo principle, that presented each scale twice in a row, performed first by a flute and then by a fluid soprano emanating from the phonograph.
Swelling anew, the purple liquid rose to the top of the tube, which seemed ready to burst. Several people stood back, discomfited by the torrid heat from the nearby cage, in which three hunting horns, set near the harp, lustily blew a deafening call. Minuscule dips in temperature then provided a sampling of the primary cynegetic fanfares, the last of which was a spirited hallali.
Having run through the main workings of his orchestra, Bex offered to take requests, and activate again any of the groups of instruments we’d already heard.
One by one, each of us expressed a wish that the chemist instantly gratified, with nothing more than his knobs. Demonstrating a second time and in random order his many polyphonic combinations, he slightly altered the character of the works by coquettishly introducing imperceptible thermal differences.
For his finale, Bex reached a special group of temperature markings, traced in red on the tube. Now practically every one of the instrument’s components worked in concert, executing a grand, majestic symphony into which joined a choir clearly nuanced by the gramophone. The percussion, composed of a bass drum with cymbals, the drum played earlier, and several additional bells of various pitches, enlivened the piece with its plain, steady rhythm. The orchestral repertoire was infinitely rich, as Bex presented a panoply of dances, medleys, overtures, and variations, finishing with a furious gallopade that strained the bass drum to full capacity. He then lifted the pedal and again took his place at the rear of the vehicle, pushing it before him like a child’s wagon.
As he turned to leave, everyone began talking excitedly about bexium and the marvelous results obtained with this astounding metal, whose stupefying qualities the instrument had just demonstrated so conclusively.
Bex, who had briefly vanished behind the Stock Exchange, soon returned, holding upright in both hands what looked like a giant button stick,1 three feet wide and twice as high, made of a dull gray metal that suggested tarnished silver.
A narrow longitudinal slit like a buttonhole opened in the middle of the giant slab, except that the circular opening which would allow the buttons through was placed midway up the slit and not at its end.
With a glance, the chemist, keeping his distance, made sure he had our attention; he then designated ten large buttons aligned vertically one against the other near the bottom of the slit, naming the substance from which each was composed.
The whole thing formed a shiny, multicolored line giving off the most varied reflections.
At the top, the first button, of smooth, tawny gold, offered a sparkling surface. Below it, the second, of pure silver, barely stood out from the similarly colored background of the button stick. The third, made of copper, fourth, of platinum, fifth, of pewter, and sixth, of nickel, were all of the same size and without ornamentation. The next four were made of various precious stones, delicately attached; one was composed solely of diamonds, the other of rubies, the third of sapphires, and the last of gleaming emeralds.
Bex spun the board around to show us its other side.
At the bottom hung a piece of blue cloth to which all the buttons were sewn.
Ten very thin strips of gray metal, attached to the fabric, lay one above the other along the slit, and were of exactly the same width. They occupied, on this side of the board, the places corresponding to each button, whose diameter was equal to their height. Ten lengths of metal thread, also gray, which anchored the precious disks solidly to the board, formed at the very center of each narrow rectangular strip a jumble of criss-crosses ending in a fat knot formed by the expert fingers of some able seamstress.
Bex dug the slightly sharpened base of the button stick into the sand; planted vertically against the Stock Exchange, it showed the back side of the buttons to the Incomparables’ stage.
After stepping out of sight for a moment, he reappeared carrying under each arm ten long and cumbersome cylinders, made of the same gray metal already amply on display on the button stick.
He crossed the length of the esplanade and set down his heavy load before the red theater.
Each cylinder, a tight metal cap over one end, looked like a kind of huge pencil fitted with an ordinary lead protector.
Bex, piling his entire stock on the ground, composed an ingeniously regular geometric figure.
Four of the monstrous pencils, lying side-by-side flat on the sand, provided the base of the structure. A second row, set over the first, comprised three pencils laid in the shallow trenches formed by the rounded shape of their predecessors. The next, narrower level counted two pencils, themselves topped by the tenth and last, placed alone at the summit of the heap with its triangular façade.
Bex had first secured the whole thing with two heavy stones drawn from his pockets.
It was by following a scrupulously determined order and selection that the chemist had stacked his cylinders, taking care to identify each with a special marking engraved somewhere on their circumference.
The metal caps all aimed their tips at the distant button stick, which acted as a target to the ten giant pencils that were trained on it like cannon barrels.
Before pursuing the experiment, Bex removed his cufflinks, shaped like four golden olives; then, taking from his pockets his watch, money clip, and keys, he handed the lot to Balbet, who promised to look after the glittering deposit.
Back at his post, leaning over the pile of cylinders, Bex firmly gripped a large ring fastened to the tip of the highest lead protector.
The chemist needed only the slight traction of a few steps backward to slip off the metal cap, which fell like a pendulum against his legs.
Now uncovered, the formerly invisible portion of the uppermost cylinder became the focus of our attention. The silvery barrel, indeed looking like an actual and perfectly sharpened pencil, ended in a cone, from which emerged a fat, smooth, and rounded amber-colored lead.
Bex, repeating this same maneuver, successively uncapped the ten cylinders, of which all now showed the same yellowish and diaphanous lead sticking out of their regularly narrowed extremity.
This process finished, the chemist again crossed the esplanade, carrying under his arms the ten sheaths, which he dropped near the button stick.
An explanation was in order, and Bex took the floor to reveal the point of these various exercises.
The amber-colored leads enclosed in the giant pencils were made of a highly complex substance, which Bex had prepared and baptized magnetine.
Despite accumulated obstacles, magnetine was attracted from a distance by a specific metal or precious stone.
Owing to certain differences in composition, the ten leads before our eyes corresponded, in terms of attraction, to the ten buttons solidly held in the slots of the button stick.
To make possible and practicable the manipulation of the recently invented magnetine, it had become indispensable to discover an insulating compound. After extensive research, Bex had obtained stanchium, a dull gray metal produced through laborious efforts.
A thin sheet of stanchium, blocking the emanations from the magnetine, completely nullified its power of attraction, which not even the densest materials could themselves manage to dampen.
The pencils and lead-protectors were all made of stanchium, as were the button stick and the ten rectangular strips rising in tiers alongside the slit. The thread used to sew the buttons to the sheet was composed of the same metal, softened and braided.
By successively guiding the now-hidden disks into the circular opening in the slit, Bex, pushing against the button stick, would provoke the sudden displacement of the cylinders, each of which would rush forcefully toward the object placed in the vicinity of its amber-colored lead.
This last revelation caused the crowd to recoil in panic.
Indeed, many injuries were to be feared from the pencils, which, drawn by our jewelry, watches, coins, keys, or gold teeth, might suddenly come flying right at us.
The visible extremity of each lead, in short, eluded the protective power of the stanchium and fully justified these healthy apprehensions.
In a calm voice, Bex hastened to reassure his audience. To trigger the phenomenon of irresistible magnetism, a substance had to cause a strong reaction in the amber lead, which ran the entire length of each cylinder. The metals or precious stones placed in the axis of the bizarre stack were the only ones capable of such an effect. The button stick, by design, was wide enough to shield the entire threatened area; without it, the attraction would have been strong enough to pull in ships crossing the Atlantic, even as far away as the shores of America—if by some chance the earth’s curvature didn’t prevent this. As the operator, Bex would be very much exposed, and thus had apparently removed in advance any suspect element, including his vest and trouser buckles; his shirt and pants buttons were all made of bone, and a supple silk belt, encircling his waist, replaced his suspenders with their inevitable metal clips. He had definitively immunized himself at the final moment by entrusting Balbet with his most precious objects. By happy circumstance, his pure, excellent teeth were free of any foreign additions.
Just as the chemist was finishing his explanations, an unexpected phenomenon was signaled by a murmur from the crowd, which had slowly approached.
Everyone pointed in astonishment to the gold coins that had been scattered there by Stella Boucharessas.
For some time, the louis, double louis, and hundred-franc pieces had been trembling gently on the ground—to no one’s surprise, as their light movement might have been caused by some capricious breeze.
In reality, the imponderable amount of currency was under the influence of the top cylinder and its powerful force; already several coins had flown straight toward its amber lead and attached themselves solidly. Others followed suit, sometimes round and intact, sometimes having been creased and trampled underfoot.
Soon the ground was completely bare along a strictly regular stripe, bordered on either side by the remainder of coinage located outside the zone of attraction.
The lead was now hidden beneath a veritable buffer of gilded paper, covered with dates and effigies.
Several infinitesimal atoms of real gold must have entered into the composition of those tinsel riches.
Indeed, by its position, the overlayered lead corresponded, without any doubt, to the gold button meant to fill the opening at the center of the button stick. Its very specific power could thus not have been exerted on an imitation that was completely devoid of auriferous elements.
The slowness of the coins, their initial hesitation, had been caused solely by an insufficiency of pure gold in their composition.
Paying little heed to the incident, which in no way disturbed his plans, Bex grasped the width of blue drapery by its upper end, pulling it smoothly toward the top of the button stick.
The easy and regular slide required almost no effort.
The cloth, climbing up the slit, gradually hid the circular opening, which, invisible but easily divined, soon framed the first strip of stanchium.
At that point, Bex, with his knees and left hand, had to restrain the button stick, which was being pulled mightily toward the group of cylinders.
Indeed, behind the cloth, the gold button corresponding to the first strip was now encircled by the round eyelet. Two fragments of its disk, deprived of their stanchium armor, now had no obstacle between them and the amber leads aimed their way.
Bex’s resistance proved stronger than the first cylinder, which suddenly shot forward and flew like a rocket across the esplanade, slamming its tip into the button stick next to the thin protective strip.
Still leaning in mightily, the chemist had been careful to shift his body to the right, staying out of the path the monstrous pencil would take.
The force of the strike nearly toppled the button stick, but, in Bex’s firm grip, it soon regained its balance.
Now immobile, the pencil hung in a gentle slope from its unsharpened end, dipping toward the ground, to the amber tip solidly adhered to the gold button despite the blue cloth between them.
The paper coins had in no way impeded the powerful attraction of the pure metal; flattened by the impact, they still decorated the lead with their artificial sparkle.
Through the cloth, Bex gently manipulated the gold button, which he labored to lift into the portion of the vertical slot above the eyelet.
The amber lead held fast, making the operation difficult.
The chemist persisted, for lack of a more practical method. Any attempt to pry the pencil loose would have proven fruitless. Only the slow, gradual interposition of a stanchium barrier could ultimately overcome the extraordinary attachment of the two bodies.
A series of laborious efforts eventually yielded the desired result.
At the very top of the slit, the gold button, still invisible, was once more completely sheltered behind the two panels of the button stick, rejoined at that spot by its faithful and rigid strip.
Bex stood the immense pencil upright.
With the sharp edge of a lead protector, he tried to scrape bare the amber tip that was still coated in gilded paper.
The thin, rounded blade, closely shaving the yellow surface, soon bested the light paper money, whose highly diluted alloy gave only feeble resistance.
When all the coins had drifted haphazardly to the ground, Bex fit the lead protector back onto the pencil, which he could now lay aside without fear of where it might point.
Then, returning to the button stick, he gently grasped the width of cloth and lifted it farther upward.
This second experiment, identical to the first, produced the flight of a second pencil, the lead of which rammed violently into the invisible silver button that had slipped into the gap.
After being liberated through the same painstaking process he’d previously employed, the pencil, now capped with a lead protector, was promptly set aside.
In its turn, the copper button, behind the blue cloth, attracted a third cylinder, which, briskly covered with stanchium, went to join the first and second.
The two top levels were now missing from the triangular façade initially formed by the stack of pencils.
Bex continued his unchanging maneuver. One by one, the buttons slid into the opening and drew the amber leads despite the distance; after this, Bex glided them into the upper part of the slot.
The pencils, having played their parts, were immediately capped and lined up on the ground one by one.
The last four disks, sumptuously composed of precious stones, corresponded to the lowest rung of cylinders, which alone remained facing the Incomparables’ Theater.
Their power of attraction was in no way inferior to that of the metals, and the impact of the docile amber leads against them was extraordinarily violent.
The experiment completed, Bex, addressing us once more, told us of the exorbitant offers that certain banking houses, wishing to exploit his discovery, had thrown at him.
And indeed, his collection of cylinders, with their ability to locate ore and gem deposits, could have become the source of limitless wealth. Instead of relying on chance to prospect underground, miners, precisely guided by an instrument that could be easily built, would immediately find the richest veins, with no false starts or wasted efforts.
But famous scientists, motivated by their proverbial disinterest, had long observed a kind of professional tradition that Bex wished to perpetuate.
Therefore rebuffing the proffered millions and even billions, he had wisely contented himself with his giant button stick, which, in tandem with the cylinders, highlighted his discovery to no practical end.
As he spoke, Bex picked up his pencils, all ten of them secured by their lead protectors.
He then disappeared with his burden, preceding Rao, who carried off the promptly uprooted button stick.
After a brief pause, we noticed the Hungarian Skariovszki in his tight-fitting red gypsy jacket, wearing a policeman’s kepi of the same color.
His right sleeve, rolled up to the elbow, revealed a thick coral bracelet coiled six times around his bare forearm.
He carefully watched over three black porters bearing various objects, who halted with him in the middle of the esplanade.
The first Negro carried in his arms a zither and a folding stand.
Skariovszki opened the stand, planting its four feet solidly on the ground. Then, on a narrow hinged frame unfolded horizontally, he rested the zither, which resounded at this gentle impact.
To the left of the instrument, a metal stem attached to the frame of the stand rose vertically after a slight bend, then split at its end like two tines of a fork; to the right, another identical stem formed its companion piece.
The second Negro carried, with no great effort, a long, transparent receptacle that Skariovszki set like a bridge above the zither, fitting its two ends onto the metal forks.
The shape of the new object was ideally suited to this means of installation. Built like a trough, it was composed of four slabs of mica. Two main slabs, identically rectangular, formed a sharp-edged base by joining their two planes at an angle. In addition, two triangular pieces, facing each other and adhering to the narrow ends of the rectangles, completed the diaphanous apparatus, which looked like a yawning, oversized change purse. A gap the width of a pea ran along the entire bottom edge of the translucent trough.
The third Negro had just set down a large earthenware vessel brimming with clear water, the weight of which Skariovszki asked one of us to gauge.
La Billaudière-Maisonnial, skimming off a tiny portion in the hollow of his hand, showed the keenest surprise and exclaimed that the strange liquid felt heavy as mercury.
During this time, Skariovszki lifted his right forearm to his face, uttering several coaxing words with great tenderness.
We then saw the coral bracelet, which was none other than a giant earthworm as thick as the Hungarian’s index finger, uncoil its two top rings and stretch slowly toward him.
La Billaudière-Maisonnial, straightening up again, now had to lend himself to another demonstration. At the gypsy’s request, he received the worm, which crawled over his open hand; his wrist immediately dropped beneath the sudden weight of the intruder, which apparently was heavy as solid lead.
Skariovszki removed the worm, still coiled around his arm, and placed it on the lip of the mica trough.
The annelid crawled into the empty receptacle, pulling with it the rest of its body, which gradually slid from around the gypsy’s flesh.
Soon the animal completely blocked the gap in the bottom edge, its horizontally stretched body supported by the two narrow inner ledges formed by the rectangular plates.
With great effort, the Hungarian hoisted the weighty vessel, the entire contents of which he poured into the trough, which was soon full to the brim.
Then, placing a knee on the ground and tilting his head to one side, he set the empty vessel beneath the zither, at a precisely determined point verified with a glance up and down the back of the instrument.
This last task accomplished, Skariovszki, standing nimbly upright, shoved his hands in his pockets, as if to limit himself from here on to a spectator’s role.
The worm, left to its own devices, suddenly raised, then immediately let drop, a short segment of its body.
Having had time to slip into the gap, a drop of liquid fell heavily onto one of the zither strings, which on impact emitted a pure and ringing low C.
Farther on, another twitch in the obstructing body let through a second drop, which this time struck a bright E. A G, then a high C, attacked in the same way, completed the perfect chord that the worm sounded again over an entire octave.
After the third and final C, the seven consonant notes, struck at the same time, provided a kind of conclusion to this trial prelude.
Thus warmed up, the worm launched into a slow Hungarian melody, tender and languorously sweet.
Each drop of liquid, released by an intentional spasm of its body, struck precisely the right string, which then split it into two equal globules.
A felt strip, glued into place on the wood of the zither, cushioned the fall of the heavy fluid, which otherwise would have produced a bothersome dripping noise.
The liquid, which accumulated in round puddles, penetrated inside the instrument via two circular openings drilled in the soundboard. Each of the two expected overspills rolled silently down a thin inner layer of felt specifically designed to absorb it.
A fine, limpid stream, emerging from some hidden egress, soon formed beneath the zither and ended precisely at the mouth of the earthenware vessel that Skariovszki had carefully set in place. The fluid, following the slope of the narrow and equally felt-lined channel, flowed noiselessly to the bottom of the enormous basin, which prevented any of it from inundating the grounds.
The worm continued its musical contortions, sometimes striking two notes at once, much like professional zither players who hold a hammer in each hand.
Several melodies, plaintive or lighthearted, succeeded the initial cantilena without a pause.
Then, moving beyond the scope of the instrument’s habitual repertoire, the annelid launched into the polyphonic execution of a strangely danceable waltz.
Accompaniment and melody vibrated in harmony on the zither, which normally was limited to the production of a mere two simultaneous sounds.
To give some depth to the main theme, the worm raised itself a bit higher, thereby releasing a larger quantity of liquid onto the violently impacted strings.
The slightly hesitant rhythm discretely lent the whole the unique character typical of gypsy ensembles.
After the waltz, a panoply of dances gradually emptied the see-through trough.
Below, the vessel had refilled owing to the continuous flow that had now run dry. Skariovszki lifted it and for a second time decanted its contents into the lightweight receptacle before returning it to its proper place on the ground.
The worm, now completely resupplied, began playing a czardas punctuated by wild and abrupt shifts in tonality. Sometimes, huge tremors of its long reddish body produced clashing fortissimos; at others, imperceptible undulations, which let through only fine droplets, lowered the now tranquil zither to a bare murmur.
There was nothing mechanical about this performance, which radiated fire and conviction. The worm seemed to be like any virtuoso, who, following his spontaneous inspiration, ran through a series of variations, interpreting an ambiguous and delicate passage in new and controversial ways.
A long medley of light opera arias following the czardas again depleted the provision of liquid. Once more Skariovszki performed the rapid decanting while announcing the final piece.
This time, the worm energetically attacked a captivating Hungarian rhapsody, each measure of which seemed to bristle with the most harrowing difficulties.
The acts of agility followed one another seamlessly, spangled with trills and chromatic scales.
Soon, through a series of enormous jerks, the worm accentuated a certain canto of ample texture, each written note of which must have been part of a thick cluster. This theme, which formed the base, was embroidered with numerous light motifs produced by slight twitches of the supple body.
The animal was becoming intoxicated with music. Far from exhibiting the slightest weariness, it grew more animated with every harmonic wave it unleashed so relentlessly.
Its emotion was communicated to the audience, which was strangely moved by the expressive timbre of certain hauntingly plaintive sounds and by the incredible speed of the endless clusters of demisemiquavers.
A frenetic presto brought the annelid’s enthusiastic delirium to a climax, and for several minutes it abandoned itself unreservedly to its chaotic gymnastics.
At the end, it prolonged the perfect cadence by a kind of expanding improvisation, reprising the final chords until the last of the percussive liquid had been entirely depleted.
Skariovszki extended his bare arm, around which the worm coiled itself anew after having scaled the mica slope.
The Negroes came to remove the various objects, including the earthenware vessel that was again as full as when it arrived.
Led by the Hungarian, they disappeared behind the Stock Exchange in single file.